Denver skyline with Rocky Mountains
Last week marked the 18th anniversary of my move from Sydney to the US. The time really has flown. I still remember touching down at Denver airport on October 7, 1991 wondering what the heck I was doing. I was 25 years old, I had never lived outside of Sydney before and I had never started a business before. Now, here I was doing both things in a country I barely knew.
But I wasn’t coming to Denver completely blind. I had done a scouting trip three months before where I had visited a number of US cities with the intention of deciding which one would be the best fit for me and my new business. On this trip I visited Los Angeles, Denver, Dallas, Chicago, and Portland, Oregon.
The natural place for many Australians to settle is California. It is the closest state to Australia, has many direct flights from both Los Angeles and San Francisco and has a huge population. It is also expensive. This was the reason I didn’t seriously consider moving to California. I had a very limited budget and I didn’t want to blow a good chunk of it on rent. I also didn’t want to live in a dump, which I would have had to do in California, I wanted a decent quality of life.
My scouting trip was in July, in the heat of the summer, so I ruled out Dallas because it was over 100 degrees the two days I was there. Chicago had the same problem as California, it was expensive. So that left Denver and Portland. Denver was the second last city on my US tour and I immediately felt at home there. I liked the pace of life, it wasn’t quite as fast-paced as most American cities, and its location as the base of the Rocky Mountains was a big plus for me. I loved to ski and go bush walking (or hiking as they say here) and the mountains provided ample opportunity for both.
Denver was inexpensive, housing and office rents were less than half the price of California. There was also an Australian-American Chamber of Commerce (now a social club) which introduced me to fellow Aussies who had done the same thing I was about to do. And I loved the fact that there were 300+ days of sunshine a year in Denver. Even though Portland was a good city, I had pretty much made up my mind Denver was where I wanted to be before I left for Portland.
Now, after 18 years here and having visited most major cities in this country I am very happy with my choice. Denver is a great place to live and work and I have never really considered moving anywhere else. So for any Aussie considering a move to the US, I would advise looking beyond California. There are so many great cities here, it can be hard to choose. Just pick a handful, go and visit them, and decide which one feels right for you.
Photo credit sonicsquirtgun
