Why can't you? Alaska ain't exactly Tokyo yet?Originally Posted by jman1984
A fitting choice. That was one heck of a salty gent with some very highly developed skills, work ethic, and confidence.
Because there are no homestead lands available in Alaska, at least none like his site at Twin Lakes. When I looked into it years ago there were tiny parcels available north of Denali that would be excellent for raising mosquitos.
So you are saying in all of Alaska there's no place to buy land, harvest some trees and build a cabin overlooking a lake with a couple of mountains around it?
homesteading in AK is a thing of the past. any remnant that was left died rather quickly in the 70s.
upon starting this successful thread, have since pirated both episodes and am currently pursuing the book.
he is my hero still
Where did ya find the booty?
"Impossible just takes a little longer"
Nothing that looks like where Dick lived, it's all parks now, or overtaken by Native Claims Settlement Act (the local indians won a lawsuit awarding VAST acreage to them). There isn't a lot of desirable land for sale, the government owns most of it. What is both available and desirable, ain't cheap. That means, unless you are independently wealthy, it'll either be vacation property or you'll have a LONG COLD commute. Contary to what advocates of "change" purport, there is no utopia.
Enroute...
All this talk has me wanting to see the show again, sans all the PBS begging for $$$ interruptions. The library catalog had it and I sholud get it in a few days. Great show...well worth seeing again!
I think he led a life that would be too lonely for most of us.
I would like to visit twin lakes for a while, but I would not want to live my life there all by myself.
Panzer
Anybody with half a brain and some willpower can live in the woods. Thruhikers do it for months at a time, just stretch those months into years and pretend your tent is a log cabin and voila! You're Dick.
It's one thing to study his life and watch his stuff, it's another to get your own buttocks out in the woods and use his life as a motivation to do so. The problem is not that there's no place to do it, the problem is modern syphilization and the responsibilities people take on by choice that keeps them from living out.
Example: Anyone can squat in a national forest for two weeks at the same place. Move a mile, set up again for two weeks. Come out after ten years and write a short story. How many national forests are there? A bunch. If someone wants a permanet hooch like Dick's cabin, go somewhere remote and buy an acre or find a friendly landowner in the middle of nowhere and ask to set up some primitive shelter off the grid with no running water, etc. Cut a trail in and don't expect to drive. Keep it simple.
What?
Panzer
that there is a bunch of BS.thru-hikers don't live in the woods, they pass thru the woods keying on towns. always thinking about a terminus
Yeah, I forgot they can only carry a 25 pound pack with just 4 days of food max and resupply on a nearly daily basis.that there is a bunch of BS.
He had to live on a lake because all his supplies were flown in, except for what he could hunt/fish or grow in his garden. It must cost a lot to have all those supplies flown in. He was on a very limited income.
When he got old he stopped living there during the winters because it became too cold for him. He closed up the cabin and flew back to civilization.
Panzer
We live out of Fairbanks and know folks that just go out to the bush and live any time they want to ! They build trapper cabins and stay the winter and trap. legal or not that is what they do. ..and will no matter what anyone says . the state has TONS of land that noone will know your are " squatting "... you can get a permit on specific lands to build a " cabin " .. thru the state. heck, we can still build cabins where we live without a building permit ! .. folks still take yurts and put them pretty much anywhere they want. ..As far as lakes go...you are kidding right ? lakes galore.
Antibomics
Is modern "syphilization" still curable with antibiomics?
Everyone has a photographic memory. Not everyone has film.
Honestly, hiking the At and living in the busg in interior Alaska have pretty much 0 in common.
A friend of mine spent 20 years building his cabin by hand out west, retired then one day got a visit from the FBI asking him about his nearest neighbor, turned out it was Ted the Unibomber. My friend said, "Ted was a nice guy, knew a lot about dynamite, came over and helped me blow out stumps one day."
I agree, two completely different skill sets, and also mindsets.
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