Blackmoor Vituperative

I have been looking at other places in earnest since early 2016, but have fantasized about it since the early 2000s. Places that have come and gone on my list of potential destinations are Mexico, Ecuador, Panama, the US Virgin Islands, and the Czech Republic (which I suppose is called Czechia now). Nowadays my short list is Nova Scotia (Canada), Portugal, and most recently Estonia. We’ve never actually been to Portugal or Estonia — by the time we became aware of those, our near-future travel plans had already been made (we plan trips at least a year ahead), and then travel ceased to be possible due to the pandemic.

Between the pandemic and the fact that we are far too comfortable in our current jobs (neither of which we could keep if we expatriated), I suspect we may have waited too long to leave. Which is … not sad, exactly. We are well off, and the problems of the USA are at arm’s-length for us. So it seems ungrateful to complain. But I wish we could leave. I don’t want to be here.

Panama is attractive due to its ease of immigration and favourable tax laws, but it’s too hot, too wet, and just as expensive as the USA. We are excluding it from consideration.

Areas of interest

• Boquete, Chiriqui

Pros for Panama

• Easy immigration
  • https://internationalliving.com/countries/panama/visa/
• No taxation of income from outside Panama
  • https://www.liveandinvestoverseas.com/country-hub/panama/taxes-in-panama/

Cons for Panama

• Cost of living is very close to that of USA
  • https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Panama/United-States/Cost-of-living
• Homes in Boquete are expensive
  • https://www.casasolution.com/category/rentals/
• Too hot, too much rain.
  • https://weatherspark.com/compare/y/20225~19385/Comparison-of-the-Average-Weather-in-Charlottesville-and-Panam%C3%A1

More information

• You can’t really trust what International Living says. They don’t outright lie, but they exaggerate the good parts and gloss over the bad parts. Also, they are relentless spammers.
  • https://internationalliving.com/countries/panama/boquete/

After several years of consideration (seriously — I started looking into this a little over five years ago), I have decided to exclude Ecuador as a possible retirement destination. It has its appeals, and for the sake of the people who live there, I hope it always will, but for me, the disadvantages are more than I am willing to bear.

Areas of interest

• Cuenca, Olon, Manta
• What is life actually like?
  • https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2019/05/05/retired-expats-in-ecuador-what-lifes-really-like-for-them/?sh=42a36d74150f

Pros for Ecuador

• Low cost of living (minimum budget for 2 adults at something close to $2,400 – $2,600 per month)
  • https://www.netcredit.com/blog/cost-comfortable-retirement-around-world/
  • https://mls-ecuador.com/en/real-estate/beach-houses-for-sale
  • https://vivatropical.com/ecuador/manta-ecuador/
• • Warm weather (too warm?)
  • https://weatherspark.com/compare/y/20225~18307/Comparison-of-the-Average-Weather-in-Charlottesville-and-Manta
  • https://weatherspark.com/compare/y/20225~19348/Comparison-of-the-Average-Weather-in-Charlottesville-and-Cuenca
  • https://weatherspark.com/compare/y/20225~18290/Comparison-of-the-Average-Weather-in-Charlottesville-and-Salinas
• • Beaches, mountains
• • No taxation of income from outside Ecuador
  • https://internationalliving.com/countries/ecuador/taxes/

Cons for Ecuador

• Spanish is the primary language
• Crime (mainly petty crime, like pickpockets) is a thing
  • https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/international-travel/International-Travel-Country-Information-Pages/Ecuador.html
• Taking anti-parasite medication every 6 months
  • https://storyteller.travel/antiparasite-amoeba-treatment/
  • https://melibeeglobal.com/blog/2015/07/real-talk-parasites-while-traveling-abroad/
• Lack of clean water
  • https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in_Ecuador
  • https://storyteller.travel/how-to-drink-the-tap-water-in-cuenca-ecuador/

More information

• https://immiguides.com/immigration-guides/ecuador/
• https://www.ecuadorexplorer.com/html/about_ecuador/immigration-visas.html
• https://www.internations.org/go/moving-to-ecuador/
• https://www.internations.org/go/moving-to-ecuador/working

Pros for Nova Scotia:

• Much cooler all year
• Physically easier to get to
• No need to learn a new language

• https://moving2canada.com/questions-moving-to-canada-from-the-usa/
• https://www.good.is/money/price-check-moving-canada

Pros for Portugal:

• Much milder winter weather, but still a bit cooler than Virginia in summer
• Bureaucratically easier to get to
• Part of the EU

• https://www.portuguese-nationality.com/residency/the-d7-visa-portugal
• https://internationalliving.com/countries/portugal/cost-living-portugal/
• https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/121515/how-much-money-do-you-need-retire-portugal.asp
• https://sirelo.co.uk/moving-to-portugal/

Pondering “pleasant” places to retire, and stumbled across Kelly Norton’s “most ‘pleasant’ days in a year” post. Rather surprised that southern Louisiana rates as highly as it does, by this criteria. Saddened, but not surprised, that New Hampshire rates so low. I wish I could enter my own criteria. I don’t mind precipitation, for example.

Southern Louisiana does look pretty good, except during the summer, when it’s uninhabitable. And of course southern California is a climatological paradise, but I don’t want to move back to California. Portland, OR is in the ballpark of Charlottesville, VA, but their “pleasant days” are spread evenly from May to October, while ours peak pretty sharply in May and September.

Susan suggested we might become migratory, traveling between North and South as the season change. Maintaining two residences seems like such a massive waste of resources, though.

Cuenca, Ecuador keeps looking attractive. Real estate and the cost of living are both affordable. … Or maybe not. Realistically, it’s unlikely we will move away from the USA.

I realized yesterday that I don’t want to move to somewhere I have already lived. I think of that as moving backward. It occurs to me that this is not how most people think.

Also, I would really like to move somewhere not populated by ignorant bigots and ruled by a death cult.

Nova Scotia has an average of 8-10 feet of snow annually, which is too much for me. So retiring to Cape Breton Island is out. Retiring to Cape Breton Island is still a possibility.

Looking at the countries on this list, Cuenca (Ecuador) is still high on my list, because of the climate, the cost, and the existing expatriate community. Boquete (Panama) is a strong second, and Panama (for the moment) makes it very easy to obtain permanent residency. Mexico (Guanajuato or San Miguel de Allende) would be a third choice: it’s easy to emigrate there, and like Panama and Ecuador, it rates pretty well for health care and medicine. And it’s a lot closer to the USA, in case we want to come back for visits.

A lot of the other places listed in the attached link sound great in most respects (like Malaysia), but are just too warm for me, while others sound great in most respects but are too expensive for me to consider retiring there (such as Ireland).

The first step will be visiting one of these places to see if we actually like it there. Anyone up for a group vacation in 2017?

I need to remember to check on the internet speed, cost, and reliability in these places.

Update: Internet in Cuenca seems decent. Netflix and Hulu are available, but require a VPN. In Boquete, there appear to be a number of high-speed internet providers, but Netflix and Hulu are only available through a VPN. Guanajuato also has high speed internet, and again, a VPN appears to be needed to access Netflix and Hulu.

Reading the “Gringos Abroad” blog (linked above), two things jumped out at me as possible deal-breakers for me: parasites, and cockroaches. So maybe ten feet of snow is not such a bad thing.

Legal Site Groklaw Shuts Down Rather Than Face NSA

I stopped flying years ago, because it offends me to be scanned, groped, and treated like a criminal in order exercise my fundamental human right of travel. Now I am wondering how long it will be before I stop using email and the web. Perhaps I should have stopped already.

How did we become a cyberpunk dystopia without most of us noticing?

In episode two of this charming series, Fry visits the South. He has such an obvious affection for what makes us distinctive, including our friendliness and our love of our history (celebrating the good and transcending the bad).

I can’t help but wish that more Americans had as few prejudices about the South as Stephen Fry does.

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

― Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad/Roughing It

Here is my MystiCon 2013 schedule, in case you are interested in that sort of thing.

Fri 8:00 PM
Ballroom D
Gaming for Beginners

Fri 9:00 PM
Ballroom E
Game Development

Sat 10:00 AM
Ballroom C
A Conversation with Steve Long (I’m interviewing him)

Sat 1:00 PM
Ballroom D
Blog Much?

Sat 10:00 PM
Boardroom 1
Ouch! You Bit Me! A Zombie Survival Guide

Sun 10:00 AM
Ballroom C
The Artistry of Gaming

Sun 12:00 PM
Ballroom E
No Shirt, No Shoes, No Entry ‐ Business Etiquette

Sun 1:00 PM
Boardroom 1
If They Came in Saucers, Why Are We Smarter?