In last weeks blog, we wrote in depth about the many highlights of our first year of early retirement from our teaching careers. We were amazed when reflecting back, just how much we have crammed into those 12 months including moving house and relocating to the Yorkshire Dales and over 23 weeks of travel!
In this blog we wanted to share that there have certainly been a few challenges for us along the way. Originally we were going to use the headings 'highs and lows' , however when we reflected on this we would say that we have not really experienced any real lows as such, just hurdles that were frustrating and needed to be dealt with.
Challenges
Stress doesn't go away, it just changes focus!
In our first few weeks after leaving our teaching careers of over 30 years we both had that feeling of trepidation that we were heading into the unknown. I think this was not particularly linked with early retirement, it was more to do with our relocation and renovation of the cottage which was a huge change in our lives after living in Cheshire for over 28 years.
The biggest stress was probably trying to keep the renovation costs on track with our budget. It was not easy moving to a completely new area and not having any connections with knowledge of local tradesmen. We feel that we were really fortunate with the team we finally selected who completed the whole renovations within a 6 week period (we did leave the house with the plaster drying for 4 weeks whilst we were in the USA). Ultimately, the renovations were more expensive than we originally budgeted, but we did have a contingency and did a lot of jobs ourselves to keep costs down. We kept to our main aim that we would be mortgage and debt free in our early retirement.
Living in a renovation project was a whole different challenge! We spent the complete winter from November in a house with a fire that we couldn't use as the local chimney sweep could not fit us in until February. We did have electric storage heaters that did keep the house reasonably warm through the night, but the stored heat would run out by 2pm and would not heat up again until after midnight! We spent the months of Jan - March with no electricity down stairs once the builders had done the structural work and replastering. it was only once the kitchen was fully fitted that the electricians came back in. All the hardships of living in a cold, barren house were soon forgotten and we now just rejoice at the beautiful home that we have made for ourselves.
Cost of living crisis
We probably early retired at the worst time financially due to the cost of living crisis which we could not have foreseen. Almost as soon as we completed on the cottage the energy crisis kicked in. Being in a village with no gas we rely solely on electricity. This did not have a massive impact on us last winter as we only had 2 economy 7 heaters working and we were away for huge chunks of time so did not have to heat the building. We hope we have made sensible choices in the renovations, installing a multifeul stove that should heat most of the house with energy efficient electric radiators as a back up if needed. Only time will tell as we head into next winter.
We have certainly noticed inflation and the cost of living and the impact of increased food costs. We find it tricky to keep to our weekly budget we had set, some of our staples have almost doubled on price. With us retiring at 51 we can't access our teachers pension until we are 55 so have no income for over 3 years! We just hope that our pot of money lasts us. We had always said that we can get part time jobs or could do temp jobs as a last resort so there is no ultimate disaster, we will just have to cross that bridge if we need to.
Living in a new community
We have been so busy in our early retirement so far that we have not really had time to commit to being part of our new community. We have been to a few social events that the village has held and met lots of really lovely people. Over the winter we hope to join a few social groups in the local area and hopefully be around more for some of the bigger planned events. Our immediate neighbours are very friendly and lovely people and have looked out for us over the last few months.
Lack of routine
Having not been in work for the past year, Richard says he has found the lack of a daily routine hard as he had 30 year of working to a timetable. He has slowly slipped into a retirement routine, particularly in the mornings as he still wakes up early (I can sleep for England!) Editing the YouTube Vlogs gives him a real focus to start the day. Don’t get us wrong, once I am up and about we are still enjoying the freedom to then decide how to spend the day if we have no plans, and there doesn’t seem to be that many days of no plans on our calendar!
Missing being close to mum
For over 25 years I have lived in the same town as my mum and although we never saw each other everyday, we would pop in to each others regularly. One of the considerations of where we moved to in the Dales was that we wanted to be within reasonable distance and travel time back to Cheshire so we could still make the journey regularly. One thing we are enjoying is that when we do see mum, we will go and stay for a couple of days and have nice quality time together as we have all the time in the world and don’t have to rush around anymore.
Early Retirement Surprises
Time flies when you are having fun
Our biggest surprise by far is how quick the past year has gone!!! We have had an action packed year, in last weeks blog I outlined the 23 weeks of travel that we have squeezed in amongst the renovation work.
Change in standard of living
We knew when we retired without an income that we would need to change our lifestyle significantly. We have never at any point seen that as a hard ship and so far have actually embraced the challenge. We are much more mindful when spending money, which is a good thing. We are much less wasteful and plan our food menu carefully making shopping lists so we only buy what we need. HOWEVER, the surprise is that we really value when we do decide to have a ‘treat’ of some sort and we are much more appreciative.
No time to work
We have been so busy in the past year that we keep asking ourselves how we ever found time to work!
Ever growing bucket list
Over the past year, we have truly embraced vanlife and getting out exploring. We cannot believe how much travelling we have already done! 23 weeks is pretty epic. Whenever we meet fellow travellers and chat about their adventures, we come away with more places added to the bucket list, and that’s just in the campervan. We are off to the US again with my mum in the Autumn, travelling through 7 states in an RV and I am sure that will give us a thirst for travel outside of Europe.
True Love
Having spent the past 12 months together pretty much 24/7, we have amazed ourselves that we have not fallen out at all! We are both quite laid back and placid which helps. We love the time that we spend together, even in the close proximity of the VW camper for 5 weeks at a time.
Never bored
We can honestly say we have never been bored over the past 12 months, infact we have only had a handful of days where we have not had anything planned or been busy. There have been occasions where I have craved a quiet day so I can lounge about and watch TV and just chill out
Not missed work
Although we both enjoyed our teaching jobs and had been at our schools for nearly 14 years each, neither of us has missed it. We thought we would miss the hustle and bustle of the day, the routine it gave us, the money we earned and the social interactions, but we haven’t. I particularly was very active in the school community and was treasurer for our PTA and had a good relationship with many of the parents and I do still keep in touch with some of them. It is the people we miss sometimes, not the job or the politics of education.
We are surprised that we have not found it as difficult as we thought it could be. There have been no tears so far (even with a relocation and renovation project) and we have had no ‘What have we done?’ moments. As one of our favourite country songs by the Zac Brown Band says “Life is Good today!’
What next?
Now that we have finished relocating, renovating and settling into retirement, most of our plans are based around travel and we are busy mapping out our future adventures. Having our campervan affords us the luxury of being able to escape at a moments notice when we spot good weather windows and affords us the freedom to travel on a very modest budget.
We are so happy that we can now have people at our cottage in the Dales so will plan to have visitors as much as possible. We love entertaining and Richard loves cooking so hopefully people will want to keep returning!
We will continue our weekly blog and documenting our early retirement adventures through our YouTube channel. Richard has treated himself to a new action camera to play with, which will keep him busy learning how to use it and edit the footage.
We write regular travel articles for VWBUS t4t5+ Magazine which we hope will continue and we have a commission for an article with another magazine documenting our American RV travels with my mum.
We want to get out and explore more of the Dales. We have not really been over to the East and Northern Dales and can’t wait to discover what is out there. We are also only an hour away from Ambleside and still have 98 Wainrights to scale!
In our quest to get more involved with the local community we want to join some local groups. Richard has already been to touch rugby and has befriended some cyclists that he met out on the bike last week who have encouraged him to join the Settle Wheelers. There is a wild swimming group and ladies cricket that I am tempted to join. We will look out for a photography group and I might have a look at the night class program at the local college as I would like to learn French and Duolingo is not really helping with the conversation side!
Our only major project around the house now is the garden, which we will start in the Spring apart from planting bulbs.
If you have not done so already, take a look at our previous blog in which we reflect on our highlights from a year of early retirement. We have also documented our thoughts in a recent YouTube Vlog
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMcwGeVybEU
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