A Country A Month
Practical travel books for trips worth planning properly.
Independent, ship-specific cruise guides, honest country guides for retiring abroad, and a national parks series in progress. Written by Leo Sotropa.
Choose your journey
Three kinds of trip, planned properly
Independent books and free guides, written to be specific enough to act on.
33 ship guides
Ultimate Ship Guides
One megaship, one book. Cabins to book and cabins to avoid, what to reserve on day one, where to eat, and a ready-made plan for every port.
Enter the ship library10 countries, more coming
Retired Abroad
What it actually costs, what the residency route really requires, how healthcare works and where you would want to wake up. Researched the way you would research your own move.
Browse Retired AbroadIn development
National ParksIn progress
Twenty to thirty parks, each its own book. Where to sleep, which trail is worth the early start, and how to see a park properly in the days you actually have.
Get the launch listPopular guides
A good place to start
Six of the 33 ship guides. The full, filterable library is one click away.
From the blog
A few guides worth reading
Free, practical, and specific. A taste of what is on the blog.
The No-Nonsense Guide to Retiring Abroad
No hype. No fear. Sourced numbers.
Every guide answers the same questions in the same order, so you can compare countries instead of comparing brochures: the residency route, the real monthly budget, healthcare, housing, and what daily life is like once the novelty wears off.
Next in the series: Costa Rica, Panama, Ecuador.
© 2026 Leo Sotropa. Independent, unofficial guides. Not affiliated with or endorsed by any cruise line. Ship names and venues are trademarks of their respective owners, used for identification only.