Along the Gringo Trail

My husband said to me one day "do you want to work another 15 years before retiring or would you rather retire now and find a way to do it cheaply." I said "where are we going and when?" This led us to a year long journey of exploring some of the top retirement destinations in the world before choosing Panama. I always seemed to have a knack for writing but life got in the way and I never found the time to sit down and do it. One day my husband stumbled upon something I wrote and said "wow, you write well and need to start doing this again." I wrote well as a teenager and was steered into a journalism career only to discover that was not the type of writing that I enjoyed. Instead I enjoy writing straight from the heart about myself and other people that I encounter along the way. What makes people tick fascinates me as does places we go to meet them. And so began our blog of our pending move to Panama, the road blocks along the way and the hurdles we had to jump over to move our lives overseas. Relocating to another country is NOT for everyone and we are still in the infantile stages ourselves. We approaced this move with open minds, open hearts and open arms. We have been willing to embrace ALL that Panama has to offer, even though it's much different from that of the United States. Blogging has been rewarding and also a way to keep in touch with those we left behind back in the states. I expect my experiences to be compiled into other publications to offer to ex-pats that may wish to follow along our trail. We are two adventurous, crazy gringos making our way in a world so different from the one we left behind. Life is too short to sit around waiting for something to happen. By moving to Panama we were able to retire in our 50's, learn a new language, make new friends, have good cheap healthcare and live on much less money while having the time of our lives.