Alaska Bound Homesteader!

Peering Off the Beaten Path and Understanding Why There are Unfilled Jobs

2010-01-17T14:27:00.001-09:00

There are jobs in Alaska. Some remain unfilled, and are re-listed in ads as the months go by. These jobs are in the very places that I have said I am not interested in going: the Bush. Those places, far away from the highways that lead to that Outer World, actually have jobs. And those jobs often go unfilled. So I took a closer look at Nome. Right now, in Nome, there are potentially job openings for both of us that have been open for quite some time.

Nome is not the Alaska of my dreams. There is no forest. Indeed, few trees survive there even when purposely planted, due to the permafrost. It is a land of tundra. It is flat. In photos, it appears rather desolate. As I peer at the photos, and as I read about the reality of the treeless tundra, I try to imagine living in a land without trees.

I LOVE trees. And, trees - forests - have always been a part of my Alaskan dream. I'm not sure I could make the transition from my dream to a reality without trees. Could I leave the forest where I currently live in order to move to a treeless part of Alaska?

Still, I persisted. It is, after all, a bit of the last frontier that I am looking for, right? And, with the potential availability of jobs, perhaps it could be the answer we are looking for? With my research mode in high gear, I dove in to see what I could find!

So I went in search of real estate. There is, as one would expect, precious little for sale. Nome is a small town. And, like most small towns, there isn't a lot of real estate on the market at any one time. What I've found so far is not encouraging. Most is in town, on tiny, tiny lots, for stunning amounts of money (from a rural Illinoisan's perspective). I found one homesteading type property on an acreage outside of town. It has a chicken house and green house already in place. It is small and quirky in appearance, and it is unfinished. Due to being unfinished, the Realtor told me that we would have to put 40% down on the $170,000 property (which is quite cheap for that area).

I asked about the accessibility of the property in winter, and learned that people who live outside of town generally ride snow machines (what we call snow mobiles) to work.

15 miles on a snow machine in -40 weather with -80 wind chills. I've been out horseback riding in -50 wind chill, so I know that with a bit more gear the -80 is survivable. But still, I gotta think about that. Going on a ride in that kind of weather is not like having to do it every single day, twice a day. I realize that it is not that bad all the time, but it can be pretty intense for lengthy periods of time.

I guess that explains why there are so few people living outside of town. But why are they living cheek-by-jowl next to each other, then? I'd have expected larger town yards with at least some chicken coops and gardens and other means to live more self-sufficiently (like the small town my grandma lived in), rather than such tight living quarters as what I'm seeing.

That is particularly so when they seem to have large pantries in which to store their "barge orders" - those summertime shipments of goods from the Outside, so that they can survive the long winters. If one must rely so much on barge orders, why not utilize a bit of yard for self-sufficiency?

Perhaps, rather than focusing on chickens and gardens (and greenhouses), they are used to focusing on hunting, fishing, and foraging. It may be my Lower 48 mentality that is not allowing me to see the self-sufficiency possibilities inherent in their set-ups. But, if so, I'm probably not quite cut out for that type of self-sufficiency.

The prices of the housing might not seem like much to people moving from many high priced areas. To them, a tiny, quirky looking fixer for $170,000 might be a steal. But where we live, nice finished homes on land in the country sell for half of what they want for that work in progress, which is apparently the ONLY homesteading type of property for sale in the area.

And it becomes clear why it is difficult to fill jobs in Nome. Few qualified people will want to move to such a remote location. Even fewer could afford to do so.

As I am scanning the available real estate, I cannot honestly see how we COULD move to Nome if we wanted to do so.

At least in my research I learned that it is possible to ship one's household goods in a container to Seattle and then from there on a barge to Nome (during the short summer season). The barges will also transport vehicles.

Getting animals there looks to be challenging. Animals would have to be flown to Nome. And the multiple flights to get there from here would be lengthy.

The Logistics Seem Mindboggling, and the Push to De-Clutter!

2010-01-14T16:49:00.005-09:00

Once you move from fantasy to a determination to make a move of this magnitude, the reality of the cost of such a move begins to slowly sink in. It is approximately 3,600 miles to drive from our home to Fairbanks, Alaska, for example. That is a long way to haul one's things! The other option would be to drive to Washington State (also a long haul) and then take a ferry (actually more than one ferry, as the first would end up in a destination with no road connection to the rest of the state).

I've been exploring various options for getting to Alaska. The cheapest option would be to rent a moving truck and get a car trailer for the car, to be pulled by the moving truck. We could then use our pick-up truck to pull another trailer. Costs go up from there, of course. Having professionals haul it would cost considerably more. It looks like the most expensive option would be for us to drive all our stuff to Washington State and take ferries.

Clearly, we need to ditch anything that is not needed, or very dear to us. That is a good concept anyway, when moving. Paying to move non-essential things is bad economics. Paying to move it 3600 miles is nuts!

I'm reminded of Henry David Thoreau's comments in Walden, where he said that people are enslaved, in essence, by their possessions. When you are calculating the cost of moving things versus the idea of giving them up, his comments have the ring of truth.

Walden (Concord Library)

That, of course, brings me back to my ideals of voluntary simplicity. I have that ideal. But I look around at all of the things that we own and really do not need. Clearly, I have not lived as simply as my ideals would tell me to live. Like most Americans, I have too much stuff. We have too much stuff.

I read Walden back in college, and it inspired in me an appreciation for voluntary simplicity, although I did not hear that term used to describe the concept until many years later. I deeply appreciated his retreat to the woods and his deliberate attempt to avoid having too many possessions which would get in the way of his inner quest. But, again, as I look around me, clearly I could not fit all my stuff in a Walden sized cabin! Perhaps I need to go back and re-read Walden for some much needed inspiration.

The next step in our preparations, in addition to the on-going job hunt, will have to be a paring down of our things. We need to do some sorting, selling, and gifting to pare our belongings down to those things which will truly be needed and appreciated on the new Alaskan homestead.

Clearly, tools will need to come along. But not every stick of furniture, nor every nick-knack, nor every gadget needs to tag along on this journey. I sense some wrangling over our parting with some things - this may test us as a couple! I also sense that becoming more familiar with e-bay sales will be a part of my immediate future!

We need to pare down our belongings to the essential, the truly helpful, and then some items that are actually and truly treasures. The junk must go! Time to de-clutter!

When You Are Not Independently Wealthy, Nor Retired ...

2010-01-12T13:49:00.003-09:00

... You need an income to survive in today's world. You need to be able to pay your taxes, to have money to purchase those goods which you cannot produce yourself, etc. I have never been 100% self-sufficient, nor able to find a way to make sufficient money to live by homesteading alone. Since we are neither independently wealthy, nor retired, the first step in this Alaskan adventure, for us, is to land a job (or jobs) in Alaska. In this recession economy, we are not expecting this part of the journey to be easy. Indeed, it may end up being the most difficult part of our journey. But my philosophy is that one can do almost most anything if one is determined to do it!

Applications have gone out. And, they will continue to go out until one of us gets a suitable job offer. We are both talented and experienced people, and so it is my hope, my prayer, and my belief that we will eventually find a wonderful job for one or both of us that will allow us to pursue this dream.

Because we need to be flexible in a tight job market, we have not settled upon one area of Alaska. Right now, we are looking at rural areas that are connected to highways. While there is definitely a romance to the Bush, and to living in a relatively inaccessible and remote area, the chances of finding work in such an area is, well, REMOTE! And, the chances of finding work in such an area that would pay us well enough to move there is probably even more remote!

The Bush areas are not connected to highways. They are accessible by air and/or (in some cases) by water. Moving to such a location with our belongings would be extraordinarily expensive. The cost of living in such areas is very high for just that reason. We are not ready just yet to jettison all of our books, our tools, our canning equipment, our dairy equipment, etc.

Therefore, we are looking for jobs in areas that would be considered "rural" by Lower 48 standards rather than by Alaskan standards. They are rural, but still accessible by roads. Each area that we have looked at so far has a very different climate: the Kenai Peninsula, the Mat-Su area, and the rural Fairbanks area. While each is very different, homesteading is definitely a possibility in all of the areas. Where ever we go, we will have to learn whole new ways of doing things. And that is part of the adventure of doing this.

As we research jobs, we are also researching the areas of interest, trying to learn about the issues unique to each area, including climate, gardening, animal husbandry, real estate, and the over-all suitability of each area to our own lifestyle and personalities.

Alaska Dreaming

2010-01-09T14:11:00.004-09:00

The dream began when I was quite young. I read a book by Jack London, White Fang. And I was smitten by Alaska. I read more Jack London, including Call of the Wild. And I was more smitten. I read other books about mushing, and Alaska, and the history of the Gold Rush. And I dreamed.

The Call of the Wild and White Fang (Unabridged Classics)

I dreamed of living in Alaska. I would live in a cabin in the woods. I would be self-sufficient. I would be able to survive in such a wild and beautiful and terrible and wonderful place. And I would thrive there.

I did not know the term "homesteader" then. I did not know that my family lived in a semi-homesteading style, with gardening, canning, baking our own bread, making our own applesauce, making our own beef jerky, putting up a side of beef, etc. But it seemed a good way to live, even though no one else around us did it too. I wanted to take it further.

I grew up. I fell in love. I got married. He had no such dreams of Alaska. I put my Alaskan dreams on a shelf. We had a baby. I pursued homesteading. In time, my husband and I divorced. After regrouping, I settled down on a little rural property, raised my child, and homesteaded.

I gardened, cared for an orchard, kept horses, raised sheep, ducks, chickens, goats, and bees. I learned herbal medicine. I canned, I froze, I baked bread. I learned to knit, and to spin wool, and to weave. And I pursued my interests in self-sufficiency and my various passions where I found myself, far from the Alaska of my dreams.

From time to time the idea of Alaska has come back to me, but each time it did, the timing was bad. I could not move to Alaska when my child was growing up. And so it remained a pipe dream. But sometimes, I would see a cabin, in my dreams, and a forest homestead.

Recently, the dream returned to me. My child is grown. I'm in a relationship now with a man who is open to the concept. It is now, finally, do-able. It is now or never! We are not getting any younger, and if we don't do it soon, we never will.

This blog will be the place where I will share my hopes, my dreams, my struggles, and the hurdles that must be cleared so that the dream can become a reality.