No Tucson in Arizona This Year

For the last several years, for a couple days in April, we have joined our friends from high school in Laughlin/Bullhead City.  The last two years we went in our Hyundai Tucson.  Not this year.  We won’t be going anywhere in the Tucson. 

Tucson in Utah

After running the numbers, or is it crunching them? - I don’t like numbers in general - we figured that unloading the car now was the best move.  Although the “experiment” was shorter than planned, it was long enough to know that we don’t need a second car when only one of us is working.  It will require more planning and consolidating but those are good habits to have anyway.

Because I love to drive I tend to do it for entertainment, which adds up in gas costs and wear on the vehicle……and of course if I’m out anyway I might as well stop in there and see if they have something I should pick up! My spending habits have changed significantly during my first year of retirement but when I look at where the money goes I still see places I can cut back. Only having a car a couple days a week will make that pretty easy.
  

The money that was the monthly car payment, insurance and XM Radio subscription will now expedite the payoff of the tax bill and the last credit card, getting us to debt-free by our deadline.  For that reason alone it feels right to have gotten rid of the car!  Reducing our personal impact on the environment, fixing lunch at home every day, increasing the time I spend walking and riding the bike, parking the Jeep in the garage……..these are all added bonuses that have us feeling really great about the decision. 

I made sure I included all this in the blog so that in a few weeks when all this self-righteousness is wearing thin and I want to go get another car, I’ll have a reminder in my own words of why it was a good idea J!

We took some great road trips in our Tucson, including Highway 1 along the coast and Monument Valley.  We visited family in and out of California, and took some family to see other family.  It helped Brian move twice and took all of Jeff’s belongings to Seattle.  It got great gas mileage, was always reliable, and had that really bitchin’ chocolate brown interior!  I’ll miss the XM radio until I figure out the sound studio in the Jeep. 

No Tucson in Arizona for us this year - time to start making new memories in the Jeep and getting closer to our dream!