[Part 3 of 4] North, to Alaska…

When we weren’t busying ourselves with Yurt Life, Sean and I were on a mission to travel the world on ski and snowboard expeditions. 


A professional snowboarder since the age of 16, Sean had been backcountry snowboarding and guiding many places — including both South America and Antarctica (twice!) before we met. So naturally, we worked on ticking off expeditions to the other 5 continents.


Sean took his first descent on his 7th continent on Valentine’s Day in 2014. I remember how the snow was tinted pink from all the sand that had blown in from the Sahara Desert — a truly wild experience and a crowning achievement for Sean.



Below: Sean riding Mt. Toubkal, High Atlas Mountains, Morocco

Below: Sean riding the aforementioned snow colored pink from the Sahara sand

Below: Seeing camels on the hike in to the snow-line of Mt. Toubkul

After Morocco, without a new goal, our future was a blank canvas.



Around that same time, I’d gotten really into practicing yoga. I trained to become a yoga teacher in early 2015, and then one day, on just a regular drive home from a class, I heard a surprising, yet unmistakable Knowing:


I would open a yoga studio.


That was not on my bingo card for 2015, but I wasted no time getting to work. One month later, I was teaching my grand opening class at Yoga Hive in my first quaint, back-alleyway studio downtown Whitefish. It was intimate, grassroots, and insanely fun.


One studio led to a second in Columbia Falls, and a third in Kalispell. And while Sean was (and always has been) supportive of these ventures as my business partner, he still maintains today that his “yoga” happens in nature... not on a yoga mat :-)

While I was sending it full-speed into yoga world, Sean was forced to slow down.


He’d spent over year managing a complicated, life-altering health diagnosis that shifted his entire outlook on life. It was during that time of quiet reflection when he finally listened to a Knowing that had been knocking on his mental door for years: Alaska.


I’d heard him say “Montana is just a stepping stone to Alaska” a million times... but I never imagined it would happen. I had plenty of excuses...

• How would I run Yoga Hive from Alaska?
  
• Could I manage the constant travel back and forth?
  
• It’s so far...
  
• I’m too busy!
  

Despite my logistical reservations, I put my trust in Sean’s intuition and I agreed to make the move north — albeit slowly. Surely, the pieces would eventually fall into place.

Sean would’ve preferred a more remote homestead, but we ended up compromising on the Kenai Penninsula — it had a small town vibe like Whitefish, epic mountains, and we already had a few friends there.


In early 2017, Sean and I made a trip to Alaska to look at properties with a Realtor. Our options were... dismal. I walked up to each one and thought to myself, “It’s a no,” before we even walked in.


We nearly gave up entirely at the last house.


Before getting out of the truck, our Realtor said, “Ok, this is a great option, but you’ll need to use your imagination...” He rattled off a few facts about the acreage and pricing, and then he said something I’ll never forget:


“... and, I have to disclose that the former owner died in the home.”


Pause.


“And it was a year before they found his body—“


“ABSOLUTELY NOT!” The words barreled out of my mouth before he could go further.


Once back in our rental car, we called our local buddy Mike, laughed as we recounted the story, and admitted how bummed we were.


Then Mike had an idea. His parents had some friends who’d built an off-grid cabin many years ago that he could remember visiting via snowmachine as a child. He knew the couple was getting older, and wondered out loud: “Maybe they’d consider selling it to you guys?”


I laughed. No way this works out.


After making a quick call to that sweet elderly couple, Mike called us back with the news: They’d just decided to sell the cabin but hadn’t listed it yet! We hiked out with Mike the next day, took one look at the idyllic hand-built log cabin, incredible views of multiple glaciers, mountains and the ocean, and my mutual Knowing was undeniable: Alaska, here we come.


Below, our first off-grid homestead in Alaska:

Below, our cabin surrounded by fields of fireweed in the summertime + glacier views in the distance:

There’s one more part to the story — and one more move north, of course. Hopefully I haven’t worn out my welcome in your inbox yet! I’ll send you the final part on Sunday.


Enjoy the weekend,
Mollie