SMART TRAVEL – THIS IS NO TRAVEL CLUB

So, here is the plan. We have decided for our 30^th wedding anniversary, we would re-visit Pays. Gloria’s favorite City in the World. I do love it too. Well we started planning about February 2014, and plan to travel in Mid-September and stay about 20 days.

That was the original plan. Now the plan, as all my travel plans do, have changed completely. We have gone from a nice long vacation to Paris to a plan to see if we can find living in Paris an actual possibility. I know what you are thinking, what a romantic idea, ok, maybe you are thinking, how you can live in Paris without a bunch of money.

Now, we are not rich, nor did I do a very good job of saving for retirement. Give me a break, I have been a small businessman for the last 30 years, and there have been good times, great times, and some really grapping times. Well of course, that let me to a burn and bust cycle of living high, then living low. Net result, not much in retirement.

Oh, well, I also, do not worry about that too much, I have my health, and I have Gloria, and some great kids, and grand kids. I have faith that all will be fine.

I mean 3 years ago, I could barely turn on a computer, now I love the computer, the internet, and all the possibilities it provides. It really is in some regards like a high tech gold rush. It is just finding the gold that can be tricking.

Well, I have completely digressed from the topic.

So, the plan is to rent two apartments (one on the left bank; one on the right bank), attempt to live like locals and see if we like it. So, I plan to explore long-term rentals while we are there, keep track of all money spent to determine an actual cost of living, and to generally see if Gloria and I could actually live in Paris. Oh, I plan to meet up with other ExPats, and generally figure out long term living conditions.

So, I plan to document the planning for the trip and during our trip to post both posts and videos of what is happening and how we are doing.

Oh, to add to the travel plans, our former neighbor, Jill, several years ago, with her husband and young daughter, retired and Jill and family moved back to a seaside city in Turkey, Bodrum. Gloria and Jill have recently reconnected via Skype (I will be talking a lot about this amazing communication system in future blogs), and now we are going to spend a week in Turkey. I convinced Gloria that if we are going to Turkey, we must spend at least 3 days in Istanbul. She agreed and so we will be sending internet postcards to all of you from there.

So, that is the plan and I will keep you posted. Feel free to comment on what aspects of the planning or trip itself you would like to hear more about.

Till next time,

Bonjour