My husband Ed and I will be joining the class of 2016. It wasn't really in our plan to retire for a few years yet but work and life changes have sped up the process. Who are we to question if life wants us to retire and travel sooner? We have sold the house within the family and hopefully that goes through without any major hiccups. If all goes well we will make our first trip from Northern California to the Quartzite rally. We are still trying to decide which 5th wheel we are going to buy. We have narrowed it down to a few! We may start out briefly in our travel trailer until we buy. There are so many details to work out yet. Health insurance is a major concern we need to figure out as we are still a little over a year from Medicare. I really do not want to have a yard sale as it just makes me crazy to have people want everything for nothing. I would rather give the majority away and take the tax write off. We have made many trips already donating to a local charity. So far it has been easier than expected to let things go, it seems like the possessions were just weighing us down. Our biggest issue has been our family not wanting us to go. We have elderly parents who are healthy and self reliant but just don't want us to leave. We have endlessly explained that we will be back frequently to visit and are really just a plane ride away in an emergency. We do have many other family members close by if needed. We also have grandchildren (9, 12 and 13) that are hard to leave for weeks at a time but look forward to them making trips with us. Even though we have always loved travel and camping our family just can't understand why we would want to give up our home and live in an RV. I've decided that if they don't get it, they just won't. We will have a small storage unit for a year to see if we want to buy a sticks and bricks home base or not. Well, hopefully that is not too much information! I look forward to meeting everyone on the road.
Beth
