I've just taken possession of the house in the countryside. It really is country side: no traffic, deep forest next door, a lot of farms.
The first thing I notice is that many of the neighbours have dogs - lab, german shepherd, etc - and I don't see any fenced yards. The dogs run off the lead and excitedly jumped all over me as I walked up the street. This reminds me of the Australia I grew up in where dogs had a bit of autonomy and a little local society of their own. Really idyllic. If I'm lucky and find a puppy with a social temperament and if it turns out there are no big mean dogs around to cause trouble then I reckon I could really be on to something here :-). We shall see!