The day before....

This is the introduction post. We're Mike and Shari who have a permanent address in Peoria, AZ. If you're reading this, you probably already know who we are and that we've chosen a lifestyle that is a little off mainstream. Our lifestyle is predicated on the fact that we are healthy now, that we don't need a lot of material items to be happy and the economy is what it is. So, we've chosen to travel and work hither/thither/yon.

Last year, Mike worked as a driver/guide in Denali National Park for Holland America/Princess. When the Alaskan cruise season ended, he came back and worked for Horizon Transport as an independent contractor delivering RV's and trucks from one part of the country to another. Meantime, I took a RN refresher course and got a job as a hospice RN in Phoenix. Doing this, we were able to save a little money. However, we probably only saw each other about 15% of the year because of conflicting schedules.

Although I loved my job as a hospice nurse, I've chosen to go to Alaska with him this year. Mike loves adventure and new things and didn't want to return to Denali without trying other places. Thus, Skagway. As I've said, I'll be working as a customer sales and service representative. No, we will not be on the ships. They come to us.

What does a customer sales and service representative do? Well, I'm not really sure. It's something to do with the land tours that the cruise ship passengers sign up for. I guess you'd say that I'll be one of their "land connections." More to come when I actually start working.

We'll be living in company housing which we've read consists either of a wing of a hotel or a house. We'll share living quarters with other employees and happily will be each others' roommates. Wherever we're placed will have a kitchen and laundry room. Unlike Denali where there was an employee cafeteria, we'll be having to cook our own food. It will cost us $6.50 apiece/day for the living quarters as a payroll deduction.

A few years ago, I was in a work rut and Mike demanded what I wanted and my reply was to be somewhere for at least a little while where I could walk outside my door and be in the woods very shortly. Well, here's the opportunity. I'm supposed to know a hell of a lot more about Skagway than I do so far...ashamedly haven't completed my homework on it. But Skagway lies on an inlet where the largest fjords in North America exist. So yes there'll be trees. And they will be UP.

So here I am blogging when I should be packing. We had an upset at our house on April 8. During that time Mike and Lauren were away on a tiger cruise on our son-in-law Joe's amphibious assault ship ("small" aircraft carrier). A tiger cruise is a public relations thing where sailors can invite family/friends (not spouses) to travel on the ship on the last leg of a long deployment. In this case it was from Honolulu to San Diego. For them it was a trip of a lifetime.

However, that means Mike got back Wednesday night. He has 6 hours of training today and 3 hours tomorrow with the HA/Princess driver trainer. Returning drivers only have to do 12 hours of training. That doesn't leave much time to see family and friends or pack. Much of what we've done so far has been to make lists of categories of things to bring: backpacks, fishing gear, computer (and "office" type stuff), toys (gold pan, softball glove, juggling items, ping pong paddle), important things (books, crossword puzzle books, GPS), kitchen items, bed linens/towels...oh yeah...and clothes for work and play. You can probably guess of toys and important things which items belong to which of us! ; )

Most things are in piles, except for the clothing and even all that is on a list. We've done our best to see as many of our family and friends in the last 3 weeks as possible given the erratic schedules we've both had. So if we missed you, we really are sorry. One of the things about living away for months of time is how important family and friends are and how much they are missed. And that is even in the face of making new friends.

One thing I'm looking forward to is that we're driving the pick-up to Alaska and planning to take about 10-11 days to do this. We'll get to see a few things on the way and knock off a Bucket List item or two. Actually Alaska IS one of my bucket item lists. We'd like to have geocached in each of the 50 states and we look forward to adding 1 new state and 2 Canadian provinces for that. And I'll get to see General Sherman. You'll have to google that. I can't make it all easy for you with every detail! And if you don't know what geocaching is, then you don't know us very well and you should check out geocaching.com.

So if you know of a friend or family member who might be interested in this self-absorbed recounting of our summer 2010 in Skagway, please pass on the link.