Smaller Cities in Canada

massdebater

Just thought I'd create a thread for anyone thinking of making a move to some of the smaller/lesser well known cities in Canada. Despite what you might think from a quick scan of the boards Canada forum, there is more to life here than Toronto/Vancouver. This might be useful for anyone wanting to make the move to Canada but without the hustle-bustle and cost of the bigger cities. Anyone here who has lived in Halifax, Vancouver Island, St John's, Charlottetown, Winnipeg etc, even to a lesser extent places like Edmonton, Ottawa etc? Please share your experiences!

I'm currently in Kelowna, BC. I'm heading out to work now but when I get a few minutes, I'll do a proper pro/con write-up of my experience here so far, job situation, cost of living, adjusting to life here, weather, acceptance of the irish etc. I couldn't find a similar thread to this so mods please move if need be! I'm thinking of moving to one of Charlottetown, Halifax or Victoria next year so a thread like this could be useful for others looking for something different than the usual big cities

vicwatson

Loved Kelowna !

jd83

massdebater wrote: »

Just thought I'd create a thread for anyone thinking of making a move to some of the smaller/lesser well known cities in Canada. Despite what you might think from a quick scan of the boards Canada forum, there is more to life here than Toronto/Vancouver. This might be useful for anyone wanting to make the move to Canada but without the hustle-bustle and cost of the bigger cities. Anyone here who has lived in Halifax, Vancouver Island, St John's, Charlottetown, Winnipeg etc, even to a lesser extent places like Edmonton, Ottawa etc? Please share your experiences!

I'm currently in Kelowna, BC. I'm heading out to work now but when I get a few minutes, I'll do a proper pro/con write-up of my experience here so far, job situation, cost of living, adjusting to life here, weather, acceptance of the irish etc. I couldn't find a similar thread to this so mods please move if need be! I'm thinking of moving to one of Charlottetown, Halifax or Victoria next year so a thread like this could be useful for others looking for something different than the usual big cities

Would love to hear more. Im thinking of heading over for a year or 2 but have not decided where in Canada yet. Was thinking of some of the smaller cities but a bit worried a bout cutting my chances of getting a job. Im currently working in the IT sector.

RDM_83 again

jd83 wrote: »

Would love to hear more. Im thinking of heading over for a year or 2 but have not decided where in Canada yet. Was thinking of some of the smaller cities but a bit worried a bout cutting my chances of getting a job. Im currently working in the IT sector.

Take a long hard look at the wages before you head over, I don't work in the area but apparently there is a shortage of IT staff in some places here but also anecdotally the reason for this shortage is the wages are so much lower than the USA so many who can go south. Make sure to factor in the increased cost of living as well.

experiMental

Victoria is not a small city, and there are a some IT / game development jobs over there. There are also boat and aircraft mechanic/maintenance jobs too.  
Also, there's no IT shortage in Canada because there will always be people from all over the world willing to move and work there. It's usually the recruiters who are claiming that there is a skill shortage, because there are not enough job seekers for them to work with.
I'm considering a move to Victoria once my lease in Vancouver expires. I've been there as a tourist and it's a fantastic looking town, which resembles better parts of England. Haven't seen much pubs and football pitches in the area, though! 
One significant con is that you'd be better off owning a vehicle, which can be expensive. If you have a family and you have to travel to Canadian mainland, it's an absolute pain to travel by bus and ferries.

el diablo

experiMental wrote: »

Victoria is not a small city, and there are a some IT / game development jobs over there. There are also boat and aircraft mechanic/maintenance jobs too.  
Also, there's no IT shortage in Canada because there will always be people from all over the world willing to move and work there. It's usually the recruiters who are claiming that there is a skill shortage, because there are not enough job seekers for them to work with.
I'm considering a move to Victoria once my lease in Vancouver expires. I've been there as a tourist and it's a fantastic looking town, which resembles better parts of England. Haven't seen much pubs and football pitches in the area, though! 
One significant con is that you'd be better off owning a vehicle, which can be expensive. If you have a family and you have to travel to Canadian mainland, it's an absolute pain to travel by bus and ferries.

Victoria only has a population of around 80,000 so it's more a large town than a city.

massdebater

el diablo wrote: »

experiMental wrote: »

Victoria is not a small city, and there are a some IT / game development jobs over there. There are also boat and aircraft mechanic/maintenance jobs too.  
Also, there's no IT shortage in Canada because there will always be people from all over the world willing to move and work there. It's usually the recruiters who are claiming that there is a skill shortage, because there are not enough job seekers for them to work with.
I'm considering a move to Victoria once my lease in Vancouver expires. I've been there as a tourist and it's a fantastic looking town, which resembles better parts of England. Haven't seen much pubs and football pitches in the area, though! 
One significant con is that you'd be better off owning a vehicle, which can be expensive. If you have a family and you have to travel to Canadian mainland, it's an absolute pain to travel by bus and ferries.

Victoria only has a population of around 80,000 so it's more a large town than a city.

That's probably just the exact city limits though is it? I always thought it was somewhere between a quarter of a million and half a million? Either way, it's still a small city for Canada.

circular flexing

massdebater wrote: »

That's probably just the exact city limits though is it? I always thought it was somewhere between a quarter of a million and half a million? Either way, it's still a small city for Canada.

"The city has a population of about 80,017, while the metropolitan area of Greater Victoria, has a population of 344,615, making it the 15th most populous Canadian urban region."

tradhead

Any suggestions or recommendations for towns/cities on the east coast apart from Toronto?

Gman0174

tradhead wrote: »

Any suggestions or recommendations for towns/cities on the east coast apart from Toronto?

Halifax is nice, but Nova Scotia has a lot of nothing in between . St John's, you'll feel like your in Ireland. I found Cape Breton beautiful too, Sydney is at its eastern point. Going back west, along St Lawrence, Quebec city, Laval, Levi, Montreal....

massdebater

Sorry about the delay but I ended up having to work a load of shifts over xmas and didn't really get a chance to do any sort of a write up here.
I'm early 30s, male and just moved to Kelowna last August. Kelowna is situated on Okanagan Lake in the Okanagan Valley region of BC. It is the 3rd largest independent city in BC (behind Vancouver and Victoria) and is approx the same size as Cork city. They have their own version of the Lock Ness monster here too, called Ogopogo.

Jobs
I've worked loads of different jobs throughout my lifetime (indoor, outdoor, construction, rural work etc etc) but mainly office jobs (customer service, marketing etc). I assumed that's what I'd do here. However, I found the wages for most non-management office jobs here were terrible (less than $15/hour pre-tax in a lot of cases!) so I decided to try my hand at serving in a bar/restaurant to make better money from tips. I didn't have any serving experience but I was friendly in the interview and I'm pretty sure I got a job purely because I'm irish. Wages are much better doing this (approx $20-30/hour now, pretty much tax free, and supposed to be way higher in the summer). It's a very touristy town so a lot of the work here seems to be service-type jobs and a lot is seasonal.

Cost of Living
This is the only place I've lived in Canada so I haven't much to compare it to. Rent in a shared house is anywhere between $500-900 per room and that usually includes all your utilities. I currently pay $670 in a large 4-bed house just on the lake approx 15 minute cycle from downtown. A pint/glass of wine would cost you around $7-10 after tax and tip, Probably more in fancier places, wineries etc and maybe around $5 during happy hours which most places have every day. From chatting with people here, Kelowna seems to be more expensive than a lot of places in Canada due to it's touristy status but cheaper than any of the larger cities.

Weather
Perhaps one of the best things about Kelowna is the weather. Very mild when compared to the rest of Canada and one of the highest average year-round temperatures in Canada. Hot, sunny summers (low 30s during the day) and mild cloudy (-5 to -20 including wind chill) winters. Apparently this year has been one of the coldest in recent years with a lot of snowfall. I've found it very cold at times but seems lovely when compared to some of the temperatures I've seen in other parts of the country.

Lifestyle
The lifestyle here has been amazing so far. Lots of outdoorsey stuff while the weather is warmer, hiking, cycling, wine tasting (it's a huge wine region), watersports on the lake, camping etc. Winter is all about the winter sports with Big White and Silver Star resorts within an hour away. I've been learning to snowboard this year which has been amazing, but sore ha! There are year round soccer, volleyball, basketball leagues too. It seems to be a decent location for getting to other well known places with Vancouver a 4 hour drive, Calgary 7 hours and the US border about 2 hours. Kelowna airport has direct flights to most major Canadian cities, Toronto, Calgary, Victoria, Van etc and international ones like Seattle, Phoenix, Cancun, Vegas etc.

Adjusting to Life/Acceptance of the Irish
I was shocked at how few Irish people there are here. I've maybe met 5/6 Irish people in my entire time here and have gone weeks/months at a time without hearing an Irish accent. I've even met a few locals, some in their 30s, who I'm the first Irish person they've ever met in their life! I'm pretty sure I get away with a lot of things due to being Irish. The local lassies love the accent and people tend to be even friendlier when they find out I'm Irish. All of the above has helped to making the move here fairly easy. I moved here by myself which made the initial move a slight bit daunting but it wasn't my first time moving overseas by myself so that helped. Everyone has been really friendly and accommodating so far and I found it easy to make friends here. I've already found myself recognising people walking down the street and people recognise me too ("ahh you're that Irish lad" haha)

Things I didn't like
There are a lot of homeless people here and I'm constantly being asked for change, cigarettes etc on the street. There are a lot of homeless facilities here but there doesn't seem to be enough to help deal with the issue. Not sure why there are so many here but my guess would be due to the relatively mild winters in this region.  Apparently Kelowna is the Hell's Angel capital of Canada too! I haven't experienced any issues myself but it's apparently something you need to keep an eye out for. Apparently they own a lot of businesses here but I haven't seen a lot of them around.

Overall, I think Kelowna is a great option for anyone considering moving to somewhere outside the usual big cities in Canada, especially if you are considering moving here for a few years and to enjoy the lifestyle. Feel free to ask me any specific questions about the area. Hopefully some of you can add something similar about other smaller Canadian cities.