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In 1991 Billy and Akaisha Kaderli retired at the age of 38. Now, into their 4th decade of this financially independent lifestyle, they invite you to take advantage of their wisdom and experience.

Travel Smarter Not Harder: Tips for Seasoned Globetrotters (50s, 60s and 70s)

Billy and Akaisha Kaderli

Billy and I have been on the road meandering through continents for over three decades. While we like to think of ourselves as spry, flexible and ready to take on the world, truth is, we are no longer twenty or thirty years old. Traveling in our 70's presents challenges that we didn’t have when we were younger. Energy levels have changed and our bodies require different comforts in order to feel well.

If you are in your fifties, sixties or seventies with active wanderlust, independent journeying is still possible. Take advantage of what we have learned over the years.

Prioritizing Rest for Older Adventurers

As seasoned mature travelers, we've learned that sleep is the ultimate travel hack for older explorers.

Skipping sleep, especially on long flights or when adjusting to new time zones can create havoc in moods, energy level and even decision making. Whenever possible we no longer take red-eye flights. Air travel has become more complicated in recent years and it's enough to handle the new requirements, the lines, and the disorientation of time zones without adding severe sleep schedule interruptions. Besides, what's the rush?

A well-rested brain is a clear-thinking brain. Proper sleep fuels your energy levels too. Travel can be stressful and sleep deprivation just amplifies it. Getting enough rest keeps your mood balanced, and that's a good thing.

Senior couple in Sorrento, Italy

Billy and Akaisha in Sorrento, Italy

Also, we don't push ourselves and we schedule rest days. Sometimes an afternoon nap is the height of luxury, and can be the pick-me-up needed for the rest of the day, especially if there is an evening event planned. We’re retired, so why not enjoy it? Allowing time for rest instead of continuous motion can be delicious.

Now we allow two down days to get organized and rested after a long-distance trip. This means we learn about our neighborhood, do some food shopping and just get settled into our new place. Sightseeing, museums and other attractions can wait until we are ready. 

In years past we’d blow into a new location without a care, knowing we would find some kind of hotel arrangements. Now, we are more inclined to reserve a room for our first night in a new city or town, or at least have a definite address where our taxi can take us. Once we arrive, we can scout out a more suitable hotel if we aren’t pleased with our first choice. We also check the beds for firmness, get a quiet room off the street if possible and we pay a bit more for better quality.

For our last two trips to Europe we fully booked everything in advance. It was too risky to show up only to find many places booked.

Senior couple in Chacala, Nayarit, Mexico

Billy and Akaisha in Chacala, Nayarit, Mexico

Fueling the Machine

We don’t skip meals and run on empty.

Solid, quality, protein-based meals and snacks have always been a focus for us. We’re the machine that makes our lives run, and this machine needs proper fuel. Light-headedness, indecision and fatigue due to lack of nutrition contributes to needless bickering and is something we avoid at all costs. Why make things harder on ourselves?

We are sure to eat at regular intervals and to bring travel food with us on buses, trains, planes and - even if we don't use it - we have it stocked in our hotel fridge for another time. Many times we just want to relax in the room first and having something to eat is a major plus. Dehydration is another important consideration and we remember to bring bottled water with us wherever we go.

 

 

 

 

 

Divide up Duties - Teamwork Makes the Travel Dream Work

We travel full time, and it's more pleasurable when duties are shared.

Destinations and travel routes must be determined, and figuring out which sort of transport we'll take and whether or not visas are required all need to be researched. Tickets might have to be purchased ahead of time, lodging located, and arrangements for financial management to cover expenses while on the road has to be thought through. Even packing travel food is an essential element of successful journeying. In your partnership, decide who will take care of what, realizing that each of these categories is important.

Consider other travel necessities like local currency exchange, and cell phone plans and the ability to connect to the internet.

Senior couple in Cefalu, Italy

Billy and Akaisha in Cefalu, Italy

When we leave our hotel room we have a system that prevents sour surprises.

Billy goes down to firm up our bill, and I do a "room check" or "walk through" before we turn in our keys. I look under the bed, in all the drawers, in the bathroom, and on all the shelves to be sure we haven’t left something important behind. These days it can mean extra electronic cables, a router or phone chargers. This prevents lost and forgotten items from becoming an issue and interrupting our travel plans.

When we traveled through both islands of New Zealand on the Magic Bus, Billy would stay with the crowd to grab our luggage while I went ahead to choose our room and pay for it. This allowed us to get both the best choices of rooms and our bags without wasting time waiting in two lines.

When it comes to choosing lodging, we communicate together what we need and what we are looking for. Sometimes we want an apartment with a kitchen, lodging close to the train station or in the center of town for access to restaurants or museums. Other times we enjoy the full amenities of a hotel, maid service, a swimming pool and airport pickup.

It helps to be clear with each other and analyze what each location offers and how it fits the trip we have planned.

The Adventurer's Guide to Early Retirement, 5th Edition
A New Perspective

Commit to Paper Instead of to Memory

Making notes of where we have hidden our valuables in our home base location while we are on the road has proven important several times.

We write things down on lists instead of committing them to memory and we’ll email that list to ourselves so we don’t lose it. Being away from our home bases for months, even a year or more at a time, can cause us to forget our best and most secret hiding places. If we put our treasures or documents in such a good place that even WE can’t remember where they are, returning home can be a stress-filled event.

Now we simply check our list and refresh our memories.

Less Is More - Embrace Slow Travel

We are the "Less is More" type of traveler, and it is our emphasized style even today.

We don’t have to pack all the action into one day just so we can say we did it. Instead, we like our time to be leisurely, not jammed-packed with something new to do every 2 hours on the clock. Staying longer in one location and allowing more room for an event on our calendar can provide many rewarding surprises and allow pleasant detours to occur. In meeting other travelers, many times we learn about places we might want to go.

Senior couple in Brindisi, Italy

Billy and Akaisha in Brindisi, Italy

Consciously deciding to make our travel days shorter when we are on the road has proven to be rewarding also.

It still takes us close to thirty hours to get to Asia from our place in Arizona, but if we are traveling on the ground, we break up our destinations into manageable segments to make it possible for us to enjoy the journey itself. It’s not a race, and we’re not in competition with other travelers. We prefer this easy going approach.

For instance, while traveling by bus in Mexico we'll split up a 13 hour bus ride into a couple of days. This way we are not worn out for our destination, we don’t arrive late at night with all the problems that it entails, and we get to explore stopover towns along the way.

As you may have read before, we are Car Free so we utilize public transport or a ride sharing service wherever we go. Leaving the driving to others reduces our stress. We don’t have to worry about vehicle maintenance, where the next filling station is, if there will be a break down, how to fix our vehicle in a foreign country, or whether we have taken a wrong turn someplace.

 

 

 

 

Packing Makes Perfect

As seasoned travelers, we've learned that packing light and strategically is key to comfortable and efficient adventures.

These days we find ourselves enjoying day packs and a small rollie. The daypacks are lighter and easier to schlep around, and the rolling luggage can go in the overhead bin in planes. They are easily placed in the trunk by the taxi driver, or in the luggage area of the Premier Bus Lines we take in Mexico.

For efficiency and convenience, we place the same items in the same location in our luggage each time. There is no jumble. Knowing exactly where everything is minimizes lost or misplaced items, allowing us to relax and enjoy our travels. We are less likely to forget an item or misplace it, because it has its own spot.

The Adventurer's Guide to Chapala Living, 3rd Edition

There are many advantages of having daypacks with us. While on the road, we can can carry anything of importance close to us at all times. This may be our medicines, our digital equipment, our maps or travel food. Daypacks also make going to the market a breeze, as we can easily carry our items back to our accommodation.

Travel Tech & Tools: Staying Connected & Organized

Over the years, we have found that what we pack has changed also.

We have embraced technology and smart systems to stay organized and connected on the road. Personal devices ensure seamless communication and access to information. Vitamins, medications and health aids like a TENS unit are essential for maintaining well-being while traveling.

We use our online Yahoo! Calendar to mark important dates like visa renewals or when to catch that plane. We also send us reminders of automatic payments taken out of our accounts or when to send physical checks so that we can stay financially current.

We create our physical checks online through our Fidelity brokerage firm who then mails them out for us to the recipient we have selected. This same brokerage firm also has the money-saving service of refunding our ATM fees from each withdrawal, and that amount adds up over the year.

We also have a US-based phone number that we have purchased through Number Barn. With call forwarding, we can receive a message from anyone who calls us and then we can return that call the next time we are hooked up to the internet.

These days we also have an excellent mail service called Traveling Mailbox, which lets us know whenever we receive mail at our US located address. They will scan our mail and we can view it online from anywhere in the world. Or they will forward a parcel to any address we give them in any country we may be visiting. They will also deposit any checks that we might receive.

Senior couple in Matera, Italy

Billy and Akaisha in Matera, Italy

Travel Smart, Travel Safe: Daypack Security Tips

For safety, we place our valuables in a daypack and wrap them up with a PacSafe.

These PacSafes are rugged, made out of stainless steel cable and we connect the wrapped daypack to something permanent in our room. This might be some plumbing pipe, a wall attached TV stand, or an iron bed. While PacSafe helps, no method is foolproof. Remember to remain vigilant of your gear, money and passport, and avoid displaying valuables openly. Trust your instincts.

We’ve had 34 fruitful years of world travel and look forward to many more. Even though we have aged, and some of our methods and equipment have changed, we’ve adapted so that we can continue our chosen lifestyle with both pleasure and ease.

Remember, if we can do it, you can too!

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About the Authors

Billy and Akaisha Kaderli are recognized retirement experts and internationally published authors on topics of finance, medical tourism and world travel. With the wealth of information they share on their award winning website RetireEarlyLifestyle.com, they have been helping people achieve their own retirement dreams since 1991. They wrote the popular books, The Adventurer’s Guide to Early Retirement and Your Retirement Dream IS Possible available on their website bookstore or on Amazon.com.

 

Retire Early Lifestyle appeals to a different kind of person – the person who prizes their independence, values their time, and who doesn’t want to mindlessly follow the crowd.

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