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Not wanting to retire to tropics/desert like climate


shootingstar

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Even if I won the lottery, I'm not even interested retiring in the tropics. Unlike a lot of Canadians I don't plot for any annual vacation for tropical/warm vacations during Canadian winters.  We went to Hawaii once for 5 days. Then upon return, my body had to readjust to the cold/shock.  I didn't like that.  

Yup, lots of people from my area vacation in Mexico, Arizona, Las Vegas.  People in Ontario, I used to know people (older generations) who went to Florida.  However, I get the impression it doesn't interest people I know in my generation to go to Florida.  

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9 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

Even if I won the lottery, I'm not even interested retiring in the tropics. Unlike a lot of Canadians I don't plot for any annual vacation for tropical/warm vacations during Canadian winters.  We went to Hawaii once for 5 days. Then upon return, my body had to readjust to the cold/shock.  I didn't like that.  

Yup, lots of people from my area vacation in Mexico, Arizona, Las Vegas.  People in Ontario, I used to know people (older generations) who went to Florida.  However, I get the impression it doesn't interest people I know in my generation to go to Florida.  

I have been south in the winter.  I hate the crowds and traffic. Now I am retired and I go NORTH in the winter. UP, Northern WI and MN I even go into that great north wasteland called Canada (don't get upset, I'm just kidding. Love winter there.)  I do try to avoid the big cities.

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We looked more seriously at houses in AZ on our trip last week. Job opportunities are available in both our fields. I prefer the heat. Yes. I have been there in the summer. I know how hot it gets. I would rather complain about the heat than the cold any day!

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42 minutes ago, groupw said:

We looked more seriously at houses in AZ on our trip last week. Job opportunities are available in both our fields. I prefer the heat. Yes. I have been there in the summer. I know how hot it gets. I would rather complain about the heat than the cold any day!

I have spent time in Phoenix during August.  Yes it is hot but with modifications to your schedule you just work around the heat.  My son was playing in a Baseball tournament while we were there and they scheduled games early/late and we just hunkered down mid day.  Locals I spoke to just said yeah we spend most of the summer indoors, the other 9 months of the year are wonderful.

 I wouldn’t rule out AZ as a place to move to either except for leaving my family.

 

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My FIL moves to the Tampa area so we have been there a few times the past two years.  I much prefer dry heat to their humidity.  I’d do AZ heat over FL mugginess any day.

We do get snowbirds in SoCal, they are the ones in tank tops, shorts & sandals while we are bundled up.  Funny that 65 degrees is warm for them and cold for us!

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6 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

I have spent time in Phoenix during August.  Yes it is hot but with modifications to your schedule you just work around the heat.  My son was playing in a Baseball tournament while we were there and they scheduled games early/late and we just hunkered down mid day.  Locals I spoke to just said yeah we spend most of the summer indoors, the other 9 months of the year are wonderful.

 I wouldn’t rule out AZ as a place to move to either except for leaving my family.

 

The home of dashboard carpets and top-down steering wheels when parked.  :) 

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Our plan is to keep our place in NY, mostly because this is where the grandkids are. Spend summers here and winters in this.

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We lived in Tucson from September 1970 to early 1975, and would not consider moving back on a permanent basis. Tucson is also weather wise much better than the Phoenix//Tempe area. Upon arrival in Tucson from South Dakota, I stopped for information at a service station, and my shoes promptly began sinking into the asphalt driveway.

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2 hours ago, shootingstar said:

Even if I won the lottery, I'm not even interested retiring in the tropics. Unlike a lot of Canadians I don't plot for any annual vacation for tropical/warm vacations during Canadian winters.  We went to Hawaii once for 5 days. Then upon return, my body had to readjust to the cold/shock.  I didn't like that.  

Yup, lots of people from my area vacation in Mexico, Arizona, Las Vegas.  People in Ontario, I used to know people (older generations) who went to Florida.  However, I get the impression it doesn't interest people I know in my generation to go to Florida.  

Adapting to a climate would not be an issue at all if you were RETIRING there. 

Don't judge how you feel going from the frigid north to the balmy islands and then back again as a realistic way you would adapt.  If you picked Hawaii (or anywhere) as a retirement location, you'd adapt over MONTHS or YEARS.  5 days isn't any sort of indicator of how you would deal with the change.

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12 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

Adapting to a climate would not be an issue at all if you were RETIRING there. 

Don't judge how you feel going from the frigid north to the balmy islands and then back again as a realistic way you would adapt.  If you picked Hawaii (or anywhere) as a retirement location, you'd adapt over MONTHS or YEARS.  5 days isn't any sort of indicator of how you would deal with the change.

What a bunch of BS!! Adapting, doesn't mean you like it, and moving to a place that requires years to adapt in retirement is not a very favorable situation.

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21 minutes ago, Zackny said:

Our plan is to keep our place in NY, mostly because this is where the grandkids are. Spend summers here and winters in this.

785F078E-7000-4FA2-8C66-96DBE7CDB471.jpeg

My MIL and her Ex did that for a long time.   They would load the RV & tow their car to FL right after Christmas & stay through March.   The ex’s health started declining so they stopped making the trips south.

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There is a small island in the Caribbean that not many people go to because ut has no real beaches.  It has a small population and not a lot of traffic.  I would consider living there.  Other than that, I will stay here om the west coast where it is mild.  I have had my fill of long cold winters when living in the Maritimes and Newfoundland.

Probably the no bugs thing here is a bigger deal than the no snow for me

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I like the south year round.

But then I lived in Key West for 2 years, Virginia for 6 and Orlando for 1.  It's difficult to describe to northerners but the heat becomes quite normal and you begin to enjoy never seeing snow.

I know that I felt the same was as most when I first went there but I went roughly from Great Lakes in the dead of winter to Key West in the spring and it took a few weeks to decide I wasn't dying.

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1 minute ago, maddmaxx said:

But then I lived in Key West for 2 years, Virginia for 6 and Orlando for 1.  It's difficult to describe to northerners but the heat becomes quite normal and you begin to enjoy never seeing snow.

Now your talking!  My wife will never move back to Northern VA.  As much as she misses the seasons she does not miss the cold, snow & ice and oppressive summers.  

My motto is: I go to the snow, it does not come to me! 😁

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8 minutes ago, sheep_herder said:

What a bunch of BS!! Adapting, doesn't mean you like it, and moving to a place that requires years to adapt in retirement is not a very favorable situation.

I hear you on the "doesn't mean you'll like it" part, but the adapting part is a different story.  I have to adapt from winter to spring to summer to fall and back again EVERY year, but I LIKE it here in VA.  If I didn't like it, whether or not I could adapt to the climate wouldn't matter.

My point is that if someone really likes a place Hawaii, Tuscon, Denver, Maine, or wherever, then judging how they felt visiting for a few days and returning home is the WRONG way to look at it.  Your body won't/can't acclimatize that quickly.  Spend some time in the place you like and see but don't be like "I can't live in San Diego because the time I visited for five days it was raining all the time and I didn't like that".

Some people hate cold or hot, but some people also haven't lived in those places for more than a week or two, so maybe not enough data for them to actually go on.

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3 minutes ago, Razors Edge said:

I hear you on the "doesn't mean you'll like it" part, but the adapting part is a different story.  I have to adapt from winter to spring to summer to fall and back again EVERY year, but I LIKE it here in VA.  If I didn't like it, whether or not I could adapt to the climate wouldn't matter.

My point is that if someone really likes a place Hawaii, Tuscon, Denver, Maine, or wherever, then judging how they felt visiting for a few days and returning home is the WRONG way to look at it.  Your body won't/can't acclimatize that quickly.  Spend some time in the place you like and see but don't be like "I can't live in San Diego because the time I visited for five days it was raining all the time and I didn't like that".

Some people hate cold or hot, but some people also haven't lived in those places for more than a week or two, so maybe not enough data for them to actually go on.

I knew what you meant, but did not like your extension to the years of adaptation. It is very hard to change folk's opinions of places that they developed on a weeks vacation. Some of the places we really like and would consider moving to are places liked by others, thus making them expensive and more populated than we like. Thus, we'll stay here for a while.

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Given that in Fl in the summer you come out of work, start your car, open the windows, turn on the air and then stand around in the parking lot chatting for 5 minutes.

In CT you come out of work in the winter, spend 5 minutes pushing the snow off your car, get in and skid around all the way home trying not to die, meanwhile realizing that you will probably have to do it again tomorrow morning just to get back.

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21 minutes ago, ChrisL said:

My MIL and her Ex did that for a long time.   They would load the RV & tow their car to FL right after Christmas & stay through March.   The ex’s health started declining so they stopped making the trips south.

We own a 1/4 acre lot on the Gulf coast in Florida that I bought when my grandmother passed. Might spend some time there but would really like to travel around the south during winter months.

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1 minute ago, sheep_herder said:

I knew what you meant, but did not like your extension to the years of adaptation. It is very hard to change folk's opinions of places that they developed on a weeks vacation. Some of the places we really like and would consider moving to are places liked by others, thus making them expensive and more populated than we like. Thus, we'll stay here for a while.

I got ya!  Yeah - if you don't want to live somewhere (for all sorts of reasons), you don't want to live somewhere. Period.  I'm just pointing out the "ruling something out because it was tough after I returned from vacation" concept is not really relevant. If you said "I went to New York City and hated it because of all the noise and people and cost", I wouldn't suggest it as a retirement place, but if you only disliked it because you were there when it was having a warm spell, and it was difficult re-adapting too your local cold temps, I would scratch my head a bit at the logic.

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3 hours ago, ChrisL said:

I have spent time in Phoenix during August.  Yes it is hot but with modifications to your schedule you just work around the heat.  My son was playing in a Baseball tournament while we were there and they scheduled games early/late and we just hunkered down mid day.  Locals I spoke to just said yeah we spend most of the summer indoors, the other 9 months of the year are wonderful.

 I wouldn’t rule out AZ as a place to move to either except for leaving my family.

 

We were in Chandler in July and August when our daughter was in chemo. Highs were regularly 108-115. I found I could get out at 6:30 am and get in 20-30 miles before the heat really set in. Good window shades are worth every penny, but even so, a pair of driving gloves is a good idea. 

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If reincarnation is a reality I must have lived nearer the equator most of my life because I enjoy hot weather more than cold.

But, as I age, I'm more prone to seek out air conditioning in the summers, so I don't know about retiring far south.  Maybe something like the Carolinas.

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9 minutes ago, MickinMD said:

If reincarnation is a reality I must have lived nearer the equator most of my life because I enjoy hot weather more than cold.

But, as I age, I'm more prone to seek out air conditioning in the summers, so I don't know about retiring far south.  Maybe something like the Carolinas.

Before my FIL moved to FL they spent about 15 years in Pinehurst NC.  I was really amazed how mild the weather was in that part of NC.  Winters were reasonable, summers not stifling hot.  

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9 hours ago, sheep_herder said:

What a bunch of BS!! Adapting, doesn't mean you like it, and moving to a place that requires years to adapt in retirement is not a very favorable situation.

Very true, just because one adapts, one doesn't mean one likes it.

I adapted for several decades to humid summers in southern Ontario since I was born there. I found the hot humidity hard at times when I got abit older. And whenever I return to visit, it takes me longer to adjust now.  Yes, I could go back and tell myself it's for the beautiful fall weather that I miss in the prairies.  

Hawai'i is quite windy ..often.  So that would bug me from a daily cycling perspective. I didn't realize until I got to Hawaii that despite it's rainforests, cycling was often out in the bare sun.  It's enough that I'm out on the prairies but we're not at the equator at least in terms of the sun strength and the heat is dry and actually quite good for cycling. Not very hot in the summer most days.  Just very warm/hot...we consider 28 degrees C very hot.  So 20 degrees C is great.

I guess I was trying to say that I couldn't for instance have a home in warm tropical country, and then return to frigid cold.  It would depress me, in addition to my body readjusting to the shock again. So psychologically it's better for me not to go in the lst place.

9 hours ago, ChrisL said:

We do get snowbirds in SoCal, they are the ones in tank tops, shorts & sandals while we are bundled up.  Funny that 65 degrees is warm for them and cold for us!

Well, to me, that's not exactly warm enough for me in  a tank top. For shorts yes, when my legs have adjusted half through the cycling season. Near the end of the cycling season, I am cycling around 40-45 degrees in walking shorts.  

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4 hours ago, 12string said:

I do enjoy visiting the tropics, but I wouldn't want to live where there's one season.  and I really don't understand retiring then moving away from family and friends..  I'm staying put, and we'll travel

Despite some challenges of winter, etc., I enjoy the contrasts of 4 seasons. And I love trees and vegetation, which the prairies doesn't have enough of.

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1 hour ago, Randomguy said:

The cold sucks. It is silly to retire and remain cold.  
My god, people, it doesn’t take years to get accustomed to local weather, it takes a few days.  Big deal.  Learn to adapt.  

The cold in Vancouver/Victoria,  is incredibly mild compared to cold to other parts of Canada in winter. 

Enough Canadians don't retire permanently in the U.S. because of its health care system.  Other reasons win big over climatic comfort....in addition to being close to family/friends.

It would be nice to say ie...retire in Thailand, Costa Rica, etc. but it is consideration of health care that would get me back to Canada at this point in life.  Wouldn't it be great to be 40 yrs. younger and not care? And it is strange 'cause I'm a fairly healthy /fit person that would be the best sort of retiree living a high life in Spain, etc.

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1 hour ago, Randomguy said:

The cold sucks. It is silly to retire and remain cold.  
 

My god, people, it doesn’t take years to get accustomed to local weather, it takes a few days.  Big deal.  Learn to adapt.  

True, but I will take the cold over Florida every time.  Those breathless humid Florida summer days are literal hell.  Arizona, year round, no problem.   

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I wonder if warm places will become havens from the flu/virus.  If it turns out that this new virus is seasonal (not yet a given) then is it possible that warm places will suffer less.  I know that people in warm places have it now, but did they bring it there from elsewhere or catch it there.

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4 minutes ago, maddmaxx said:

I wonder if warm places will become havens from the flu/virus.  If it turns out that this new virus is seasonal (not yet a given) then is it possible that warm places will suffer less.  I know that people in warm places have it now, but did they bring it there from elsewhere or catch it there.

The mold in the vac systems is disgusting.  I have gotten nasty respiratory infections twice from that.  

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Wo46 and I were looking into moving south to a warmer state but after crunching some numbers and looking at our options we decided to stay here. It is cheap for us to just stay in our little house and in the winter we can spend more time in the motorhome driving around the south. 

Our son was talking about doing some remodeling at his house so I spent part of the next winter in Georgia remodeling and installing new windows. 

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12 hours ago, Further said:

Why would I want to be old, alone and confused in a strange place ? I'm staying where I at least have a chance of remembering the way home.

You waited too long.  I'm hoping to be well acclimated to my "forever" home way before I start to forget stuff like that. 

20 minutes ago, Randomguy said:

The whole east coast ocean and lakes and streams are an open sewer. 

FIFY

1 hour ago, Wilbur said:

True, but I will take the cold over Florida every time.  Those breathless humid Florida summer days are literal hell.  Arizona, year round, no problem.   

I agree that Florida is super humid at times so not at the top of my list, BUT it does make great sense as a "primary" home (tax benefits) used in the mild months, with a secondary home or RV used in the summer months. We've started our scouting for a smaller "downsizing" home and have too many options at this point, but one higher ranked option is a "mountain" home - either Rocky Mtns or even closer to home a bit west of DC or south towards NC or TN, etc..

2 hours ago, shootingstar said:

Enough Canadians don't retire permanently in the U.S. because of its health care system. 

We have a crappy "insurance and coverage" system, not a bad health care system.  I'm guessing folks just don't want to pay extra to buy good coverage when it is covered already by their home country? Sort of like retirees here covered by Medicare not being able to use it as effectively out of the US.

13 hours ago, shootingstar said:

I enjoy the contrasts of 4 seasons.

That's my wife's argument when I propose a warmer year round place.  Virginia has just about a perfect 3 month seasonal rotation, so we get distinct winter, spring, summer, and fall seasons with the pretty transitions from summer to fall and winter to spring.  Sometimes, like this year, the winter is mild, and sometimes a summer is mild, but likewise, every so often we get "big" winters or "hot" summers.

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I lived in 4 season country for the first 43 yesrs of my life, then moved to basically a two season area (dry season and wet season) and truth be told, I do not miss the change of seasons of the winter cold one bit.  I don't miss the snow, I do not miss the frost or the slippery roads or bundling up to go outside.  

I would be hard pressed to find a reason to move back to that

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Just now, Zephyr said:

I lived in 4 season country for the first 43 yesrs of my life, then moved to basically a two season area (dry season and wet season) and truth be told, I do not miss the change of seasons of the winter cold one bit.  I don't miss the snow, I do not miss the frost or the slippery roads or bundling up to go outside.  

I would be hard pressed to find a reason to move back to that

It's cheap!  

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54 minutes ago, Zephyr said:

I lived in 4 season country for the first 43 yesrs of my life, then moved to basically a two season area (dry season and wet season) and truth be told, I do not miss the change of seasons of the winter cold one bit.  I don't miss the snow, I do not miss the frost or the slippery roads or bundling up to go outside.  

I would be hard pressed to find a reason to move back to that

Florida has 4 seasons.  Early summer, summer, late summer and next summer.

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