Outdoor voluntary simplicity & survivalism in Santa Fe hills

[Music] this is my yearr round winter camp and it's it's on private property but I have my tent which is a Mongolian yurt I have my little pop-up camper over here is my shower room into another garden and there's no running water no electricity provided here my toilet system is above check out the shower T the seasonal shower this thing's not over here in the the winter time come on inside man this is five star yeah it's an old of course we had this old parachute yeah we just pipe in the water through a garden hose and it's solar heated these days so oh super nice come in and start here clean yourself off and it is super nice it is nice today I live outside basically uh most people would say I'm homeless but I got to great home oh we got hot water but it's all the mindset when resources go thin I have no running water in my house and so I have to come up with Solutions how much did this cost to make oh maybe maybe $20 even in the winter time we do bathe outside there's the cold plunge oh jeez that's cold oh jeez it's in the upper 30s cuz it's still freezing at night it is hard [Music] man I basically live in an outside environment this whole Space so beautiful and of course the Y it's amazingly beautiful these are Yak hair here it's look at that wow but uh beautiful as this year is people think oh yeah it's all romantic and everything you have to maintain this thing so I have to brush brush off the snow CU you don't want these to get wet cuz they get moldy and you have to keeping them ventilated and now my Transportation my ebike how do you charge yeah I have this solar panel here this is a 100 wat foldable panel and this goes into a charging station this is a 400 watt so I can plug in but it's kind of silly because I have to go through two inverters this is very e inefficient people I have a whole way to make this system better but there so it's a poor man's Tesla so this also Powers my home so this is my digital Nomad life if you get your Wi-Fi signal in here you can be totally self-sufficient to a high level in our Modern Age and I do like these micro grids I think this is the way to go rather than people put the big money into the the larger units because ours is starting to fail after 20 years and we're going to close it down turn that engine on got a full tank let's go ride oh yeah start snowing check it out oh yeah pedaling up 12 mph up a 10° Hill I grew up in the mountains it's going to be scary coming down this hill once I lived in Suburbia and and that's hell really for me and I went nuts as a kid so this is like elective poverty oh now goes fast 21 I can actually get up to 39 mph down here how long have I been doing this living off grid you know no running water all that sort of thing probably three solid years now a awesome home sweet home yeah but the end is this is like camping all the time I have this I spent an entire winter here it's like a Space Capsule and it was cold these are so cold RV life is not for me this is the popup camper I'll open it up just takes a second I lived in this for like 9 or 10 months it's got these big Windows you can open up the vent totally self-reliant yeah you got the refrigerator propane fired and then a little sink that I never used in a two burer the [Music] stove it's a game changer from the tent world I started as a climber a rock climber but we'll look over here oh this is that Summit Pinnacle you want to top out huh as a climber the simplest way to sleep is of course the bivwak imagine spending the night th000 ft above on the cliff or up in the trees you get up near the summit and you just lay your head on some rocks and try to get some sleep I don't think this is the way I'm going to have to go around it's fuing huge it's like 600 ft no here we are this is just all day hike 7:40 p.m. 11 hours out here overnight use need a permit so I have to go out to the road and get on the bike and go for another 6 miles we drive all all through the West to go climb for a weekend oh that's not the way that's not the way that's a long drop so it's that Recreation culture when you're independent like that and it does take some money so I went through through 30 years of that and phased out I've been challenged by jobs and careers my entire [Music] life I've never made much money you know $30,000 a year for me was like the tops average for me was probably $117,000 a year through my 30s 40s and 50s climbing up climbing up oh I was basically came into a forced retirement my life flipped upside down in 2017 so let's let's climb down down and go for a walk with the dog so I downsized sold my possessions divorced and was not earning money at all my income went to zero and it has been for 3 years now thank goodness I have savings but that's like going to zero this is the the life but there's a tent that goes up above this so this is like the first floor or the second floor and the third floor is uh up I basically went into forced retirement I'm like well you could do anything where do you want to go so I bought this equipment and because I was so used to camping out you know I lived in a shed when I moved out of my house I went to live in a shed greasy floor and then I started going up from there so here we are 2020 and now this is basically a refined system look I got my garden in and I got my YT here let me get some light in there first let's open it up since I was having such a hard time living in the standard three bedroom two bath house Square buildings for me just made me feel uncomfortable I just was just I got to get out of here I got to get out of here but once I got into roundhouse living I feel so much more comfortable this is the old style year with the felt so the horse hair ropes and felt inside and everything and the natural canvas this is a 2500 year old design and so it's pretty fun it's kind of like a TP you have to keep it vented we'll go in this is a four seasoned tent g g it feels big in here yeah this is a 19 ft across top of it is 9 and 1/2 ft tall or so there's a wood stove that comes in here in the winter this is my wood stove but in the summertime I take it out and then run the chimney up through one of the holes it's too big for one person you know I think the best yurt size is like a 12 foot to 16 ft diameter this gets pretty cold in the winter it's a dirt floor I decided not to put in just because I wanted to see what Earth does over a full year and it's a little too cold so I'm getting donated carpets and I'll just build carpets up and reduce the size and close this off cuz you can get this really comfortable in the winter why do you think the round shape suits your oh nothing's hitting this is like the inside of my brain yeah this is kind of the Center of My Universe The Wheelhouse here and this all inspired from burning [Music] men you know I talked about my difficult year in 2017 and the low low but also the high high was going to burning man I went there as a volunteer one of the 10 principles of the burn man is we clean up after our party and they do it really well out there and here I could also do it very well beautiful part about this structure is if I was going to move away I can take this down pack it away and cover everything up leaving no trace the bed is a raised platform this was my dining room table in my married life and you can take the pieces outside and make a table for a group Gathering whatever you want to do with these pieces of beautiful wood I sleep just use a thin mat this is plenty of padding for me I don't need one of those fancy mattresses things an air mattress right yeah this was just air one so it's just very very comfy and my dog Tippy she hangs out with me yeah yeah it's nice actually it's proba better for your back oh yeah yeah I find most of my back problems was because of the straight back chair so now I've live on the ground and uh be just fine the kitchen's all outside so really it's you keep everything compartmentalized a shower outside kitchen outside this is just for sleeping yeah basically sleeping yeah so no food in here so no rodents over next is my poop station which is really funny I built this for $0 yeah living off grid everything like that how do you go to the bathroom and so how do you do it effectively I don't like to have a bunch of dug cat holes and poop everywhere I manage it way better this was one of my early designs and the thing is to separate your poo and the urine and start composting it into the garden systems so this is my old original man it was a milk crate and I carved a wooden lid and got an old Automotive funnel and it comes out the other side and it goes down to the Garden I can water the garden with my pee that evolved into a 5 gallon bucket system because I found out with this one open air like this with a 5 gallon bucket under it created oh too much smell and flies and things like that I wanted to have a secure lid seal it up so the 5G bucket system developed here so I'm the duer version two with the automotive funnel still but I cut a hole in the bucket and then I attach the bottle through here so you capture your urine I separate the urine from the poop so now this next Evolution check out my little dog it's got a lid that seals keeps the flies out and I carved this out by hand made this one obviously with the funnel separator that goes into a bottle now I want to get to how do you use it in public well it's easy man whoa check it out and it goes over your head and then it drops down and you sit on your toilet and uh yeah do you do your business the dooder man yeah insta privy so this is tawa land so the original inhabitants here is tawa and and this is the end of the Santa Fe Trail in these parts so the ancient Santa Fe Trail goes right through here all the way to posos and then all the way to St Louis so this is an Ancient Ancient route cuz Santa Fe is the oldest colony town in the Americas before the pilgrims arrived and everything like that the Spanish came up looking for the Seven Cities of Gold and so these conquistadors came around right up through here and this was probably an ancient little campsite cuz it's trees and it's out of the wind and then this thing arrived probably 20 years ago which is a straw bale House New Mexico has a great tradition and history of different architecture Adobe of course straw bales Earth ships and so people been doing off- griding alternative stuff here for decades they put it up really quick because there's no budget and you know notice new mexic Mexico looks kind of poor to a lot of people's eyes and yeah it's it's rural for sure but we have that tradition of let's just find what works and put it together and put it up cuz people did that before us then the roof leaked after a while and then the mold came in and uh it this was abandoned this property the people who owned this before was a family like a homesteading family and they were really trying to go off grid and out here it's pretty tough in the winters it's cold the wind blows it's just a little too far away from town to make it really work that was all abandoned the family went on vacation and they never came back they were they're like this is too tough let's check it out come on in and this is the kitchen outside there's no running water in the house this is our hand wash station sink and it's got a little foot pump and it's activated these are really good so these first saw and used these on River trips like in the Grand Canyon same with our tables and chairs and coolers so this is a adaptation from Recreation again you know the river the river communities which are floating kitchens basically can you show me what you used to cook yeah yeah just the Coleman two burner stove and it's got a five gallon propane tank we also have a wood fire living without Refrigeration your one's diet has to change you basically become more a lot more fruits and nuts and vegetables rather than Dairy and meat and all those things so yeah you really adjust foodwise do some eggs and Flakes and rice superfoods that sort of thing so you're eating healthier probably than maybe you would have oh totally eat really healthy and also who wants to do the dishes in the winter time you know it's just like no no no I'll just have some fruits and nuts and that's good for today we're going to do some dishes here at this outside kitchen hot water and then get the rinse water on look at that flame it's a blaster so a lot of this kitchen you think this crazy guys is washing dishes outside in the winter it's true and then add a little soap frozen soap so the kitchen is from the River Community Grand Canyon that I worked in for a number of years was uh my dream job and I got fired from it from a river guide in the Grand Canyon what I learned in the River Community is making yourself a really good sturdy outdoor kitchen just part of Camp life you know you got to do do everything yourself if you're going to live off grid kind of simple like cuz for most of many people not everybody but for the developed Western mindset this is like oh my gosh he's he's washing dishes outside and it looks like it's very messy cuz there's all this messy stuff around and uh it's not the best kitchen Arrangement but we'll improve it our Main Kitchen I've improved today I brought the table up so it's mobile this is an old stool I just put these planks in that we had up there but now look at this man we have a dishwashing station and a cooking station yeah I carved this today and working on this this is actually Oak and yeah we got it for free I got my supplies this is going to be vegetarian I find that cooking meat out in these Community Kitchens creates green grease and stinkiness and then it attracts more rodents so yeah there's all these issues huge issues about uh the so-called homeless kitchen yeah yeah most people say oh man this guy's a homeless man and uh but yeah okay let's say I am homeless guy but how do I cook and eat out here when there's no running water yeah I acknowledge that poverty is not something that's really uh desirable for people but are there anything positive to Poverty I'd say yeah one is you got time time to do stuff you can slow down your life and take time to do whatever you want to do my rinse water I dove into like stoicism which is a retreat you know it's that acceptance and not playing that victim role anymore you know I don't think I'll be invited to Washington anybody soon to work on policy decisions about homelessness and poverty but sharing this information saying hey there's this guy doing his dishes outside he doesn't have running water inside he's looks like he's under some hardship but he's having fun and the dude's even producing something of it and wants to start this whole movement around being able to live affordably but not be in poverty it's a it's a bulb pressurize it squeezes it you hear it and it goes into the Clean Water there and then through pressurized push the water goes up and out the spet and then the dirty water goes out we Haul our water in on these big jugs this time of year it's not frozen of course but we have garden hoses which make makes it a lot easier off of our well up on top but in the winter time we got to carry this when the sun is right we fill up our water jugs and go really lean in the winter up we go Hall water start in the morning morning chores just like on a primitive Farm or Ranch so to the well to see if we have water in the tank that's flowing it could have froze last night let's get up here probably around 80 ft of elevation gain so here is our well and it's about 200 ft deep so we have a solar pump inserted down there that's solar powered and brings it into the tank and then when we can we distribute the water back down the hill back to the house and the gardens the future Gardens since there's no water and a tap down below we turn this on and oh I bet oh no it's running wow look at that so let's fild it up not a great well it only produces about 2 gallons a minute out so there's very limitations on what we can do here on this property the yellow cord going all the way over to the uh solar shed and that uh produces electricity open this up oh they're heavy this goes down in the hole it's just a pump that brings it up so this is the weak point of the entire thing there's no structure it freezes in the winter in the simple sense we have to haul our water by hand and that's a lot of Labor so how many people actually do that not too many someday this will be covered and we can protect our water and grow food all year long our power system we have a wind turbine and solar panels which are old and it's at the end of its life we would need an upgrade so anywhere from $5,000 to $110,000 uh Plus batteries and you have to maintain the batteries so once this goes dead completely we are going to go for our main power is probably back to the Grid it's only about 400 watts if you ever thought of going to live in a shed at least you got a cover over your head but there's no electricity there's no nothing basically except shelter so how do you do that so power supply it's nice to have some lights the little lights that plug in the efficient ones the little LEDs you can plug in regular style too you know a little hand saw folding saw especially since I live without heat unless I cut firewood I have a stone axe this breaks Stone rather than wood and I was fabricating a new handle because the old handle broke so we have Woodworking and my main tool is choice is this Filipino bolo you know so yeah it's this is a great tool from the Philippines so everything I try to manage by hand as much as I can rather than rely on power tools I do have some no doubt I'm guilty of of of power tool use but I don't have a shop anymore no more concrete you know no more of that that whole thing kind of the the American life is I'm down sizing out of that and I'm moving more into hand tools I don't even use a a gas chainsaw anymore there's a nice little electric one I use power tools and old stuff both all right paleo almost modern this ones I use the angle grinder with the sander on and then I burn it we're going to burn this board what we're doing here is just torching the edge for protection with a Japanese technique of sealing that wood otherwise what do you do paint stain maintenance so I'm getting away from maintenance this tool out here is great for going out into the forest and this is how I heat my house in the winter that one's too big let's get this one I just go collect small diameter wood out of the forest I get out my aggressions so about that size try not to get killed but then a lot of wood this size goes into my fireplace so I don't need the big log splitter I don't need the the heavy axes where that's hard work for a lot of people so as you get older you get a little smarter right and this goes all the way into our Force management because the extreme danger out here is fire you know this whole place is over forested overgrown it's dry be very careful with fire and by using stick your clearing underbrush is that the idea yeah I clear underbrush I go in with a little Handa and then I'm just sawing the lower limbs bringing that up so ground fires don't go up into the canopy I've been trimming out overgrown fire prone Forest here so this is all cleaned out now it's trimmed back because this is a wash and flood waters come down tear up the vegetation so yeah I trim this out it's looking good it opens up the canopy a little bit more these are all my art project this is how I would like to make some money is carving these out of the local Cedar here so I get in here with my bolo and then I G it out all by hand all by hand and these are used to take care of your body so you know you just cut a regular log and then I'll just start cutting away the this is the handle people think ah it takes so much time look at that beautiful wood that comes out then I make it all artistic then I go down to a knife and uh start carving in this and this is great by the wood stove in the winter time I do a lot of this in the winter time this is the kitchen outside and it's the workshop and and we live out here under this all year we move in when it's really cold 0° and snowing it's just miserable we'll move the stove in and cook there for 30 to 60 days the people who built this they had kids and so it's kind of kind of like a playhouse with all these different roofs rooms it's really strange this is roughly 120 ft with a porch a nice porch outside inside we're so tall our head touches the roof but the beauty is the wood stove this little room with the wood stove heats up very efficiently you don't need much firewood at all and you get toasty warm yeah I am so comfortable in the winter now in these kind of spaces and um you can heat up your water these little pot belly stoves are awesome it's just a very nice space yeah 7 ft wide in the middle not even 6 feet tall and there's a secret little room one day we'll put couches in there and make it a really good hangout spot so that would be our library there's no wearing here that works so I bring in my own solar powered battery packs and I have these little LED lights that I take with me everywhere so they fent in a tent or whatever and so the cost of like house construction can go way down if you're not doing all the wiring and plumbing and everything and so these beautiful little lights they're bright they last a long time you know like 12 hours out of this lighting system and so I just set up my little string lights wherever I'm staying it it works wonderfully I have you meet Carol my roommate how did you find this area oh I was so lucky I think I was blessed to have gotten in this place so once I got the place I would like to share with people the same vent as myself we are a collective trying to build a place and build small structures so this is the euga hot IFA if you know about the famous rice teres in the Philippines they are the builders and their ancestors are the Builders of this thousands of year old so they're really experts in Terrace building and the engineering that goes with maintaining rice lands and rice patties and such steep slopes it is made without nails this one so it's a here you just have the beams but there are no nails so when there's an earthquake it just goes and moves so this was transported in Parts it it had to be assembled here so this one it it's just like it's just a socket that's put into this so it holds on to the to this beam but at the same time you have these structures and the traditional use of that is that so that mice or rats cannot go up so so actually that's a safe place for them and then of course you can put your stin here your keys or whatever this is a hagab this is a traditional bench that families own in ugal this Harold Conlin studied the UGA people the peoples here are unconquered in the Philippines because we were under the colony of Spain for 300 years this was intended to be used as a healing Hut for all of the indignities that were experienced by indigenous Filipinos who were brought to the World Expo in St Louis in Chicago I believe and they were shown in the Expo as though they were Savages so this place it is becoming like a hub for Filipinos especially that are trying to understand or reconnect to the roots so traditionally as a living structure this small hat is where the UGA would live and these would there would be a ledge here and it could be a bed at night and there could be a fireplace here and that's where you you can cook and warm the house in the rainy season and then dry some of the meat and so it's a very compact living space and that means that you can have a whole lot of things so all of these are are not nailed you can see where they are connected but open to the elements no this is actually enclosed okay okay except that we cannot find the indigenous material to complete the roof so because it is thatch we don't find that here so we're trying to see what kind of material we can use instead you see here too that it's strap right is that is that traditional with the Rope yeah there would be some kind of traditional twine of course but uh you know we're here where we use what is available and that's just the thing with the indigenous way you use what is there I was a International Development worker but then when you see what's happening in in this world then you see uh the pain I couldn't handle it so far that you see that that there's nothing more you can do about a whole lot of things so that's what happened and so I decided to just pull back a bit and to find the sanctuary and I found it it was magical how would you call it um it it it's a it's really a dragon canoe is the concept of mamerto to make this and this actually floated okay Hey Thomas did you want to join me here so you do this and you ride the SKU yeah this is a magical place right right so you can do anything this cool I was talking about magic how we found this place so I I withdrew from from work and I promised that I would find myself a sanctuary so I can live by the forest and all that sort of thing are we going to row are we going to sit CLE on Craig's List I saw this man who was selling this house and you know what he did he said okay if you want to buy my place write me an essay what would you do with it and so I told him I just want to build small structures I learned how to make uh super Adobe Dome structures and I'm going to build tree houses and fancy stuff uh and just leave it as it is he finally said your response resonates with me and so I I got it it's it's so peaceful here but it's also the idea of writing a dragon can you believe that it's magic in terms of developing a place and the idea of helping others to do this it doesn't require that you have a whole lot of money you have a whole lot of creativity and a passion to live more simply we are not into austerities by any means or a glorifying poverty but it's to be able to connect with everything that is we enjoy all of this uh being in the forest and all that this was this was actually an Impulse buy it was on sale and I liked how they conceptualized but it it matches a Hut this is a uh a modern Hut system it's actually three stories so a person or persons can live in a small square footage you know going vertically and so coming up into our hammock this is like a hammock that three people can get in and then the upper story is the tent yeah and then you sleep up in here get up in this one it's a good system like say if uh the homeless had to live in a parking lot like some cities are doing right now is trying to House people in parking lots okay you know when are you going to provide some shade you know shade is one of the core important things with survival food Water Shelter shade so down on the ground you could actually cook set up your little cook stove down in there and then this is your hangout area but I'm in the shade and then up in the The Loft here uh get some sidewalls and make like a pyramid fabric pyramid and then you're talking you know okay guess I'll try living on this asphalt for a while so the city just needs to provide poles like in a triangle and living off the ground is important it's very clean up here the rodents aren't going to get up in here and so once we're a little more prot protected from the wind and such these are very interesting struckers okay so making a structure inexpensive how cheap can you go and make a solid structure that's like earthquake proof and so the cow Earth method the sandbag house so thick perfect for this location with the sun and the wind yeah inside is it's a a long sandbag and you fill it up there's a little bit of mortar mixed in with the sand and it hardens but you have to Tamp it so it's filling these up by hand with a little cup and bucket again and again and again and again and build build build and it's labor intensive so maybe the material costs are next to nothing but the labor involved is heavy labor if it was easy we would have tons of these around and this is three weeks worth of work just half done and the sun will degrade this so it needs to finish so it's half finished because the people walked off the job it was just too hot too intense so these are our team and Village efforts but at some point this will be 10 ft tall people want to know what it's like to live off grid man this is training come up here and spend 30 days and live like this this is a good [Music] school [Music] these are carved from a great friend of mine which are atlal that predate the bow and arrow for many who come in they want to have like that Hunter experienes how ancient is this system oh this predates the bow and arrow archaeologically late Paleolithic yeah definitely during the the Paleolithic time all right so yeah it's an extension of the arm increases the throwing power these are definitely for like wild pigs deer you know larger animals turkeys you know this is like a 7ot long Arrow shaft so it delivers quite a punch takes practice you got to just practice practice so my target would be down by the the Green Bush so come in wow not bad hey I haven't throwing one of those in a long time so there's a a carved Notch it's like a head of a bird beak and then at the end of The Arrow is a little divot and then that fits right on there then there's a little holder for the other part of the arrow you tilt it up to balance it and then get your fingers through develop your feel your hand and then yeah yeah kind to become the warrior then and really make sure it's accurate so practice practice practice for these kind of things and then it's kind of is it a leverage what's making yeah once you start to move and you start to swing the uh the arrow comes off the cradle and then you feel it you then it's feel you feel the projector coming off and then you throw it at the opportune moment and it flies off into the direction and hits your target I actually really enjoy my solitude and I've learned how to master Solitude which is a big hurdle for the Western mind is cuz we're always busy and scheduled and to the 10th degree now yeah we don't practice too often because the dog chases it it' be very dangerous for a [Laughter] dog this Lifestyles is for people who are wanting to go with nature rather than the technology side you know technology side's got the whole thing man we're going to Mars yeah try getting along at Mars man good luck I I like to break again because a friend of mine wanted

Channel: Kirsten Dirksen

Views: 154,858

Keywords: no income lifestyle, low income lifestyle, permanent camping, camping lifestyle, camping home, camp home, yurt, yurt home, pop up camper, ebike, microsolar, tentsile, tree tents, homeless housing, ifugao hut, thatch roof, tomas robison, voluntary homeless, paleo modern, paleo modern tools, paleo weapon, straw bale, building codes, composting toilet, DIY composting toilet, cal earth, superadobe, solitude, river raft kitchen, low-income, slow living, frugality, endurance

Id: pCkTLCRcRxQ

Length: 45min 11sec (2711 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 03 2020