New Pioneers

Up until 2021, we led a typical life in a Southern California suburb. My husband had a good job as an IT professional. Our adult son worked and paid rent. I was developing a productive micro-farm with a food forest, laying hens, and meat rabbits all on our 0.1 acre postage stamp yard. We had renovated our 1950 kitchen with custom tile and were beginning to redo the rest of the house in pretty new paint colors, etc. We took frequent road trips with our friends, camping and exploring so many beautiful places all across the Southwest.

Why on earth would we pack up everything, sell our house, and move to a windswept plateau in the middle of nowhere, NE Arizona?

It began with the insanity of 2020, when we learned that we couldn't "bug in" during the kind of civil unrest that swept over the nation and our own neighborhood. But also, an overlanding trip to our friends' bargain property outside of Pietown, New Mexico inspired us with new possibilities of living off the land.

As soon as we returned home, it was clear to us that the daily grind of Matt's relentless career responsibilities and our 30 year mortgage was sucking the life out of us. And even though I managed to produce about 1,000 pounds of fruit and vegetables from our tiny yard, city codes forbade us from having the kind of livestock we dreamed of.

Matt began searching for potential sites where we could run sheep, dairy goats, pigs, and male poultry without restriction.

Our lucky break came via a Facebook group for a tiny town just a few miles from the Arizona-New Mexico state line. This community had such a friendly vibe and was near the byway we'd driven along on our August trip. The landscape is gorgeous with juniper trees and sunflowers decorating sweeping grazing lands for our future herd.

When a private party answered our query for parcels for sale, we headed out in October 2021 to have a look. Of course, we made arrangements to view other properties with the help of a realtor, but as soon as we saw this land, we fell in love. The price was so low, it astonished us and Matt bought it free and clear with his 401k savings.

We found a house flipper who took our Southern California shoebox as is. House prices in that city were insane, so despite our mortgage requiring 30 more years of payments, we escaped California debt-free and with a nest egg large enough to set up our new life on our off-grid homestead.

We started camping in a canvas tent, laying out our plans for where to place our RV home, animal quarters, and the rest. Then we began visiting the land in our box trailer during the frosty late fall/early winter, and rented a skidsteer to lay the gravel platforms for the used 5th wheel and a shipping container barn.

Matt quit his job at the end of the year and we filled the Conestoga (a medium sized moving van) with all our worldly possessions. The cat, dog, rabbits and chickens were crammed into our little box trailer, and we arrived February 4th, 2022 at dawn. It was 4°F and we'd driven 12 hours. The animals were shook, but everyone survived the journey.

A sense of pure, simple bliss filled our hearts. Our life as New Pioneers was just beginning.