I am happy to report that our first full-retirement excursion was an unqualified success.

We returned home after spending about 10 days on the road in our fifth wheel RV.

We spent the first part of it in the Hill Country of Texas visiting family members: my wife’s brother, two nieces, our “nephew in law,” and two great-nieces.

Then we headed west, toward Ruidoso, N.M.

But first we had some wind with which to contend. We pulled up in the Davis Mountains region, then trekked northwest toward El Paso and straight into some gale-force winds that kicked up a whole lot of dirt.

Our fuel mileage plummeted as we powered through El Paso and then headed north toward Ruidoso.

But we got there and spent a couple of nights at a campsite next to my sister and brother in law, who had driven in from their own vacation spot in Mesa, Ariz.

We had a serious blast with them. They departed and we stayed on to trudge along some mountain trails, which we did each day until our departure this morning.

Here’s the best news: Neither of us was particularly anxious for our journey to end. And this feeling, I venture to speculate, will accelerate as we move more deeply into this retirement life.

We came home, plan to do some laundry and then we’ll refocus on our next journey to, oh, hither and yon.