Do You Have A Sense Of Adventure?

L

Lon

Well-known Member
Location
Central California
It's just my opinion but I think those of us retirees that had no trouble planning where we would live and what we would do in retirement tend to be leaders and not followers and viewed the process with a sense of adventure.I sold my home when I retired, moved away from family and friends and spent the next 25 years living half the year in New Zealand and the other half in California with lots of travel and adventures in between. Now I back where I started and though family is here most old friends have died or moved. In retrospect, knowing what I know now, I would not have done anything different. .My adventues now are more modest and suitable for a 82 year old aging body.
 

I have no sense of adventure at all. I like routine and could spend my life puttering around my home and garden. Having dinner out is nice once in awhile and a phone call now and then from friends and relatives is all it takes to keep me happy. .
 
Nope, I'm pretty much a homebody.

For me the perfect vacation is a week in a rustic cabin by a lake with a book, some booze, good coffee and lots of bacon!!!

I think about going on a vacation to England, Ireland or Scotland but I want to see those places as they were before WWI and have no interest in seeing what they are today, I tune in to the local PBS station for my wild adventures, LOL!!!
 

I did, more when I was somewhat younger. When my husband and I retired, we moved from Maryland clear across the country to Washington state, because we had fallen in love
with the Pacific Northwest. We didn't know a living soul there, just liked the adventure, and the look and feel of the place appealed to us. We stayed there for 18 happy years, eventually returning to MD to be near one of our children. (As you get older, living 1000 miles from your nearest "kid" starts to be a little too much of an adventure!)
 
Sense of adventure implies wanting to experience as much as a person can into their life. We've lived out of country. We've lived in several differant states. We've traveled to every off shore place we ever wanted to see. Most enjoyable and still at it is hiking America's national parks. For instance Old Faithful at Yellowstone how many know that there is a trail leading to a mound about 1/4 of a mile behind Old faithful that gives a far better view. Two very short trails under Mt. Rushmore. River tubing outside Cades Cove in Tn. Latest was hiking The Arches in Moab, Utah again, there is something special about getting to delicate arch and talking to people from other countries that come there just for that experience. Jobs, several differant kinds, the most mind numbing was for the U S Post office, I lasted about 6 months, how I have never been able to figure out.

For sure no patience for bingo, horse racing, Nascar or Indy 500 racing. Bingo has no challenge, you either get numbers to win or you don't. Horse & automtive racing is the epitome of boredom. Face a track, horses or cars begin in front of you, make a left turn, another left turn, another left turn, another left turn then pass in front of you.
 
No, I'm more of a hobbit, perfectly happy in my own little shire. Luckily, my wife is of the same persuasion. I know a lot of people dream of retiring, buying a motor home and touring the country. I've never felt the urge.

Don
 
If you're not livin' on the edge, you're taking up too much space!

I must have been a severely unhappy homebody in my past life, because this life has been filled with wandering, some of it aimless. In western Washington state I learned to white water canoe on the Skagit river, how to hang glide on Dog mountain, and did a ton of miles remote hiking in the Olympic mountains over 14 years. Almost crashed in my friends plane after we flew over Mt St Helens not long after it erupted, air filter filled with ash and we landed in a field. In the California Mojave desert, I wandered aimlessly looking for ghost towns and abandoned mines in my spare time and since I had a legit military base sticker, I would wander Edwards AFB, China Lake Naval Weapons, and Ft Irwin until someone with a machine gun said "halt" over 7 years. In west Texas, I participated in the Sheriffs posse, on horseback sometimes, in search and rescue, along with being a tornado spotter in some very sketchy weather, and raced my cars on some of the greatest back roads in the world (Hwy 17 between Balmorhea and Ft Davis was a favorite). Then, after 20 years in sales, I got sick of people and decided to drive a big rig across the continual US and chalked up 280,000 miles in 2 years with no tickets or accidents. Still have the intense desire to travel and see more before my body finally says "halt". I did settle long enough back in western NY to remarry my 1st wife, but even then we took a month to adventure to places she never saw when the doctor declared she was in submission from cancer. The places she wanted to see the most, were places I was already in love with. Must have been meant to be.
 
Probably not anymore. I've traveled a lot and had some adventures when I was younger but I sort of enjoy the little things now. I appreciate the quiet times. There's still some travel in my future but it's to see family and not just for the adventure aspect of it.
 
I've been fortunate in having a career that gave me the opportunity to travel and work in other countries. It also gave my wife the opportunity to join me (at the firm's expense) and have plenty of short breaks. Now that we're retired and having moved to the other end of the country, the sense of adventure is pretty strong. There's such a lot to see and I don't want to miss too much of it.
 
Lon, it seems that seniors set the bar so low nowadays, that just answering a telemarketing call is considered adventuresome and dangerous.

I'm not prepared for a tornado, identity theft, a burglary, a terrorist attack, or most other things. So, in that way, I guess I'm adventurous. :)
 
I like to think I am. I have visited close to 30 states and been to the Bahamas. Last week I went with family to St. Louis and had a great time. We went to Comic Con and I figured I would be the oldest one there but there were several older than me. Some wore costumes. We decided we wanted to go again and wear costumes. That was an adventure to me. I love to visit St. Louis.
 
Lon said:
It's just my opinion but I think those of us retirees that had no trouble planning where we would live and what we would do in retirement tend to be leaders and not followers and viewed the process with a sense of adventure.I sold my home when I retired, moved away from family and friends and spent the next 25 years living half the year in New Zealand and the other half in California with lots of travel and adventures in between. Now I back where I started and though family is here most old friends have died or moved. In retrospect, knowing what I know now, I would not have done anything different. .My adventues now are more modest and suitable for a 82 year old aging body.
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That sounds like a great life. No I don't have that kind of sense of adventure in me. Wish I did, but I'm more of a routine kind of guy. I do have a vacation condo 3 hours from here, but certainly doesn't compare to living half way around the world for a portion of the year. I do like my lifestyle and glad I can afford to own 2 places.
 
At My age now, my adventures consist of things like walking down three flights of stairs from my apartment to the SPA with out tripping and falling down or falling into the SPA and drowning. This morning my BIG Adventure was calling UBER to take me to the VA to have my Hearing Aids adjusted and then back home. My big adventure later today will be to walk some what painfully two blocks to Wallgreen's and back to pick up a pain reliever. Ah My ---How things change as we age.
 
Our adventures were mostly traveling to see how other folks lived. We are very glad we did it when we could, because it would be difficult now at ages 83 and 82.
 
So many places to explore! Just add up the national parks, national monuments, national forests, state parks, provincial parks, etc. and it is a very long list. And there are so many unique little towns along the back roads. We still have time and are actively exploring our way through it.
 
As an Air Force and later airline pilot flying missions and non scheduled international flights with mega layovers all over the world I've had enough adventures for a lifetime. But here's a few things I learned.
*Adventures come with a price. Most real 'adventures' require leaving someone or something behind and often times you can't get them/it back.
*Adventures without someone special to share and relive memories they just aren't as good.
*Adventures all turn into memories and memories seriously fade with time.

After 2-3 generations even my family won't know or really care that I've been here, or that my life was or wasn't well lived. So was all of the adventure pointless? Maybe. For now that answer is the best I can do. Because nowadays I think it better to just live in the moment and enjoy time with my loved ones. That one should be my last and best adventure.
 
My (late) husband was a truck driver and was away from home for a few days at a time until he went to work for a local company. In the 90's I worked for a company and had to do some traveling, which was not fun. I don't care for the crowds, staying in hotels. airports, etc.
Hubby was for sure not into traveling when he was not working..lol..

We made one trip in our pick-up truck, which came with a camper attached. We decided to take a trip to the mid-west to see my relatives. We were on the way back home, sitting in a restaurant in Bakersfield, Calif. I was reading the newspaper and noticed the date. Told hubby, Do you realize that we are going to be home one daily early from vacation? Hubby said, Ohhhh Yeah!! Right after we got home, he removed the camper shell and eventually sold it.

When we bought the home where I still live, it became our 'vacation spot', and after 40+ years, it still is.

I have no sense of adventure. I like my own bed and my own bathroom.
 
Always have, always will. I spent several retirement years RV traveling. Saw much of U.S. and Canada as well as small bits of Mexico from the driver's seat of my Winnebago. I loved the comfort of my own kitchen at mealtime and bed at night. Did Europe via Eurail Train Pass, was freighter passenger to New Zealand and Australia. Concessions to age and health have required compromise so most current adventures are of brain/mind variety but adventures nevertheless.
 
Have had many adventures, now I'm more settled..A big adventure was riding with my hubby for 25 yrs..
 

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