Where to retire?

Well I haven't said much in 6 months, not much to say. I have just had my head down charging ahead, paying into investments and futilely wishing the housing market will recover. But, plans are coming together... Next step, get my home in good working order and ready to rent. Refinancing helped make payments a little more manageable and my realtor thinks my house could do well on the rental market. Then I will look at a cheapish rental near work. My primary duty location is changing in a couple of months so I won't be staying there long unless I find the perfect place location with stupid reasonable rent.
Rolling into the next year after tax returns I'm going to pay off the land in the mountains and start saving to build. I have been neglecting it pretty badly (not that it needs upkeep), but it would be nice to start doing some landscaping and driveway work to get things started. I'm going to try to get out one day a month starting in the spring time to work on improvements around the property.... Time to start earning that sweat equity!
Why is this titled where to retire? Oh yeah I'm sitting in Costa Rica, swinging in a hammock listen to an afternoon shower in a rain forest. My thought on costa rica? I'll stick to a retirement perspective... San Jose is a big dirty crowded city that isn't that cheap. Monteverde is lovely mountain town that is secluded from civilization by 3 hours of rough dirt roads, but is a lovely mountain town much akin to a dozen I can think of in Colorado. Puerto viejo (Caribbean coast) is beach covered with hippies and my hotel is a lovely open abode in the middle of a private farm. There are ant swarms like I have ever seen, tons of mosquitos and a constant battle with termites that are trying to eat your house. Why am I pissy? I'm not, it is a lovely place and overall it has been a great trip, but I'm trying to see the benefits of retiring here and it isn't currently in that category.
On the plus side, the currency is stable. The water is potable. Roads, not great roads, but roads just about everywhere. There is plumbing. There is some healthcare here, but Im beginning to wonder about the quality when med school costs $30k.
In other news, i did hear Bolivia is quite lovely and a very cheap place to live, downside, really third world, but I bet they have plumbing in the cities, even of you can't drink the water...
One lesson learned, I really need to learn Spanish, I hate being an ignorant American.

The long path to saving

It has almost been a year since my last post, I can't believe it! There have been many changes since then and they unfortunately haven't been overly productive towards my retirement goal. Losing a job for 4 month doesn't help the savings not to mention taking a 50k pay cut for the next job. But, I have been trying to get things on the right track again recently. How? Well I just refinanced my house, cutting my rate from a 6.25 to a 4.5%. This will save me over $400 a month, which will take very little time to recover refi fees. I have also been able to slowly rebuild up my savings again to a reasonable level (6 months or so of expenses). I also opened a high yield savings account with ING to sock that money into. It isn't the highest rate out there but the reviews fornthe company are really very good so I figure it is worth a try. I had a tax exempt money market I used to stash savings into, but it didn't seem like it was worth the hassle before.
I will add updates on new clever money making schemes and stocks as I find them. In the mean time check out BORK, SPIR, and BMWG.DE (yes the car company)... Happy investing!