Retire to Wales

Wales is a country of social and cultural contrasts. There is a divide not just between Welsh speakers and English speakers but between South Wales Welsh and North Wales Welsh, two different dialects springing from two separate tribes. Within the language there are social and political divides between the middle-class professionals who run Wales public bodies, administration and media and the native Welsh speakers of the rural heartlands. Anyone who lives in Wales will tell you it's a country, not a region and definitely not a demeaning 'principality'. Yet the vote which gave Wales a limited-power assembly was agonisingly close, partly due to the suspicion among people in the south that such an assembly would be the first step to enforced independence. It's a suspicion that has constantly frustrated the ambition of Plaid Cymru, the Party of Wales, which constantly has to reconcile the nationalist views of its North Wales supporters with its largely English-speaking socialist supporters in the south.

And if it seems strange to preface a survey of attractive retirement venues with a précis of Welsh social politics it's because these thing permeate every aspect of Welsh life, not least the subjects of jobs, house prices and incomers.

That said, the Welsh are well aware of the contrasts and contradictions and that is underlined by a wealth of self-deprecating humour. The ability to laugh at yourself is rare in Britain . That and a genuine interest in strangers are the only two characteristics that might be regarded as common throughout Wales . Rightly or wrongly, people in Wales attribute different characteristics to people in different parts of the nation - there are jokes about people from Cardiganshire being careful with money in the way that in England there are jokes about the Scots.

Hundreds of thousands of people now visit Wales for holidays, thousands more arrive for year or two to work, particularly in Cardiff , Europe 's fastest-growing city, and find a warm welcome. But if you plan to retire to one of the stunningly beautiful parts of rural Wales be prepared to become part of the community and contribute. And if it's a Welsh-speaking area, learning and using the Welsh language will be a vital part of achieving that, every bit as important as it is in rural France or Spain.

Because of this necessary commitment Wales , like Scotland , is more likely to appeal to people who already have links - perhaps moving back to retire after a long spell away or moving to be near children and grandchildren. This also assumes that the general area of residence has been decided. In this guide we split each area into rural and urban and show what is available in each.