Best Places In The World To Retire

Some people say that the worst things about retiring in the Yucatan is the heat. Yes, it is hot here but Chicago was, too. We would have days in Chicago in the low 90 degrees and humid and people say, “What’s the weather like there.” They all think that it’s like Arizona or Northern Mexico and that it’s 120 degrees; like you’re in an oven. If you have ever been in Miami or Key West, South Florida, that’s what the weather is like here in Yucatan....

Some people say that the worst things about retiring in the Yucatan is the heat. Yes, it is hot here but Chicago was, too. We would have days in Chicago in the low 90 degrees and humid and people say, “What’s the weather like there.” They all think that it’s like Arizona or Northern Mexico and that it’s 120 degrees; like you’re in an oven. If you have ever been in Miami or Key West, South Florida, that’s what the weather is like here in Yucatan. Most people do not realize that the biggest seller at Disney World are the plastic ponchos for everybody that comes in the summer and nobody understands that it rains. We have tropical rains here. It rains super heavy and then the sun comes back out. Then an hour or so later, everything dries up but guess what, it could rain again for about another hour.
 
A friend of ours has a house in San Cristobal de las Casas is a state south of Yucatan, where we are going to visit. It is high up in the mountains in the Chiapas. It’s in the low to mid 70s even now and humidity is not a factor. That is one thing that some people do not realize about Mexico. Mexico has different climates. There are also parts of Northern Mexico like Lake Patzcuaro where the climate is cooler because it has some elevation. You are not going to find snow here except for some of the mountaintops. There are mountaintops that do have snow between Mexico City and Puebla. There is a dormant volcano there that has snow on it. But those places are not in Yucatan. Yucatan is extremely flat and the temperature and the climate is pretty much the same throughout. The region is a scrub jungle and the terrain is very thin soil with lots of limestone plateaus and big boulders underneath them. There is no above-ground river in all of Yucatan.
 
There are a lot of best things about living here - the people here are friendly, the cost of living is low, and Yucatan provides a great lifestyle. We feel very comfortable living in a foreign country. Maybe it is because I did a lot of international travel for a living. I have been in India, Indonesia, Africa, and many other places. I have seen abject poverty. There is some poverty here in Mexico but the good thing here in Valladolid is that you don’t see beggars. It’s not like you would see in some other countries. For us, living here gives us a very comfortable lifestyle. 
 
We had one of my wife’s relatives come here and her husband loved just about everything here: the house, the swimming pool, the people we introduced him to, the restaurants we took him to; he loved it. In contrast, his wife would say, “Oh, look at the street dogs.” “Look at the shacks some of the people live in.” She just brought all her US American values with her and was very uncomfortable here, and despite what we told her about being safe, she said, “Are you sure we could really walk half a block to the main square and eat at the restaurant? It’s night in Mexico.  Are we safe?” No matter what we told her, she was not comfortable here the whole time and her husband loved it. You just have to decide what is your range of comfort. She did the proverbial “talk louder” because here, especially in Valladolid, not a lot of people speak English. Even in the hotels or restaurants, Spanish is the language. If you go to Cancun, everybody speaks English, especially in places where expats frequent such as hotels, restaurants, gas stations, Walmart, Kmart, Costco, Sam’s Club, Office Depot, Sears. You are not going to find as many English speakers here in Valladolid, so you have feel comfortable living in a place where they don’t speak your language and you need to learn to speak some survival Spanish, unless you go to Cancun.
 
In Merida, there are a number of universities, medical schools, and there are a lot of high-income people there. We go to a chamber music series in a place called Hacienda Xcanatun from October to June for a Chamber of Music society – a quartet. They play in the Yucatan State Symphony. They all speak English. The lead person in the Chamber of Music Quartet, whose name is Chris, is a Brit and who plays a Guarneri violin, which is about a $300,000 violin. Everybody knows about Stradivarius, and Guarneri is also another famous maker of violins in the 1700s. The crowd in the Chamber of Music was about 60 people and about two-thirds of them are expats. Everybody in that group speaks English. In fact you will find out that at one time in their life they probably went to boarding school or military school in the US. That was something they did a number of years ago and maybe even to some degree now.  We know a number of people who when they were kids, or even with their children now, they send them off to boarding school in the US.

 

(Ruth Bennett harpist from the Yucatan Symphony in concert at John Venator's home, Casa de los Venados, Valladolid, Yucatan, Mexico, pictured.)

Yvon Marier is correct about the importance of not "traveling naked". When Snowbirds and travelers come down to Mexico they often neglect to consider what might happen in a Medical Emergency in Mexico.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are some important things to consider before you travel:

Yvon Marier is correct about the importance of not "traveling naked". When Snowbirds and travelers come down to Mexico they often neglect to consider what might happen in a Medical Emergency in Mexico.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are some important things to consider before you travel:

2. How would I pay for a medical emergency?- Private hospitals in Mexico only take cash, debit or credit cards. You will need to have credit or debit cards with at least a $10,000 USD balance to cover any medical emergency.

 

3. Will my health or traveler´s insurance pay for my hospital bill? - Showing an insurance card at any private Mexican hospital does not guarantee you service. Hospitals take from 48 to 72 hours to verify health insurance coverage & benefits. Private hospitals, therefore, require payment up front for services.