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Hello everyone! Thanks for your responses in advance.
My husband and I are looking for a new place to call home and would love some advice. We are both in our early 20's and have lived in the same area for our entire lives (Amherst/Northampton, MA), with the exception of a few-month stint in Boulder, CO (we loved it there, except it was a bit too highly populated for us). We like our current area/hometown, but feel like the community has too much of a college-town vibe (without much else going on) and we are just ready to go out and find our own utopia. College-towns don't bother us in general, but we want our new place to have other things going for it.
About us: I am about to graduate from college and am a massage therapist. My husband makes his living as an artist.
Our perfect place: We want to be inspired by the outdoors. Mountains, lakes, endless hiking trails, the ocean... All good things! Small city size is perfect. We've been thinking of places like Ashville, NC, Olympia, WA, Santa Cruz, CA... The more inexpensive, the better. We would rather be in an area with a lower cost-of-living than our current area. We would also like to be in a warmer area than our current area (at least not any colder). We are really progressive politically, so an earthy-crunchy place is right up our alley. We would love for the general population to be down-to-earth and to also not have that uber-pretentious, educated, liberal vibe.
Austin seems to be the city you're describing, it literally has all of the qualities you just described. However, the population is growing rapidly.
Boulder is more outdoorsy and progressive than Austin..have known both places very well for years and Boulder is smaller so Austin would be too large for OP, but on the plus side Austin is dirt cheap compared to Boulder CO. I would look at Ashville NC, Manitou Springs CO, Taos NM.
Last edited by Scott5280; 03-19-2013 at 03:29 AM..
This request just screams Asheville, NC. Earthy-crunchy, warmer climate, scenic, not too populated (remember those who post Austin/Portland), & inexpensive.
Nacogdoches the oldest town in Texas and has a lot historic sites all around the city and statues of important people like Stephen F.Austin and Sam Houston and alot of others.
The city have side walk everywhere for you to get to these locations of historic sites.Nacogdoches also have alot of clubs and bars with a university named after Stephen f Austin.
The city downtown have art gallaries and is all red brick streets running through downtown.Nacogdoches has alot of walking/hiking/biking trails everywhere in the city and the city has multiple choice of lakes like lake Nacogdoches and lake Naciniche and lake Sam Rayburn for fishing.
Last edited by dee936; 03-19-2013 at 02:38 PM..
Reason: J
Thanks everyone for your posts so far! Asheville is definitely at the top of our list. Anyone who has any insight on Asheville in particular would be wonderful.
creeksitter - Yes, I do have other job skills. But, continuing down my massage therapy path is definitely really important to me! Maybe it would be important to secure a job before moving...
hello all! My fiancee and I are in a similar boat as "looking for utopia" but we presently live in the Temescal district of north Oakland, California, and have been for almost 2 years, having moved from Memphis Tennessee and before that Savannah Georgia. The varied culture in in Oaksterdam is beyond comparison, especially due to the transformation of San Francisco in the last 5 years (i.e. yuppies moving into the city employed by tech companies--driving up the cost of living and jacking up the culture of nontraditional and culturally rich/ open minded individuals/ liberals are then moving to the East Bay--thats Oakland/Berkeley). But the cost of living, the density of population, the lack of space..the distance from our families...these factors are undesirable. Sooooo (haha) onward to the next adventure! We also prefer natural settings, preferably small towns (bicycle friendly would be great, did i mention we dont own a car--by choice--?!?) We have been looking at nashville, Tn. But arent sure thats THE place for us, especially after coming from the Left Coast. Anyone have some input on this? Another factor (moreso for me than for her) is how progressive each potential city may be towards the sticky icky, i.e. the chrondo, i.e. trees. Out here I can smoke on the street in broad daylight, and busybodies just go on about their lives, without the SWAT being called. Its GREAT. I am from Springfield Missouri, where like most of the country, a joint is a FELONY. YIKES. that is NO way to live! haha okie dokey, looking forward to yo' responses!
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