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Hello! My husband and I are dreaming of moving out of our small southern Minnesota town within the next five years. We have two children, ages 8 and 4.
We are musicians, so live music venues and some sort of arts scene is really important to us.
My husband loves outdoor adventures, especially rock climbing (and our 8-year-old daughter is quite amazing at climbing herself, so we'd love to get her out more often while she's young). I love the ocean, so mountains and coastline would be great (neither of which we have here, except lakeshore coastline)!
It gets so cold and dark here in Minnesota. Sunshine but still seasons - especially fall - is high on my list. And, I am an avid gardener - we have started an urban homestead of sorts and I dream of being somewhere with a longer growing season!
We love to bike/walk/take public transportation when possible.
Our extended family is very spread-out, including Philadelphia, Akron, Minnesota, North Dakota, Denver and southern California. Some places that interest one or both of us are northern CA, Boulder (though we could never afford it, but maybe somewhere nearby), and somewhere near the Appalachians. But I'm open to any ideas! This is just dreaming stage right now anyway
Sounds like Southern California is the place for you. Unrivaled music/arts scene, mountains, 70 miles of beaches, plenty of walkable areas (believe it or not). Not much in the way of extreme weather changes, but fall in the city is AWESOME.
Take a tour of the southeast that includes Charlottesville, Roanoake, Blacksburg, Knoxville, Asheville and Greenville. Most of these cities don't have great ocean access but they are a lot closer than Boulder!
Come in the summer to see if you can handle the humidity.
Last edited by creeksitter; 02-13-2012 at 07:27 AM..
Reason: .
N Carolina goes from vast stretches of beach on the ocean to the mountainous beauty of the Smokey mountains, toss a coin to see if you live by the ocean and drive to the mountains or live in the mountains and drive to the ocean..
Yep. Southern California.
11,000+ mountains less than 1.5 hours from the shore.
(in Orange County 5600 foot Saddleback Mountain is actually bikeable from the ocean).
Great indy music scene.
Plenty of smaller downtown areas with walkable amenities in Orange, San Diego, Ventura and Los Angeles Counties.
Cheaper living in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties (although there are some nice areas like Chino Hills you are essentially living with a Walmart/County Fair general population)
The season thing may be a deal breaker since we essentially have two: a Spring/Fall hybrid and Summer. But we do get snow in the higher elevations. Even Saddleback is occasionally dusted in snow.
Thanks to everyone who replied here! Since I last posted, we have narrowed in on Colorado. I can handle just visiting the ocean occasionally, but easy access to mountains is a really big deal to my husband. We were just in Longmont for my BIL's wedding last month, and our whole family is gung-ho Colorado.
Still thinking Boulder would be ideal, but not sure how we'd afford it. How bike-able is Longmont? I don't mean recreational biking, but transportational - are there bike lanes/paths around the city center? (and is there a decent city center? We stayed in Lyons and just drove to the outside of Longmont for the wedding, didn't get to explore the city unfortunately).
Is there any public transportation in Longmont?
And tell me more about Golden. Or even Denver. Or another town in that area you'd recommend. Thanks!
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getting more substantial
