Although I still haven’t finished the story of how I ended up working on the F/V Starbound at the start of this winter, I thought I’d cover what I’ve been doing since being forced to leave for medical reasons. There I was, again crashing on couches in Fairbanks while waiting to hear when Starbound would be back in port so I could potentially fly back to Dutch Harbor and go…
On car trips parents will sometimes threaten their kids with the line, “Don’t make me turn this car around!” How often do they actually need to enforce that warning? Most times the words are just spoken words. Well, I’m proud to say that my health forced the captain to give the order to haul in the nets, turn our boat around, and head to Dutch Harbor early. Maybe proud isn’t…
“How are you doing?” That’s a heartfelt question I’ve heard quite a bit in the last few days. Unless Michigan (or any other team) has beaten Michigan State, New Zealand has ceased to exist, or I haven’t hugged a puppy in months, chances are I’ll answer along the lines of “Good” “Pretty good” “Fine” “Okay” Here’s the truth about me. Since I don’t like imposing on people, being dependent,…
Some relatives and friends consider me crazy for taking off to the middle of nowhere to live in a tent for months, driving around NZ on my own, and wandering through Tiananmen Square during an 8 hour layover in Beijing. I’ll admit the Tiananmen adventure was something else, but everything else I’ve done pales in comparison to finding myself a job on a fishing vessel during winter in the Bering…
Here I was on a trip home to the Mitten, stranded between jobs and yet unsure of what the next job would entail. Since I dislike working in town and didn’t want to settle for some virtually meaningless job, I’d decided to try for a job that would supposedly pay decently: commercial fishing in the Bering Sea. Now you’re probably picturing me flailing around on some small vessel like you…
Probably my favorite thing about my travel style is the capacity for crazy random happenstances. Admittedly I’m not the most outgoing person, but I seem to bump into the right people at the right place and time. I was too busy having fun in NZ to write about it when it happened, but I ended up joining a group of internationals when I was on my hike up/down Mt. Doom….