Why The Trip?

Okay, so we’ve decided to loose the shackles of everyday, ordinary living. And why, you might ask. In our opinion (not a judgment, just an opinion) living is not going from your house to your car, your car to your cubical, your cubical to your car, and back from your car to your house. Therefore, we have concluded that we will live the colorless workaday life, when circumstance absolutely demands it -- and no sooner. After all, why should we have to put our lives on hold before actually living life? For that matter, how many retirees actually get to enjoy the liberty they now have?

We try and live a fairly minimalist lifestyle as it is, but even with the comparatively little amount of material possessions we have, we are finding ourselves more and more caught up in the hassles and burdens of dealing with them.

Well, that ends now.

There is a huge, beautiful world out there with magnificent sites to see, cultures to experience, and adventures to have. Unfortunately, the devices that were sold to us as makers of convenience -- ways to make our lives easier and more enjoyable -- have become nothing more than an anchorage, stagnating our will, our desire even, for adventure.

“You have to have a house”; with a house comes a mortgage, gas bill, water bill, electricity bill, garbage bill, etc., and since you have to pay all these things, you have to work harder and longer hours. This means you don’t really have the time to go anywhere and do anything anyway, so you get stuff you can do at home: phone or cell phone (so you can stay connected) another monthly bill; computer (so you can take advantage of all the benefits they provide, most of which are very good) another monthly bill, plus your virus protection bill, plus whatever debugging / hardware / maintenance / replacement costs; BBQ grill which will need fuel (liquid or solid) and cleaning and cooking tools.

The list just goes on and on.

You soon find yourself working more in order to buy more stuff for your stuff, or to pay for the stuff your stuff needs just to operate for you in the first place. Meanwhile, that Egyptian pyramid is not coming any closer to your house.

It’s time to take the house on the road, and we’re do’n it old school. Paper maps, no phone, sleeping bags, cold meals, avoiding all the major freeways and highways, and I’m sure -- on occasion -- peeing outside.

Here's the plan; we will be traversing a giant S across the U.S. and then circling almost the entire Gulf of Mexico, from Weeki Wachee, FL to Cancun, Mexico and then down into Belize.

** All of this is, of course, subject to change at any given time. The goal of the trip is for it to be as organic as possible. No deadlines, no set pace, no obligations...