Sometimes Quitting Can Change Your Life

On the importance of travel, rolling with the punches, and a stroll down memory lane

My momma. Ain’t she cute :)

I just got back from Hilton Head from a vacation with my mom. We stayed in Palmetto Dunes which is where Savannah and I played pickleball when we took a trip for her birthday at the end of February. We flew into Savannah so we walked around there first after landing and then headed to the island. We spent the next several days baking like loaves of bread on the beach, strolling around, and eating delicious food. I had a grilled watermelon salad at The Sage Room that I haven’t stopped talking about. However, my chia pudding at Collins Quarter at Forsyth in Savannah rivaled my salad for my favorite thing I ate on my trip. Now, I’ve got to figure out their recipe to try to recreate it at home.

When I got home Sunday night, I didn’t even get my suitcases in the house before I fed the goats and got them tucked away for the evening. Savannah had been doing all these chores all by herself all week, and I was anxious to see my goatie girls. As I was walking to their shelter I was pondering the stark contrast to the beginning and ending of my day. I awoke in a beachside resort, spent the day in the city of Savannah, and then ended my day in the woods on a tiny mountain. Plane travel is amazing at highlighting two different realties. In a matter of hours your entire world could change. Where you once were surrounded by trees or pavement you could be surrounded by the ocean or jungle. You could meet people who have lived an entirely different life than you. You can try foods you’ve never even heard of and see flowers you’ve never seen. This is why I will always love traveling.

Tulum, Mexico- we’ve been 5 times 😍

Savannah and I, both, have always loved traveling and in fact that love is in some way how we ended up here. I have shared this story before, but I imagine many of you have never heard it. Many years ago, we wanted to become travel bloggers so we could get paid to travel. However, we needed to actually travel to make content. We had a small problem, though. At the time we didn’t have much money to do said travel.

One day while I was at work I called Savannah and I said, “We need to get into camping. This is how we are going to be able to afford to create travel content.” She was on board and we planned a one night camping trip for a couple of days later. We went to Walmart the night before to buy the basics and a cheap tent. We loaded up our three dogs and on we went. That one night of camping had us hooked.

We planned many more camping trips and started spending a lot more time outdoors. We also got into hiking and started following hikers on social media. This gave me the idea to consider hiking the Appalachian Trail for my 40th birthday that was looming. However, at this point we had never even been backpacking. We decided on a shorter but still challenging hike- the John Muir Trail.

Unfortunately, even with all of our preparations, we were only able to complete about 60 miles in 7 days on the John Muir Trail. We ran into numerous problems like managing my blood sugar as a Type 1 diabetic. It would fluctuate from 50 to 400 in a matter of hours. Savannah suffered from altitude sickness, had no appetite, hardly slept, AND she was on her period. To top it off, the temperature was about 20 degrees cooler than normal. Deciding to leave the trail was really hard, but doing so changed our lives in a way we would never have anticipated.

One of the super cool places where we stayed in Woodland, CA

Changing our flights to fly home early was too expensive so we decided to spend the next two weeks as field scouts for Hipcamp around California. If you aren’t familiar, Hipcamp is like Airbnb for campsites, and as field scouts we could stay at a campsite for free and get paid $100 to take pictures of the sites and leave a review. Not a bad gig. This allowed us to travel from Mendocino down to LA and we spent time on farms, homesteads, a cave, and wineries. This trip was one of the greatest experiences of our lives, and it reignited our desire to homestead.

Many years prior we shared chickens with our neighbors (before city chickens were even a thing) and we started our first garden around the same time. We even dabbled in canning. At this time, I’m not even sure we had even heard the term, “homesteader.” We were city girls through and through. When we moved to another house, we left those chickens with our neighbors and the only gardening we did was landscape gardening. For a few years we focused on decorating and building things in our new home, and navigating our lives as content creators.

Our first chicken coop build

So after the JMT/California camping road trip, we came home, ordered chickens immediately, and started building their chicken coop. We built garden beds and by the following spring, at the beginning of the Covid pandemic, we were intensively gardening. We did what I urge people not to do- jump into homesteading head first and do all the things. By the summer of 2021 we would buy our property here and the rest is history.

This story is a lesson on how a failure might be a blessing. Traveling and having new experiences can change your life in a big way. So while we love our home and property, we will also always nurture our love for traveling. Because you never know what could happen. One day you could be a fashion blogger and the next you could be cleaning up chicken poo. What a wild ride it has been! And we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Thank you for reading!

- Casey (&Savannah)