Things to try out for the first time in your retirement
We recently asked all the members of our Boomers’ Money Club to share what it was they most recently did for the first time, and what’s next on the list. There were lots of great ideas on there so we thought we’d share them with you…
The last things they did for the first time were…
Photo by Dimitris Kiriakakis on Unsplash
Went to the Tower of London
Learnt to make Japanese paper toadstools
Walked 300 miles for Macmillan Cancer Care and raised £54,000 to fund an additional nurse for Gloucestershire & Oxfordshire
Waved my daughter off to Australia
Haggled for a teapot in Marrakech
Started adding Pilates to my daily routine
Made wild garlic pesto
Sorted out my recently deceased father’s affairs
Spent the winter in Spain for 3 months from Nov 23 to Jan 24
Visited Cambodia
Moved to Greece
Had a sleepover in the Egyptian Gallery at the British Museum
Put a grandchild to bed
Swam with whale sharks
Crewed a yacht across the Atlantic from Tenerife to Saint George in Grenada
Bought an iPhone after years of resisting
Looked into inheritance tax rules
Took a sleeper train to Berlin
Made a BBQ for one
Retired from work
Played golf in Ireland - first time since starting golf about 25 years ago
Had a dental implant
Went to North Africa and walked up a mountain
Went jet skiing
Organised my daughter’s wedding
Went to the 24 heures du Mans motor race at the Circuit de la Sarthe near Le Mans, France
Took my granddaughter to the zoo
Worked out how to use a washing machine after 45 years at sea - under supervision of course
Donated a kidney
Learnt to row (scull and sweep) on the water, last autumn and rowed in a regatta in April this year
Started an over 60s 11-a-side footy team from scratch - we entered the national over 60s tournament
Started a new (paid) part-time job post retirement
Replaced fuel hoses on a 1972 Triumph X-75 Hurricane motorcycle
Done a 13-mile hike including 3 Munros
Went for a father & son epic road trip to Tennessee and parts of Mississippi and Alabama, taking in the music of Nashville and Memphis, plus Civil War history sites
Baked bread
Went river paddle boarding
Went on a flight in a two-man micro plane in Australia
Walked the Camino Way to Santiago de Compostela
Rode the Severn Bore.
Participated in a 80 mile cycling sportief
10 pull ups
Booked a cruise to the States
Renewed the sealant around my bath
Private dining in a fancy French restaurant in London
A first holiday in mainland Spain - Frigiliana
Bell ringing
Diluted my cash investments to less than 10% of my investment portfolio
Kite surfing
A long weekend in Stockholm. What a truly beautiful city, despite the cold!
4 day motorbike trip through the Cederburg and Tankwa Karoo in South Africa
Sky dived in Malaysia
Played the piano at a funeral and a wedding during the same month (this March)
Things they are going to do next for the first time:
Photo by redcharlie on Unsplash
Go to Poland (to see Ed Sheeran - also a first)
Learn to row
Go to the Chelsea Flower Show
Make a blood orange gin cocktail
Use AI for meeting notes
Book a last-minute holiday to Majorca with my wife
Set up my new allotment and then go back to Spain
Visit Mexico
Wild camping at 2000 m
Start learning to play the Theremin
Sell a business
Go on safari in Botswana
Join a University of the Third Age history group in Somerset
Not bother to vote in GE, they are all hopeless
Set up regular cash gifting for adult children from my surplus income to reduce potential inheritance tax liability
Travel from Dorking to Bergen via trains and ferry
Go away for our wedding anniversary
Go on an Alaska cruise and Rocky Mountaineer train holiday
Play a decent bloody round in Ireland
Visit Madeira
Do a euro rail type trip - aiming to use more of the Italian I’ve been learning
Visit Croatia
Strike a hole in one at Bonanza Golf Course in Lusaka, Zambia
Hire a car for a visit to relatives
Read Solzhenitsyn
Take my wife sailing for the first time, at 70 years old
Fly first class
Go to the opera in Verona
Play in the 1/4 finals
Fit a new bike rack to my car and drive off for a ride along Tissington Trail in the Peak District
Ride a 1972 Triumph X-75 Hurricane motorcycle further than ten miles
Buy an electric mountain bike to help get to and from the bottom of remote mountains
Have my prostate removed
Lay a gravel garden path
Paddle board while on holiday in North Devon this summer
Go to Paris to see the Roland Garros tennis competition
Cycle round Ynys Môn on a Brompton
Barbecue some aubergine and eat it without grimacing
Learn to single scull and compete in a British Rowing event - a regatta or head of the river
Take our two teenage daughters to their first gig at Brixton Academy
Travel across the States - east to west
Attempt to stop my back door from creaking and squeezing. Just been and bought the WD40
Fly fishing lesson in 2 weeks time
Visit the Menin Gate Memorial at Ypres
Controlling a church organ with a PC
Take a regular income of 1.5% per year in monthly instalments
Kite skiing
Flying to Naples and then taking the ferry to Ischia for a short break
Go to Namibia
Dive in Maldives
Visiting Mauritius for work and not for holiday
Surely there must be a few (lot of) things on this list you’ve not tried yet - what’s next for you?
Doug