The Beginning of a Blog

Who am I and what on earth am I doing?

So, here I am.

Sitting in a 20 foot sea can in the snow on a mountain. Where to start?

I spent a decade living and working in the trades. I loved it. Not only did it launch my life into the insane awesomeness that it is now, but it was a pretty cool learning experience. Full of adventurous, opportunistic and driven people. More on that later.

Now I sit on a mountain. My mountain. In southern British Columbia. Off grid. No power, no running water, no road in and out - it’s winter and the road is very snowed in. If I want to go to town I’ll need to hop on the snowmobile, and ride it to the neighbours some kilometres away. Thankfully he offered to let me park a truck in his driveway this year. Last year I had neither, the snowmobile or the parked truck. I just didn’t leave. For four months.

Water

There’s a spring at the bottom of the property that I collect from. I store water for the winter. Last year I ran out and resorted to melting and boiling snow water. It’s delicious and makes your skin so so soft! It was hard but I loved doing it for one winter. However it’s not sustainable. This year I tried to get smart - stored water in a sea can, next to a propane freezer that has a small pilot light that you’d think will keep things warm. It didn’t. So, back to melting snow.

Food

Food is stored in a sea can. I’d love to say that it’s neatly organized and I know exactly what’s there but, life’s too busy for that. It’s a good thing, I think. Future plans involve a cold cellar of course but with only four hands doing all of the work here it hasn’t been a priority yet. The long term goal is to be self reliant and to be buying only the things that can’t be grown or harvested here. That takes time.

Electricity

I have a simple solar setup. It runs the main things: lights, wifi, small pump, laptop. It handles 98% of my power needs aside from high-wattage stuff. For that I have a generator. I’ve been impressed by how little a person actually needs when they run their life simply.

Housing

I’m living in a 20 foot sea can. For those unfamiliar a sea can is one of those cargo containers that go onto ships and across the ocean. It’s 20ftX8ft on the exterior. I had it moved here, two years ago this land was entirely bare. It’s wood framed inside, insulated and I have a wood stove that keeps it toasty warm. The front doors are a repurposed sliding glass door that’s been made into massive french style doors. I must admit that it turned out beautifully, making the entire end of the house glass.

The Team

I get asked a lot if I’m out here alone. I don’t know why but the question gets under my skin. Probably because it seems to suggest that I wouldn’t be doing this solo. Which I would. So the answer is, part of the time. I have a partner who’s here mostly. We’re both strong personalities. To say that we’re dynamic would probably sum us up pretty well. I’m sure we’ll get into that later on in this blog.

The ‘Why?’

I want to live more simply and self reliantly. To understand fully where my food comes from and how I consume. To learn how to make my own things. My best example is that I own a wood mill. I can make a tree into lumber. That makes me happy. Seeking out the organic section at the grocery store doesn’t do it for me.

Me.

I was working in Alberta, making awesome money and generally happy. In a business related course I heard the teacher describing work life and retirement as ‘the deferred life plan’

Wait a sec. Something hit me.

I’m deferring my life, for money? Oof. Not sure what to make of that…

Around the same time I took my PDC. Permaculture Design Course. It’s a kind of very holistic gardening course. The people there made me realize that I don’t have a clue how my food gets into my mouth. Or the effect that getting it there has on other systems.

Fast forward a few years and I’m here, on my mountain, embarking on creating an off grid homestead. 1 part tradesman, 1 part hippie farmer. Let’s see how this goes..