Picturing Our Future (While Hiking) in Washington

LONG STORY SHORT
We start to get an idea of what we want our lives to look like after The Big Trip.

​By Kristine McGowan

Two very serious hikers having very serious discussions about their very serious future.

We had lots of reasons for setting out on The Big Trip. Yes, we wanted to see the country, but our insatiable wanderlust wasn't the only thing urging us to quit our jobs and hit the road.

This trip isn't just about living in the moment. It's also about figuring out our future.

Back in Southern California, any sort of future we wanted for ourselves felt out of reach—not by inches but by miles. You've heard this story before, probably from other Millennials: Housing prices in the region are out of control, and buying a house seemed about as plausible as pulling gold bars out of our butts (although that certainly would have helped with the situation).

​Truth be told, we probably could have afforded to buy something in the area, and we came close to doing just that. But recently, Jason put into words exactly how we felt about our old life in Long Beach: We were priced out of happiness. Sure, we could have bought a small condo in an area we didn't like, but we wouldn't have been happy. And we didn't want to invest in something that wouldn't contribute to our happiness.

For me, fear played a big part, too. Our life in Long Beach was comfortable. We hated a lot of things about Southern California—the prices, the traffic, the pollution, the heat—but we both grew up there. It's the only life we've ever known. For that reason alone, it would have been so easy to stay.

Still. I didn't want to look up one day, 10 years from now, and wonder what could have been. It was time to get off the hamster wheel our lives had become.

Since hitting the road, we've devoted most of our time to exploring the western U.S. and Canada. We've toured caves and fled from thunderstorms in Nevada; paddled down rivers in Utah and Montana; trekked dozens of miles in Wyoming, Montana, and Alberta. But it wasn't until we got to Washington this September that a place left a lasting impression on us.

Outside of California, we've spent more time in Washington this year than in any other state. We stayed at an Airbnb near Seattle throughout April, and we bounced between the state's national parks in September. We found that Washington checks off a lot of boxes for us: easy access to outdoor spaces, a relatively robust job market (near Seattle, anyway), and plenty of golf courses for Jason.

Plus, one big bonus: Jason had no allergies in Washington. Friends and family will know how big of a deal this is. We saved so much money on Kleenex.

That said, during one of our hikes in Mt. Rainier National Park, we discovered a problem. It wasn't specific to Washington, or any place for that matter. It was a problem with us.

This trip has intensified our wanderlust. We like being on the move. And we just can't see ourselves staying in one place year-round. 

I know. We're ridiculous.

But rather than sweep this feeling under the rug—as we could have done when we first considered doing The Big Trip—we talked about it. Considered the options. If we manage to land remote jobs in the future, maybe we can spend our summers in Washington and the rest of the year somewhere else. We don't have to be on the move constantly, but maybe we can have more than one home. And maybe our non-Washington-based home can be somewhere closer to Southern California so we can visit family and friends during the rest of the year.

It's not conventional. It wouldn't be easy to pull off a lifestyle like that—but it wouldn't be impossible either.

We pulled off The Big Trip, after all. Who's to say we can't pull this off, too?