About us
Nicke Barefoot and Thomas Fitzgerald have been a couple since 1983. We met in New Jersey and moved to Florida in 1986. We both are entrepreneurs, Nicke became a top producing Real Estate Agent, and Thomas started a successful computer software business.
Since then we both worked hard and played hard. We went on many vacations in the intervening years. We visited the USA, Mexico, The Bahamas, the Virgin Islands, Panama, Canada, Greece, Monaco, France, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, and Portugal. We loved them all for the same reason, new adventures, new sights, new (old) history, new culture, new people, new experiences.
Nicke Barefoot
Hi, I am Nicke Barefoot, a senior currently living in South Florida. My newest stage of life after a successful 14 year Banking career and a 30+ year Real Estate career, is as a TRAVELER. I like to travel with my long time partner, Fitz (Thomas Fitzgerald). We have been to numerous US states, Canada, Mexico, Central America, and the Bahamas. Lately we have been exploring Europe.
During our recent trip to Portugal a positive Covid test resulted in an unexpected extension of our 10 day vacation to a 27 day trip. This experience cemented our idea of possibly living in a foreign country to actually deciding that Portugal would be a great place use as both a new place to live but also as a base of discovery other parts of Europe, Africa, and beyond.
Thomas Fitzgerald
Hi, I am Thomas “Fitz” Fitzgerald. I have retired from a lifetime of different careers. I always knew that I wanted to be in some type of technical position, because tech always came easy to me.
I originally started as a Electronics Lab Technician, where I worked on projects for large clients like Sears and Wester Electric. I installed Cable TV for a couple of years in several states. I worked as a Cost Estimator for a major thermocouple manufacturer, and then became product manager for both thermocouples and mini-heaters for the plastics industry. I then worked selling custom process control systems to fortune 500 clients like Coke, Pepsi, Allied Chemical, Exxon-Mobile, M&M Mars, Nabisco, and others. I most recently retired after owning and operating a successful computer software business for 35 years in South Florida.
Even though I am “retired” I am also an App developer, and I take on some projects occasionally.
But THIS blog/vlog will be taking up some of my time as Nicke and I continue to enrich it with articles about …
- Moving to Portugal
- Living in Europe
- Traveling in Europe
I hope you enjoy our experiences, and, maybe, get inspired to travel or even move to Europe yourself.