Our retirement planning
Finances and our home
The plan seemed to be to retire at age 65, that’s when our NZ Government Pension kicks in, and it seemed like a logical starting place for the two of us. In the end it took me to being nearly 66 before I kicked the work habit, and have never looked back.
We had started some serious retirement savings provisioning in our early fifties, killing the mortgage, encouraging children to leave home, building up our superannuation.
At the same time we had also bought & renovated a property we knew we wanted to live in and enjoy in our retirement, so setting that up with things like:-
- One level living, if required
- No stair access, if required
- Stairwell wide enough for a chair lift
- No lawn to mow
- Plenty of storage for children’s and grandchildren’s gear
By our early 60s, we were a bit more focussed on retirement things and with the house now 10 years since renovation, we did a number of things:-
- Had the exterior and much of the interior repainted
- The main living area has a native timber floor, so this was sanded back and revarnished
- We had the roof cleaned
- And we took the opportunity of updating and downsizing motor cars
Our Health and Diet
Having worked in many parts of the world, and as was encouraged by our GP, we have had an annual medical check since we first left the U.K. in our mid 20s. With cardio issues prevalent in past generations of my family and getting to early 60s without too many issues, it was time to get a full Stress Tested ECG, etc etc, to reassure and to reassess.
This was valuable in getting a more precise BP Meds combination, and advise that the sooner I retired the better, lose the work stress, get a better diet and critically regular ie daily exercise.
Diet has never been a major issue for us, we eat heaps of fruit and veg, but I needed to cut down on my alcohol intake, and moved to 4 days – Thurs to Sunday, with alcohol and 3 days without. I have since moved to 3 days with, Friday to Sunday with and 4 days without.
Daily Regular Exercise
My wife and I love our sport, regularly exercise but with retirement ahead, really wanted to kick the actual exercising up a gear!!
Traditionally we have walked, swum, Pilates, tennis for my wife and cycling for me. So a good start.
To this we have added and embraced, Deep Water Running – once a week an hour session group class – just fantastic
We have also added a group class of TRX, which stands for Total Body Resistance Exercise, where one uses a strap suspended from above to perform a range of exercises. Ones body weight provides the resistance and it’s really hard work, but fun!
Our goals were to have at least one serious exercise routine every day in the week – Saturday is Pilates, Monday is Deep Water Running etc, and through this and better diet, to lose some weight, improve fitness , flexibility and balance.
Travel planning
First some lists
- Places to Go & People to see ( stay with & do stuff with), and How Long do we go for ?
- Key Dates of Events, Family weddings, Festivals and other time related things eg Northern Lights – November to February, Dutch Bulbs at Keukonhof – April, Tour de France Cycle Race – July , so the be aware of what is on and when.
- Your Home -what to do about the house we are leaving, maybe a house sitter, Sky TV, Car Insurance, Cars in Garage, Garden, Pets ( we have none), Fridge clean – Freezer, Burglar Alarm etc.
- What clothes, hats and shoes to take for the places we are visiting, eg Alaska Treks in Wilderness + Mediterranean Beach Holiday – general rules being use clothing layers and most places have Shops!!
- What Meds will we need for the time we are away – discuss with GP
- Other Stuff List – Travel Insurance, Mobile Phone Sims – sort before you leave or acquire on arrival,
- Draft Itinerary- we use a Word doc table or spreadsheet – my son wants us to save it to Google Docs so we can update it and all recipients then see the updates as they happen. I think we can do this.
- Final Itinerary – you may be using a Travel Agent to do all your bookings and they may produce this. We typically do not use Travel Agents, unless the travel activity is quite specialised eg Small Boat Alaska Explorations. Outside of that we really enjoy building our itinerary and in the end it has all our Trip Info we need. There are probably Apps for this, something to research.
Travelling in retirement some thoughts
Time
Now we are not working we have Time to Travel!!
This may be circumnavigating your own country, or it may be exploring the Pacific Coast of the USA. If finances allow, and they can be stretched often by booking well in advance, using AirBNB or Bed & Breakfast, rather than Hotels, then TAKE YOUR TIME!!!
Your Post Retirement Travels are no longer the annual family holiday to the beach, but your reward for years of work so do take your time and enjoy each destination as much as you can.
So the Trip does not need to be for the traditional week vacation, why not TWO MONTHS??? OR LONGER???
Plan and book well in advance
Our 2018 Trip of over 3 months to England, Madeira, Portugal, France, Corsica and Scotland was planned in 2017 with principle air fares, car hire and accommodation booked & deposits paid by Christmas 2017, saving money.
Our 2019 Trip will be over 4 months and again planned in 2018, with air fares, accomodation and car hire booked before the end of Feb 2019, again saving money and giving us access to more options, particularly accomodation. Note that often accomodation booked with AirBNB or Booking.Com, will either allow you to pay on arrival or split the costs with a deposit at time of booking, balance closer to arrival date, this helps with budgeting .
Up to now, April 2019, we have used Skyscanner extensively in planning air travel but prefer to book direct with the airline for booking certainty. Skyscanner seem to include the low cost carriers, eg Norwegian, EasyJet, RyanAir etc.
For car hire have found Auto Europe to be consistently great value and very hard to beat.
NB We have found it much more economic when booking car hire and considering their Insurance options to take the highest excess option, as we have Car Hire Excess Protection within our Travel Insurance. If you are at all unsure about this check with your Insurer or Broker on how this all works.
Accomodation
Over the last 5+ years we have used AirBNB in, New Zealand, Australia, Boston USA, England, France, Scotland, Corsica and to this in 2019 we will add mainland Italy , Greece and Sardinia.
The above are three examples of where we have stayed :-
Havelock in the Marlborough Sounds, South Island of NZ – three bedroom house, beautifully presented and very clean, with an amazing view
Lumio, north west coast of Corsica – village up on the hill, about 10 mins drive from the beach and 20 mins from Calvi. Spectacular sea and mountain views, two bedroom apartment. Owners lived below us , delightful retired restaurant owners, provide us with fresh vegetables from their garden and a lovely bottle of Corsican red wine
Portree, Isle of Skye – cosy super clean cottage, warm as toast, beautifully presented one bedroom, kitchen , bathroom and lounge. Views of the Black Cuillins in the distance and a ten minute drive into town.
Now we do use Hotels and Bed & Breakfast places but these are usually just for Short Stays – one or two nights, and that’s fine for us. It’s up to you.
We do find by staying in a property such as you can find in AirBNB that you get much more of a sense of the local place, and meet more local people than you will in a hotel.
And we think it’s much better value, and MORE FUN!
Problems get fixed
Using AirBNB so many times, we have had the odd hiccup, but they get fixed :-
Boston USA – it was a hot first week of July, the apartment air con was on, we turned on another appliance, and all the power crashed. No obvious sign of a fuse box, so a call to the apartment owner, clear instructions over the phone, sorted!
Montpellier France – arrived at our apartment, beautiful location overlooking a square in the inner city, great atmosphere, but on closer inspection the sheets and pillow cases were damp! Phone call to the owners representative, profuse apologies, rushed back to apartment and replaced with clean , dry linen and all sorted .
Lisbon Portugal – on arrival and met by apartment owner, it was clear that the cleaners had not been to service the place after the previous guests. Owner super apologetic, and actioned the cleaning service right away. We went out, had some lunch and on return all sorted, a nice bottle of Portuguese wine provided and half a days rental was refunded.
As an aside, this Lisbon AirBNB Host, at our request, had arranged for a driver to meet us at Lisbon Airport when we arrived, and then to take us to the apartment. Perfect as our Portuguese was limited, not expensive and a great service.
Using AirBNB
We like their property selection process. You select the location, insert your dates, use filters to specific things that are important eg air conditioning, lift access, wi fi etc. You can use the Map feature which shows you where properties are in an area, so that’s useful, if not always totally accurate.
Where we can we use Super Hosts, these seem to be extra good on service and cleanliness.
But the most critical thing for determining a property, is the Review left by previous users. These really tell you what you need to know, good but quite funny translation feature too.
It’s important when looking at the Reviews to consider the time of year you are staying at the property, and the time of year of the Review. Try and match them up, it can help avoid problems. For example we found a superb property in Sardinia, perfect in every way, it we wanted it at the end of the season in early October. An October review from 2018 warned that the property was lovely, but the village was dead and season was over. So, this one was not for us.
Our Travel Blogs
We wanted to share a little of the experiences we were having in our own retirement travelling with friends, family and anyone who wants information on the places we get to.
Each Blog will focus on a specific place or small area, with some pictures to help give the reader a perspective on it. They are not intended to be, “lonely planets”, nor to remove the need for maps, travel guides or any other resource you can find.
They will more often than not be smaller places out of the main tourist centres, and usually include our own wanderings as we explore in our own way.
Travels with My Wife 