First stop San Juan, Puerto Rico.

We’re on a plane to San Juan, Puerto Rico and we are a little emotionally hung-over from the parties our friends and family have thrown for us, and from the incredible stress of actually leaving everything behind.  Our tickets to San Juan are one way.  We are renting an apartment in Old San Juan for a few days and then getting on a ship for Spain where we will be taking a twelve week intensive course in the Spanish language.  This was the beginning of a whole new life.

Our goal is to live “in the world”, see places we haven’t seen, meet different people that speak different languages and have different cultures.  It is surprisingly difficult to wind up your affairs in order to live abroad extensively.  We hoped we had been successful and knew that only time would tell if we had missed anything important.

It’s a muggy, dark April night when we finally arrive in San Juan.  We have to travel heavy when we move since it is everything we own (four 50 pound duffle bags and two 20 pound backpacks).  The taxi driver takes us to pick up the keys to our apartment.  Our landlord Gaby has been wonderful and has made arrangements for us to collect the keys to the apartment at 11 p.m. on a Thursday night.  Then we’re off to the apartment.

The outer gate to the apartment is locked and barred but the keys work fine and we step into a lovely inner courtyard to the sound of a running fountain.  Our apartment is on the second story which is accessed by a steep, winding, stone staircase.  In some places the stone is broken and dangerous if one were to step wrong.  Mike’s job is to carry the heavy duffle bags up this staircase.

When we get everything in we are covered in sweat.  We have rented a small, one bedroom apartment right in the center of “old town”.  There isn’t much to it…a living area with a small couch and bookshelves, an attached kitchen with a small dining table, a small bedroom with built-in closet space and a functioning bathroom.  Much bigger than a standard hotel room and right in the location we wanted!  It is clean and has everything we need to live for a few days.  The front door has swollen from the humidity and doesn’t open or close easily and we soon find that the French doors to the balcony have the same problem.  Interestingly, the apartment had air conditioning but we never felt the need to use it.  We just opened the French doors in the bedroom and the salon and let the island breezes cool us off……perfect.  There was certainly a bit of street noise but we slept right through it that first night.

There are only a couple of large hotels in the old part of San Juan, and we did not want to stay in the areas where they were located.  We wanted to be where real people are living and the hotels we could find in the Old San Juan area were very expensive boutique hotels with a small number of rooms.  We had discovered HomeAway.com and it lists apartments for rent (generally a four night minimum but you can find lower minimums) by private individuals; fully furnished of course.  An apartment just seemed right for us…..the price was certainly an improvement.

Our first full day in San Juan was wonderful.  As is typical for us, we walked entirely around the old city and started exploring within.  San Juan has an walled fortress and separate castle and beautiful ocean views.

San Juan, the capital of Puerto Rico,  is the oldest city in the American territories.

Like all “old towns” there is an incredible combination of old ruins and restored walls and buildings.  Beautifully maintained buildings stand next to crumbling, weed infested derelicts.  We wandered through the narrow streets, with their interesting bright blue cobblestones, grabbing a coffee at a stand in one of the plazas and enjoying the ambiance of a city we had never been in before.

Old San Juan is the historical center of the city.  It is a lovely warren of old homes, churches, government buildings and gardens with spectacular views every where you look. 

15 minutes outside of the old city you can find Condado Beach, tall hotels and apartment buildings on a beautiful Caribbean beach that reminds one of Miami Beach. 

There is a rain forest that is definitely worth seeing and a myriad of other interesting things on the relatively large island of Puerto Rico.  We chose to ignore the beach and the rain forest this trip, instead spending our four days in the old city.

By mid-afternoon we stopped at an outdoor bar, attached to a restaurant for a coconut rum.  This drink is made by removing a shot glass worth of milk from the coconut and replacing it with, of course, the rum of your choice. 

It has an interesting taste that is not for everyone and the locals swear this drink is good for the digestion (sometimes too good for the tourists if you know what I mean).  Our bartender Norman was wonderful and we returned in the evening, after a late afternoon nap, for further drinks and to sample some the restaurant’s island cuisine which was fantastic.

We met our friend Eddie near the port on the second day.  Eddie took us to the Don Q production facility to learn about rum production but most importantly, to sample some of the many different flavored types of rum.

  We passed a lovely day with Eddie wandering the old town and finished with dinner, drinks and cigars in an outdoor plaza.

  Eddie lives on the beach on the opposite side of the island and as we bade him farewell for the evening we agreed that our next trip to Puerto Rico would include a trip to his side of the island.

Our last two days on the island were punctuated by rain showers and featured wonderful seafood cuisine and cocktails made with rum.  We walked every street in the old city, occasionally stopping at an outdoor café for some food and/or a beverage.  We quickly discovered the difference between the tourist-oriented locations and the harder to find local facilities.  People everywhere were warm and welcoming, this island needs tourism and has a lot more to offer than some of the smaller Caribbean islands.

In hindsight, the old city can be explored sufficiently in two or three days but we used the extra time to make friends and decompress.  Wandering and enjoying this island paradise was just the way to embark on our new adventure.  Our final day dawned rainy and we caught a cab to the port to embark on our ship to Spain.

By the way…not a single Irish Pub to be found in Old Town San Juan or in the Condado Beach area, anyone looking for a business opportunity?

Now Arizona would b e where we came from....rather than home.

It was Monday, April 9^th and our plane to Puerto Rico left on Wednesday.  All we had left to do on Tuesday was sell the truck, pack everything we intended to keep, clean the condo, have all the left over stuff picked up, cancel our mail, cable and cell phones, donate the scanner (just finished scanning the last of the photos, whew!) and move to a hotel for an evening. 

We had decided to stay at the Twin Palms Hotel in Tempe for our final night in town (thanks so much Pat!).  That way we did not have to worry about getting to the airport in the early morning, the shuttle would take us.  We are not big on extended good-byes so it would be easier than having friends or family take us to the airport, we could enjoy their company on Tuesday night in the hotel bar and avoid any early morning drama at the airport.

Tuesday was a little less crazy than we thought it would be, we concluded a deal with a friend to sell the truck after listing it for a couple of weeks, unsuccessfully on Craigslist.  Resurrection Ministries came first thing in the morning so we were able to get everything out of the condo that wasn’t going with us.  We had been packing our bags for a week so there were just a few things left to pack.  We successfully checked the weight of the bags on the bathroom scale to be sure we would be okay at the airport, cleaned the condo and headed out to run the last few errands before checking into the hotel.

Marilyn went into the post office in person while I fielded a client call and waited in the parking lot.  Our purpose was to cancel our mail because any correspondence we needed to receive had been either changed to our permanent address or was being received electronically, successfully.  After about twenty minutes, Marilyn came out obviously suppressing laughter and when I terminated my call and asked why she told me what had happened.  Apparently, postal clerks are unprepared for a person who wishes to cancel their mail, permanently, with no forwarding address.  The clerk had to call a supervisor in order to determine if this could be done, which, after several minutes of confusion turned out to be possible.  There was no way we could explain why and the incident still provides a good laugh for us.

We made a quick stop at the Salon to have my hair cut very short, by our friend who has been cutting it for years, and were given a great going away gift, an electric hair clipper to take with us (this requires an understanding that Marilyn would be cutting my  hair in the future, very scary).  A quick stop at the Cox store to drop off the cable box and a run next door to the Verizon store to cancel our cell phone contracts and we were all wrapped up. 

As the beautiful Arizona sun began to set our family and a few close friends came by the hotel.  We commandeered half the bar and spent our time just chatting and enjoying each other, knowing that it would be an extended time before we would be back here for any length of time.  Some tears were shed as we said good-bye, especially to our girls, who we knew we would miss tremendously, but the anticipation of the journey to come was a great offset for them.

Ok, we have to admit, there was something we just couldn’t part with; our golf clubs, we left them with some very good friends (thanks Guy and Dee Dee) whom we did make time to have dinner with a couple of nights before we left.  We did however, get rid of substantially everything else and the feeling of liberation was incredible; and still is.

We do not have to pay property taxes, car insurance, homeowners insurance, or rent a place for our things.  We don’t have to register vehicles and our income taxes are very simple.  We only have to pay utilities in the small apartments or houses that we rent and make arrangements for health insurance wherever we stay.  We really don’t worry about theft because we don’t have anything worth more than a few hundred dollars.

80% of the stress in our lives had been eliminated and the rest was rapidly changing.

It was still pitch black outside when we got up in the morning to head out to the airport, the shuttle got us there in plenty of time and surprise, surprise the flight was leaving on time.  As we taxied down the runway the Arizona sun was just touching the valley.  We could not have asked for a more beautiful departure.

Why Fly?

Looking at retirement causes many changes in perspective.  One of the better changes is a relative lack of deadlines.  You have time!

Over the past ten years we have grown increasingly disgusted with the cost, the hassles and the state of airline travel.  Cancelled or delayed flights, baggage limitations, damage to and outright theft from baggage, seats built for dwarves, etcetera.  We have put up with this due to the necessity of business travel and the time limitations on our rare vacations.

Guess what!  No more business travel.  No more time limitations.  Our time is now our own.  If we can avoid an airplane ride, it just makes the whole travel experience that much better.

We have been destination cruisers for about 15 years.  For a while it was comforting to think that we only had to unpack once during our vacation and the ship was basically a hotel that followed us around.  Over time however, the ship became more of a tether pulling us away from places we wanted to be.  So, for a time, we stopped cruising, preferring to spend time in the places we wanted to go.

When planning our trip to Spain we were astounded at the cost of airline travel and dreading the idea of 20 hours of flying and airport connections.  On a whim we looked at repositioning cruises, since it was to be the springtime ships would be going from the Caribbean to the Mediterranean…seemed like a good fit for us.  We found several cruises from the east coast of the US or the Caribbean to ports all over the Med and were delighted by the low prices.  The perfect cruise for us left from San Juan, Puerto Rico and arrived in Malaga, Spain a 1.5 hour bus ride from Granada!  The cost for two people, in a balcony cabin for two weeks with several interesting stops when added to the cost of air travel to San Juan was less than the price of the economy class airfare to Spain!

Hmmmm, let’s evaluate. 

Two weeks of reasonably good food in several restaurants, a double bed to stretch out on, a private bathroom, maid service, 24-hour room service and entertainment all included.  Beverages of all kinds are available for purchase when you want them not when the flight attendant decides to visit you.  No jet lag?  Sold!  An added benefit; two weeks of living expenses are covered as well!  We were to stop in St. Thomas; St. Maarten; Lanzarote; Tenerife; Madeira and then made final port in Malaga, Spain.  We would arrive in Spain happy, tanned, well rested and ready to go.  Having energy from the first hour of the first day would be a first for us in Europe.

Another thing to consider, we were going to be in a state of near exhaustion from the last few weeks of getting rid of everything in our lives and saying good-byes to everyone.  Perhaps some "down time" on a ship on our way across the Atlantic would give us a chance to rest and catch our breath before beginning an entirely new life, in a new place, with a new language.

We booked it! It was an RCCL cruise on the Adventure of the Seas and we used vacationstogo.com to get the best deal.  Cost of air tickets to San Juan $189 each accommodations in Old San Juan for 4 nights $324, cruise in a balcony cabin for 2 weeks $799 each.  $2300 total for everything including meals….two one way coach class tickets to Madrid $2160, no contest.  Keep in mind that we knew we were going to spend money for food and drink in San Juan and for drinks and extras on the ship but these expenses were already in the regular monthly budget for living expenses, no matter where we are we will have to eat and drink.

If you have time and have the flexibility to travel whenever you choose, a cruise just might be the way to knock the longer flight segments from your travel and save your back from those awful airline seats.

Besides, isn’t retirement about not being in a hurry?

Buying into our wild idea completely.

Late summer turned out to be a time of momentous decisions for us.  The Peace Corps contacted us and asked if we would be willing to delay our service for a full year, to which we agreed.  With Marilyn’s accident it was going to be difficult to obtain medical clearance in time to serve earlier.  I was informed that since I had turned 50 I would need to have a colonoscopy in order to clear medical.  Oh joy!  At this point however, we were beginning to wonder if serving in the Peace Corps was actually going to be in our future given the delays in our medical clearance process.

As Marilyn continued to improve from her hand surgery and whiplash we began discussing what we would do if we were unable to serve in the Peace Corps or if our service was again delayed.  Trying to time the sale of our home and ridding ourselves of all the things we used every day was going to take time and it would be a process that once started, could not be stopped.  After much discussion, we came to the conclusion that we still wanted to live abroad, see the world and experience new cultures.  Our friends were beginning to think we were crazy at this point and some of them wondering why we would want to live abroad or spend so much time together.

What followed was a series of life changing decisions as we now bought into our wild idea completely.  We decided not to replace Marilyn’s car and instead try to share one vehicle.  This was going to require some serious coordination which we figured would be good practice for us.

We also decided to go ahead and put our house on the market and try to get it sold by the end of the year.  This would give us a time frame in which we could organize all of the other things we needed to do.  Most importantly, we made the decision that we were going to just go, rather than wait for the Peace Corps bureaucracy to drive our actions.

From our reading and research we had developed the thought process that we might be able to “follow the sun” by living in Europe during the summer and then in South America in, well, the summer.  We really hate to fly however but we had discovered this really interesting fact; cruise lines relocate ships from the Caribbean and South America to the Mediterranean in the spring and reverse this process in the fall.  There were some fantastic deals available that made a 3 week cruise cost the same as flying.  Since we would be in no particular hurry and the cruise provided the added benefit of covering 3 weeks of living expenses; this became one of our preferred travel strategies.

We then took a lovely 3 day break during which our friends from the TEFL course, Nathan and Frannie, visited us.  I’m not sure we got out of the pool other than to eat or sleep for those roasting hot late summer Arizona days.

 Both Nathan and Frannie were freshly returned from several months in Granada and we were able to catch up on the news of our other friends there.  We really missed Granada!

Back to work, put the house on the market and immediately we found we needed to make several more important decisions.  Where were we going to go?  When were we going to go?  How were we going to get there?  What were we going to do when we got there?  It may sound like we really had no plan at all but that wasn’t true; it was the details and advanced planning required that we really needed to address and all of these details dovetailed with each other.

By early fall and after hours of discussion we decided to begin this adventure with a return to Granada, Spain and take Spanish language classes.  It made sense to us to try to acquire another language and Spanish is spoken in a lot of places in the world that we wanted to experience.  Now began the research on language schools in Granada (there are over 40).  We were familiar with Castila because they provided space for our TEFL program and we knew they were a quality program.  While they weren’t the cheapest program there was the benefit of familiarity for us and they would be able to arrange housing for us until we were able to find a place.

Now we had to decide when.  That would be determined to a large extent by our travel schedule because Castila initiated beginner level classes every other week.  We had put this largest of decisions off as long as we could.  It was time to commit…. so we signed up for classes beginning in early May and committed to an intensive course for 12 weeks.  We found a 2 week cruise that left San Juan, Puerto Rico (a place we wanted to visit) in mid-April and traveled to Malaga, Spain which is only an hour and a half from Granada by bus.  We wanted to spend a few days in Old San Juan and by working backwards like this our departure date was identified.  Our departure would be on April 11^th; my birthday.

We put the house on the market and decided to join a very interesting group called InterNations that was forming a new Phoenix chapter.  InterNations is a networking group for people who are either living abroad or simply interested in traveling abroad.  It is a group of widely diverse people of many different nationalities and they are a friendly group of people.  In fact, not long after we joined we were contacted by an American who had been living in Granada for 3 years offering whatever assistance or guidance she could.  Amazingly, it turned out she worked for Castila and her assistance was both invaluable and appreciated.  Gracias Allison.  Te echamos de menos.

We felt were definitely on the right track, and the train was now running at full speed.

Granada, for the first time....

Arriving in Granada in the pouring rain at seven in the evening wouldn’t be any fun even if you knew where you were going and how to get there, which we didn’t.   We had arranged our accommodations through the TEFL school and were a bit nervous; we had made the very conscious decision to “go local”.  We had booked into their version of a “boarding house” called the “residencia”.  We had been able to secure a bedroom that had its own private bathroom attached but knew that the rest of the house for the most part was bedrooms with shared bathrooms in the hallway.  We would be sharing a kitchen and living area, an experience we had never encountered before and which we expected to be a significant learning experience.

Knowing only that it was located in the oldest part of the city, the Albayzin, in a renovated 16^th century building with tiny narrow streets that were like a labyrinth, being tired and carrying baggage we did the only intelligent thing and decided to forgo trying to learn the bus system for another day and just take a cab.  Much to our dismay there were other passengers waiting at the cab stand but no cabs……in the cold and the rain.  In hindsight we think the couple of lone cab drivers that showed up in the next 10 minutes to take the first few groups of passengers into town must have just called all their friends told them to take their cars to the airport.  Eventually we got in a cab that did not have a meter, signs or anything that remotely made this late model Mercedes look like a cab but the driver was taking us to town so off we went.  Stupid, but at the time there were not many alternatives.  We made it to our destination 45 minutes and 35 euros later, should have been 30 minutes and 20-25 euros but, what did we know?               

Thankfully the rain had stopped while we were in route and we were let off right in front of a big archway that led to what looked like a church with a big wooden door to the left that turned out to be our destination.  The residencia had originally housed a seminary and was where the young monks lived while preparing to enter the order.  The area had originally been part of a Moorish palace complex built in the 11^th century but that was destroyed by the Christians at the end of the 15^th century.  The monastery was built on the location in the 16^th century.

The architecture still carried the Moorish flavor and featured very thick walls to keep the heat in or cold out depending on the season.  When we entered the building it immediately charmed us with an inner courtyard that had a fountain and plants and that would be open to the sky three stories up when the weather was nice.

It was larger than we expected and as Antony, our contact from the school, showed us around we found that the building had a rooftop terrace with the most spectacular views of the Alhambra that we could imagine.

Our room was tiny with two twin beds that we made into a king, a small nightstand and a small desk.  All of the furnishings were very rustic antiques in keeping with style of the building.  The room had one window that opened into the interior courtyard but not to the outside.  The bathroom - a sink, toilet and shower crammed into less than 5 square feet was surprisingly functional.

The entire Albayzin , this oldest area of the city, is a protected UNESCO World Heritage site.  This means that no updating or remodeling can be done without very a very rigorous permitting process which makes it very time consuming and expensive.  Everything has to be done to protect the integrity of the original structures and this means that the foundations cannot be dug up and new pipes put in underground unless the old clay pipes fail and there is absolutely no other choice.  We discovered that this meant no paper of any kind goes in the toilets.  Every toilet has a basket next to it with plastic bags and you NEVER flush toilet paper… talk about new experiences.

Antony explained the cardinal rule of never getting lost in the Albaizyn.  You can only go two directions, up or down, no matter how far to the right or left you go you will always be able to find your way to your destination within a few minutes’ walk.  He walked us to the school; 2 minutes away so that we could find our way to class and showed us the most common way down to town so we would not get easily lost.  While in town we picked up a few basic supplies fearing that everything would be closed the following day, Sunday, and then got settled in.  Our house manager was a lovely little Ecuadorian lady who spoke no English at all but was more than able to make you understand her meaning when it came to the rules of the house.  She showed us where to store our stuff in the communal fridge and cupboards and we learned that in addition to the TEFL students there were other residents in the house, some for short stays others as longer term boarders.

Sunday we walked around the area in the daylight to get oriented and discovered that “everything is closed on Sunday” doesn’t really mean “everything”, we had a meal in a charming little restaurant near the church San Miguel Bajo and picked up a few more supplies for the kitchen.  Our fellow students were arriving and we had an orientation meeting scheduled that evening at 8pm.  This was our first real experience with people who live on a Spanish schedule and for them, 8pm is not considered late for a meeting to start.  Orientation was, as most are, 2 hours of information that could have been covered in 20 minutes, but then we did get to take a lovely group walk to the Mirador San Nicolas to see the Alhambra all lit up for the evening and we later stopped at Bar Kiki for a drink and a tapa before heading back to bed.  Granada is just about the only city left in Spain in which tapas are free when you buy your drink.

We were definitely the old folks of the group; our fellow students were significantly younger than us, all under 35 and most under 30.  Ten students, from 5 countries, it was quite a mix.  The young enthusiastic energy that this group created was great for us, and everyone was very accepting of each other, so it was with a very positive outlook that we all got ready to begin classes at 9:30 Monday morning.

First steps

One of the things we talked about was the possibility of serving in the Peace Corps for a couple of years when we were ready to retire.  This idea appealed to both of us and sounded like an ideal way to begin our retirement.  Initially we had planned to retire in our early sixties.

We looked long and hard at the Peace Corps and found positives and potential drawbacks.  We could serve together and it wasn’t unusual for people with more “life experience” to serve (5% of volunteers are over 50).  After attending a couple of recruiting meetings we were more or less convinced that this was something we could do.

As we evaluated other parts of our lives including downsizing our home and simplifying  our day-to-day existence we started to think: “Why not now?”  We could sell or lease our house while serving and restart our lives when we returned.  Perhaps the perspective we would gain while serving in the Peace Corps would help us determine the next direction for us. 

The application process; what can I say?  The Peace Corps application process is designed for the recent college graduates that make up the vast majority of their applicants.  Imagine finding dates, locations and physician names for vaccinations or surgeries that occurred 35 to 40 years ago, and getting transcripts from every university where you ever took a class. Then there’s the reference letters.

Reference letters are supposed to come from recent work or volunteer supervisors, kind of difficult when you been self-employed and haven’t had one for over 25 years.  Additionally, a personal reference letter is required, that’s the easy part…just gang up on your friends and see who is willing to put in the time required to fill out the online reference form sent out from the Peace Corps and answer all their questions about you.  Our friends, well you’d have to know our friends.  They could do more damage than help all in the name of humor or, alternatively, would be very uncomfortable or unfamiliar with the type of evaluation asked for.

We fought our way through the application process completing and submitting them in less than 5 weeks.  Las, our wonderful recruiter, explained many things to us about serving together and having significant “life experience”. Turns out it is difficult for the Peace Corps to place a couple together because they must match both of your skill sets with positions that come available, simultaneously.  This can take some time.  Although we both have quite varied skill sets the programs only classifies or needs a few.  To facilitate the selection process we decided to add to our skill sets whenever possible.

But what skills do you add to a lifetime of business and non-profit experiences?

As part of our research into retiring and living abroad we looked at ways to earn money or make a living overseas.  There are more alternatives than we originally thought.  One thing that made a lot of sense for us and that fit into the Peace Corps model was obtaining a TEFL (teaching English as a foreign language) certificate.  Teaching English, especially the TEFL method is utilized by the Peace Corps and is in demand worldwide.

TEFL certification courses are taught all over the world.  From a personal growth standpoint, we wanted to spend some time on the ground, living in a different culture where we didn’t know the language and would be required to learn some, and where we had never been before.  Kind of a “stick our toes in the water” approach before taking on a Peace Corps assignment.

We had always wanted to go to Spain….