Our life changed as a family in 2013 when we were living in Austin, TX, and decided to take a year to travel around the Western United States. We sold our home and our possessions and packed our SUV with essentially one bag each, a box of books, a little camping gear, and a bag of rollerblades. We made the decision to do this in early summer and were able to pull out of our driveway in six weeks! It was definitely crazy, but the time-constraint helped us focus well. It was a great opportunity to shed many things we’d accumulated over the years.
That year we lived in different cities like Seattle, Portland, Salt Lake City, Spokane, Durango, St. George, and San Francisco for a month at a time as a home-base for work and school. We felt that we were able to get to know an area well and use it as a day-trip hub. We explored all the beauty of National Parks, hiked so many trails, and visited multiple ski resorts in Colorado and Utah. It felt like we packed a whole lifetime of adventure into just one year. We transformed into people who loved the mountains and outdoors and couldn’t imagine living away from them.
So at the end of the summer of 2014, we decided to head back to Austin for 3 months to reconnect with dear friends, play soccer, and tie up loose ends. Then we took off again, this time deciding to try to stay in places for 3-6 months. Our first destination was Keystone, Colorado for winter 2014-15. We hopped around the Sierras and Alaska during the summer of 2015, and then stayed in Nashville, TN for the fall of 2015. We spent a second winter season in Colorado for the kids to progress in snowboarding competitions, and took off again for the summer of 2016, starting in Sedona, AZ for some relaxation and red rock trails. We made it to the East Coast for a bit, visiting Washington DC and then hooking it up to Chicago before booking it back to Breckenridge. The kids were getting older as teenagers and having stronger individual opinions. So we decided to settle down in the beautiful Breckenridge, Colorado, enroll the kids in school, and make Summit County our home.
How We Lived while traveling
We have always had a lot of fun together as a family and try to make the most of every moment. We’d jump in creeks, hike new trails, explore new towns, and snowboard as much as possible. At the same time, we were always wired in. It is amazing what the internet and wifi afforded us. Our kids worked off of their iPads for reading and schoolwork, built their own websites and managed their learning pretty individually.
We had been moving our life towards this adventure on the road for quite some time. We homeschooled our kids, and so they always enjoyed an extra level of freedom and independence. While traveling, they were able to experience the wonder of nature and the history of the west beyond just merely reading the stories.
Don worked remotely with clients all over the world as an executive advisor and venture partner, and I worked with marketing content and design on various projects with Don. I juggled a lot, also being the primary teacher and travel planner, but it was totally worth it!
Why We traveled for over a year as a family
We came up with the term “freejourners” as a derivative of the words “freedom” and “sojourners”. We live our life to be as free as possible. Our friends who know us get this, as they pursue freedom and happiness with their own lives. For us, it means being unencumbered and able to make the choices we want.
There is this current in life that seems to sweep us. Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” We always want to examine our lives and live it deliberately, not because these strong conventional currents pull us. Many of these forces are good. But many are just tradition and unquestioned.
We also see ourselves as sojourners. It is a bit of a Biblical term describing the journey of people who believe in an afterlife. This life is so temporary. We’re here seventy-plus years and gone. There are billions of us that will pass through this journey.
As a sojourner, we want to always maintain a long-term perspective and try to help as many people as we can, honor God, love our family and have a great time experiencing the wonder of the world.
So, we called ourselves freejourners. We love knowing and meeting people who are of the same vein.
Where We traveled
- Dallas, TX
- Oklahoma City, OK
- Omaha Zoo, NE
- Mt. Rushmore & Badlands, SD
- Devil’s Tower National Park
- Glacier National Park, MT
- Lake Louise, Canada
- Jasper, Canada
- Spokane, WA
- Coeur d’Alene, ID
- Palouse Falls, WA
- Grand Coulee Dam, WA
- Yellowstone National Park, WY
- Grand Teton National Park, WY
- Jackson Hole, WY
- Boise, ID
- Seattle, WA
- Long Beach, WA
- Portland, OR
- Multnomah Falls, OR
- Mt. Hood
- Canyonlands National Park
- Salt Lake City, UT
- Park Cities, Canyons, UT
- Sundance, Brighton, Snowbird, and Wolf Creek Mountain, UT
- Arches National Park, UT
- Durango, CO
- Mesa Verde National Park, CO
- Pagosa Springs, CO
- Telluride, Snowmass, Steamboat Springs, Crested Butte
- Buttermilk, Monarch, A Basin, Loveland Mountains
- St. George, UT
- Zion National Park
- Bryce Canyon National Park
- Grand Canyon National Park
- Horseshoe Bend, Arizona
- Yosemite National Park
- Death Valley National Park
- Sequoia National Park
- Santa Barbara, CA
- Big Sur, CA
- San Francisco, CA
- Crescent City, CA
- Gold Beach, OR
- Bend, OR
- Rocky Mountain National Park, CO
- Pecos National Park, NM
- Petroglyphs National Park, NM
- Santa Fe, NM
- Keystone, Breckenridge, Vail, Beaver Creek, Aspen, Crested Butte
- Colorado Monument National Park
- Black Canyon of Gunnison National Park, CO
- Disneyland
- Curecanti National Recreation Center, CO
- Backpacking at Channel Islands National Park
- Backpacking in Sierras outside of Bishop, CA
- Anchorage Alaska – Kenai Fjords National Park, Denali National Park
- Antelope Canyon, Page AZ
- St. Louis, MO
- Nashville, TN
- Smokey Mountains National Park
- Atlanta, GA
- New Orleans, LA
- Petrified Forest National Park
- Sedona, AZ
- Washington, DC
- Roanoke, WV
- Chicago, IL
- San Diego, CA
Sonya Dalrymple 