Living in a Cloud

How do we live an almost completely mobile life carrying belongings in small, 20-25 pound packs?  In part, we live in a cloud.

As we prepare our last bags tonight at our friend Lisa’s house and head toward Latin America in a few hours, we are wondering if the preparations of the past three years will work.  During those years, we slowly converted everything we could to electrons.  We have learned a lot from reading reviews, blogs, and asking others about their path to freedom. 

We scanned most of our old photos (or at least Jess’s nephew Jack did!) and in the end, sent the last few hundreds to Digmypics.  They professionally brought the memories of a lifetime to us via a DVD and albums on Google’s Picassa.  The images are more available than they have been to either of us in the past decades and the memories are rich.  We converted all of our music with Itunes to mp3 files.  We took pictures or scanned things that we had moved from house to house for years including notes from friends, old sports awards, etc.  We went through our filing cabinets and scanned important papers.  All of these and more are available to us on the Ipod Touch, Iphone, and Ipad as well as anywhere there is web access through a wonderful program called Dropbox.

Mail was a particular challenge for us.  Because we no longer have a physical address in Gunnison, Colorado, we had to find somewhere to receive mail.  The solution was a service called MailForwarding.com.  We changed our address to Michigan and the company there receives our mail, scans the envelope, and notifies us via email that it has arrived. We then may request that they open it, forward it, shred it, or scan and email it to us.  As a backup, Sally’s sister in Fort Collins receives any forwarded mail.   (Sandy, you rock!)

We researched the one financial institution that refunded ATM fees, charged no foreign transaction fees, and offered excellent online banking (Charles Schwab).   We obtained a credit card with the best exchange rates and no foreign transaction fees (Capital One). 

Piece by piece the physical manifestations of our life became electronic and accessible.  Our phone will be turned off at midnight but if our preparations have worked, we will be in contact through our emails, Skype accounts as well as this blog.

Wish us luck as we find out if the three years of preparation really did prepare us for our international walkabout.

Posted in Los Angeles, California

How do you choose?

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.   ~Dante Alighieri

As we turned our energies and minds toward planning the first steps of our broader world journey, we knew that we would eventually have to explain how we chose where we decided to go from the almost 200 countries that exist in the world.

As has been the case in both of our lives on the most momentous choices, we are making these choices remarkably blindly, ill-informed, and with little real knowledge or sufficient thought.  Whether it was our decisions about life partners, graduate schools, career moves, or family… we have always made our choices the same way and found that with work, luck, and the willingness to learn, we grew and thrived within the boundaries defined by those choices.

We have asked hundreds of people about where they have been, what they have loved, and why they have loved it.  We have read travel blogs for over two years.  We have researched methods and modes of travel around the world.  We are certain of one thing.  We are naïve and ignorant. 

So our choices derive from a few principles, the most important being that all places, and the people within them, have something to teach us.  We have chosen places that thrill us, unnerve us, excite us, and intimidate us physically, mentally or emotionally (and occasionally all three at once). We have learned it is in this state that we grow the most.  We are sure that our journey will diverge from the path indicated below, and if all goes well, it will only be the first year of the trip.    

By publishing the dates and places, we hope that some of our friends and family may choose to walk by our side for part of the experience.  And walk is the key word.  Our next task is to get all of our possessions into a pack that weighs no more than 20 pounds.

Warm, south and international… the next stage of the trip

Los Angeles, CA (Depart Oct 22)
San Jose, Costa Rica (Arrive Oct 22 – Depart Oct 29)
Lima, Peru (Arrive Oct 29 – Depart Nov 1)
Cusco, Peru (Arrive Nov 1)
Overland on our own through Peru, Bolivia, and Argentina and back to Chile

Santiago, Chile (Depart Feb 5) (Fly through Lima, El Salvador and Costa Rica to LA)

Los Angeles (Arrive Feb 5 – Depart Feb 10)

Rarotonga (Cook Islands) – (Arrive Feb 10 – Depart Feb 18)
Auckland, New Zealand (Arrive Feb 19)
Overland to Christchurch, New Zealand
Christchurch, New Zealand (Depart March 19)
Melbourne, Australia (Arrive March 19)

Overland to Darwin, Australia

Darwin, Australia (Depart April 19)

Bali, Indonesia (Denpasar) (Arrive April 19 – Depart May 3 and fly through Kuala Lumpur)
Kota Kinabalu, Borneo, Malaysia (Arrive May 3)

Overland on our own to Kuching

Kuching, Borneo, Malaysia (Departure May 24)
Singapore, Malaysia (Arrive May 24)
Overland on our own to Thailand, Cambodia (Angkor Wat), possibly Laos and Vietnam, later to Burma, India and trekking in Nepal by November 2013.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.  ~ Lao Tzu

Posted from Haines, Alaska

Putting Alaska to Bed

September in Alaska is a very different time than July or August.  It is a frantic time for many Alaskan residents as they seek to prepare for the cold, dark, nights of the upcoming winter.  Boats are brought out of the water, buildings and vehicles are winterized in a variety of ways, wood is put in, and the final harvests of beasts and berries are done regardless of the weather.

Fewer tourists are about, with no long lines of RVs at the gas pumps in the small towns, and the temporary “locals” working in the service industry are headed back south for the season.  Tour companies and the supporting food stands, Thai trailers, and coffee shops are closed, even gone, from the empty lots that once bustled with 5 am traffic from hungry fishermen and busy women.

Wildlife is different as well.  The bears are frantically finishing their feast of over 200,000 berry days and their sides move like Jello as they waddle across roads and meadows.  The final salmon, now decaying, white and slowly drifting in small streams, have successfully thwarted the seine nets, dip nets, and combat fisherman on the streams only to die after a final dance in their spawning grounds. 

The fall, short as it might be, gives up its last life in a burst of reds, oranges, and yellows that turn the once green hills into a mottled, earthly and rich landscape with snow encroaching slowly from the tops of the mountain ranges into the foothills.  And finally, the days have turned into days of longer darkness than light. 

Our goal was to come to Alaska until it was cold and dark and then to turn our attention and journey toward some destination south, international and warm.  We have begun that turn mentally and physically and look forward to posting about the next phase of our peregrination.  

Posted from Valdez, Alaska

Reunited: Hitchhiker Part 2

“Once you have been given and you have gifted another with trust such as the three of us did, there is a part of you that forever travels with each other” we wrote in our blog entry about Tamar, our hitchhiker.  We have thought about Tamar often through the past couple of months as we traveled through Alaska, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories.  We thought about her so much, we decided to make a 1,000 mile detour to visit her once more before we headed back south.

Tamar lives in Delta Junction, a town of around 900 hearty souls of deep faith and fortitude.  Her family of three (Mitch, Nora and Sibby), came from Oregon about 4 years ago to carve a home and life out of the challenging back country of Alaska.  The work that they have done on their 900 acre property is impressive.  They live in a comfortable log cabin made from poplar logs, cut and peeled by their own hands.  The caribou roast, salad, potatoes, and pesto bread they fed us all came from food they had harvested and it was special as was the fellowship at their table.

We were curious to see if Tamar would welcome us as we had been part of what was undoubtedly one of the hardest weeks of her life.  We were happy when she came to us with friendship and enthusiasm and showed us around the wonderful yard and world she was seeking on the day we met her. 

One of the hotly debated issues in animal behavior is whether animals have emotions.  Neither of us has ever felt any debate as we know that animal emotions are powerful, real, and one of the most enriching parts of our relationship with the natural world.  In the final two photos below, look carefully into Tamar’s eyes in the photo in our van just hours before she was to be reunited with her family and look at her eyes in the photos from our visit.  She is, now, a happy dog as she found the people she loved and the place she calls home.

As we hugged our new friends and hosts goodbye, Tamar barked happily and the sound she made was not remotely related to that lonely howl in the Visitor Center that had drawn us back to her side in July.  As we got ready to drive away, Nora asked if we might want one of Tamar’s puppies in the future.  We laughed and said to call us if we were back on the continent as we know that this Husky’s lineage is special.  In fact, there is a part of her that will always travel with us and a part of us that belongs to her.

Posted in the town of North Pole, Alaska

The Road

During its short few days of “fall”, the Dempster Highway is one of the 7 natural wonders of the world.  Rather than seek our own words, we are turning to Robert Frost for our narrative and posting a few extra pictures this week.  After all, a picture can be worth a 1,000 words!

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

 

 Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,   

And sorry I could not travel both              

And be one traveler, long I stood             

And looked down one as far as I could  

To where it bent in the undergrowth;          
Then took the other, as just as fair,    
               

    

And having perhaps the better claim,    

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there     

Had worn them really about the same, 

And both that morning equally lay         

In leaves no step had trodden black.      

Oh, I kept the first for another day!        

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh 

Somewhere ages and ages hence:          

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— 

I took the one less traveled by,  

And that has made all the difference.  

               

Posted from Dawson City, Yukon

Beauty and the Beast

Beauty is found within luminescent ribbons splitting the few moments of darkness into the mysterious Northern Lights.  It is the rich, organic, sweet smell of the tundra permeating the air from the labyrinth of plant, fungi and bacteria as the weight of our feet plunges toward the permafrost a few inches below.  It is in the tart taste of lowbush cranberries and the sweetness of blueberries as their sun-warmed richness slides down our waiting throats.  It is in the change of fall as green grass in a single night erupts the next morning into a symphony of gold, oranges, and reds painting rainbows down the hills of shale coated peaks.  It is the deafening sound of perfect silence.  It is a sunset that fades into sunrise in a land that night has fled.

 Some might see the beast in the grizzly tearing at a bloody caribou leg as the first dust settles along  the early morning Dempster Road or in the Arctic Ground Squirrel feasting on its brother’s road kill remains as it prepares for the deep sleep of winter.  For us, the beast is not those natural and necessary events; rather, it is the dust and the drugs that seep into the fabric of life on and near the Dempster.  It is rancid, yellow water from a tap where a gallon of store bought pure spring water costs $5 dollars now and will double and triple in cost during the transitional months of freeze and breakup before ice roads can be built.  It is the pain of paying $35 for a 12” pizza of canned vegetables on edible crust.  Of all of the beasts, it is the drugs that prey like a dark animal on young kids buying from men in dank campgrounds or in the vacant eyes of a mind and soul lost to family and friends as their owner stumbles through the streets of Inuvik.

The small towns surrounding Inuvik have formed almost vigilante like efforts to eradicate drugs and alcohol from their communities as seen by the signs warning those who would deal.  For us, Inuvik is a place at the end of a 760 km road to finally turn back toward family and friends, but for others, it is clearly the end of the road when there is nowhere else to go.  The town has beauty in people like the young man who took us on a boat tour.  He had much to teach us about the effects of global climate change from the observations of his elders and his family’s almost 50-year relationship with a scientist who has measured the destructive effects of climate change on permafrost.  But much of the town feels like the brightly painted colors covering dilapidated metal and deteriorating wood buildings.  There is beauty, but it covers a beast. 

 Perhaps the most significant beast is not one inherent within individuals from the north, but from the global connections playing out in places like our hometown of Gunnison.  As John Muir wrote, “When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.”  Each day we made decisions about our use of energy and resources as we accumulated more than we needed.  Our carbon footprint continues to affect the globe as it marches toward a warmer future.  That future is not theoretical at the poles. Many still debate the reality of climate change while the people in the extreme north watch its actions as land thaws beneath their feet. The permafrost is melting at an unprecedented rate and soil is sliding into the rivers as the land becomes a quagmire and life strangles in the waters.

The Dempster Highway is a 760 km gravel road that travels north across the Arctic Circle and through a Canadian province, a Canadian territory, and two time zones.  The land, and the road, are contrasts, harboring both beauty and the beast.  We have been changed by our visit as our souls strain to understand the meaning of the words from the soft crooning of the elder Neil tapping his beaded, moose-hide moccasins in a rhythm ingrained into a mind softened with age but rich with understanding.

Posted on the Dempster Highway in Eagle Plains, Yukon.

Warmth

One of the important themes of Alaska life is warmth.  It can come in the simple satisfaction of turning on the heater in our conversion van to ward off the early morning Alaskan chill.   For Dennis, who retired from the Healy local coal mine and therefore receives free coal for the rest of his life, it comes in the pleasure of rebuilding and modifying an old boiler to burn his “annuity” in an almost maintenance-free manner.  It can be as costly as it is to the twin sisters Miki and Julie Collins who live north of Denali deep in Alaska’s roadless interior.  After dog food for their mushing huskies, it is the most significant expense in their solitary and adventurous lives. 

It can be a critical part of survival as Christopher McCandless, whose life was prematurely ended due to starvation and exposure, found out after he went “into the wild” and spent his last moments in a cheap sleeping bag feeding wood into a stove in an abandoned school bus just within the borders of Denali National Park.  Summer warmth to the Caribou, Dall Sheep, Arctic Squirrels and Grizzlies of the Park comes with the opportunity for raising a new generation and feeding 20 hours a day to prepare for deep sleep,  hibernation, or living off of lichen and grass in the long  and frigid winter nights.

Warmth can mean many things, but the most significant for the two of us is not as a necessity of life in the far north, but the most common characteristic exhibited by many that we have met along our way.  It can be the thoughtful act of turning on the electric mattress cover for two “new friends” invited for a delicious salmon Alfredo dinner and a much needed shower and warm bed.  Another example of Alaskan hospitality came with  an invitation for midafternoon “seafood snacks” resulting in a three hour, 6 course meal, including smoked Kenai salmon, Prince  William sweet shrimp, local moose, fresh fruit, homemade cranberry liquor, and warm lingonberry muffins dripping in sweet  butter.  The meal was followed by wonderful conversation, a guided tour of the Healy backcountry, and a  ride in the “DeLorean” (actually, the hydraulic lift traded for the DeLorean) revealing the majestic Alaskan mountain range visible from Cheryl and Dennis’s home.

The manner in which  Alaskans welcome us has been a “warming” and rewarding experience.  We better understand what “warmth” really means in this remote and spectacular state.

Posted in Delta Junction, home of Tamar!