Is anyone planning on travelling full-time after retiring?

[travelbug]

Hi.

I am just curious to meet some even more like-minded thinkers.

We are FI now but trying to sell our business and then we will sell our paid for home and travel permanently.

We are a family with 2 small children and cannot wait to do this. We love travel and hope to based in each place for 1 month for the first 12 months or so and then try to "season" in a new place after that. (so 3 months or so).

Asia will be our first port of call as it's close to Australia and then I would like to explore Europe with our children, DH and I have been there before, and have them become multi-lingual while we are there. We have even considered enrolling them in a local school somewhere for the Winter so sa they can be ingrained the the language they are learning.

Italy and France are on our top priority list with Switzerland after that. The USA has been amazing in our travels and we would love to travel slowly around many different states.

I really cannot imagine us settling down anytime soon again with the overheads of a house etc, when we have so much world on our list and it is cheaper to travel this way than going on two (international) holidays a year and keeping a house.

I would love to chat about this type of lifestyle if anyone else is passionate too?.

TB

[smedleyb]

I am absolutely passionate about this type of lifestyle.  And I'm absolutely terrified of taking the steps to make it my reality.  My own limits as a husband, father of 2, son, etc. come into relief, and I'm reluctant to move beyond what my comfort level or society tells me is an acceptable way to live in the world.  Being frugal while maintaining the appearances of normal social conformity (job, car, activities for kids) is one thing.   Putting that lifestyle into abeyance to pursue a deeper passion to explore and learn through immersion is a different -- and terrifying -- animal altogether. 

[arebelspy]

Yes.  The wife and I are about 3-4 years from FI, and are planning on traveling full time, living for about 3-6 months (visas permitting) in one place before moving.

Living local and renting apartments isn't too expensive, and sounds great.

We will have likely one child, infant to toddler age to start.

We're planning on doing this for 5ish years (maybe up to ten) before settling somewhere (right now we're thinking Belize) and homesteading on a farm and maybe having a few more kids.

[limeandpepper]

Hi travelbug, I'm also from Australia and I, too, enjoy travelling and am entertaining the thought of doing it on a more extensive, long-term basis. In my case I probably won't even wait till FI, as I am pondering the digital nomad route.

Do you have a timeline of sorts, e.g. a date for when you want to leave Australia by? Would love to hear more about it. Perhaps you can start a journal/blog. :)

[SnackDog]

After spending my 20s traveling to every continent and then working and living on five, we have had enough! It's just not that interesting once you have seen many spectacular places. At this stage we are more keen to put down real roots when we retire and are already shifting our vacations away from new places and to our future retirement locale... 

[BlueMR2]

After spending my 20s traveling to every continent and then working and living on five, we have had enough! It's just not that interesting once you have seen many spectacular places. At this stage we are more keen to put down real roots when we retire and are already shifting our vacations away from new places and to our future retirement locale...

I've not traveled that extensively, but I also have lost the desire to travel anymore.  I've been a number of supposedly "spectacular" places, but have found the experience lacking.  The things that others find exciting about foreign places no longer do anything for me.  I'm quite content to hang out within a few miles of home these days.  :-)

[Zikoris]

Yep - my boyfriend and I plan on spending a good chunk of time after retirement just setting up shop and living in various countries. We travel a lot now and make it a point to scout out "potentials", places that are walkable, lovely, interesting, have good grocery stores, and connect well to other places by trains or coaches or boats or whatever. London, Paris, and Marseille are all on the list so far(Marseille is my favourite so far).

We'll stay in one place as long as they allow us, probably a few months per place. It shouldn't be too difficult to get visas as we won't be looking to work.

[KMMK]

At least in the winter we plan to live in an RV and travel around the southern states. It's just too cold here. I think we should RV full time, to save money by not having a regular residence, but my husband isn't quite on board with that idea. We'll have to see how it plays out. We both have the urge to just get up and drive away so that's the first thing we'll do when we both retire. I have no desire for a permanent residence, except I'd like to grow my own food, so might get a plot of land somewhere in Southern Canada where we can park the RV during growing season.

[Nancy]

Yes, our plan is to slow travel/live in as many countries as possible for as long as we like. We may start in Europe before we're FI since we have EU citizenship and could work.  Eventually, we're planning on homesteading, hopefully in a location with a surfable beach. We won't be having kids.

Arebelspy, you beat me to it. You're invited to our imagined future farm any time (after it becomes a reality).

[travelbug]

smedleyb, we are a bit scared too...but as it has been in the grand plans for so long we are becoming used to not fitting inside the box with our lifestyle in general. Between being frugal, self employed, planning on retiring at 41 and 38, unschooling our children, seeling up and travelling around the world with all the freedom that encompasses is seen as another crazy scheme from our loved ones and those around us.

When we first announced our plans, we received mixed reactions, some family memeber were quite angry at us and we were really shocked.

But we figured by us following our dreams, albeit outside what society expects, we are making those we love look closer at their own lives and that was where all this pent up emotion was coming from. So we accepted their views and kept on planning.

Like our finances though, we prefer stealth wealth/ under the radar planning so as to avoid confrontations about our lifestyle.

We are scared and there are many days when I look at what we are "giving up" and yearn to be satisfied with settling down like others around me.

But then I think of the world and all the amazing places, languages, experiences, people and I just want to get on the plane and go, shaking off my fears and societal expectations.

We are planning on seeing family over a 3-6 months period, all over Australia and then 3-9 months in Asia, this will depend on when we sell everything as we don't want to hit Europe in the Winter and that will be our destination after Asia. We are from a tropical climate, so it would be too much of a culture shock for our thin blood.

But in Asia we will start in Thailand or Malaysia and explore Cambodia, Vietnam. Each place we visit will be for 2 weeks- 1 month to get into the swing of the lifestyle initially.

That said, if we sell up in the European Summer we may just do a month and then head off to Italy. I am trying not to overplan everything too much.

In Europe our plan is to settle in Italy for at least 3 months and help the children adjust to the language etc, while we all attend language lessons. I can speak Italian but am a bit rusty, but my family cannot. We think around Lucca would be a good spot to start.

After that depending on whether we obtain a year long visa or stick to the Schengen rules to start with, we will go to the UK to see friends or keep exploring regions of Italy or head to France; so many areas here we love.

So the first two years will be doing this, but we will be open to all sorts of adventures within this framework.

DH and I took a year off before we were mariried and travelled around Europe, not working just exploring, and we loved it. We have travelled internationally ( and domesticaly) pretty much every year since. We love travel.

It's great to see others planning their journeys. Where are you all heading off to?

TB

[Roland of Gilead]

We also plan on travelling full time but only in the USA and Canada (the 51st state!).  I would love to go to Mexico but I am chicken plus have a fondness for my head.

Building our own RV, which I know you probably think sounds very MMM badassity but it is costing us an entire spring and summer plus more $$$ than you would believe.   Part of the problem is we are both engineers and refuse to cut corners like you would find on a traditional RV.

Here is a pic of it nearing the point of getting the roof coated and the aluminum siding painted:

[Jed]

It's fun to read about people's travel plans – it gets me fired up.  While I don't think we'll end up being as 'nomadic' as the OP or others in this thread, when we become FI in 3-4 years, we plan to uproot the family in the U.S. where we live now and move to a Spanish-speaking country for a year or probably two.  Who knows if that will turn into full-time travel and relocating, but it wouldn't surprise me if it did.

While Spain is destination #1 on the list right now, we’re in full-on research mode in trying to find the best spot.   We have twin 7-year old boys that are in a Spanish language immersion program at school so we thought it’d be cool to move somewhere where they could crystallize their fluency while taking in an entirely new culture.

[vern]

We plan on doing this a few months from now when I pull the plug at work. 

I read a book about 20 years ago about this retired couple that travelled to Europe long term.  They did the usual cities you would expect...London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, etc...but they stayed a whole month in each city.

Renting a furnished apartment is much cheaper than getting a hotel.  Then you have a kitchen, so you can save even more money by preparing meals at home.  (You can still eat the local food for lunch and breakfast when it's less expensive.)  Also, when you are there for a month, you can purchase bus/subway passes for more savings.

We are going to apply this model but in Asia instead of Europe. 

Sites like airbnb make it very easy to rent rooms/apartments anywhere in the world.

We can't wait!!!

[nawhite]

I'm curious about the people who plan to do this plan with kids. I love the slow travel idea (both in the US and internationally) and could really see doing this for summer breaks but I'm confused on what your kids will do for school if you slow travel or RV live all year round. Are you all planning on homeschooling? Take advantage of local schools and forcing your kids to change schools every 3 months? How does this work?

[travelbug]

nawhite; because our children are so small (3 and 6) we have decided to unschool them for now as we have weighed up the lifestyle factors and have decided that, for us, showing them the world that encompasses art, geography, languages, currency, history, culture etc etc... is more valuable to their wealth of knowledge than what a standard classroom environment could give them.

We may continue with this model, as so many others families are doing with great success, or we will bend our travel plans to suit what our children are interested in learning. That said, we may later enrol them in an internation school (which has the same curriculum worldwide), or we may enrol them for  3-12 months in a local school somewhere, or we may find specialists in their fields of interest to tutor them, we may use an internet based curriculum,....

There are so many options that we can choose from. It will depend on our children, where we are, what we decide to do longterm as a family.

If you are interested in alternative education I highly receommend to start with John Holt and John Taylor Gatto, any books by these guys will provide a platform for further research.

Education is important, I actually have a Phd, but I truly believe that there are more options than schools can provide. There have been many studies stating that homeschooled children are in no way behind in obtaining university scholarships and grants, in fact, just the opposite. A university education encourages asking questions, testing theories, self reliant learning: all things many of my students have had to learn when they arrive as an undergraduate. I think that homeschooling can mould children to think like this from the start; it embraces the love and joy of learning.

But, I digress....I will hop off my soapbox now, as the subject is close to my heart (if you cannot tell??!!! LOL)

I suppose it's all wrapped up in the "how" of our travel plans, so it is very relevant to our family.

vern;  I agree how easy it is now with the internet. When DH and I travelled in the late 90s we would arrive somewhere and many times were not happy with something and would move accommodations. The net makes it so much easier!

[frugaldrummer]

I hope to have my house paid for by the time I retire, then I could rent it out and go traveling for a while.  I'd love to live in some of my favorite cities for a few months - London, Paris, Rome, Bangkok - as well as see more of the places that I haven't gotten to yet.

Whether I'll be able to do this will depend a bit on the other people in my life.  Will my elderly mother require my care?  Will my younger boyfriend be able to retire and travel with me?

Right now I have to be satisfied with an annual vacation with my mom and sister - this year we are going to Ireland and Scotland. :)

[vern]

No kids here.  The wife and I have been very careful!

[Silvie]

Yep - my boyfriend and I plan on spending a good chunk of time after retirement just setting up shop and living in various countries. We travel a lot now and make it a point to scout out "potentials", places that are walkable, lovely, interesting, have good grocery stores, and connect well to other places by trains or coaches or boats or whatever. London, Paris, and Marseille are all on the list so far(Marseille is my favourite so far).

We'll stay in one place as long as they allow us, probably a few months per place. It shouldn't be too difficult to get visas as we won't be looking to work.

I can't believe you want to leave Vancouver! I lived there for a few months on exchange at SFU, most beautiful and friendly city I've ever been. Love it! In fact, I was planning on moving there.

[Watchmaker]

Travelbug

Between Lucca and Florence is a town called Montecatini Terme which I fell in love with it a few years ago.  I'd highly recommend it if you are looking to stay in the area.

[patrickza]

The plan for me is to wait for my son to finish school, then buy a small catamaran and go cruising. Hopefully circumnavigate in about two years and then let my boy go to university and I'll carry on cruising with my SO.

Another vote here for having no permanent residence.