This is quite belated, but I really enjoyed putting together my photo essay for 2020, so I decided it was time to do another year in review with pics.
You will see that several of these are professional-quality photos, if I do say so myself, and several look like I have never held a camera before. Most are somewhere in between. And I feel like that is a perfect representation of our life last year.
…
Inspired by a lovely photo essay from my world-traveling bestie, I decided it would make me feel slightly less bummed about the poop fest that was this past year if I assembled something similar for myself.
In an effort to make this a positive venture, I have omitted photos of me at my office sweating in uncomfortable PPE, me wearing the same pair of stretchy pants day and night for weeks on end, and me crying in the garage with the lights off. But you can rest assured that all those things did happen, because this was 2020.
…
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’re aware that much of the world has recently been under various degrees of stay-at-home orders, lock-downs, and quarantines.
The major disruption in our area has lasted about 6-8 weeks (so far). While this is far from ideal and not nearly as fun as being on a 6-week-long outdoor adventure, I’m pleased to report that our many years of backpacking, trail running, skiing, etc. in the great outdoors has left us better prepared for this than one might expect.
Here’s why:
…
We’ve been backpacking with our now-teenager since he was 9 years old. And I’m talking about real wilderness backpacking in rugged terrain and extreme temperatures where you carry everything you need to survive, not “I did some walking in Europe with a backpack on” backpacking.
I put in 6 years of backpacking as a teenager myself back in the day, followed by an additional 13 years of backpacking as an adult (pre-munchkins). So hopefully that establishes me as reasonably qualified to dispense advice in this area.
…
Remember that post I wrote about how we’re not selling everything to see the world? I admit that our plans for next summer sound a lot like we’re doing just that. But we’re not – we promise.
…
Whaaaaaat??!!
This might come as a huge shock to those who know us, what with the recent upsurge in nomadic impulses among Millennials – especially those who, like us, have always loved traveling and are drawn to minimalism.
If you were unaware of this trend, just search “nomadic lifestyle” or “millennial nomads” or “digital nomads” or “nomadic families” or anything similar and you’ll be up to speed in no time. People seem to be hitting the road in droves with one-way tickets in hand.
Any parent will be happy to explain to you at length that everything gets more complicated after you add kids to your life. This includes your fitness regimen. But instead of letting that fall by the wayside – and letting your physical, mental, and emotional health suffer as a result – it’s best to get back on that horse as quickly as you can.
For us, that looked like getting back out on the trails asap after Baby J arrived last year. He did his first hike with us around 4 weeks old.
Fast forward to right now: my husband and I just finished a respectably difficult trail race in the San Juan Mountains, with our kids cheering us on at the finish line. This was the third time we’ve done this race together and the second time since we’ve been parents.
You might be thinking: “That seems kinda cool but…Nah. They seem a little bit crazy, and I’m not even sure they have real jobs. Plus running just comes easily for some people. I might have done something like that before I had kids, but not now because I’m way too busy…” …
Let’s take a well-deserved break from talking about houses and moving and house projects and money and dive back into the topic of travel!
As somewhat seasoned travelers who have now entered the life phase of family travel, we run into a fair number of objections to traveling with young kids (and even medium-sized kids):
“They won’t remember it.”
“They’re too young to appreciate it.”
“It’s too expensive to take the whole family.”
“The kids would rather just stay home and play (latest trending video game) anyway.” …
This is a topic I get asked about often, so I wanted to share this interview that I did in 2016. I have revised and updated it here. These pictures are all the real deal from our family travels, so forgive the blurriness, pixelation, and/or general low quality that you’ll see in some of them. That’s just cracker crumbs and sunscreen on the camera lens.
When I was little, my parents were very insistent about all of their kids trying new things and seeing new places. Sometimes that meant camping (usually in the rain) near our home in Washington, sometimes it meant trips across the country by train or plane to see family. As we kids got older, it included more difficult backpacking, biking, and skiing trips and then international travel and things like scuba diving and riding camels. …
In the previous post I made a confession about my newly-founded, totally irrational fear of boats. Today it seems fitting to talk about some of the dangers that are actually present in our travels and adventures. Ironically, while we do get a lot of questions about safety, the most menacing dangers are never the ones people ask us about.
Part of loving travel and adventure – even if you’ve figured out how to minimize your own anxiety about it – is that people are happy to constantly remind you about all the things that could go wrong, while simultaneously calling your decision-making ability into question. …