In 1991 Billy and Akaisha Kaderli retired at the age
of 38. Now, into their 4th decade of this
financially independent lifestyle, they invite you
to take advantage of their wisdom and experience. |
|
We’re Still Here! An Evolutionary
Tale
Billy and
Akaisha Kaderli
We did not have our
retirement life scripted to purchase a house in a community, buy the last car
we’d ever possess, and settle down. We let our retirement lifestyle unfold,
blossom and develop into what it is now. Our style of over 30 years of financial
independence was never planned. It evolved on its own. After quitting the rat
race, our first stop was a 36-square mile
island in the
Caribbean West Indies named Nevis. Our number one project on our no-plan agenda was to slow down.
Every day we’d take the
public combi van and ride on the one circular road around this volcanic island,
go to immaculate beaches, soak up the rays and eat a lobster salad sandwich or a
cheeseburger in paradise.
We became captivated by
characters
Since our time in the
sun-baked islands, we have gotten more skilled at traveling on less and with
greater joy. The nomadic lifestyle became addictive because of the captivating
cultures, the ceaseless
opportunities to volunteer, all the unique destinations,
and the numerous
colorful characters.
Professional gamblers,
handsome ramblers, ladies of the night, Buddhist monks, travelers with trunks,
wagon masters, ruby miners, Reggae musicians, accomplished magicians, ex-MI-5
agents, famous chefs, stuttering geniuses, AIDs victims, recovering rock stars,
and wealthy wannabes are just a few on a long list of eccentrics we have met.
Our continuous adventure is like stepping into the River of Life with its
currents pulling us here, moving us there, and no two days are the same. What
luxury to be able to live this way! You can do this, too, if you are so
inclined, or not.
The beauty of
financial
independence is that you get to
choose. We
give you the map, but you determine your path. The last couple of
decades have been filled with opportunities that, had we continued working
behind our desk, we could never have experienced.
Only the beginning
The pristine island of
Nevis, where we ate our weight in fresh lobster was only the beginning. We
danced to the Reggae beat in the tiny Caribbean-colored shack bars, went skinny
dipping in the sea and watched the full moon rise over the volcano.
Eventually, we made our
way to Cumana, Venezuela the oldest city in the Americas, lost our luggage on a
dark and rainy night and ate giant black ants, a local delicacy.
A few years of traveling
the western US in an RV, we decided international travel was what we wanted, so
our skeleton plan was to travel to
Chapala, Mexico and stay two months. Those
two months turned into a surprisingly rich four years.
A badge of honor
Every season or so there
in Chapala we’d tell each other that we’d leave and hit the road again, but the
town and its people captured both our hearts and imaginations. We jumped in with
various self-started volunteer projects to improve the community, including
building
two new tennis courts on Federal land in a city park.
During our retirement
years, we applied for and were denied from joining the Peace Corps three
separate times. Undaunted, we continued to pursue our own style of volunteer
work and today, with all of the activities and projects that we initiated, we
wear that Peace Corps denial as a badge of honor.
Thousands of miles on the road
Meanwhile we increased
our Spanish language skills, which are still only par but they easily get us
through all of Mexico, Central and South America. Far different than Latin
America in custom, food, history and religion, discovering the world of Asia
brought a completely different dimension to our journeys. We began traveling the
high roads, low roads and back roads of
Thailand. We both now know basic Thai
cooking and enough Thai language to order food, obtain lodging, purchase tickets
for our transport needs and to dicker at markets.
We have bodysurfed the
famous international surfing beach of
Kata in
Phuket, Thailand and Akaisha was
trained by a private tutor in
the art of Thai
massage. We meandered though
Laos,
North and South Viet
Nam, distant places in
China, a few islands of the
Philippines and bargained for rubies, sapphires and diamonds in Burma. We blew
through Bali,
Magic
Bussed though the Land of Oz,
New Zealand and hung out on
the beach in Manly,
Australia.
Time marched on and we
provided End-of-Life care for Akaisha’s ageing mom and dad and my own father as
well.
After all of this
emotional and physical intensity, we headed to
Ecuador. Here we met the
Quechua
indigenous peoples, stayed in their homes, sought out volcanic hot springs in
the Andes Mountains, and lodged in the ancient Sacred Valley of
Vilcabamba.
Public demand
Upon returning to the
States, our website was born out of demand from followers and we wrote our first
book, The
Adventurer's Guide to Early Retirement, A Common Sense Approach, Your Simple
Path to FIRE - Now in it's 4th Edition.
Neither of us had written a book before and had no connections to established
media or to publishing houses. Being the independent types we are, we wrote our
retirement story anyway and included hundreds of photos. It sold in over forty
countries, and our tale attracted the attention of
media around the world.
On the road again we
continued with a steady cocktail of traveling to both Asia and Mexico, where
Akaisha
trained Mexicans in Thai Massage, and then we headed further into
Central America, retracing foot prints from a previous life of four decades
past.
The Maya are mystical
and we lived a year among them in
Panajachel, at the volcanic crater lake called
Lake
Atitlan in Guatemala. Learning of their beginning-of-the-world story and
their end-of-the-world predictions, we drank the finest mountain grown coffee,
ate handmade Maya chocolate and locally harvested
macadamia nuts by the pound!
Sharing our perspectives
and skills, we continue to write books such as
Your
Retirement Dream IS Possible, illustrating alternative retirement options, destinations, and our
love of travel.
We’re just getting
started
We have spent Christmas,
Easter, Valentine’s Day, Loi Kratong, Buddhist and Chinese New Year and every
other holiday in various countries around the world, with a special mention of
the famous Nyepi day experienced on Bali. Talk about a contrast! But we relished
in them all.
And after thirty
years of travel we are just getting started!
Receiving emails from
friends in faraway places still stirs our wanderlust and we yearn to visit.
Watching travel shows and seeing interesting foods that are unknown to us makes
us want to taste as much of the world as we can.
There are so many
places, peoples and cultures to see that when we look at a map, it is like a
candy store to us. We are approaching 70 now, and the clock keeps ticking; we want to make
the most of it.
So, after all of these
accomplishments, travels and experiences, if you think we are ready to sit on
the porch, forgetaboutit! We didn’t always receive encouragement for following
our dream, and our choice mystified some people, but it was our dream. Sometimes
you just have to look into the eyes of the doubters and then look back into your
own hearts and minds and follow what you believe. And because we didn’t abandon
our path, we are blessed with friends all over the world and have memories of
colorful characters straight out of a novel.
We are grateful for every bit of
it.
Life is an adventure.
Follow your dreams.
For more on
Retirement Topics,
click here and
here
About the Authors
Billy and Akaisha Kaderli are
recognized retirement experts and internationally published authors on
topics of finance, medical tourism and world travel. With the wealth of
information they share on their award winning website RetireEarlyLifestyle.com,
they have been helping people achieve their own retirement dreams since
1991. They wrote the popular books, The
Adventurer’s Guide to Early Retirement and Your
Retirement Dream IS Possible available on their website
bookstore or
on Amazon.com.
Trending on Retire Early
Lifestyle
Retire
Early Lifestyle appeals to a different
kind of person – the person who prizes their
independence, values their
time, and who doesn’t want to mindlessly
follow the crowd.
HOME
Book Store
Retire Early Lifestyle Blog
About Billy & Akaisha
Kaderli
Press
Contact
20 Questions
Preferred
Links
Retirement
Country Info
Retiree Interviews
Commentary
|