A Paupers Pension Tale (Not many nuts to dig up)

trevjl

Aristotle67 said:

Albermarle said:

My time is better spent going racing

I can second that, although this Winter the weather has been a bit of a problem ( very wet at Newbury on Friday ) 

You should have told me you were there!! Someone I know suggested the 50/1 winner.

Saturday was better weather, of course.

I am spending my retirement travelling around the country visiting every racetrack in GB. Enjoying it immensely and visiting some lovely towns that I might otherwise have bypassed. 

I was at Newbury Friday too !!! worst days racing of my life, weather, ground, results AND forgot to ask for concession price at the gate I will get used to that eventually !!
Off to Wincanton today.
I am also planning to do every course too, even the ones i have been to but not for years. Have purchased a scratch map to scratch them off as I go. search Etsy scratch map racecourses and you'll see it.

Albermarle

I was at Newbury Friday too !!! worst days racing of my life, weather, ground, results AND forgot to ask for concession price at the gate I will get used to that eventually !!

The concession price of £17 and being able to go into the nicer/warmer Premier stand was the best bit. Not my favourite course. You seems a long way from the action, and it is partly surrounded by new build apartments, and backs on to a freight railway line and an industrial estate.

Anyway we had better not derail ' A Paupers Tale' with gambling/racing anecdotes !

Ciprico

..we went backpacking recently to Vietnam. (in our late 50's).

There is no comparison to the "back in the day" travelling when you turn up in a new town and pore over a lonely planet guide and end up in some flea infested dormitry in the red light area....

Now it (can be) all Uber's and Airbnb's. Not the same challenges, but it is an effective way to manage a grand tour, seeing a large area and gives the flexibility to move on or hang around in somewhere you like....

gorgeousme

Ciprico said:

..we went backpacking recently to Vietnam. (in our late 50's).

There is no comparison to the "back in the day" travelling when you turn up in a new town and pore over a lonely planet guide and end up in some flea infested dormitry in the red light area....

Now it (can be) all Uber's and Airbnb's. Not the same challenges, but it is an effective way to manage a grand tour, seeing a large area and gives the flexibility to move on or hang around in somewhere you like....

Wow, we are in our mid 50s and we will be going to Vietnam this August too. We will be going for 3 weeks flying to the North and backpacking all the way down to the Mekong Delta. We will be staying in small independent places plus home stays with the goal of using this trip to test whether we want to do this for longer periods in our retirement. In an ideal world, we would backpack for 3 months at a time once we start our retirement. We would return home for a rest and go again for 2-3 months at a time. Whether our plan will be realised remains to be seen, but our want is to travel like this until we want to stay home and live a quieter life. Obviously the longer travels would be in cheaper countries and we would do short trips for the expensive parts of the world to stretch our retirement income.

 How did you find it?  Do you rate the venture as “very do-able” in terms of both physical and financial angles?

Ganga

Pat38493 said:

gambleruk said:

Spending the Winter months in Spain as much more appeal to me now.

We have talked about spending the winter travelling as my wife is already retired at 56 and I will probably stop work in the next few years.  

Like others here I did a lot of travelling earlier in my career so taking lots of short breaks or holidays doesn't appeal much - I think we will be taking longer trips once I am not working.

I have no idea where to start though as neither of us ever did any long term travelling in the past.  I recently exchanged a few emails with a blogger who is FI and who travels with his wife for the winter - they basically negotiate short term rentals through the winter, often in countries like Vietnam where the cost of living is much lower - even reasonable hotels and short term apartments there are very cheap if you don't go to a tourist hotspot.  He told me that for the moment, they have even sold up in the UK and they just take short term rentals in the UK as well - they try to negotiate discounts for stays of a month or more.

Just the fixed running costs of a decent sized property in the UK would go a long way towards paying for a long round the world trip so one thing that I have in mind is the option to sell up, do some travelling and then buy a UK place again at the end.

There is also of course the dreaded "round the world cruise".  We really like cruises so this could be an option but I am a bit unsure whether doing that for over 100 days in a row might become a bit samey - more likely we would plan a kind of bespoke hop on/hop off trip with some parts cruising interspersed with some stays in various countries.

Currently we are slowly preparing our house for sale (downsize) - probably going to get it valued in May/June time but most likely won't actually sell until 2026/7

The only downside of this is what some ex-pats have found ,they sold up in this country and lived abroad BUT when they decided to return to the UK found that property prices had risen that much it left them unable to get back on the property ladder.

Ciprico

gorgeousme said:

Ciprico said:

..we went backpacking recently to Vietnam. (in our late 50's).

There is no comparison to the "back in the day" travelling when you turn up in a new town and pore over a lonely planet guide and end up in some flea infested dormitry in the red light area....

Now it (can be) all Uber's and Airbnb's. Not the same challenges, but it is an effective way to manage a grand tour, seeing a large area and gives the flexibility to move on or hang around in somewhere you like....

Wow, we are in our mid 50s and we will be going to Vietnam this August too. We will be going for 3 weeks flying to the North and backpacking all the way down to the Mekong Delta. We will be staying in small independent places plus home stays with the goal of using this trip to test whether we want to do this for longer periods in our retirement. In an ideal world, we would backpack for 3 months at a time once we start our retirement. We would return home for a rest and go again for 2-3 months at a time. Whether our plan will be realised remains to be seen, but our want is to travel like this until we want to stay home and live a quieter life. Obviously the longer travels would be in cheaper countries and we would do short trips for the expensive parts of the world to stretch our retirement income.

 How did you find it?  Do you rate the venture as “very do-able” in terms of both physical and financial angles?

It was a great trip, food fantastic, logistics easy, everything cheap with a relaxed view on regulations, ie the kids (we took our two teenagers) could go on a supervised scuba dive without any instruction/experiece and drive mopeds. You avoid talking politics to the locals and wonder at the corruption (ie the tour bus is pulled over and the driver hands cash over to soldiers). The beaches are disappointing (nothing like Thailand), a huge amount of (touristic) development in the big coastal towns and a vast number of overweight Chinese and Russian tourists. (ie the rich!), who the locals seem to just about tolerate...But the local people/food/weather/history/natural beauty massively over compensate for any short comings once you leave the big towns.

One unforseen issue, trains aren't big over there, they use modified overnight sleeper buses, faster, cheaper, more reliable and more frequent, but the couchettes are designed for people of max height 5'6....Next time we'd probably use more internal flights...

We did the same trip, Hanoi to Saigon...

hostertlady

I have enjoyed reading this thread and pop in every now and again, I have no desire to do a 'round the world cruise' once retired.
My hubby hopes to retire at 63 ( feb 2025).. I am already retired but am busier than ever with 3 Grandaughters, cats, and friends to fit into my days..
Its our 40th wedding anniversary next year so we plan to do something, not sure yet.. 
But those of you with 'Grandparent  duties' how the heck do you manage to go off for weeks at a time? Maybe it's me ( holding myself back? putting others before myself etc)

Albermarle

But those of you with 'Grandparent  duties' how the heck do you manage to go off for weeks at a time? Maybe it's me ( holding myself back? putting others before myself etc)

You can add to 'Grandparent duties' any type of family caring responsibilities. Such as dealing with elderly parents, family members who have physical or mental health problems, learning or physical disabilities etc

 Or even just having a dog, or a regular commitment to almost anything.

Just having the finances to go on extended holidays, does not necessarily mean you can, even if you want to.

robatwork

hostertlady said:

I have enjoyed reading this thread and pop in every now and again, I have no desire to do a 'round the world cruise' once retired.
My hubby hopes to retire at 63 ( feb 2025).. I am already retired but am busier than ever with 3 Grandaughters, cats, and friends to fit into my days..
Its our 40th wedding anniversary next year so we plan to do something, not sure yet.. 
But those of you with 'Grandparent  duties' how the heck do you manage to go off for weeks at a time? Maybe it's me ( holding myself back? putting others before myself etc)

I'm not a grandparent myself (hurry up if you're one of ours reading this!) so this may sound harsh but surely the whole POINT of grandparenting is to help out/get pleasure from your grandkids without the responsibility of being a parent? The people who look after your grandkids are their parents, unless your "duties" are actually officially in loco parentis?

If indeed your offspring has never looked after their own children continuously and solely for a few weeks, then I think it's actually beneficial for you to go away and not be always available - you're a privilege not a right.

barnstar2077

As I always say to people who are selfless to a fault, you can't look after others if you don't also look after yourself!

Getting away and recharging your batteries if you like to travel, especially for important anniversaries or birthdays, sounds pretty sensible to me.

Edit:  Not that I will be doing much travelling, with my pauper credentials.  I just want to be able to afford to stop working and not be at the mercy of the company's next brilliant idea!