We've had a property in Spain for about 8 years now. We originally had a flat which we used a holiday home. We bought a house a couple of years ago to retire to and I took early retirement in April and we now spend half our time in Spain and half in UK.
In Australia, after moving from Melbourne, we moved to Mt Gambier itself and then to Kalangadoo (about 27 miles away) for my Dad's work.
We love the life in Spain. The way of life takes a bit of getting used to as the pace is quite slow. The Spaniards seem to work on a different clock to us and we often find them going out for dinner just as we are heading home after a night out. Although the main shops now open right through the day (big supermarkets and shopping malls), a lot of shops still close for siesta from around 1:30 to 4 or 4:30. A lot of the offices and businesses also do that and they work 8:30 to 1:30 and 4:30 to 8 or even later. In Torrevieja, a town about 10 km from us, they have a street of bars which we always thought were closed down as we never saw them open. It was only after being here a while we realised they didn't even open until nearly midnight!
Our "village" is Ciudad Quesada on the Costa Blanca. It is getting bigger all the time and we would probably now call it a town in UK. It has many restaurants and bars on the main street with several commercial centres dotted around the place containing some large supermarkets and other businesses. We absolutely love it and adore the way of life. We have marvellous neighbours, of many different nationalities (mainly North European but some from Iceland and Russia) as well as Spanish. I always feel so relaxed here (and did even before I retired). My wife has suffered from arthritis for some years but it just melts away here in Spain. We are very close to the large salt lakes in the area and this (apparently) makes it a very healthy area to live in. I know that my son-in-law, who has asthma, always feels a lot better when he comes and visits us. We certainly feel a lot healthier in this area and I believe it has added years to our lives. We keep ourselves busy by tending the garden (bouganvillea, jasmine, hibiscus plus several types of palm and cactus) which tends to get out of control if not looked after, walking through the nature park which is quite close to us and chewing the fat with the neighbours. We have an excellent swimming pool complex in the community which is ideal during the summer months. Our diet in Spain is certainly a lot healthier and we tend to buy most of our fruit and veg from the local markets. I guess you would call them organic in another country and they certainly taste more superior to those we buy in the supermarkets and are certainly larger.. Of course, the Spanish wine is also excellent and I have yet to find a bad one.
Spain is not as cheap as it used to be for us (our pound has not done very well over the last 3 or 4 years) but we still find it cheaper than UK. Electrical goods are about the same as UK but furniture tends to be more expensive. We shipped most of our belongings out from UK.
All in all, we really enjoy our life in Spain. It is going through problems of its own at the moment but we do like the people and their way of life. Speaking the language is a great plus and the Spanish really appreciate it when you talk to them in their own lingo, although I can't understand a word they are saying to each other as they talk Valencian around this area. There are many dialects and, in some cases, totally different languages like Catalan, Mallorquin, Basque etc but they will speak to you in Castillian Spanish if you address them in that way.
I hope you enjoy your time in Spain. Make the most of it while you are here and mix in with the locals as well as the expats.