(FORTUNE Magazine) – AT LAST you have time to improve your handicap and tarry at favorite vacation spots. But retirement is no mere lark. Like a pioneer setting off in a Conestoga wagon with limited provisions, you must learn new resourcefulness. Even if your wealth is invested to shield you from inflation (see previous article), you must be ready for four major contingencies: -- YOU GET BORED. For some, three golf games a week quickly palls. If you stumble into a nice part-time consulting job, plan to inform the Social Security folks -- and arrange to take a cut in that monthly check. Retirees between 65 and 69, eligible for a maximum benefit of $1,022 a month, lose $1 for every $3 of earnings of more than $9,720. The penalty ends at age 70. -- YOU GET VERY SICK. Most Fortune 500 companies continue health benefits for retirees and their spouses until they become eligible for Medicare at 65. Thereafter, the company plan usually piggybacks onto Medicare, whose coverage has gaps and spending limits. But total peace of mind is out of the question because employers usually impose a lifetime spending cap once you depart. It's unlikely that you will breach this ceiling, which at some companies can be as low as $100,000 for each family member. But medical costs are rising twice as fast as inflation in general, and even today you might use up a sizable chunk of your allotment if you required, say, bone marrow transplants for leukemia. The best way to provide for such catastrophic expenses is to buy one of the standardized ''medigap'' insurance policies that are expected to hit the market following a new federal reform law. Sometime in 1992, the American Association of Retired Persons, which offers all its health policies through Prudential, will introduce a minimum-cost ''core'' policy that will probably cost about $30 a month per person regardless of age. -- YOU WIND UP IN A NURSING HOME. In case you haven't heard, Medicare's nursing home coverage is limited to brief recuperation from a major illness or injury. Prolonged nursing home stays are the wild card in any family's post- retirement finances. As the table below shows, the odds are in your favor that your family will be spared. But there's no way of knowing if you or your spouse will be among the unlucky ones, incurring annual costs that could reach $139,430 each by 2010. Many Americans buy nursing home insurance for protection, but the premiums can be fearsome. A study by the Health Insurance Association of America, a trade group, shows that a 50-year-old paid an average $660 a year in 1990 for a policy that covers $80 a day in costs, with built-in 5% yearly increases to offset inflation. The premium leaped to $1,400 a year for those who waited until 65 to buy, and $4,200 at age 79. Many insurers turn away people with preexisting conditions such as Parkinson's disease. Pore over the fine print to determine what you will get, if anything, should the awful time come. James Firman, president of United Seniors Health Cooperative, a nonprofit consumer group in Washington, D.C., charged in recent congressional testimony that many insurers ''bury, obfuscate, or simply fail to reveal in the marketing literature critical information about key eligibility requirements for receiving benefits.'' If you want coverage, Firman says, consider only a big, well-known insurer such as American Express, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Bankers Life, CNA, and the AARP. Another way to head off nursing home expenses is to move into a so-called continuing-care retirement community. Starting out in an apartment, you gain automatic entrance to an adjoining nursing home when your health deteriorates. The more you shell out initially -- a median of $75,300 in 1987 for a two- bedroom apartment, three times as much in a ritzier enclave -- the greater the proportion of nursing home bills that are prepaid. You could also solve the problem by going broke and letting the Medicaid program for the poor pay your nursing home bills. A more sophisticated approach is to save something for your family, giving away most of your money to children or putting it in an irrevocable trust for them, at least 30 months before turning to Medicaid. One catch is that you must virtually pauperize your spouse too. Rules vary by state on assets he or she may keep. New York allows the maximum permitted under federal law: $66,480, plus a house and a car.

Few executives from the upper-middle management brackets will ever need to resort to this maneuver. Boston attorney Alexander Bove Jr., who spells it out in his forthcoming Medicaid Planning Handbook (Little Brown & Co.), says that a couple with $700,000 in financial assets should be able to handle one spouse's nursing home costs. Paul Westbrook, president of Westbrook Financial Advisers in Watchung, New Jersey, tells his affluent clients to be ready to use their own assets if need be. Says Westbrook: ''We use three years as a planning figure for nursing home expenses after 85.'' -- YOUR INVESTMENTS BOMB. This is no problem if you have a margin of safety. Earl Gordy, 65, of Silsbee, Texas, who retired five years ago as an engineer at Mobil, has had smooth sailing so far. Linscomb & Williams, a financial planning firm in Houston, has his IRA money in a dozen mutual funds, Gordy says, with an overall yield of about 7%. Among them: the T. Rowe Price NEW INCOME FUND, which holds high-quality bonds, and several funds holding mortgage securities issued by the Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae). Gordy is living within his income, and in a pinch could move more heavily into higher-yielding funds. It's a different story with John Salzer, 69, who stepped down four years ago as president and CEO of Dresser Leasing Corp. He lives with his wife, Lillian, two years younger, in Naples, Florida, a favorite retirement Valhalla for middle managers and up. Salzer's bundle is somewhat bigger than Gordy's, but he's taken some hits investing on his own. Among his mistakes: junk bonds and real estate partnerships. ''You call to sell the partnerships,'' he says, ''and they say you're 800th on the waiting list.'' Salzer has done better with his investments since he switched to the A.G. Edwards brokerage firm. His holdings include electric utility and regional telephone stocks as well as corporate bonds and Florida municipals. His pride and joy is MAUNA LOA MACADAMIA PARTNERS, which yields 11% in income. Because of a blood vessel disease, Salzer has been turned down for nursing home insurance. But his health is otherwise good, and he plays the sax in a local band. ''My life expectancy is 12 years,'' Salzer notes. He has been dipping into principal to maintain his lifestyle but has an ace in the hole: a $700,000 house that he could sell if he uses up his other assets in the next ten years. Says Salzer: ''Our money should outlast us.''

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE CREDIT: FORTUNE TABLE/SOURCE: UNITED SENIORS HEALTH COOPERATIVE CAPTION: WHAT NURSING HOMES WILL COST. . . . . .AND WILL YOU NEED ONE? The bad news for retirees is that inflation will hype nursing home bills. The good news: Odds are you'll be spared.