Panama Archives - Route to Retire

Master the Art of Anticipation: How Travel Planning Can Double Your Vacation Fun!

9 Comments / Travel and Vacation, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Life in Early Retirement, Panama, Spending / By Jim @ Route To Retire / February 28, 2023 February 28, 2023

It’s hard not to enjoy a good vacation… a chance to get away from the “same old” just for a little while. Traveling can be an opportunity to visit places you’ve never been, see new sites, meet interesting people, and maybe even try some different foods! Whether traveling just a short distance away, flying to another country, or cruising around the world, just the idea of travel gets the vacation-goer chomping at the bit. And that’s what’s so interesting – …

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A Month-Long Panama Trip for 3 for an Unbeatable Price of Less than $1,500!

23 Comments / Panama, Life in Early Retirement, Spending, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / January 17, 2023 February 14, 2023

I’ve been excited to talk about this for a while now, but I wanted to hold back until we were sure it was going to happen. Well, it’s now official… We’re heading back to Boquete for a month-long Panama trip! After just shy of 3 years of living in Boquete, Panama, we moved back to the U.S. last spring. We thoroughly enjoyed our time there but it was time to come back. A lot of folks continue to ask us …

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The 10 Most Popular Posts of 2022

4 Comments / Blogging, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Investments, Kids, Life in Early Retirement, Motivation, Panama, Spending, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / December 27, 2022 December 21, 2022

Last year, I wrote a wrap-up post with the 10 most popular posts of the year. It was an idea I borrowed from my friend Fritz over at The Retirement Manifesto (with his permission, of course). I liked that idea so much that I’m running with it again this year. And guess what – Fritz did it again as well and beat me to the punch! If you’re interested (and you should be!), you can check out his post appropriately …

Finding My Place Again in the U.S. – 3 Things I’m Worried About

31 Comments / General Thoughts, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Geoarbitrage, Life in Early Retirement, Panama, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / September 13, 2022 September 13, 2022

We moved to Boquete, Panama back in 2019, just months after I had retired from work at the end of 2018. We had sold everything we owned and moved to a country that we had only visited one other time – a country where we knew no one and almost everyone speaks Spanish. You would think that this whirlwind would be one of the biggest hurdles in life to adjust to and figure out. Funny enough though, finding my place …

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3 Attainable Characteristics That Drastically Improved My Quality of Life

14 Comments / Motivation, Education, General Thoughts, Health and Fitness, Life in Early Retirement, Panama, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / May 24, 2022 August 8, 2022

None of us are perfect. That’s life and we all know it. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to improve our quality of life. That applies to us physically, mentally, and spiritually. Doing so can make you healthier, stronger, smarter, and happier. I have this innate tendency to not become complacent. I want to continually work on bettering my quality of life. I want to become the best person I can be. I know that I’ll never be able …

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Boquete, Panama vs Ajijic, Mexico… Which Is the Better Place To Live?

12 Comments / Geoarbitrage, Life in Early Retirement, Panama, Spending, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / April 26, 2022 April 26, 2022

We just finished up an 8-night stay in Ajijic, Mexico. It’s a small town in the Lake Chapala area in the state of Jalisco. Ajijic, Mexico is a place I heard brought up several times during our 2 years and 8 months of living in Boquete, Panama. Some folks were enamored by the town of Ajijic and some folks weren’t. Regardless, the town was brought up enough in conversation that we decided why not check it out on our move …

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We’re on a Bus to Costa Rica Right Now! Here’s Why…

14 Comments / Travel and Vacation, Financial Independence / Retire Early (FIRE), Life in Early Retirement, Panama, Spending / By Jim @ Route To Retire / April 19, 2022 April 17, 2022

You read that right… I’m typing this entire blog post while on a bus to Costa Rica. We took a taxi from our home in Boquete, Panama to David (also in Panama). Then we got on a Tracopa bus around 9 am that’s taking us all the way to San José, Costa Rica. By the time it’s done, we’ll have been on this bus to Costa Rica for probably 8-9 hours. You might think of this as a grueling day, …

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41 Fun Activities We Did in Panama

12 Comments / Panama, Health and Fitness, Kids, Life in Early Retirement, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / April 12, 2022 April 10, 2022

In just a few days, our time of living in Panama for over 2 ½ years will be coming to an end. It’s bittersweet in so many ways, but today I thought it would be fun to look back at so many of the fun activities we did during our time here. Whether it was sleeping in a lodge in the jungle, spending time at nearby beaches, or just walking around the town of Boquete and admiring the beauty around …

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The 2 Big Reasons We’re Moving Back From Panama… and What’s Next!

10 Comments / Panama, Geoarbitrage, Kids, Life in Early Retirement, Self-Employment, Travel and Vacation / By Jim @ Route To Retire / March 29, 2022 February 14, 2023

I’ve been regularly putting my entire life out there publicly on this blog since 2015. So when someone is surprised to find out we’re moving back to the U.S. from Panama, I’m sometimes confused for a second… doesn’t everyone follow our journey on this site every week? Of course not! Though you should be! 😉 When friends ask us about why we’re moving back, I usually fill them in. And when blog-reading friends ask us why we’re moving back, I …

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3 Popular Panama Beach Resorts – Las Olas, Las Lajas, and Show Pony

4 Comments / Travel and Vacation, Life in Early Retirement, Panama / By Jim @ Route To Retire / March 15, 2022 March 12, 2022

Beaches are prevalent throughout the country of Panama. Frommer’s notes that there are over 1,000 on the Pacific side and more than 500 on the Caribbean side. That’s a lot of beaches in general, but a heckuva lot considering that the entire country of Panama is slightly smaller than the U.S. state of South Carolina! And with that many beaches comes a lot of Panama beach resorts. In the province of Chiriquí where we live (that’s where the cities of …