Off Grid Living Made Easy!
Why Live Off Grid?
There are several reasons why folks decide to live off grid. For the most part people go off grid because they enjoy it! Others go off grid to take advantage of the natural benefits such as growing your own food, using firewood versus electricity for energy, getting your water from natural water sources as springs versus city water. One reason that becoming popular is to cut down on expenses!
And hey, our present residence could turn into an off grid place when disasters hit. When we lose power for days or weeks in an area, the water supply could go as well. At this juncture we could say we are living off grid! As we speak, I sit 12 miles from the dreaded San Andreas fault here in Southern California. Back on the island my house gets battered at least once every five years by a super typhoon!
The cover image above is that of a solar panel and a battery. This configuration at its most basic could help us move up the survival chain. This set up could give us lighting if not the ability to cook a few things! Add a few more batteries and panels and an inverter and we could start living like we were back on grid!
The Magic Of Living Off Grid
I have watched many videos of people living off grid. I find it very exciting to see them live the very basic way. It is a hard kind of living but it is also very rewarding. I watched this one guy leave the city, take to the wild, build his log cabin, catch or grow his own food, roam the mountains for fun. It must be the caveman in humans that we find it such a fun thing to do.
It must have been because I grew up around rivers and mountains, did a lot of hunting, diving for fish with spear and literally roamed the island having fun that I find living off grid enjoyable.
Hey, splitting firewood with an axe sure gets you in shape and turns your body really healthy as if by magic!
What It Takes To Live Off Grid
The basics is all it takes to live off grid. But then again we can live off grid in style. It all depends on what kind of off grid living we want. Roughing it with the basics is my kind of off grid living. To drag all the luxuries of city living into a dwelling in the wild takes the fun from it.
For sure we have to have food, water, energy, tools and the desire to do it. There are many ways how we can get these basic needs to our off grid location. My favorite youtube show is this guy in the middle of the jungle (titled 'primitive skills') who lives between two huge mountain ranges where a natural supply of very clean water is 'piped in' using bamboos. Natural running water would be a huge bonus to one's off grid site. He then builds his hut with bamboos, catch fish with bamboo trap, catch wild chicken with traps from small limbs of trees. He built his iron tools from iron ore (rocks). A furnace made of dirt and ancient Roman cement that he also made allowed him to have basic tools.
Do You Have What It Takes?
Do we have what it takes to go off grid? It all starts with a desire to do it. Then learn the basics, get your basic tools, find your site and go for it! And to make it more fun and challenging leave your advanced tools behind! If you care to carry all your fancy gear, take the big refrigerator as well...or stay home in the city!
The Hazards In Off Grid Living!
And of course if you are the weak at heart about off grid living, you would have a ton of excuses not to do it although you you may have this urgency in you to do it just for the heck of it. And hey you are right! Despite all the advantages and fun in the art of living off grid, there are some major hazards! Just check out the photo above! This is off grid fishing gone wrong!
Reality Off Grid Training!
Now seriously, I have an acre or so here in the high desert of California 60 miles above Los Angeles on your way to Vegas and I am planning to start an off grid site just a hundred yards from my on grid house! I will do the same in my location back on the islands come December.
Why? I can practice living off grid and teach others. Then perhaps I can make some money online by showing the videos on you tube!
Things that I can start making are furnaces made out of dirt and sand, Roman ancient concrete, tools from iron ore, a hut made of sticks and mud, a mud stove to smoke fish in, a trap to catch the neighbor's chikens. And yes hunting with bow and arrow! : )
That Is All For Now Folks!
Hey joking aside, videos in youtube are making a ton of money...if you know how to make them interesting and fun. I am hooked to some of them! Try searching 'Becoming Filipino' and a Canadian will show you how!
Joe
Recent Comments
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Brilliant idea! No traveling, no lugging around stuff. Everything you need are all there! Hmmm...why did we not think about this? : )
Thanks for stopping by John. You are a legend!
Joe
Awesome post Joe!! I can relate to where you are coming from with the off grid lifestyle. Ever since I was a young man growing up in the Arizona desert the off grid way of life has always been appealing to me. I've camped and have lived most of my life in the outdoors. Now that I am in my 60s there are some things that I am unable to do any longer, but my niche is on RV living and that includes solar power and other things that go hand in hand with living off grid.
Thanks for the all the insight into what you are doing. Great stuff my friend;
Rick
Hello there Rick! Great to hear from an RV master! I still say that this kind of living truly pulls the best out from all of us. The challenge, the exhilaration of the day to day hurdles would truly hone our natural talents to duke it out with nature and all.
Looking forward to your website or posts on the subject! : )
Thanks for sharing your experience with us Rick!
The best to you my friend!
Joe
That’s a great post. It harkens back to my past.I lived off the grid for many years but eventually moved back into society for my kids and their schooling as they get older. I miss that lifestyle, but now I think I’m too old to sustain it.
Hello there Jim! So you are an old hand at living off grid! Wow sorry to hear you gave that up! But yeah for the sake of the kids we always give up even things that we enjoy.
Had you kept that kind of life style you would still be in shape to keep at it I suppose.
Thanks for stopping by!
Joe
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When I was a kid we lived all over remote BC, lots of times in an old cabin where the roof was collapsed and we had to shore it up and put a tarp over...or how about a boat without a motor, moored to a reef...my sister and I had to go in the rowboat every morning to the beach and fill pails of water from a small creek there, for drinking and cooking...
I guess you would call that genuine off the map living, let alone off the grid...lol
Wow...I would have found that kind of lifestyle extremely enjoyable! I simply love the outdoors and roughing it!
Thanks for the very inspiring feedback Kathleen!
Joe