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Depending on who you ask, off grid means different things to different people.
To Kyle and I, it’s living remotely, unconnected to local power grids, and someday being self sufficient. To someone else, we might be considered “on grid” because we have cell service and internet. Even if I just went to town to maintain this blog that might constitute being on the grid to some!
Regardless of our definition or anyone else’s, this week we had a semi-forced experiment in truly stepping back into the simple life.
Somehow our generator got water in the gas (darn snow!) and quit on us. Servicing it would take several days, and we haven’t cleared enough land for our solar to be particularly effective with the low winter sun. So we went dark for a few days.
I will own up to the fact that I spend too much time on my cell phone and Facebook. Seeing what everyone is up to is something I spend too much time doing! I am that person that always has my phone in hand, reading books, researching homestead plans, or just laughing at memes. Putting it down for a few days was very difficult, but it made me realize how distracting my phone is to my everyday life. Kyle has his own issues with the x-box, but at least he can’t carry his in his pocket!
So what did we end up doing with no internet, x-box, cell phone, or lights? Getting shit done, of course!
We ended up going for a ride to the lake, then down to the beach to check out the glaciers and taking a nature walk to Seven Egg Creek. I was amazed at the different formations the water froze in! If you are ever in Alaska during winter, I totally recommend making a trip out to Captain Cook State Park!
Kyle also collected a lot of beetle killed spruce from around on our property a used the 4 wheeler to drag it to the cabin for firewood. We finished the floor (finally!) with the chainsaw to make all our cuts since we couldn’t power our saw.
We cooked, cleaned, washed dishes, organized, ate and put together furniture by candle light (we used candles like this). Luckily, I hoard candles and had insisted on bringing a huge box of them with us from Washington. I also brought several hurricane lamps (Amazon) for light without electricity, we just haven’t found oil for them yet.
We spent a lot of time together, just hanging out as a family by candlelight as well. We talked about plans, rehashed some ideas for the homestead.
Another decision we made is that we are going to try to do a power free day every week. For people who are so hooked on their toys, we both found it relaxing to turn them off for a while.
Hooray for a successful experiment!
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