Success!

When we lived most or all of the year in our home in Colorado, we never had a problem renewing our driver's licenses. Even when we began traveling extensively, it wasn't too much of a problem because Colorado allows online renewals. This only becomes an issue every five years. But this year it did become an issue. We are old enough we have to renew in person. My license expires at the end of May 2016, but John's expires in February 2016. Since we spend our winters in Arizona, we needed to do something about John's before we leave Colorado. Otherwise, we faced a round trip drive of 1,400 miles in the middle of winter.

To our delight, we discovered we could renew our licenses at any time before they expired. We looked up the requirements online and read we needed evidence of our Colorado residence in addition to our old license. They suggested a credit card bill to that address. No problem. Our credit card bill is addressed to our permanent address in Colorado. We also needed proof of our Social Security number. That is more of a problem. We don't carry the cards in the RV. The website suggested a copy of our Social Security 1099. Also a problem, since I don't carry our income tax files with us since we aren't living full time in the RV anymore.

I searched and found that we could go online, set up an account on the SSA.gov site, and print out one from a previous year. That shouldn't be a problem. The questions they asked are like when you apply for a credit report--you have a bank account at one of these banks; you opened a credit card with one of these companies; you own this vehicle. I easily answered those questions and set up my account. The same process for John didn't go as well and the account was locked out for a week.

We set off for the Department of Motor Vehicles in nearby Pagosa Springs, hoping John's Medicare card or statement of medicare claims would fill the bill. No luck--the DMV in Pagosa doesn't issue drivers' licenses. We did enjoy looking around the small town.

The next day, we headed to Durango, a larger town nearby. Yes, they have a driver's license bureau. And we didn't need proof of our Social Security number, after all. Why did the web site say we did? But we weren't complaining. We have both renewed our licenses for the next 5 years. And we enjoyed looking around Durango, too. We are so glad this item is off our agenda for five years.

In my next blog, I will show some o the sights in Pagosa Springs and Durango.