IL Magazine + 101 Travel Secrets FREE!
Subscribe now for Instant Access about subscribing to International Living Magazine
Travel and Retirement magazines love to write about seaside towns like Viña del Mar, but if you’re craving an urban lifestyle, consider Santiago de Chile as an option for your retirement. If you’ve always been a city-dweller the easy access to shopping centers, dining out, urban green spaces, and the bustling energy of Santiago de Chile is a great option.
Julie May Locke, a 68-year-old Brooklyn native, never planned on living in the small, south-central Mexican village of Mitla, which is about a 30-minute drive from Oaxaca City. She had recently retired, and she needed a change—but this hadn't been on her radar until she realized exactly how priced out of life on the east coast of the US she really was.
We signed up on our first house-sitting website and created a profile that included our experience with animals, home ownership, photos, ages, occupation, and more. Literally, within a few weeks, we were offered our first sit in Ajijic, Mexico where we spent one month with a cat. The next month we were off to Ambato, Ecuador where we lived in the shadow...
Murcia is a city in south-eastern Spain, serving as the capital of the region of Murcia and its center of culture and history. Lying at the confluence of the Segura and Guadalentín rivers, in a fertile area known as the Huerta (orchard land), Murcia thrives in agriculture and tourism. Here are my picks for the top 10 things to do in Murcia.
Too many of us Americans will never afford the retirement we imagined, and which the American Dream promised when we were younger. The cost of living a typical American life today has exploded past anything resembling rationality and has taken expected lifestyle off the table for so many. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Mexico’s Oaxacan coast has a slightly more European feel than its Caribbean counterpart, which is predominantly frequented by North Americans. Here, it’s more of a mix of nationalities. In terms of age, there were plenty of retirees around, especially in Huatulco and Puerto Escondido, 60 miles eastwards, but the expats outside of those two main towns were on the younger...
“There’s a sense of community here,” one expat told me. “Colombians are the warmest and most welcoming people I’ve encountered in the 26 countries I’ve been to. They don’t have much money, but they’d give you the shirt off their back if you needed it.” Same question, a different expat’s answer: “What does Colombia have? You mean, apart from the affordability, and the perfect climate?
That successful American dream was killing me. So, my partner Michael and I decided to look elsewhere for our dream. A dream that would let us slow down and enjoy life. When our friends learned of our intent to retire early, outside the U.S., they looked at us askance and wanted to know why we would ever want to leave a life of success in the "good ol' US of A."
Europe’s beaches are as diverse as the continent itself, which makes it puzzling that the overwhelming majority of visitors to Europe choose the established beachside resorts of Spain’s Costa del Sol, Italy’s Amalfi Coast, or the primped and pampered sands of the French Riviera as their beach destination...
My husband, Warren, and I dared to have a dream: We wanted to travel through Europe as slow roving retired nomads, with our two dogs. We knew that traveling by plane repeatedly with a dog weighing nearly 30 pounds was just not feasible, so we decided we’d travel by car. I won’t lie. Being Americans, it was somewhat complicated and daunting to...