Dillon

“What would you do if you had ten years to live and $10 million in the bank?” and “Where Would You Live, Anywhere On The Planet?”

Two what we now describe as “Wireless Resorters” – Premier Resorts and Maturing Resorts – called Parker home.

 

An excerpt from Book Four in “The Knowledge Path Series” dedicated to helping you find the place of your dreams in the Rocky Mountain State.

When Siri told us we had arrived our host, Finnmark, waved down to us from his slightly worn natural-colored wooden deck.  

He leaned over his dark green metal railing as we pulled into his driveway and greeted us. 

From behind him we could see the smoke from his grill drifting up into the cooling dusk night-time sky.

When he called inside, his two large poodles scampered out.  

He climbed down his entrance way steps to quickly help us bring in our suitcases and ran back to his deck barbecue to flip the chicken one more time.

And then in minutes we sat at his kitchen table which probably was set much earlier than the time we arrived.  

We visited, settled into our room and then hit the bed early since we were clearly worn out from our drive. 

For the next few days we would enjoy our own base camp for hiking, touring, visiting, eating and drinking at the best of what Summit County would offer.

  • Dillon.
  • Frisco.
  • Breckenridge.
  • Loveland Pass.
  • Shrine Mountain Ridge.
  • The Continental Divide.
  • Keystone Resort.
  • Copper Mountain Resort.
  • Vail Resort.

And, discover what the attraction was to our hosts when they followed their dreams.

For the second time.

Colorado Regions

A decade earlier we visited them when they called Parker, Colorado, their home, an exurb Southeast of Denver.

They went out of their way to show us the off-the-beaten-path experiences no tourist would find in and around Denver.

How did they end up in Parker?

From Southern California, by way of Chicago. 

As a couple, they inspired me to write this “Guide for Leaving California.”

Both of them missed the outdoors, sports and mountain living – hiking, backpacking, and skiing. 

Both  grew up nearer the Pacific Ocean.

Both frequented the local mountains and the Sierra Nevada’s – Mammoth Mountain.

Finnmark worked summers near Tom’s place, where we’ll visit later following the Birds-of-a-Feather (BOFs) resort bucket list itineraries in California.

Rock Creek and Little Lakes Valley to be more exact. 

After the move out west again, everything they loved was in driving distance. 

Except the ocean, of course.

Finnmark told me it was the congestion.  

How all of Southern California became overdeveloped.

It forced him entertain second thoughts about returning to California, when he realized Illinois just didn’t suit him any more.

And what was wrong with the Windy City? 

The Great Lake comes close to being an ocean.

For a Southern California boy, it was the fact that he had to wear long underwear under his suit during the first winter there.

It wasn’t the cold so, much, he told me – Denver gets cold, but the humid cold of Chicago was something else. 

And no access to “real” mountains gnawed at them.

He told me it hit him when he waited to cross a downtown street at a pedestrian cross walk. 

A big SUV came barreling through the intersection, hit a puddle and drowned him with gray slush.

That slush broke the camel’s back! 

All the little things just added up into a general recognition of dissatisfaction for them.

They both had jobs.

They owned a home.

But, they recognized if they didn’t act the opportunity to move might just slip slide away.

He and his wife sat down that weekend – at a little resort hotel they both enjoyed — and answered two questions: 

“What would you do if you had ten years to live and $10 million in the bank?” and 

“Where Would You Live, Anywhere On The Planet?”

They listed their passions and their dissatisfactions. 

When they combined and prioritized their two lists into one common one they discovered they were in synch on the vast majority of their “Musts” and “Wants.”

So they transferred their jobs to a better quality of life location?

That was the hard part. 

They tried.

But, in the end they took a leap of faith.

They took a big risk. 

They gambled that they could both find jobs to support their lifestyle in a climate and geographical location where they’d be happy.

But, it was a calculated risk. 

  • They did their homework and tapped into their “Birds of a Feather” – tribal connections, if you will — ahead of time.
  • They knitted together a small group of like-minded people for the sole purpose of trading inside information and referrals.
  • They needed inside sources of business intelligence and introductions to make the best life decision they could.
  • And, they took several scouting trips – some on business trips, some on vacations to confirm what they had researched. 

They double-checked advice they had received from family, friends and new acquaintances they met along the way.

They set up their own “outpost” by renting outside of the Denver urban area while they explored where they wanted to live. 

As it turned out, Finnmark managed to finagle a position with his Chicago-based company by opening an office for them in Denver.

Shortly after arriving his wife landed her job.

In the same industry and function, with the flexibility to work from her home office since she conducted audits “in the field.”

In fact, like a farmer you could say she was outstanding in her field.

Look, I didn’t say you would, but you (I) could.

Point?

She earned an outstanding reputation recognized by her new employer.

And in a few months both began living their version of the “Colorado Dream” lifestyle in a beautiful home in Parker. 

Over a decade ago we profiled Finnmark in “The Journal of 2020 Foresight.”

On our chart it is in the upper right hand corner at the intersection of “Doing What You Love in Current Geographical Location.” 

We visited some of these neighborhoods in Parker, Colorado to which our friend moved from an exclusive Chicago suburb. 

They don’t have to live in congested, urban areas so you find like-minded residents in the elite suburbs. 

Statistically, these neighborhoods house a high concentration of the wealthiest in the United States. 

If you are familiar with the Southern California – you’d find them in … 

  • La Jolla, 
  • Torrey Pines, and 
  • Escondido (San Diego County) and 
  • Newport Coast, 
  • Newport Beach, 
  • Corona del Mar, 
  • Huntington Beach, 
  • Irvine and 
  • Mission Viejo (Orange County).

Not all of Parker’s neighborhood lifestyle profiles grouped together within the elite suburbs.  

Two what we now describe as “Wireless Resorters” – Premier Resorts and Maturing Resorts – called Parker home.

Here’s how we described the broad grouping and then two lifestyle segments – Country Squires and God’s Country –  in the “Journal of 2020 Foresight.”

And Landed Gentry?

They’re the fourth most affluent with multiple incomes from executive, professional and technology-related knowledge workers. 

They prefer to live in the exurbs – beyond the suburbs and dense urban areas.

And the Country Squires and God’s Country?

Both yearn to escape urban stress and prefer to live away from the city. 

Country Squires have been called “big bucks in the boondocks” by Claritas. 

God’s Country neighborhoods apply their dual incomes to support an active, outdoor lifestyle.

Slowly neighborhoods change.

You can see the fit that Finnmark and his wife found when they first moved to Parker many years ago. But over time, what once was exurban now becomes suburban, and almost urban as communities mature.

If they had to do it over again, they might check out Parker’s 2025 Master Plan to decide if there was as much fit as they had anticipated.

Here’s a kernel of an idea that grew over time. 

It evolved.

When the opportunity presented itself, it burst to the forefront of Finnmark’s planning.

In the long term Finnmark said he wouldn’t mind living off the grid – becoming more self-sufficient like in the Lone Eagle scenarios. 

We now call the Lone Eagle scenarios – High Country Eagles.  

And, in many of the mountain resort communities you’ll find them living farther away from the towns in Rural Cowboy ranches, farms and other sparsely populated rivers, lakes and open land.

Steps:

8) Sit down with your spouse, partner or friends and write-up your bucket list of places.

20) Pivot. Maybe the lists of best places don’t appeal to you. Where can you go to make a fresh, new start? Don’t limit your imagination. Think anywhere — across the globe. Where do you really, really want to live, work and play?  Why not live where it’s a vacation all year round?

21) Spend the time to find the best place to live and invest. It will be worth your while. The great thing about living where others spend their vacation is the year round quality-of-life. 

Taking Calculated Risks

As a real estate investor you’re looking for the equivalent of a stock market mantra, “Buy low, sell high.”

Attracting Trend-Setting Couples
Well off empty nest 45 – 65-year-old couples and successful midlife 30 – 44-year-old couples signal the transition to higher appreciation in real estate.

An excerpt from Book Five in “The Knowledge Path Series” dedicated to helping you find the place of your dreams in the Sierra Mountain resorts.

Part Two in a 4-Part Series.

Part One: You

Look for a real estate market just taking off or, as in the Lake Tahoe market, accelerating again after a consolidation or drop in prices.

Lake Tahoe Homes

Contact local brokers for property price statistics and discuss vacancy rates for the town

  • Falling vacancy rates indicate demand is outstripping supply.
  • And that translates into enduring price appreciation.
  • Another quantitative variable to check is any factor that would limit the amount of land available for development.

Harry Dent advises you to look for any clues

These would include environmental constraints, water shortages, adjacent hills and lakes that count towards the acreage totals but cannot be developed, zoning laws, and so on.

  • As a real estate investor you’re looking for the equivalent of a stock market mantra, “Buy low, sell high.”
  • Or in retail, “Location, location, location”
  • A limited supply of suitable land plus growth equals appreciation.

    Explosive Las Vegas Growth

Dent turns to Nevada, Florida and Colorado for examples.

  • In Las Vegas at the time of his report had been growing by 14% every year, exactly the kind of statistic you’d want to find.
  • But with so much cheap land surrounding the gambling and entertainment mecca housing supply easily kept ahead of demand.
Desert Surrounding Vegas

This is why, for example, Las Vegas is growing at an astonishing rate of 14% per year but homeowners are enjoying only modest appreciation. 

Here’s the contrarian position.

  • When “timing is everything.”
  • There is a physical limit after all.
Mountain Range Halting Limitless Expansion

But Las Vegas is approaching the limits set by the surrounding mountain ranges. As a result, it may see more substantial price appreciation in the future.

What about Florida, an irresistible  magnet for snowbirds and retirees?

High population growth rates?

Check.

But, Dent says to consider two anti-appreciation factors.

Florida Lifestyle

Lots of flat land suitable for development and plenty of water have kept the price appreciation in most areas relatively modest. 

Look for pro-appreciation factors at work.

Limitations which limit growth (supply) while the attraction (demand) drives population growth.

  • California’s priciest areas limit growth by geographical, think Pacific Ocean, and ecological limitations.
  • Finally, at the top of our bucket list, Telluride, Colorado, is surrounded by mountain walls.

    Canyon Surrounding Telluride

The appreciation in such areas due to a growing population has been phenomenal.

The idea for this book germinated from a simple question my son asked on the porch of Tom’s Place.

He pointed to the houses, cabins and vacation homes perched on the winding terrace lots.

“How to live in one of those while doing what I want to do.”

My quest to build my knowledge bank came from Dent’s insight.

The final piece of quantitative data that can give us insight into a potential boomtown tells us about the local lifestyles, known as psychographics. 

Without having to visit each and every boomtown you can first filter a long “Birds-of-a-Feather” bucket list down to a more manageable regional itinerary.

  • Then visits to your short list you can confirm what lifestyle profiles suggest.
  • Take extended vacations in both the summer and winter test the fit, get a “feel” for the place and check out what’s going on.
  • You can correlate numerous measurable demographic factors with specific lifestyle preferences as we’ve shown beginning in Whitefish, Montana and ending with Mammoth Lakes, California.

A lifestyle analysis of any city, town, zip code, or neighborhood …

can help you identify a new town that is  attracting people like you whom you’d enjoy as neighbors. 

It is also important to use such data to identify which towns are attracting the trend setting lifestyles of the more affluent sectors of the population. 

The towns with Wireless Resorter profiles attract trend setting lifestyles.

Center of Mammoth Lakes Development
  • Over time Mammoth Lakes shifted from a Maturing Resort lifestyle magnet – informal, bluejeans  unpretentious – to a growing Premier Resort  attraction over the years we tracked them.
  • The appearance of both the 09M1T1 and 25Y1T1 profiles — well off empty nest 45 – 65-year-old couples and successful midlife 30 – 44-year-old couples signal the transition to higher appreciation in real estate.

Dent originally wrote …

If a Claritas (now Nielsen PRIZM Segmentation) report on the town you are researching shows a significant or growing influx of any of these lifestyle segments, then it confirms that you have selected a boomtown. 

But if it didn’t, how could you find Wireless Resort profiles?

Steps:

22) Selectively evaluate the best quality-of-life communities to live in and weigh the tradeoffs of risk and rewards for accruing real estate appreciation along a progression of rural and small towns that meet what your pocket books can afford.

 

You

“… it is necessary to invest time to personally visit and evaluate each one—there are many qualitative factors affecting your final decision that can’t be wrapped up in neat columns of data.”

Is This The Right Investment for You?
On the other hand, if real estate prices have been growing for a long period of time, there is a risk that prices could peak and consolidate for a period of time.”

 

An excerpt from Book Five in “The Knowledge Path Series” dedicated to helping you find the place of your dreams in the Sierra Mountain resorts.

Part One in a 4-Part Series.

Part Two: Taking Calculated Risks

What about you?

It’s time to clarify your own priorities.

Is This Lifestyle Right for You?

There are not shortages of best places lists, but what is the best fit for you personally?

  • To what type of place do you want to relocate?
  • What type of boomtown would be a wise investment? 

The challenge and the opportunity lying before you falls into two parts.

First, use quantitative data to research potential towns that interest you for your own bucket list.

Second, Harry Dent says

it is necessary to invest time to personally visit and evaluate each one—there are many qualitative factors affecting your final decision that can’t be wrapped up in neat columns of data or expressed in a terse written description.

Is there a threshold below which or above which you should look for?

For the first, Dent cautions you as you consider towns with fewer citizens.

As a general rule, you will want to invest in a small town only when it has a minimum population of 3,000; an even safer bet is 5,000 people. 

If the town has between 3,000 and 5,000 people, make sure that there are solid plans for growth and that it offers some qualitative advantages over other areas before investing in it. 

Too Far Away To Appreciate

Another rule of thumb.

The growing towns following their development strategies often take off after reaching a population of 20,000.

The next threshold Dent identified was 50,000.

The critical mass for many new growth cities (or formerly small towns) making the transition to a growth city, is often around 50,000.

But, that’s not all.

At each of those minimum population thresholds you will also want to find out if their continuing growth trend is growing or, better yet, accelerating.

This is a strong indicator that real estate is appreciating, not depreciating, and confirms that you have selected a town that other investors find attractive as well. 

Absolute population growth or even population growth as a percentage can be misleading, though.

A better measure is relative growth calculated over the last 10 years.

How does it compare to the rest of the country, state or region in which the town is located.

To calculate the relative growth, simply divide the town’s population growth for each year by the population growth of the country, state or county for that same year, and then plot the figure on a graph. 

Before Google and Wikipedia, you’d have to spend a tremendous amount of time at the library sorting through statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau.

And, then you’d have to visit or subscribe to reports from state and local agencies, and from demographic marketing companies.

Now most of that information exists online at two or three sources.

For future projections, you might have to dig a little.

I’ve grown to depend on city-data.com

Mobile Analysis While You Enjoy Your Visit

By collecting and analyzing data from numerous sources, we’re able to create detailed, informative profiles of all cities in the United States. From crime rates to weather patterns, you can find the data you’re looking for on City-Data.com.

For a snapshot, Wikipedia usually provides the top-level statistics, as it does for Mammoth Lakes.

As of the 2010 United States Census, the population was 8,234, reflecting an increase of 1,141 from the 7,093 counted in the 2000 Census.

And, if Mammoth makes the first cut consult Wikipedia for a little more detailed data. 

In this case what the 2010 Census revealed.

The population density was 325.4 people per square mile (125.6/km²). The racial makeup of Mammoth Lakes was 6,643 (80.7%) White, 29 (0.4%) African-American, 49 (0.6%) Native American, 128 (1.6%) Asian, 5 (0.1%) Pacific Islander, 1,151 (14.0%) from other races, and 229 (2.8%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2,772 persons (33.7%).

But, if projected population data are available, plot future years as well.

Let’s say you’ve done you homework researching your bucket list.

And you discover that the town has grown in the past, but it is not growing faster than the surrounding regional area.

Red flag.

While not always included in other Wikipedia’s pages, for Mammoth Lakes a sidebar tracks population growth from each Census beginning in 1880 (473) through 2010 (8234) or an increase of 16.1% from 2000.

Wikipedia’s sources project for last year in 2015 a drop of 3.5% from 2010 to 7946 residents.

It is not a genuine growth town.

In all categories of boomtowns you’re considering, with the exception of areas that appeal to affluent retirees, look for growth in job markets and a rising level of income.  

Without the growth there simply isn’t enough money circulating to boost  real estate prices.

  • Are there extenuating circumstances?
  • An economic downturn that all resorts suffered?
  • Does that signal a buying or investment opportunity?
Center of Mammoth Lakes Development

Dent says

Even in a growing resort area with a large percentage of retired homeowners, you would expect to see job and income growth for the people who provide goods and services to the town.

Dent recommended engaging demographic marketing firms for economic and job data.

In addition to providing past data, they can give you good estimates for 25 years into the future, based on demographic factors and business and employment trends. 

Today that once expensive knowledge can be found online.

Specific to Mammoth Lakes

As more powerful “Big Data” cloud technologies aggregate it for you.

No matter what the source, you should review data for an entire county as a reliable way to evaluate a single town.

Mammoth Lakes, California Zip Code 93546

“But, only when that town comprises most of the county’s population,” Dent says. 

“Or, such data also can help you easily identify high growth counties in which to look further for high growth towns.”

Searching on City-Data.com for “Mammoth Lakes” and by Mammoth’s zip code “93546” yield slightly different, but useful data sets.

I’m not sure why, but you should consider both when you are serious.

And, another search of “Mono County” shows you all the growth comparison calculations you’ll need plus the distance to nearby towns and nearby zip codes to explore.

Details About Mono County from City Data

All within minutes.

If you find growth in the town’s real estate prices, Dent says treat it as a simple positive indicator.

“Strong appreciation indicates that other people think this town is a good investment, too. 

On the other hand, if real estate prices have been growing for a long period of time, there is a risk that prices could peak and consolidate for a period of time.”

Steps:

21) Spend the time to find the best place to live and invest. It will be worth your while. The great thing about living where others spend their vacation is the year round quality-of-life. 

22) Selectively evaluate the best quality-of-life communities to live in and weigh the tradeoffs of risk and rewards for accruing real estate appreciation along a progression of rural and small towns that meet what your pocket books can afford.

Itineraries

“It is obvious that you are a young, smart-a– who probably moved from LA to Mammoth, couldn’t afford to live there and ended up here.” “I was born here. You’re obviously a hypocrite.”

Winter Season
Itineraries:  11 resort towns in 3 travel regions in California; 14 resort towns in 3 travel regions in Colorado

Changing Regions for Changing Reasons during Changing Seasons.

Let’s help you put together a travel itinerary.

Summer Outdoors

Your goal is to plan two vacations, one for opposite seasons – winter and summer.

In the regions of your top bucket list destinations.

To sample the good, bad and ugly community factors.

With the help of our knowledge bank, you can choose for variations in your new neighborhood by:

But to zero in on the best place for you you’ll have to visit and schedule time to explore potential new homes in a region.

For our “quality-of-life purposes” we can help you plan two mountain itineraries —

  • one for the Rocky Mountain Region and
  • one for the Sierra Nevada Mountain Region.

Whitefish, you’ll recall is located in Northwestern Montana in the Glacier Country Travel Region within the Rocky Mountain Region of Western United States.

Best of Whitefish, Montana

Phew!

You’d like it for all of those quality-of-life outdoor activities like

  • skiing and snowboarding in the winter, and
  • road and mountain biking, hiking, camping, kayaking, horseback riding, and whitewater rafting in the summer.

That means, of course, to build your own bucket list, you should focus on the four-state region Rocky Mountain Region which includes

Colorado, Idaho, Wyoming and Montana.

So from the common (Premier Resorts –WRPR 09M1T1 and Rustic Eagles –HCERE 58M4T4) and the lifestyle-specific lists we’re eliminating some states.

The first to go is Arizona, followed by parts of California and Nevada, and New Mexico and Utah.

Get Your Kicks on Route 66

But, first you may enjoy our “Best West Road Trips – Route 66” which traces the “Mother Road” from

the Texas Panhandle Region through New Mexico, Arizona and

ends up on the Santa Monica Pier in California.

Oh, and if you’re planning to move your lifestyle business from Whitefish to an artist colony, you may want to keep

Bisbee, 85603 and Jerome (Prescott), 86305 in Arizona and

Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505 on your list.

Jerome (Prescott), 86305 in the Northern Arizona travel region was once a notorious “Wild West” town, a hotbed of prostitution, gambling, and vice — “the wickedest town in the West”.

Today Jerome is known as an art destination, with more than 30 galleries and working studios.

Bisbee, 85603, on the other hand, is in the Eastern Arizona travel region known for high desert lands, Wild West history galore and small towns near the border.

Art Galleries

“Bisbee offers some of the best art galleries together with highly Zagat-rated restaurants and brewpubs. 

Main Street’s antique shops and galleries are surrounded with examples of Victorian architecture.”

In our “Best West Road Trips – Route 66” magazine profiling the North Central travel region of New Mexico  you may enjoy discovering all that Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505 has to offer you as one of the

Santa Fe, New Mexico Art Scene

“world’s top destinations for its long history of artists (especially Georgia O’Keeffe and Alfred Stieglitz) , musicians and fine dining.”

Oh, and before we dismiss Montana, if Dudley and Arthur and the long-term locals, Charles and his brother relocated as part of the Rustic Eagles –HCERE 58M4T4 migration, it’s entirely possible that they would prefer Red Lodge (Billings), 59068.

You’ll recall that they fell victim to astronomical tax valuations based on the skyrocketing land values that had turned much of western Montana into a real estate gold mine over the previous 10 to 15 years.

So if they took some of their friends advice, “Your sitting on a couple million dollars; why don’t you sell it?’ they might have capitalized on a hidden opportunity.

Most other Montanans got relatively small property tax increases in the same year — some, in declining areas like eastern Montana, actually saw their tax bills go down.

And, not only is Red Lodge still in Montana it is on the eastern side of the Continental Divide roughly an eight hour drive southeast of Whitefish.

Like Whitefish, Red Lodge offers many outdoor recreation opportunities: skiing, mountain biking, and backpacking.

Red Lodge in Montana

In April it is host to a popular triathlon called the Peaks to Prairie.

Red Lodge’s population increases from about 1,200 people in the winter to over 1,800 people during the summer tourist season, arriving via the Beartooth Highway.

Pretty much just like Whitefish in the good old days before the celebrities, sports stars and CEOs made neighboring Flathead Lake their playground.

With sometimes as much driving time and distances to cover as from Whitefish to Red Lodge and with only a week or two vacation time to spend, we recommend organizing your itinerary by travel regions.

In the Rocky Mountain Regions, Colorado is often considered the gateway to the Rockies.  Within Colorado tourism areas are broken down into:

Colorado Regions

Denver Area

Eastern Plains

Front Range

Northwestern Colorado

South Central Colorado

Southwestern Colorado

In California the travel regions vary greatly, ranging from forested northern coastal regions to the rugged interior mountains to the harsh southern desert.

“Outside California’s major cities one finds some of North America’s most rugged national parks, incredible skiing/snowboarding opportunities, and quiet and ancient northern forests including the highest mountain peak in the contiguous states, Mt. Whitney.”

California’s 10 travel regions are broken down into:

Goin’ Coastal on PCH

Southern California

Desert

Central Coast

San Joaquin Valley

Sacramento Valley

Sierra Nevada

Gold Country

Bay Area

North Coast

Shasta Cascades

If you’re interested in the Desert and part of the Southern California region, you may enjoy the “California Regions” edition of “Best West Road Trips – Route 66

“California Regions – the last leg of your journey. From the desert and the mountains to the sea. Ending In Santa Monica at the Pier. It’s all there if you dare!”

If you’re fascinated by the beach towns and breath-taking scenery along Pacific Coast Highway (PCH), then you might enjoy, “Best West Road Trips – Goin’ Coastal,” an itinerary.

Iconic Hotel Del Coronado

It that takes you from

the historic beach Hotel del Coronado in San Diego

through South Coast beach towns to

the laid back Central Coast,

the Bay Area and finally  to the North Coast before continuing into

Oregon and Washington.

California – birds-of-a-feather (BOF) towns sorted by regions.

Southern California – Idyllwild, 92549; Del Mar, 92014; Escondido, 92026; Julian, 92036; Lake Arrowhead, 92352 and Malibu, 90265

Bay Area – Mendocino, 95460; Healdsburg, 95448; La Honda, 94020; Napa, 94558 and St. Helena, 94574

Sierra Nevada – Truckee, 96161, 96162; Lone Pine, 93545; Oakhurst, 93644; North Fork, 93643; Bishop, 93514; Squaw Valley, 96146; Tahoe City, 96145; and Truckee, 96161

Central Coast – Baywood – Los Osos (San Luis Obispo), 93402; Cambria, 93428; Montecito, 93108; Morro Bay, 93442; Santa Cruz, 95064; Santa Ynez, 93460 and Scotts Valley, 95066

Desert – Indian Wells, 92210; La Quinta, 92253; Palm Desert, 92260 and  Rancho Mirage, 92270

Gold Country (Western Sierra Nevada) –  Murphys, 95247 and Roseville (Granite Bay), 95746

Shasta Cascades – Susanville, 96137

Colorado – birds-of-a-feather (BOF) towns sorted by regions.

Denver Area – Golden, 80401

Front Range – Boulder, 80301; Winter Park, 80482;

Northwestern Colorado – Aspen, 81611; Basalt, 81621; Beaver Creek, 81620; Dillon, 80435; Edwards, 81632; Frisco (Copper Mountain), 80443; Snowmass, 81654; Vail, 81567; and Walden, 80480

Southwestern Colorado –  Crested Butte, 81224; Creede, 81130; Lake City, 81235; and Silverton, 81433

South Central Colorado – Pagosa Springs, 81147

Organizing potential quality-of-life mountain towns into travel regions for the migrating Premier Resorts –WRPR 09M1T1 and Rustic Eagles –HCERE 58M4T4 BOFs eliminates from the Southern California region …

  • Del Mar, 92014,
  • Escondido, 92026, and
  • Malibu, 90265.

We also skipped those towns in California’s Shasta Cascades, Desert, Central Coast and Bay Area Travel Regions.

So, our itinerary in California focuses on  the Western Sierra Nevada – Gold Country and nearby Sierra Nevada travel regions.

In preparation for the Colorado itineraries, we’ve eliminated the Eastern Plains, because no potential towns attracted ex- flocking neighbors.

And, by passing on the Denver Area and Front Range travel regions, we’re concentrating on the potential bucket list towns in the western half of the state, Southwestern, South Central and Northwestern Colorado.

California Itineraries 11 resort towns in 3 travel regions:

Southern California – Idyllwild, 92549; Julian, 92036; and Lake Arrowhead, 92352

Sierra Nevada – Truckee, 96161, 96162; Lone Pine, 93545; Oakhurst, 93644; North Fork, 93643; Bishop, 93514; Squaw Valley, 96146; Tahoe City, 96145; and Truckee, 96161

Gold Country (Western Sierra Nevada) –  Murphys, 95247 and Roseville (Granite Bay), 95746

Colorado Itineraries: 14 resort towns in 3 travel regions:

Northwestern Colorado – Aspen, 81611; Basalt, 81621; Beaver Creek, 81620; Dillon, 80435; Edwards, 81632; Frisco (Copper Mountain), 80443; Snowmass, 81654; Vail, 81567; and Walden, 80480

Southwestern Colorado –  Crested Butte, 81224; Creede, 81130; Lake City, 81235; and Silverton, 81433

South Central Colorado – Pagosa Springs, 81147

So the good news is you (and the migrating BOF from Whitefish, Montana) won’t have to visit all 75 potential communities.

By taking travel region itineraries you can cut the total by 66% and not have to deal with the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO).

However, since we’ve eliminated most of the Southern California travel region you won’t have a chance to visit one of the three chicken-war battle fields, “Wealthy Influential” Newport Beach.

But the better news is, by traveling the Sierra Nevada regional itinerary,  you’ll (and former  BOF) be able to compare notes during Bishop’s Mule Days Celebration over the Memorial Day holiday at popular Erick Schat’s Bakkerÿ on north Main Street.

Come Early to Skip the Lines

You might run into those “hypocrites” …

“It is obvious that you are a young, smart-a– who probably moved from LA to Mammoth, couldn’t afford to live there and ended up here.” 

“I was born here. You’re obviously a hypocrite.”

And, so it goes.

Steps:

(32) Plan extended seasonal vacations during summer and winter months. Group destination locations together in regional trips to explore what several bucket list towns have to offer in the general vicinity – with only a week or two vacation time to spend, we recommend organizing your itinerary by travel regions.

An excerpt from Book Three in “The Knowledge Path Series” dedicated to helping you find the place of your dreams.