FIREside Chats

hugheskevi

jennystarpepper said:

As for the future, what does everyone have planned?  When the big 'R' (retirement) comes what are everyone's hopes/ dreams or whimsies,  no matter how big or small.... cheap and cheery or blowing it all?

We have some fairly unusual plans

We will sell everything except from putting a few things into storage and head off traveling. The main destination will be a trans-America overland trip from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, which we will do independently (it will be a bit like this commercial trip, but with more time spent in USA). This should last about 18 months, as you want to avoid winter at either north/south extreme, although it could last a little longer if we head back north after reaching Tierra del Fuego to see the eastern side of South America.

We have budgeted for 3 years of travel at a cost of £60,000 p/a. I doubt we will spend that long traveling - the longest I have continually traveled previously is 13 months and that was grueling - in all that time I didn't spend 7 nights in the same bed. However, I think with slower travel and building in some relaxing time rather than continuously traveling it will be less tiring.

I keep a Google Map, which nicely shows the 'gaps' left to see, and I especially would like to visit a bit of East Africa between Gondar in Ethiopia and Abu Simbel in Egypt to complete a huge circle of overland travel stretching from London down through west Africa, up through east Africa into South Asia and China and back to London via Russia. There are also some sites in Indonesia I very much want to visit whilst my wife would like to visit South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

Once we are done with travel we will come back to central or north Wales (probably near Snowdonia) and buy somewhere with about 1-2 acres of land in a very rural location. Then we will indulge in pets, which we haven't previously had living and working full-time in London. That will probably be a couple of dogs, and maybe some geese and perhaps a rescue snake or two.

I then envisage a lot of time doing things I don't really have time for when working - things like watching full stages of the Tour de France, reading, doing volunteering work at an osprey centre and helping organising a running club maybe. I certainly want to be very active, but doing things I choose to do rather than working. Plus a lot of running and a bit of cycling, as I currently do, as well as gym and swimming which are things I don't do much of at the moment.

Retireinten

We have lots of ideas but no firm plans other than to not have our time dictated to by paid employment.


We are home birds and although we go abroad sometimes, I cannot cope with the heat in the height of Summer in Europe.  I  prefer UK holidays generally  but I hate our drab winters so I want to trial a long term rental somewhere a bit warmer.  


Hubby wants to buy a boat .


I would love to learn a new language (if we found that some time abroad did suit us I would want to integrate as much as possible) because I suspect we'd be drawn to the same place every year.


And I want to learn to play the piano. 


Other than that the simple things in life appeals to us, similar to Edinburgher. 


Although not a definite, a downsize is a very real possibility.  We live in a normal house in an expensive area.  We could move to a normal house (possibly a bit smaller) in a normal area and release a good £150-£200k. How extravagant our plans are will dictate whether we have to downsize or not. 

edinburgher

@hugheskevi - now that's travelling!

I forgot - I'd like to walk the Pacific Crest Trail - but I may gift myself a six month sabbatical to do this as a more sprightly 50 year old (12 years) 

Cheery_Daff

Wow @hugheskevi that is some map!! Mine would have about three points on it 😂

Retireinten

@Hugheskevi - I would love a bit of your passion for travelling, but I suspect it would do terrible things to my retirement planning spreadsheet

jennystarpepper

hugheskevi said:

jennystarpepper said:

As for the future, what does everyone have planned?  When the big 'R' (retirement) comes what are everyone's hopes/ dreams or whimsies,  no matter how big or small.... cheap and cheery or blowing it all?

We have some fairly unusual plans

We will sell everything except from putting a few things into storage and head off traveling. The main destination will be a trans-America overland trip from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, which we will do independently (it will be a bit like this commercial trip, but with more time spent in USA). This should last about 18 months, as you want to avoid winter at either north/south extreme, although it could last a little longer if we head back north after reaching Tierra del Fuego to see the eastern side of South America.

We have budgeted for 3 years of travel at a cost of £60,000 p/a. I doubt we will spend that long traveling - the longest I have continually traveled previously is 13 months and that was grueling - in all that time I didn't spend 7 nights in the same bed. However, I think with slower travel and building in some relaxing time rather than continuously traveling it will be less tiring.

I keep a Google Map, which nicely shows the 'gaps' left to see, and I especially would like to visit a bit of East Africa between Gondar in Ethiopia and Abu Simbel in Egypt to complete a huge circle of overland travel stretching from London down through west Africa, up through east Africa into South Asia and China and back to London via Russia. There are also some sites in Indonesia I very much want to visit whilst my wife would like to visit South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

Once we are done with travel we will come back to central or north Wales (probably near Snowdonia) and buy somewhere with about 1-2 acres of land in a very rural location. Then we will indulge in pets, which we haven't previously had living and working full-time in London. That will probably be a couple of dogs, and maybe some geese and perhaps a rescue snake or two.

I then envisage a lot of time doing things I don't really have time for when working - things like watching full stages of the Tour de France, reading, doing volunteering work at an osprey centre and helping organising a running club maybe. I certainly want to be very active, but doing things I choose to do rather than working. Plus a lot of running and a bit of cycling, as I currently do, as well as gym and swimming which are things I don't do much of at the moment.

Sounds wonderful.  

I have traveled Australia, NZ and Asia a number of times.  Plan to go back to French Polynesia and Hamilton Island ( South Pacific Island hopping) at some point.  We have discussed renting our house for  a year or two before downsizing.  I didn't meet Mr Pepper until my late 30's and was a bit of a bachelorette, so I spent some time traveling.   

It would be nice to have pets again, (had them previously) love the sound of geese, always wanted them... but, winter sun will win out for us.  The last pets I had were a Norwegian Forest cat and a couple of large pedigree dogs, they really spoilt me and don't think I could replace them in the future.

Wales is beautiful, I can understand why you want to move there.  It's good to hear you can fill your time with things you can't do now. 

becky_rtw

We are definitely going to travel. We're learning French because we want to live there eventually. 

We have to sell our place anyway so that helps a bit actually. Means we aren't tied to anywhere. 

Ideally for me we'd travel by train, but hubby would like a camper van. All of France and Corsica is on the list, as are the Nordics.

Lots of hiking and running definitely. I also would like to spend some time in French speaking parts of the world like Morocco (been once). Maybe learn a 3rd language, our French is decent now, not fluent of course. Being able to communicate is really important to me. 

We'll probably start drawing up more definite plans once we put the place up for sale. It can take up to a year to sell dental practices. This means we may have to move our plans around. 

We are real stay at home peeps by nature so this seems our one chance to explore some more. Then we are looking at chateau/towers in France, probably in Burgundy or Occitane (have to watch for termites down south though!). 

jennystarpepper

becky_rtw said:

We are definitely going to travel. We're learning French because we want to live there eventually. 

We have to sell our place anyway so that helps a bit actually. Means we aren't tied to anywhere. 

Ideally for me we'd travel by train, but hubby would like a camper van. All of France and Corsica is on the list, as are the Nordics.

Lots of hiking and running definitely. I also would like to spend some time in French speaking parts of the world like Morocco (been once). Maybe learn a 3rd language, our French is decent now, not fluent of course. Being able to communicate is really important to me. 

We'll probably start drawing up more definite plans once we put the place up for sale. It can take up to a year to sell dental practices. This means we may have to move our plans around. 

We are real stay at home peeps by nature so this seems our one chance to explore some more. Then we are looking at chateau/towers in France, probably in Burgundy or Occitane (have to watch for termites down south though!). 

We have a few years to go yet and having a bit of time to plan things is good because you can 'tweak' as much as you want., but it is exciting to think about the future.

Love your Idea of train travel, we have discussed a few train journeys in Australia.  Our last trip to NZ had our train trip stopped due to an earth quake, but we can book again and our friends and family were safe. 

becky_rtw

jennystarpepper said:

becky_rtw said:

We are definitely going to travel. We're learning French because we want to live there eventually. 

We have to sell our place anyway so that helps a bit actually. Means we aren't tied to anywhere. 

Ideally for me we'd travel by train, but hubby would like a camper van. All of France and Corsica is on the list, as are the Nordics.

Lots of hiking and running definitely. I also would like to spend some time in French speaking parts of the world like Morocco (been once). Maybe learn a 3rd language, our French is decent now, not fluent of course. Being able to communicate is really important to me. 

We'll probably start drawing up more definite plans once we put the place up for sale. It can take up to a year to sell dental practices. This means we may have to move our plans around. 

We are real stay at home peeps by nature so this seems our one chance to explore some more. Then we are looking at chateau/towers in France, probably in Burgundy or Occitane (have to watch for termites down south though!). 

We have a few years to go yet and having a bit of time to plan things is good because you can 'tweak' as much as you want., but it is exciting to think about the future.

Love your Idea of train travel, we have discussed a few train journeys in Australia.  Our last trip to NZ had our train trip stopped due to an earth quake, but we can book again and our friends and family were safe. 

Train in Aus are meant to be good, but not necessarily cheaper. I love a bit of 'man in seat 61' https://www.seat61.com/index-mobile.htm

For inspiration.

We did London to Florence via a few days in Geneva a couple of years ago. It was lovely to travel through the mountains and Italian trains are a delight. Free prosecco in slightly fancier class 😂

jennystarpepper

Cheery_Daff said:

jennystarpepper said:

I have loved reading everyone's plans and look forward to reading how everyone is progressing, along with more new plans / members.

As for the future, what does everyone have planned?  When the big 'R' (retirement) comes what are everyone's hopes/ dreams or whimsies,  no matter how big or small.... cheap and cheery or blowing it all?

Hopefully Mr. Pepper and I will be mortgage free in 4 / 5 years time, the plan then is to finish a few things in the house, (we are very lucky as Mr. pepper can fit kitchens / bathrooms and do most home repairs, (fancy new bathroom is sitting in a bedroom waiting for it's day as I type)..... we do get the experts in for plastering and some building work.

Downsize and fingers crossed by an apartment in the canaries, the main reason for this is medical (osteoarthritis and new knees for both of us).  We have toyed with a full time move abroad, but for us we need the winter heat and to swim daily.  Hope to be able to jump on the plane with hand luggage and in a taxi within an hour of landing. 

Mr Pepper will then grow his veg March to October and I will make his pies and other treats... then it will be off to the sun to 'let it all hang-out' with a few beers and gins sitting on our balcony and BBQ and salad for dinner / tea.

Excellent question! My plans aren't as detailed as yours... partly because they're further away, and partly because some of them are a continuation of now. 

We have an 18 year age gap, and Mr Cheery left his job (early, at age 47), several years ago. He's been rather part time self employed since then doing musical stuff, and that will continue for the foreseeable future. 

I work full time for now, dropping to four days later this year (hooray!) Because of that, our mortgage free date has shifted back a bit, and I'll likely be in my early 50s. I'd like to leave work once that's paid off, preferably at 50, but definitely by 55 - at that point Mr Cheery will be 73 😮

So no great plans for jet setting - for me retiring early is about sharing our 'retirement age'. If I wait til my official retirement age (68) Mr Cheery will be 86, and with the best will in the world that's not really an age for too many adventures. 

So my aim is to get out of as much work as possible for as long as possible, to just do normal hanging out things while we're both relatively young... Musical stuff, gardening, cafes, baking, sewing, knitting - not even got any big plans to travel, although I'd like to spend a bit more time at the seaside 😁

Of course best laid plans can go out of the window anyway... Mr Cheery's recent health issues are partly what's prompted my shift to four days - no point me working flat out for 10 years then stopping completely, when it might be better to work a bit less now, even if it has to drag on a little longer... We'll see.

Looking forward to hearing other people's plans! 

Mr Pepper and i are a year apart, so fortunate in one respect, but CSA and meeting later in life has added a few years to our FIRE plans, but if we can be mortgage free by 55 like you then win, win.  

Travel is not for everyone, and I do think life is about quality.... what makes you happy.  I have a relative who's partner is 19 years older, still together 30 years and counting (they are happy not to travel).

I agree about you moving to a 4 day week, if it works for you, that's what life is all about.