Live and Invest Overseas
FREE REPORT: THE BEST PLACES TO RETIRE IN 2025
We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.
  • Home
  • Countries

    Top Destinations:

    Whether you’re looking for fun and sun, a peaceful retirement, or the chance to earn some extra income, you’ve got a real world of opportunity open to you… In short, we’ve done our best to narrow down your best options, but only you can decide the right country for you.

    • Spain
    • Portugal
    • Panama
    • Belize
    • Colombia
    • Cyprus
    • Mexico
    • France
    • Montenegro
    • Browse All Countries

    Best For:

    • The Best Places To Retire
    • Health Care Abroad
    • Cost Of Living
    • Investing in Real Estate
    • Establishing Residency
    • Gun Laws In The World
    • English-Speaking Countries
    • Safest Places For Retirement
    • Best Places In Latin America
  • Budgets

    How Much Will It Cost You To Live Overseas?

    The only honest answer is, we have no idea. And neither does anyone else. The only one who can answer that question is you. Here’s the most important thing to understand about budgeting your new life overseas…

    Super Cheap

    • Chitré, Panama
    • Santa Marta, Colombia
    • Phuket, Thailand
    • Dumaguete, The Philippines

    Cheap

    • Medellin, Colombia
    • Boquete, Panama
    • Kyrenia, Cyprus
    • Hua Hin, Thailand
    • The Algarve, Portugal

    Affordable

    • Valencia, Spain
    • Cascais, Portugal
    • Las Terrenas, The DR
    • Pisa, Italy
    • La Rochelle, France
    • Mazatlán, Mexico

    Luxury

    • Ambergris Caye, Belize
    • Kotor, Montenegro
    • The Panama City Beaches
    • Paris, France
  • Resources

    Global Living

    • Living & Retiring Overseas
    • Raising A Family Abroad
    • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
    • Offshore & Diversification

    Making Money

    • International Real Estate
    • Banking
    • Employment
    • Investing

    Follow Us:

    • Meet Our Experts
  • Real Estate

    Join our Weekly Newsletter
    Overseas Property Alert

    Sign up for our weekly newsletter to receive expert insights on the best international real estate investment opportunities.






      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

      Buying Real Estate For Cashflow

      • Discover tips and strategies used by global property investing veterans

      Explore Our Latest Posts

      • Learn how to invest and purchase property abroad…

      Go To The Overseas Property Alert Site

      • How To Become Independently Wealthy And Fund The Lifestyle Of Your Dreams
    • Conferences

      Upcoming Events

      • Explore Our Events Site

      Live and Invest In Spain Conference

      Offshore Wealth Summit

      Greece Workshop

      VALENCIA, SPAIN

      Sep. 17-19, 2025

      PANAMA CITY, PANAMA

      Oct. 15-17, 2025

      VIRTUAL

      Nov. 13, 2025

      LEARN MORE
      DISCOUNT
      LEARN MORE
      PRE-REGISTER
      LEARN MORE
      PRE-REGISTER
      • MORE EVENTS

      Contact Our Events Team

      Toll-Free U.S. and Canada:
      1 (888) 627 8834
      From Outside North America:
      1 (443) 599 1221
      Working Hours
      Monday – Friday 08:00 am – 17:00 pm EST.

      Reach us with your questions by email at: events@liveandinvestoverseas.com

    • Store

      Unlock The World

      • Access Your Library

      Overseas Havens Reports

      • Expats' comprehensive destination guides

      Conference Kits

      • Hours of coverage  from our latests conferences

      Lahardan Books

      • Titles on living and investing around the world
      • Explore Our Store
      Your passport to a life well-lived abroad

      Services

      overseas living letter offers affordable retirement guidance
      The Simon Letter Wealth Protection Insights
      Global Property Advisor Global Investment Opportunities

      Our Customer Service team is here to assist with any questions or concerns CustomerService@LiveandInvestOverseas.com

    • My Library
    Live and Invest Overseas
    • Home
    • Countries

      Top Destinations:

      Whether you’re looking for fun and sun, a peaceful retirement, or the chance to earn some extra income, you’ve got a real world of opportunity open to you… In short, we’ve done our best to narrow down your best options, but only you can decide the right country for you.

      • Spain
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • Colombia
      • Cyprus
      • Mexico
      • France
      • Montenegro
      • Browse All Countries

      Best For:

      • The Best Places To Retire
      • Health Care Abroad
      • Cost Of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Establishing Residency
      • Gun Laws In The World
      • English-Speaking Countries
      • Safest Places For Retirement
      • Best Places In Latin America
    • Budgets

      How Much Will It Cost You To Live Overseas?

      The only honest answer is, we have no idea. And neither does anyone else. The only one who can answer that question is you. Here’s the most important thing to understand about budgeting your new life overseas…

      Super Cheap

      • Chitré, Panama
      • Santa Marta, Colombia
      • Phuket, Thailand
      • Dumaguete, The Philippines

      Cheap

      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Kyrenia, Cyprus
      • Hua Hin, Thailand
      • The Algarve, Portugal

      Affordable

      • Valencia, Spain
      • Cascais, Portugal
      • Las Terrenas, The DR
      • Pisa, Italy
      • La Rochelle, France
      • Mazatlán, Mexico

      Luxury

      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Kotor, Montenegro
      • The Panama City Beaches
      • Paris, France
    • Resources

      Global Living

      • Living & Retiring Overseas
      • Raising A Family Abroad
      • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
      • Offshore & Diversification

      Making Money

      • International Real Estate
      • Banking
      • Employment
      • Investing

      Follow Us:

      • Meet Our Experts
    • Real Estate

      Join our Weekly Newsletter
      Overseas Property Alert

      Sign up for our weekly newsletter to receive expert insights on the best international real estate investment opportunities.






        We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

        Buying Real Estate For Cashflow

        • Discover tips and strategies used by global property investing veterans

        Explore Our Latest Posts

        • Learn how to invest and purchase property abroad…

        Go To The Overseas Property Alert Site

        • How To Become Independently Wealthy And Fund The Lifestyle Of Your Dreams
      • Conferences

        Upcoming Events

        • Explore Our Events Site

        Live and Invest In Spain Conference

        Offshore Wealth Summit

        Greece Workshop

        VALENCIA, SPAIN

        Sep. 17-19, 2025

        PANAMA CITY, PANAMA

        Oct. 15-17, 2025

        VIRTUAL

        Nov. 13, 2025

        LEARN MORE
        DISCOUNT
        LEARN MORE
        PRE-REGISTER
        LEARN MORE
        PRE-REGISTER
        • MORE EVENTS

        Contact Our Events Team

        Toll-Free U.S. and Canada:
        1 (888) 627 8834
        From Outside North America:
        1 (443) 599 1221
        Working Hours
        Monday – Friday 08:00 am – 17:00 pm EST.

        Reach us with your questions by email at: events@liveandinvestoverseas.com

      • Store

        Unlock The World

        • Access Your Library

        Overseas Havens Reports

        • Expats' comprehensive destination guides

        Conference Kits

        • Hours of coverage  from our latests conferences

        Lahardan Books

        • Titles on living and investing around the world
        • Explore Our Store
        Your passport to a life well-lived abroad

        Services

        overseas living letter offers affordable retirement guidance
        The Simon Letter Wealth Protection Insights
        Global Property Advisor Global Investment Opportunities

        Our Customer Service team is here to assist with any questions or concerns CustomerService@LiveandInvestOverseas.com

      • My Library
      Live and Invest Overseas
       Moving Out Of The U.S?

      THE 10 BEST PLACES TO RETIRE IN 2025

      the 10 best places to retire in 2025

      PLUS: A SPECIAL BONUS DESTINATION

      Simply sign up to receive the FREE daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and we’ll immediately email you our editors’ latest research report… absolutely FREE

      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

      Home Lifestyle

      Icy Dips, Twinkling Lights, And Pure Delight

      by Kathleen Peddicord
      Dec 25, 2024
      in Lifestyle
      0 0
      Winter snow day view Sacre-Coeur Montmartre Paris

      AdobeStock/Sergey Novikov

      ’Tis the season to remember
      All the faces and the places that were home…

      ’Tis the season to remember
      And to count up all the ports of call we’ve known…

      ’Tis the season to remember
      That we’re never far from home…

      Merry Christmas, everyone.

      –“Merry Christmas, Alabama” by Jimmy Buffett

      Our seven Christmases in Ireland, we could never bring ourselves to participate in one of Ireland’s quirkiest festive traditions, what the Irish refer to as the “Christmas Day swim.”

      On Christmas morning, from beaches, piers, and coves around the country, people of all ages gather to immerse themselves in waters of about 50 degrees Fahrenheit (maximum).

      “Swim” is a bit of a misnomer. There is no particular distance that you need to cover, nor any agreed-upon duration you must stay in the water. You simply join the crowd of people running toward and then into the water (cheered on by well-wrapped-up spectators), screaming as their bodies hit the ice-cold sea. A quick splash of the arms and legs, then back in to shore to dry off, wrap up, and enjoy a hot drink or a shot of whiskey.

      Wetsuits have appeared on the scene in recent years, mostly among the kids, but it remains an unspoken rule among the hardy adults taking part: traditional bathing suits only.

      Our four Christmases in Paris were all about the lights. Each year, starting in November, Boulevard St. Germain, just a few blocks from our apartment in this city, is strung with tiny white lights. The trees and the building facades are covered with them. Each morning and again each evening as I’d walk Jackson, aged 4 through 8 at the time, to and from school, we’d linger at the intersection of Rue du Bac and Boulevard St. Germain as long as possible, looking up and down, up and down, slowly, working to fix that magical view in our memories.

      “It’s a fairy land,” 4-year-old Jack declared it one morning. I see it still in my imagination.

      Twinkling lights and decorated shop windows. This time of year, storefronts throughout Paris are draped with pine garland, and displays feature green trees flocked with white and trimmed with red and gold baubles. No one does shop windows like the French do shop windows, and no others anywhere compare with the shop windows of central Paris at Christmastime.

      My favorite part of Christmas in Panama City, where we’ve lived for the past decade-and-a-half, first full- and now part-time, is the chance it gives us to enjoy the diverse community we’ve built in that part of the world.

      Start Your New Life Overseas Today!
      Sign up for our free daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and we'll send you a FREE report on the 10 Best Places To Retire In 2025.
      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.
      At our office tree-trimming party every year, the group assembled around our fresh-from-Canada Douglas fir drinking eggnog and singing carols includes Panamanians and Americans, as you might expect, but also German, French, Belgian, Irish, British, Russian, Jamaican, Colombian, Venezuelan, and Canadian friends and colleagues.

      In years past, standing off to the side during these parties, watching everyone in the group joke and laugh with each other, I’ve known moments of pure delight.

      How fortunate I am, I’ve been fortunate enough to realize, to be part of this eclectic community.

      These past two decades that we’ve been moving around the world as Lief and I have been, it’s been this creation of like-minded societies that has been perhaps the greatest source of pleasure for me everywhere we’ve spent time.

      Getting to know people from all around the world, as friends, as business partners, as workmates, then focusing together on particular goals and objectives, helping each other to pursue opportunities as we identify them for both fun and profit… for me, that’s as good as it gets.

      This time of year is for taking stock and regrouping… and, as I write to you today from my home town of Baltimore, Maryland, I can’t help but indulge in those directions…

      It was from Baltimore years ago Lief and I took off for Waterford, Ireland…

      From there we ventured off to Paris, France… and then, eventually, Panama City, Panama.

      Now that our children are both launched, we’ve flipped the switch to this next stage…

      Which has Lief and me dividing most of our time between Paris and Panama and moving around the world otherwise as business agendas and personal curiosity dictate.

      We’re thinking this sublimely flexible phase of our lives could be the best yet.

      This past year has presented challenges, of course… but treasured chances, too.

      We’ve known struggles… but much joy, as well.

      Now we look ahead to a New Year that promises many new adventures.

      The world remains as alive with opportunity for both fun and profit as ever.

      Where will 2025 lead us?

      I can’t wait to find out.

      On behalf of the entire far-flung staff of Live And Invest Overseas, please accept our warm and heartfelt wishes for a Merry Christmas, wherever you find yourself enjoying it this year…

      And our sincere hope that 2025 is the year your own far-flung dreams of adventure overseas begin to come true.

      All the best from our family to yours. We so appreciate you coming along with us for this ride and are delighted and honored to count you among our fast-expanding global community.

      Until next time,

      Kathleen Peddicord signature

      Kathleen Peddicord

      Founding Publisher, Overseas Opportunity Letter

      Tags: 'Expats Overseas'Christmas Abroad
      Share83Tweet52
      Kathleen Peddicord

      Kathleen Peddicord

      Kathleen Peddicord has reported on opportunities for Americans to live, retire, and do business overseas for 40 years. She has traveled to more than 75 countries, invested in real estate in 24, established businesses in 7, renovated and built properties in 6, and educated her children in 5.

      Kathleen has moved children, staff, enterprises, household goods, and pets from the east coast of the United States to Waterford, Ireland, then to Paris, France, and finally to Panama City, Panama, where she has based her Live And Invest Overseas business. Peddicord and her husband, Lief Simon, now divide their time between Panama and Paris.

      Peddicord was a partner with Agora Publishing’s International Living group for 23 years. She opened, staffed, and operated International Living publishing and real estate marketing offices in Waterford, Ireland; Panama City, Panama; Granada, Nicaragua; Roatan, Honduras; San Miguel de Allende, Mexico; Quito, Ecuador; and Paris, France. Peddicord launched Live And Invest Overseas group in 2008 and has built it into a successful multimillion-dollar business. Today, she shares her firsthand experience of expat life with more than 500,000 readers of her publications, including Overseas Opportunity Letter and Overseas Living Letter.

      Kathleen has been featured often in The New York Times, MSNBC, AARP, CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC, and more and writes monthly about expat matters, international real estate, and offshore diversification for Forbes and U.S. News.

      Kathleen has written several books including the memoirs “At Home In Ireland” and “At Home At Los Islotes” and her latest title “At Home Abroad,” all published by Lahardan Books. Her best-selling "How To Retire Overseas: Everything You Need To Know To Live Well (For Less) Abroad” was published by Penguin Random House in 2018 and her “Buying Real Estate Overseas For Cash Flow (And A Better Life)” was published by Wiley in August 2020.

      Start Your New Life Overseas Today!
      Sign up for our free daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and we'll send you a FREE report on The 10 Best Places To Retire In 2025.

      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.
      Our Expertise Unlocks The World

      quick links

      • Best Places To Live
      • Best Places To Retire
      • Finding A Job Overseas
      • Real Estate

      LIOS Resources

      • New To LIOS
      • Ask An Expert
      • Media Center
      • Contact Us
      • FAQs
      the 10 best places to retire in 2025
      Sign up for our free daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter, and get your FREE REPORT: The 10 Best Places To Retire Overseas In 2025

      We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

      As seen in

      US Media Logos

      © 2008 – Live and Invest Overseas™ – All Rights Reserved.

      About Us / Contact Us / Privacy Policy / Terms / Unsubscribe
      Facebook-f X-twitter Youtube Linkedin-in Instagram

      Welcome Back!

      Login to your account below

      Forgotten Password?

      Retrieve your password

      Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

      Log In
      HOME

      Top Countries

      • Spain
      • Portugal
      • Panama
      • Belize
      • Colombia
      • Cyprus
      • Mexico
      • France
      • Montenegro

      Best For:

      • Health Care Abroad
      • Retirement Living
      • Cost Of Living
      • Investing in Real Estate
      • Establishing Residency
      • Gun Ownership
      • English Speakers
      • Safety
      BROWSE ALL COUNTRIES

      Budgets

      How Much Will It Cost
      To Live Overseas?

      Super Cheap

      • Chitré, Panama
      • Santa Marta, Colombia
      • Phuket, Thailand
      • Dumaguete, The Philippines

      Cheap

      • Medellin, Colombia
      • Boquete, Panama
      • Kyrenia, Cyprus
      • Hua Hin, Thailand
      • The Algarve, Portugal

      Affordable

      • Valencia, Spain
      • Cascais, Portugal
      • Las Terrenas, The DR
      • Pisa, Italy
      • La Rochelle, France
      • Mazatlán, Mexico

      Luxury

      • Ambergris Caye, Belize
      • Kotor, Montenegro
      • The Panama City Beaches
      • Paris, France

      Resources

      Global Living

      • Living & Retiring Overseas
      • Raising A Family Abroad
      • Foreign Residency & Citizenship
      • Offshore & Diversification

      Making Money

      • International Real Estate
      • Banking
      • Employment
      • Investing
      Meet Our Experts

      Real Estate

      Overseas Property Alert 

       

      How To Become Independently Wealthy And Fund The Lifestyle Of Your Dreams

      VISIT SITE

      Buying Real Estate For Cashflow

       

      Discover tips and strategies used by global property investing veterans

      READ MORE

      Explore Our Latest Posts

       

      Learn how to invest and purchase property abroad…

      EXPLORE

      Conferences

      Live and Invest In Spain Conference

      VALENCIA, SPAIN Sep. 17-19, 2025
      LEARN MORE
      DISCOUNT

      Offshore Wealth Summit

      PANAMA CITY, PANAMA Oct. 15-17, 2025
      LEARN MORE
      PRE-REGISTER

      GREECE WORKSHOP

      VIRTUAL Nov. 13, 2025
      LEARN MORE
      PRE-REGISTER
      MORE EVENTS

      Contact Our Events Team:

      Toll-Free U.S. and Canada:
      1 (888) 627 8834

      From Outside North America:
      1 (443) 599 1221

      Working Hours
      Monday – Friday 08:00 am – 17:00 pm EST.

      Reach us with your questions by email at: events@liveandinvestoverseas.com

      Store

      Overseas Havens Reports

      • Expats' comprehensive destination guides

      Conference Kits

      • Hours of coverage  from our latests conferences

      Lahardan Books

      • Titles on living and investing around the world

      Services

      • Overseas Living Letter: Affordable Retirement Guidance
      • The Simon Letter: Wealth Protection Insights
      • Global Property Advisor: Global Investment Opportunitites
      VISIT OUR STORE

      Free Report

      THE 10 BEST PLACES TO RETIRE IN 2025

      FREE REPORT: The 10 Best Places To retire in 2025

      Sign up to receive the FREE daily e-letter, Overseas Opportunity Letter and we’ll immediately email you our editors’ latest research report…






        We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

        LIBRARY

        Follow Us:

        © 2008 - Live and Invest Overseas - All Rights Reserved.

        RETIRE OVERSEAS AND LIVE LIKE ROYALTY

        Sign up for FREE to learn how. Plus, check out our FREE report on THE 10 BEST PLACES TO RETIRE


        We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.

        RETIRE OVERSEAS AND LIVE LIKE ROYALTY

        Sign up for FREE and learn how to live the good life on a modest budget, find bargain property, and more. Plus, check out our free report on the 10 BEST PLACES TO RETIRE.

        We Value Your Privacy! We will not share your email address with anyone else, period.