What do you think of Ballarat?

So we have decided to relocate.

What do you think of Ballarat? Any opinion, if you've lived there, live there, know people who live there etc. Are the people nice? Is there much trouble? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Tia.

Only thing I have to say it IT'S FREEZING!!!!!!!!

If you like the cold, then go for it.

Sorry I have no other advice. It's quite pretty, tho.

I grew up there, it's not that cold. It is hotter than Melbourne in summer. I think it is the same as most places, there are nice people and not so nice people, good areas and not so good. I think it is still a pretty good place to bring up kids.

I haven't lived there but visit fairly often. I like it a lot. Good infrastructure, good shops, playgrounds, cafes, schools etc.

We couldn't move there as it's too far from Melbourne and both DP and I need to be in a reasonable commuting distance for work. Having said that, lots of people from Ballarat do commute so it wouldn't be impossible - just not great for DP who often has 4am starts.

We did a treechange to Woodend and one of the bonuses for us is that virtually everyone we meet is a treechanger from Melbourne so everyone is up for making new friends. I don't think the same would be true of Ballarat so it would be harder to make friends as people probably have their little circles already. Obviously, I'm not saying you won't make friends but it's easier in places where there's lots of newcomers. A former BB member lives there and I think she reported that it had been a bit tricky.

Check out Woodend :) (I'm biased). It's about an hour's commute from Melbourne (and Bendigo). Extremely community-oriented with lots of families and young children. We used to live in inner city Melbourne (Northcote) and I don't miss it one little bit.

We relocated from Melbourne to Ballarat 5 yrs ago.

We were so sick of the city, I was communting into the city from Cranbourne (taking me 1hr on the train - standing almost all the way home) and DH was driving to Box Hill to work via the Monash Freeway so some days could take him over an hour. We were sick of having to spend so much time communting and having no quality of life and our Mortgage and living was so expensive that there was no chance of kids while living there.

For the first 2 years we were here we commuted to Melbourne to work - just over an hour on the V/Line trains - and for some of that I was having to do interstate travel so I was driving to the airport. DH then got a job in Ballarat and we decided to buy a house instead of renting, we now live in a small town called Linton (about 30km's west of Ballarat) so for us a 30min trip into Ballarat is nothing, plus our cost of living dropped hence us now having our 3 children. Ballarat has everything you need ie: shopping and has some of the best private schools as well, plus house prices are much cheaper than Melbourne.

Yes it does get cold in winter - on average it is about 4c cooler than Melbourne during winter and generally we get 1 day of snow during winter each year, although we haven't had any snow fall in the last 2 years.

For us making the move is the best thing we have ever done and we will never move back to Melbourne, we even hate having to go back there for visits.

Thanks for the feedback ladies, I really appreciate it, I just want to try to get as many different perspectives as I can. I hate not having everything planned out and the answer being clear.

I personally couldn't live there. Country town. Lovely for a visit but not to live. My SIL is from Ballarat and she couldn't live there either. She told me she felt isolated. Depends where in Ballarat you live maybe ? Best of Luck.