Hello my dear friends,

Things are weird right now for all of us. I wanted to drop you all a quick line to let you all know what’s going on with us. But before I dive in, I wanted to let you all know that we’re thinking of all of you. We hope that this blog post finds you healthy, happy, and staying sane in these insane times.

This past Thursday we were in northern, Arizona and had been for about two weeks. We went there to knock out a few projects before moving into California for the work we had lined up for the next few months. Then last week, everything changed.

COVID-19 has affected everyone from every walk of life. Over the last few weeks when things were starting to look more serious here in the US, we thought that our mobile lifestyle actually set us up well to weather the storm. Social distancing is inherently built into the way we travel, and thus it’s not uncommon to be away from civilization of any kind for days at a time. However, over the last week we came to realize just how vulnerable we are in the wake of a worldwide pandemic. The source of our vulnerability is we can only “stock up” on so many supplies. We have the ability to carry 20 gallons of water, 20 lbs of propane, a small fridge worth of perishable food, and we only have so much room to carry a large back stock of non-perishable food. That reality set in for us when we started to show up at the grocery store and see so many of the things we needed sold out.

Ultimately we decided that it was our responsibility to come off the road until this all blows over. As hard of a decision as it was, we feel that we needed to remove ourselves from the equation to prevent ourselves from getting sick and others that we’d have to come into contact with to get the resources that we would inevitably run out of. Thankfully, we have amazing friends, Karissa and Linhburgh (@gondirtin), who offered us their backyard in California. We took them up on the offer. 

The feeling of relief after we arrived at their home and got our rig nestled into their yard came immediately. The anxiety of the constantly changing situation had taken a toll on us. We’re endlessly thankful to now be here, where we can move our focus towards more productive outlets. 

Over the last week most of the work (and income) we had booked has effectively dried up (this is the case with a lot of freelancers). We’ve decided to use all of this new found free time to edit a number of videos that we’ve already filmed. Our hope is that it’ll provide a little entertainment for you all, and give us a little income during this complicated time. We also would like to get caught up on our recap blog post from our months on the road this year.

We’ve been getting questions about how you all can support us through this weird time, which is beyond generous but absolutely not necessary. We feel it’s important that everyone focuses on taking care of themselves and staying healthy. If you do still want to do something to support us, watch our videos on YouTube, grab something from our store, or you can make a donation on our support page. It really makes a difference.

Though our web store is still live, we’re no longer shipping out orders until the end of the month and we’ll re-assess when that time comes. We’ve also decided to cancel our group trip to Costa Rica (sad face) because this is just not a time where people should be focusing on extracurricular travel. 

We’ll update you if anything changes on our end!

Be well and we’re sending you all full pantry and cup-runneth over vibes.

Love,

MAK & Owen