Living In The Remote Wilderness. . . .

[Rick]

This has sort of turned into an "us" and "them" thread. I'm not sure why. Let's face it, there are folks that simply can not live in the wilderness. They have neither the skills nor the physical ability to do so. Likewise, there are folks that can not live in an urban environment. Like their city cousins lost in the wilderness, they don't have the skills. You choose to live where you are the most comfortable and utilizing the best set of skills you have. For those that have figured out where that is, they will probably be the happiest. It's all good.

[David1_s]

Nativedude...my hero

It seems some people on here don't read all you said, based on there questions. I would question there ability to do what your doing.

Going back to the basics such as you have is not for every one. It also goes back to "strong survive and weak die". If a person gets sick easy, I wouldn't recommend this. Our modern-day medicine allows people to live normal lives, who would have not been able to live normal lives due to illness, or weak immune systems, allergies, and other things that incompasitated or killed people 200+ years ago when the settlers first came to America.


Personally, my teeth are my greatest concern. I havn't been sick in over 5 years, but have had a moler, and wisdom tooth that needed attention. I didn't go to dentist, and was able to take care of the infection my self. But did use products from the drug store, and pain meds, I would not have access to in the wilderness.
Back in Grizzly Adams day, people didn't have good teeth. Any ideas on how to overcome this issue?

[David1_s]

Yeah - I'd have to ask - why limit your choices to a and b? City life? - some like it, but not for everybody. Living in the woods 100 miles from civilization? - again, some like it, but its not for eveybody. As has been said, there are aspects of both that are appealing. I'd hazard a guess that the majority of members here live in neither of the two extremes, but rather someplace in between.

Indeed...


I live somewhere in between. When I first moved here it was cow pastures and chickens everywhere. 25 years later those cow pastures have been developed into neighborhoods. Drive 5 miles one direction its all country, and 5 miles the other direction your in the city. Sux, because the city continues to get closer and closer to me.

To address some things I have read............

Country folk are just as criticle of city slickers, and visa-versa. I grew up in the country, and am an outdoorsman all my life. I can shoot the **Hat** off a nat at 100 yards, skin a buck, or trap a quail. But when I pull up to a country store in my japanese 403 hp 300 zx twin turbo, you should see the ugly looks I get from the old timers sitting on the porch. I can pull up in my big rock crawling jeep the next week, and the same guys giving me ugly looks will smile, and greet me as one of there own.

So it happens on both sides of the fence. Human beings as a whole(some exceptions ofcorse) shun those that don't look, dress, and act like they do, and share the same ideas. For some reason we tend to dislike those who think differently then we do. right/wrong, or what ever, we don't like those who are different, and at the very least, we avoid those who are different. Its just in our nature for some reason.

[klkak]

I live a little over 20 miles north of Anchorage Alaska, and work year round in the bush. I enjoy the best of both worlds. Anyone who feels or says that one is better then the other is narrow minded and probably a poser. I love being in the Alaska bush but I also like coming home and going to some of the connivances that the city has to offer, like Boondocks sporting goods and Shines Sushi restaurant in Eagle River Alaska, as well as Great Northern Guns and Golden Corral in Anchorage Alaska.

[Rick]

Sushi.....Blech....If God wanted me to eat raw fish he wouldn't have invented the skillet!

[Batch]

Sushi.....Blech....If God wanted me to eat raw fish he wouldn't have invented the skillet!

Yeah, if god hadn't wanted us to eat sushi he wouldn't have made Wasabi!

[LowKey]

Rick makes a good point. None of this has to be either or.
I wish more people would stay in the cities actually.

For RWC, it sounds like you and I are in the same kind of predicament. A little late in life to be fixing the things we should have done while young. Instead I've opted for, at the moment, an acre of land a little bit beyond the 'suburbs' and a rental agreement with family that allows me to do a bunch of gardening and get some plants established that can be moved when I find my own place in a year or two (blueberries, cranberries, apples, pears). They look at me funny when I bring home cases of food instead of cans, when I brought home a canner last fall and then went out to buy cases of produce to practice on (garden will be big enough this year), packing stuff away in a freezer (you're only one guy, who's gonna eat all that?). You just tell them to get over it and do what you want. They may even admit later that your stuff tastes better than theirs. LOL.

You can wish for a group setting but once you bring the dynamics of a group into long-term wilderness living there are bound to be problems. Humans cannot seem to live together without somehow causing each other grief. You might not think it will happen at first but bet on it. Quite frankly, that is the part I'd like to get away from.

[klkak]

It took me 8 years of planning and progressive remote living before taking the plunge. Now I live 240 miles from the nearest town and only go into town twice a year for supplies, and once every other year to visit family for the holidays.

Generally speaking, where would 240 miles from the nearest town be?

Edit: Now this is the second time I've asked you what part of Alaska you live in. I'm not asking for a GPS coordinate just a general area ie. The Brooks range, the Alaska range, the Koyakuk, etc.

[klkak]

I'm beginning to think you have no clue where you live.

I stored my gear in a storage unit in the nearest town (100 miles away.)

Come on up Mitch. . .I'll show ya around my digs!! I'm 110 miles from the nearest town!

I have no neighbors (that I know of nor have ever seen) for about 160 miles.

Now I live 240 miles from the nearest town

First, let me say thank you Wildwoman. There are no roads within 240 miles.

[Sourdough]

Note to self: Keep stories straight when communicating with Klkak.

[Rick]

Or at least be pretty good at estimating distance.

[klkak]

Or at least be pretty good at estimating distance.

I guess you have to take into consideration the type of GPS he is using.

My GPS. . .the sun. I've never heard it say "recalculating - recalculating"!!

[rwc1969]

... there are folks that simply can not live in the wilderness. They have neither the skills nor the physical ability to do so. Likewise, there are folks that can not live in an urban environment. Like their city cousins lost in the wilderness, they don't have the skills. You choose to live where you are the most comfortable and utilizing the best set of skills you have. For those that have figured out where that is, they will probably be the happiest. It's all good.

AFTER THINKING ABOUT I THINK IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH SKILLS OR LACK THERE OF. FOR ME IT'S JUST A PERSONAL PREFERENCE. And I would choose to be a lil less happy if it meant others could be a lil more happy.

I would prefer to live in the wild away from the corrupt and spoiled cities. Not because it would make me happy, but because I would feel better about myself knowing I'm contributing less to a bad way of life. I wouldn't even need to live in the wild, just away from all the hussle and bussle. I'm happy having three or four major hospitals within a half hour drive, and I like being able to walk to the store, and having a gas station, Walfart and Mc'ds every 6 miles. I fit in just fine in this modern society and I have the skillset required, social and otherwise, to do just about any job or career path I set my mind to. But there's a price to pay for those conveniences and those careers and jobs. That price is getting too high.

I look at the freeways and from near outer space it must appear like a bunch of ants going and coming and coming and going, day in day out never changing. Always rushing toward that hole in the ground that we will alll one day fill. Run rabbit run... I would rather not live my life as a parasite.

every day we get better at living and find more and more ways to keep from dying. That is survival at it's most basic, but we've become to proficient at it. What happens when we cure all disease and everyone lives for 120 years. Where are all the people gonna go? what are we gonna eat? Each other? We make farming more efficient but take away land for housing and spoil the rest with toxic wate from factories, landfills and roadways. We're already extremely overpopulated. Are we going to decide who lives and who dies based on genetic quality or what? We'll have to do something to control the population and it won't be pretty whatever it is. I picture any number of sci fi futuristic societal horrow show scenarios here. Take your pic.

Now that we've excelled at survival we need to start considering how to maintain that excellence long term. are we gonna live on floating cities on the oceans or on the moon? LOL! We probably will, but that won't fix the problem long term. Are we gonna quit reproducing or limit it? We haven't yet!

It's not much different in a wilderness or rural setting, just less ants making trails thru the dirt, less consumtion and congestion. It's a much slower winding path to the inevitable.

That's what I'm looking for. less hussle and bussle, more laid back way of life. and leaving less of a grungy, greasy chemical toxic filled footprint where I travel. I chose not to have kids. I would have been happy to have them, but i'm happier knowing i didn't contribute the ever growing problem of overpopulation.

People I know wanna have big trucks cuz they think their safer, cooler, can haul more or go thru snow better, etc. But they hog gas and pollute the hell outta the environment. Most people I know that have trucks haul less and go off road less than me in my lil subcompact. My little car handles better than any truck in the snow, ice and rain too. I love trucks and vans, they make me happy, but I can't see owning or using one on a regualr basis when all I'm doing is goin for groceries or into the woods to shoot some squirrels. If I need a truck I'll rent one or dust off the old Chevy van if I need to haul something big. I can see if you need it for work, or live in an area that requires it, deep snow, rutted two tracks, etc., but for the average joe it's just a huge waste for a lil ego boost.

I hate to say it, but people in general are just plain ignorant and that's what ticks me off the most about modern society. People have set thoughts in their head about what they think is cool or right and they're unwilling to change because of foolish pride and ignorance. There's a difference between pride and foolish pride. That's too bad and it's a good part of the reason this country's falling apart. Other countries don't have these issues and they are walking all over us. It saddens me to say that, but, I'm not gonna ignore that reality.

people make stupid jokes and harp on the ones that are trying to make things better because they feel guilty knowing they are essentially "evil" and the things they do out of foolish pride and selfishness are gonna make life for future gens more difficult. They know that those other people making better are better than them. I guess that's there way of ignoring the reality of the situation and calming their guilty conscious. I don't know!

People can argue that modern society has it's benefits and it does, but the negatives far outweigh the good if you look at life in the long term and in an unselfish, un-ignorant way.

You can't drink the water from the creeks and lakes, you can't even drink it from the wells or springs in many places. You have to be extremely careful where you pick vegetables from or grow them because the soil is contaminated with heavy metals and toxic chemicals that last for centuries. You can't eat fish from many rivers and lakes. There are areas in our state where you can't even safely eat the animals. OMG! Wake up people!

To me wilderness living isn't about be happy as much as it is about being right.

It's not getting better, contrary to some weird belief that we are starting to pollute less. It's not true. Don't buy into all that propaganda. It's just being covered up better and we are becoming more ignorant to the reality. We are learning to accept it by ignoring it.

when I went to mexico City, Mexico the birds would fall dead out of the trees from CO poisoning and they would have smog curfews where you weren't allowed out for fear of suffocation. The rivers had dead fish and garbage floating in them. You could smell them from a mile away. They were milky white from all the oil and who knows what that was dumped in them. The sky was brown with toxic death and after a few minutes of departing the plane I could feel it rushing through my veins. You could clearly see the greenhouse effect. Far up over the plateaus and hills the sky was blue, but down below it was brown toxic death. my eyes would start to water when we got close to the river from the burning stench that it produced. I'm now starting to see that same brown haze and dead birds and fish here and it saddens me greatly.

We live in a big fishbowl people. When you dump a toxin into the air, water or ground it stays there. It doesn't just vanish into outer space as we'd like to think. Down the road somebody breathes, drinks or eats those same toxins you just ignorantly dumped. You probably dumped em without even realizing it.

I don't sit and dwell on it, but I do take notice of it, acknowledge it and try to drill it into people's seemingly thick skulls that in order for the world to continue we need to change this consumptive way of life, cut the population increase and get back to a more basic and slower way of living. That doesn't mean we have to go off 240 miles from town and live in a wigwam, but we do need to cut back on the electric, gas and other things that destroy the very world we live in. We need to accept a lil unhappiness so future gens can have a chance to be a lil happy.

After realizing what it takes to live in the wilderness or on a farm I don't know if I would be happy with that lifestyle, but I would be happy knowing I'm making things better, or at least slowing down the process of making them worse.

Our world has come very close to mass extinction several times in recent years and people don't even take notice, or they make jokes about it. They don't even care because they're too busy running back and forth up and down the ant trail to take the time to consider the facts and implications. Maybe people just can't live with themselves knowing they're destroying the world around them so they ignore it. I don't know, but something needs to change and it will, by force or reason one. We sit and wait for scientists to make one false move so we can ridicule them and put to waste all their years of work which our tax dollars supported.

I may not be living the lifestyle, but I am working toward that end even if it takes me till I'm 60 to do it. I'd much rather die alone and cold in the woods or on a small farm smelling pig **** than in a sterile hospital bed with family and friends mourning over my withered body.

[Sarge47]

I'm beginning to think you have no clue where you live.

Whereever it is, he has internet access & electricity! Not bad where there are no roads, huh?

[BENESSE]

Whereever it is, he has internet access & electricity! Not bad where there are no roads, huh?

Why does it matter so much?
If ND wanted to be more specific (can't imagine why) he would have done it already.

[2dumb2kwit]

I'm beginning to think you have no clue where you live.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nativedude
I stored my gear in a storage unit in the nearest town (100 miles away.)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nativedude
Come on up Mitch. . .I'll show ya around my digs!! I'm 110 miles from the nearest town!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nativedude
I have no neighbors (that I know of nor have ever seen) for about 160 miles.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nativedude
Now I live 240 miles from the nearest town

Quote:
Originally Posted by Nativedude
First, let me say thank you Wildwoman. There are no roads within 240 miles.

Wellll duuuuhhhh.....he lives in a "mobile" home! LOL
(I crack myself up!) LOL

[2dumb2kwit]

...Oh, and relax rwc....the herd is gonna get thinned in December of 2012.

[Sourdough]

Why does it matter so much?
If ND wanted to be more specific (can't imagine why) he would have done it already.

Well, would you feel conned, snookered, lied to, de-fraud-ed, if it turned out He had Never set foot in Alaska, if he made the whole thing up, all of it, part of it, any of it.......? It really does not matter, He has not given bad advise, or even harmful advise. I think he has been very helpful, and he has empowered people to explore their dreams. Empowering others to look at what is possible, is a rare and valuable ability. I don't know where he is, Yes I am curious where, but is really does not matter. OK, I lied I really want to know roughly, not exactly.

[rebel]

OK, I lied I really want to know roughly, not exactly.

As they say in Dixie, "you're a mess" (funny).

[Sourdough]

As they say in Dixie, "you're a mess" (funny).

Just where is Dixie.....? and is that where they make those cute little cups....