Retirement Traveling Around the World!
March 22, 2022
Who doesn't want to retire and travel the world? Or retire early & do perpetual travel as we did in our early 50's non-stop for a decade as a digital nomad family. We wrote about how to do extended travel and mini-retirements back in 2008 after we'd been doing it for a few years & were cases studies in Tim Ferriss's famous book 4HWW. We love that we can live so much happier & cheaper this way and we thrive on a minimalist lifestyle ( plus now we can be even lighter as we are not roadschooling, so do not need all those kids books for our compulsive reader!)
We loved the around-the-world family travel lifestyle, so are thrilled to see van life, digital nomads, location independent living thriving in our post pandemic world. Now we are making this big transition again to another non-stop decade traveling the world, only this time as a couple, since our 21 year old daughter Heavenly Reyna ( aka Mozart) has her own place now & Twitch Music Partnership in Los Angeles, but she will come visit when she can. We've been clearing everything out of our apartment, saying goodbye to family & friends, going paperless and will fly to Europe during the first week of May.
We do a combo of van life in Europe and long stay rental apartments or homes. Our vintage van has been in storage for a decade, so we are super excited to be updating it now with a great mechanic near Barcelona and will do more when we arrive ( interior painting and upholstery).
Barcelona area is one of our "homes" around the world where we have spent many months over many years and have dear friends there, so once we settle in and complete the van update, we are looking forward to more explorations there and the beaches and towns in Costa Brava we love. Perfect for slow travel enjoyment!
Covid and Putin's invasion into Ukraine does make things trickier, but at our age, we need to travel this decade while healthy and vibrant, plus, our form of travel, being "van life" (which is like living outside most of the time for meals and such and self contained), is the safest. We also do slow, eco -focused travel, so do not have to worry about gas prices as we mainly walk, ride our bikes or take mass transit and use our camper van as our tiny home! Our friends in Europe say life feels very normal in western Europe. Last time we started off when there was the huge financial crisis of 2007/8, so seems like there is always something in our world.
Spain is also very far from Ukraine ( 2 to 3 thousand miles) and we appreciate that Spain’s Covid-19 rules stipulate that masks must be worn inside shops, bars and other indoor public places unless a person is eating or drinking, plus we do not need a covid test to enter & the plane ride will be all masked, clean & well ventilated. We are boosted, will mask up when needed and will likely get the EU Digital COVID Certificate (EUDCC) when we arrive in Paris, just to make things easier for our long stay in Europe. I have also lost 100lbs so that should help my health & our travel lifestyle has us walking, biking daily and spending more time outdoors in fresh air and sunshine soaking up that natural vitamin D!
Who else is planning travel to Europe or dreaming about traveling the world in retirement and as an empty nester?
Who doesn't want to retire and travel the world? Or retire early & do perpetual travel as we did in our early 50's non-stop for a decade as a digital nomad family. We wrote about how to do extended travel and mini-retirements back in 2008 after we'd been doing it for a few years & were cases studies in Tim Ferriss's famous book 4HWW. We love that we can live so much happier & cheaper this way and we thrive on a minimalist lifestyle ( plus now we can be even lighter as we are not roadschooling, so do not need all those kids books for our compulsive reader!)
We loved the around-the-world family travel lifestyle, so are thrilled to see van life, digital nomads, location independent living thriving in our post pandemic world. Now we are making this big transition again to another non-stop decade traveling the world, only this time as a couple, since our 21 year old daughter Heavenly Reyna ( aka Mozart) has her own place now & Twitch Music Partnership in Los Angeles, but she will come visit when she can. We've been clearing everything out of our apartment, saying goodbye to family & friends, going paperless and will fly to Europe during the first week of May.
We do a combo of van life in Europe and long stay rental apartments or homes. Our vintage van has been in storage for a decade, so we are super excited to be updating it now with a great mechanic near Barcelona and will do more when we arrive ( interior painting and upholstery).
Barcelona area is one of our "homes" around the world where we have spent many months over many years and have dear friends there, so once we settle in and complete the van update, we are looking forward to more explorations there and the beaches and towns in Costa Brava we love. Perfect for slow travel enjoyment!
Covid and Putin's invasion into Ukraine does make things trickier, but at our age, we need to travel this decade while healthy and vibrant, plus, our form of travel, being "van life" (which is like living outside most of the time for meals and such and self contained), is the safest. We also do slow, eco -focused travel, so do not have to worry about gas prices as we mainly walk, ride our bikes or take mass transit and use our camper van as our tiny home! Our friends in Europe say life feels very normal in western Europe. Last time we started off when there was the huge financial crisis of 2007/8, so seems like there is always something in our world.
Spain is also very far from Ukraine ( 2 to 3 thousand miles) and we appreciate that Spain’s Covid-19 rules stipulate that masks must be worn inside shops, bars and other indoor public places unless a person is eating or drinking, plus we do not need a covid test to enter & the plane ride will be all masked, clean & well ventilated. We are boosted, will mask up when needed and will likely get the EU Digital COVID Certificate (EUDCC) when we arrive in Paris, just to make things easier for our long stay in Europe. I have also lost 100lbs so that should help my health & our travel lifestyle has us walking, biking daily and spending more time outdoors in fresh air and sunshine soaking up that natural vitamin D!
Who else is planning travel to Europe or dreaming about traveling the world in retirement and as an empty nester?
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As usual from you (always, actually!), this blog entry does not disappoint! It answers questions many of your online network might have about your next steps while putting out there topics some others of us may also have on our minds when thinking about international travel in the third third of life. Thank you and I look forward to all news coming up from you & yours!
Posted by: Margaret | March 22, 2022 at 09:41 AM
As usual from you (always, actually!), this blog entry does not disappoint! It answers questions many of your online network might have about your next steps while putting out there topics some others of us may also have on our minds when thinking about international travel in the third third of life. Thank you and I look forward to all news coming up from you & yours!
Posted by: Margaret | March 22, 2022 at 09:41 AM
Aw, thanks so much Margaret! It is always great to hear from you and get your input! It is a tricky time, especially for travelers our age, so we have put a lot of thought into this and hopefully will keep us safe and save us money.
Maybe we will be able to finally meet in person! We are doing this for 3 months in and 3 months out of Shengan style & I have planned ahead for many months, but I also have many back up plans in case things change.
We will watch the covid numbers and base on next base on that. We were looking into UK, but may change it to Andorra.
Also if Putin goes insane, we could go to NZ and rent a camper for 3 months. But I don't think that will happen. I pray that we are all headed to a better world & this will catalyst for positive change and a faster end to fossil fuel dependency.
But we always have possible contingency plans as it is a wing it travel life, and luckily our minimalist life makes it easy to change our minds and shift directions.
No absolute safety no matter where we are, but we hope to love the adventure and joy and keep the risks as low as we can.
Posted by: Jeanne | March 22, 2022 at 11:42 AM