Life (and future business) update — we are moving!
We have contentedly, if rather slowly, been making progress on the “Headwaters” land in Finland. That said, we were more than a little overly optimistic about our timeline on the outset of this endeavor. Despite having a great life and no real complaints, I can’t help but be a impatient as an impending move north teases us.
When we closed on the land in November of 2021, we thought we’d be able to fully move by the end of 2022. (lol.) We’d underestimated the work of prepping the land to actually build at all. Thankfully, a willing neighbor with a brush cutter made clearing an actual build site a snap, but in order to get back to the build site, we needed to clear an ATV trail, at the very least, which involved felling trees, moving boulders, and grading the trail. Jared did manage to clear a serviceable trail while contending with mosquitos, black flies, and zoning and permitting.
Seasonally, there is just not much we can do right now (or the last several months) up there. We didn’t get to a point before the snow fell where Jared would be able to work through the winter — at the very least, getting cabin footings dug. (This has actually worked out fine for us, with Jared taking on more duties at our homebase about 3 hours south of the Finland property while I take on more client work.)
So here we are into 2023 and we have ⅔ of a sauna, an outhouse, and a platform for a wall tent. Not to mention there is no actual road yet to speak of, so hauling supplies back must be done via ATV/trailer or, these winter days, snowshoes/sled. And simply parking off our road in the winter involves first shoveling out a parking spot. It’s been a physical slog for Jared and a mental slog for me. (Actually, let’s be real: it’s been a physical and mental slog for both of us, but in different ways.)
Left: 2/3 of a sauna (stay tuned for the other 1/3!) // Right: Finally, a parking spot, after 2 hours of shoveling.
As you may already know, we are expecting our second little one in mid-June (!!) and we have no delusions that life will get easier and progress up north will get faster if we keep up with our current situation. Taking this into consideration, we started looking at properties within an hour or so from the land with a plan to move after the baby comes. This would allow us to do pretty much exactly what we have been doing while cutting Jared’s commute time, reducing his overnights away, and, ideally, also cutting some of our living expenses.
What we ended up finding and falling in love with surprised us both.
We closed yesterday on a small piece of land about 20 minutes east of downtown Ely, a stone’s throw from Moose Lake and a day’s paddle from Canada. The land has a fairly old, very in-need-of-work trailer on it, and our plan is to shift focus a bit away from the Finland project while we (mostly Jared) gets the trailer livable so that we can sell our house outside the cities and move in this fall!
Shorter commute to the land? Check.
Reducing overnights away so that Kate isn’t left wrangling two babies solo every time the weather is nice? Check.
Cutting our living expenses? Check.
Some additional bonuses of this particular property:
1. It’s pretty much in the BWCA. It is a stone’s throw from Moose Lake, the most heavily permitted entry point into the Boundary Waters! This made it incredibly appealing.
2. We already feel like we have a lovely little community here. One of the first properties we ever looked at together, back in the fall of 2020, was an essentially defunct canoe outfitters just west of Ely. In getting ready to make that purchase (which obviously fell through!) I interviewed friends, and friends of friends, and friends of friends of friends, with connections in and around Ely to see if it would be a good place for our family. (The consensus was YES!) So to end up here after all is pretty kismet!
3. The price couldn’t have been beat. We feel so lucky to have gotten [another!] great deal on an ideal-for-us property. (It seems to pay to have a little imagination and goals that are outside the norm!) Living in a trailer will cut our living expenses considerably, allowing us to start saving again vs. having everything we make go towards building in Finland.
4. It’s luxurious! It already has septic and electric, and drilling a well will be one of our first priorities. We’d been wrapping our minds around how we would live completely off-grid in Finland (including potty training in an outhouse) in a roughly 600-square-foot cabin. So the reality of having running water, electricity, 3 beds, 2 bathrooms, and ~930 square feet of living space is downright posh.
Of course, there are some downsides. Namely, the trailer needs A LOT of work, and in order to come down in price, we agreed to take it “as is.” (A.K.A. we have a lot of leftover junk to deal with. But maybe we’ll find some treasures??)
In short, our primary focus this spring and summer — besides, duh, a new baby — will be getting the trailer to a livable condition by the fall, which means the progress on the Headwaters property will be slower in the short term. But middle term, living this much closer to the land will mean both having Jared home more and being ultimately able to do MORE work on the land. And long term, if we ever end up moving this will, at the very least, be an ideal family getaway for decades to come!