Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Welcome to the forum! Sounds like a fascinating backstory. I hope you start a journal. It is a great way to engage with others and continue down the ERE path.

Well done! Looking forward to a future update with photos of art on the walls.

over the last 12 months I have taken 5 MILLION steps. This sounds like the ideal way to celebrate financial independence and your youth. Hopefully you'll be keeping up the same pace in 30 years! You are at least 1.5 million ahead of me based on my rough calculations :D Also, props on the good sleep...

When I was time rich and limited on cash in my early twenties, I found traveling up and down the coast between Vancouver BC and Portland Oregon was quite affordable on Amtrak if I selected certain times/dates/routes. A train ride on a Tuesday afternoon from Seattle to Portland might be 75% cheaper t...

@2b1s - that is a helpful reframe in terms of the magnitude of changes I've experienced in the last few months. In terms of planning and experience, I gravitate towards keeping the itinerary somewhat open-ended to allow for additional flexibility. DW and I found this worked better than over-planning...

Reflections on some of the downsides of travel: I thought I would take a little time to reflect on some of the downsides of travel and nomadism. DW and I are doing exactly what we planned, and are experiencing some stunning natural areas and cities. All of this at a fraction of what we would pay ba...

Travelling is certainly more work than being rooted somewhere with systems in place. I'm looking at this as a period of time to try new things out, I felt like I needed a phase like this before I settle back down again. I'm also experiencing this first hand. I think it is easy to underestimate the ...

What do others experience? The most dramatic one for me was experiencing mega-fires erupt in the northwest US every year, often leaving my city filled with acrid smoke for months. While I knew it was a possibility, it was certainly an unpleasant development and a younger WRC always thought the risk...

Well.... It has been more than a week since @theanimal released his new book. I'm going to take the liberty and create a new thread to promote it. I think it is worth celebrating when someone from the ERE community achieves something of this magnitude. Here are details on how you can find a copy if ...

Three Months of Nomadic FI: We've been on the road for three months now! Vietnam has delivered beyond our expectations for culture, value, and quality of life. We are currently in Nha Trang and really like it here. I'm typing this from a high-rise condo looking out at blue and turquoise water towar...

Mastering vegan cheese sounds like a good goal for skillfest!

Have you tried making a vegan pesto with cashews? When we were growing a lot of basil we made it with almonds regularly, and tried it with walnuts as well. Not quite as good as pine nuts, but still did the trick at a much cheaper price.

This is great, thanks for the writeup! Considering all of the interest in building IRL community around this forum, it seems only logical to learn from the successes and missteps of MMM. Seems like he's been working on a similar project for almost a decade now. [*]He said his forums tend not to be a...

The first two variables I'd consider when purchasing property are whether it is located in flood plain, and what is the water source. That is true for rural or urban property. As Mark Twain said - "Whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting" One could argue that the SW is a uniquely id...

If you have any good vegan cashew recipes / uses, please send them my way. I don't have our recipe books on hand, but DW makes a killer granola with cashews, dried cranberries and coconut. Cashews also make for the best vegan cheese, so there are probably endless options to put that to use if you m...

I'll put a plug in for Lancaster, PA and some of the surrounding towns. I live on the family farmette in the countryside. Lancaster is No. 1. retirement destination according to U.S. News & World Report. Christopher McDougall, author of Born to Run, talks about moving to Lancaster County in his...

Continue rambling but perhaps related to above: I talked already a couple of times with DW of planning a trip alone, like the one at AH later this year or the ERE Europe meetup. DW encouraged me to take the step and go ahead. So, I planned an overseas trip to meet some (old) friends and forum membe...

Congratulations! The property sounds like a great buy. It seems like it represents an ideal outlet for a lot of your extra time and energy after finishing up with your job. I hope this is the beginning of many exciting new adventures for you.

Any recommendation for a cadence of things to learn would be great. YT channels, reading material, etc... I'm probably not the best to offer advice, as I've never taken formal lessons, don't read music, and pretty much just found my own way through YouTube and playing with friends. @Idave, Gin&...

Thanks for the update. I'm curious how I'll experience Bali as it has been on the travel bucket list for a while. Based on your feedback, I worry it sounds like the equivalent of Phuket in Thailand, which doesn't really interest me. Nonetheless, the flights have been booked for a few months and we p...

@gp - that is a great point. Making your own music or, even better, making it with others is WL 7+ on the musical Wheaton Scale. It is something that transcends language and culture. It has the potential to open a lot of doors. Last night I met a Vietnamese guitar player with a classical, nylon stri...