Several months ago, while my boyfriend and I were working at a roadhouse on Australia’s remote Nullarbor Plain, a familiar couple entered the main shop and office. Recognizing the two friendly faces from a TV special on Australia’s growing population of retiree travelers, I asked for an autograph.
Meet Sid and Sandie Whiting, pioneers of the ‘grey nomad’ movement and creators of Grey Nomad 101. While traveling around Tasmania, the two answered my questions, via email, about what a grey nomad is and how you can become one.
Q: How do you explain the term ‘grey nomad’?
A: The term has been around forever and can mean different things to different people. For instance, to truckies it means old farts in caravans who slow them up! I think for most people in Australia, it means folks who hit the road for extended periods, rather than just for a fixed term holiday to somewhere and back.
Q: Why did you originally leave your home in 2007?
A: Because we sold it! We were tired of the city, so we sold up and bought some land in the country. It was the perfect opportunity to do some serious traveling before building and settling down again.
Q: What methods do you use to make your finances last while you travel long-term?
A: We don’t really! I kept accurate records for the first twelve months, and we blew $81,000 (AUD). So it’s just a case of tightening the belt across the board. In that first year, we didn’t just have steak, we had fillet steak. We like to live well, and it’s not cheap. Yet there are plenty of folk out there who wait until next pension day so they can afford the fuel to move on to the next spot – and they seem just as happy as us.
Q: How do you finance your travels? Do you work along the way?
A: In our case, we produced the Grey Nomad 101 series of DVDs about how to do what we do. Plenty of other nomads do their own thing – mobile hair dressers, mechanics, etc. We see plenty of people doing caravan park management courses and doing relief management for a few weeks at a time, all over Australia. The trick is to find something you can do without being tied to a physical base.
Q: How do you keep your sanity traveling long-term in a confined space? With one partner?
A: We don’t spend all our time cooped up in car or caravan – they are for getting there (wherever ‘there’ may be) and for sleeping. Once we stop somewhere, there’s walking, fishing, boating, meeting other travelers, sitting around drinking . . . it’s not as confined an existence as you might think. And as for the partner, well, I just do what I’m told and I’m OK. And there’s a great trick for really getting out of each other’s hair for a while: house sitting. We’ve done it all over Australia, and one of our DVDs gives some great tips on how to go about it.
Q: What are your essential packing items?
A: A camera! And apart from that, it’s too hard to answer. In the first DVD (Grey Nomad 101) we take 45 minutes to empty our hatches on camera so you can see what’s involved with setting up for long haul travel. And it’s scary!
Q: What skills do you need to survive long-term travel (especially in Australia’s extreme environments!)?
A: I’m a handy guy, and it sure comes in handy. For people who aren’t, I’d advise against going to remote areas alone. We did the Outback Way right through the middle on our own. We got into some fairly ‘interesting situations’ which less confident caravanners would find quite daunting. Grey Nomad 104 covers this journey and shows the kind of things that can happen.
Q: What advice would you give to a retiree who wants to travel long term, but hasn’t packed up and left yet?
A: Do a lot of research! There’s plenty of info out there – in magazines, on the internet, etc. The trouble is, it takes a lot of sifting through, and how do you know if you’ve covered everything you need to know? At the risk of blowing my own trumpet too much, that’s the beauty of Grey Nomad 101. I reckon if you digest everything that’s in these DVDs, than you’ve got most of it covered. I say most, not all, because we’re still learning ourselves . . .
~ Until the next adventure! ~ Kelli
Photos courtesy of Grey Nomad 101.