Georgia and I have been toing and froing over the past two years of where we would love to live for our future; where would we feel like we are part of a community that we can fit into and grow with, and where (if we decide to have some) would we love to have our kids grow up, where we feel safe that their education, sports, art or any hobbies would be well catered for and finally grow our new businesses.
Both Georgia and I grew up in small towns, her more considerably smaller than mine but we both created a wonderful community around us. Now neither of us really wanted to move back to our original spots but wanted to have the same feeling.
So here came our questions: what regional area is growing and exciting, has beautiful cafes/coffee, restaurants and bars (as we both have worked in hospitality for most if not all our working lives). Where is there an amazing arts culture, quick and easy transport to a city and finally what regional city is close to beaches and what can we afford?…. Now I am not going to lie, that is a list that crossed off pretty much every city or town, especially in this part of Victoria and we were ready to make sacrifices for the opportunity to own a house. But then we looked into Geelong. We started to visit Geelong more and more after that. A few of our closest friends live in the Bellarine and so we were able to say hi to them and explore the towns and suburbs. This was the greatest thing we could have done. The Geelong people accepted us with open arms and then some. We have met some of the most amazing people.
Now we live here, we now have a beautiful friendship group, got to see Chicago at the Palais, drink the beautiful coffee from Funk by Botanical Brew, swim at the beach in Queenscliff and give our puppy the garden she needs to run roll and play. We could not be happier!!! We are now looking to the future, what we can contribute, how we can help, how we can support.
That’s the thing about beautiful regional areas … The people make you feel loved and in return you want to love back! We now LOVE GEELONG!!!
