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Anciana

I didn't mean to imply that to live abroad and alternate between two places, say, or to take short trips from one's abroad 'home' does not equip one with a wonderful opportunity to experience different cultures, or that no travel of any type would be involved. Nor does it mean I am dismissing what sounds like a very interesting and satisfying way of living.

That said, my comment was intended to help clarify the parameters of the question, because travel from a more or less permanent home base abroad is very different from what I suspect the OP is referring to when they speak of taking one or two trips a year. This is travel as the dictionary defines it – to go from one place to another. No particular speed is to be implied or assumed, let alone an If-This-Is-Tuesday speed, which I doubt this board as a whole endorses even pre-retirement. But it does suggest a type of travel in which one’s more-or-less permanent residence is in the same country one lived, pre-retirement.

Even pre-retirement, many people prefer a 'home base' type of itinerary, in which they book an apartment for a week, say, and then do daytrips from said apartment. But booking an apartment for months at a time is quite a different matter, both legally and financially, from just staying in an apartment on a truly transient basis. What you describe sounds fascinating, but it is almost a separate retirement topic.

By the way, your 'converted barn' style accomodation sounds quite civilized. In making my 'straw' comment, I didn't mean to dismiss your suggestion. I was, however, making the point that significant changes in accomodation standard are unlikely to be found acceptable, post-retirement, by most people. Nor do most people make significant changes to the approach they use to solving problems, post-retirement.

Sue, as a matter of common sense, in-the-box thinking I actually do agree with you. But, the advocatus diaboli spirit in me, that tends to challenge a status quo, but not necessarily a status quo ante ;-) makes me think about the times gone bye, when our (European) ancestors (and a handful of American rubber barons) had two abodes - a summer one in the countryside, with a farm and peasants, of course (there was white slavery in Europe as late as XIX century) for recuperation and money making and a winter house in the city for socializing and making political and other connections.
And when they traveled, as they had to, because it was socially de rigeour, they did it for years or at least months at a time, to LEARN, not only see a few most famous sites, but to learn other countries, other people, their lifestyles, modes of thinking, their preoccupations, foods, etc. etc.

Modern retirees - both American and European - can in much higher numbers, and without exploiting slave labor - enjoy that lifestyle, just on a slightly less grand a scale. :-)
So, if one,or two - since we are usually talking about couples here - have all the time in the world, why would they still want to travel as American working age do, because they are slaves to an uncivilized two short weeks of vacation a year? Why would a retired couple want to rent a room somewhere for one week only and even then be so restless - or so uncurious about their new neighbours - that they could not stay put in one place for a week and make an excursion the other week, and another the third and so forth??? It is the short, mad rush travel in which you do not even brush with the natives, that costs and arm and a leg, and leaves you with a few sights checked out to brag during lunches at home, but with not much taste of the world, much less an understanding of places you were to and people who live there.
If you work in America, and you have to put up with those puny two weeks of vacations, it is understandable you want to cram all you can into those two weeks. But after retirement???