Word.ws English Dictionary

grey nomad

grey nomad noun: a retired person who travels independently and for an extended period within their own country, particularly in a caravan or motor home.

Noun

grey nomad (plural grey nomads)

  1. (Australia) A retired person who travels independently and for an extended period within their own country, particularly in a caravan or motor home.
    • Every year Grey Nomad migration sees the little Gulf town of Karumba stretched creaseless with sunbirds and fisherfolk.2008, Monte Dwyer, Red In The Centre: The Australian Bush Through Urban Eyes, Monyer Pty Ltd, page 69
    • I suppose I only became conscious of the grey nomads when I became one.[…]Some grey nomads are on the road for up to two years as they follow the seasons — Broome and the Kimberley during the dry season, or Far North Queensland from the Gold Coast up to escape the southern winter. Then a stately...2011, Tim Bowden, No Tern Unstoned – Musings At Breakfast, unnumbered page
    Synonyms:
    snowbird

Synonyms of grey nomad

Forms of grey nomad

pluralgrey nomads
alternative formgray nomad

Origin of grey nomad

Coined by documentary filmmakers Catherine Marciniak and Steve Westh for the documentary Grey Nomads screened on the Australian public broadcaster ABC on September 23rd 1997.

Questions about grey nomad

What does grey nomad mean?
Grey nomad means a retired person who travels independently and for an extended period within their own country, particularly in a caravan or motor home.
What part of speech is grey nomad?
Grey nomad is a noun.
What is the plural of grey nomad?
The plural of grey nomad is grey nomads.

Words near grey nomad in the dictionary

  1. grey night
  2. grey nights
  3. grey noddies
  4. grey noddy
  5. grey noise
  6. grey nomad
  7. grey nomads
  8. grey nurse
  9. grey nurse shark
  10. grey nurse sharks
  11. grey nurses

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: grey nomad (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: EN-AU ck1 grey nomad.ogg.

Cite this entry: “grey nomad.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/grey_nomad. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.