This winter my dreams of living in a cabin in the woods full time came true! Home is now a 200 sq. ft cabin past the roads’ end where cell reception goes to die. I have no running water, bathroom, or conventional heating.

I wouldn’t trade my lifestyle for the whole wide world BUT it does come with some not-so-glamorous realities. In my opinion, these realities make the adventure richer but I’ll let you be the judge, beginning with the least glamorous of them all:

Don’t Expect Modern Plumbing
This was the toughest reality for me to live with. I’m quite fond of being able to use a heated ladies room with a flushing toilet. I’m also a sucker for a nice hot bath.

So this setup took a little bit of getting used to. At midnight, when nature calls and it’s ten below outside there’s no option besides bundle up, grab the headlamp, and head for a tree or the outhouse up the hill.

I haven’t had the stomach flu or anything yet (please dear god someone knock on wood) but I can imagine the outhouse won’t be quite as accommodating as a modern bathroom would be in a situation like that.

You get the picture! As rough as I make it sound, it really isn’t all that terrible. I don’t know what the view from your porcelain throne is like but I’ve got a forest of pine trees and snow.

Keeping Your Cabin Warm Takes Planning and Effort
Luckily, my cabin is very small so it’s easier to heat than my dad’s cabin. It’s very common for him to wake up to 40-degree temps inside if he doesn’t keep the fire going all night.

I have a small baseboard heater that keeps my cabin, the Pepper Shack, comfortable until the temps dip into the single digits. Below ten degrees, I like to keep a fire going in my wood stove during the night. Come January that little stove will be inhaling firewood!

Keeping the cabin warm while we’re there is only half the battle; it’s when we’re away that it gets dicey. The last thing you want is everything in your home to freeze up!

In January and February, when temps commonly reach negative ten or twenty, we won’t be able to leave the cabin unattended overnight.

If you do the math, that is A LOT of firewood! That’s where the planning comes in. The last thing we want is to be hauling, splitting, and stacking firewood in negative twenty-degree weather so it’s important to get our firewood stocked up well in advance and pray to the winter gods we calculated correctly.

Check back with me in February to see how we did!

Isolation and Cabin Fever
If I step outside my door, there’s a very slim chance I will bump into another person. I could meander the river and roads all day and might not see another soul. It’s easy to find solitude but like everything else in life, there’s a balance.

You can’t stay in the cabin seven days a week with your cat, you’ll go nuts.

If you spend too much time isolated, away from other people you will become what author, Sigurd Olson, calls a perimeter man (or woman) – a person who refuses to “live in towns and cities and is always found far from their own kind.”

Unless we can derive some peace or meaning from this outdoor experience to share with others, the purpose is defeated. You risk losing warmth, humanity, and your ability to communicate.

So for that reason, we visit town weekly.

Getting to Town Isn’t Convenient
As I said, my dad and I visit town at least once a week but that isn’t as easy as hopping in the car.

I can’t just go grab a bite to eat, run back to town because I forgot something on the grocery list, head to the gym for a workout, pick up a latte because I have a craving, peruse the aisles of Target for crap I don’t need, or anything else normal 26-year-old girls do.

For one, there is no Target in town (tragic) and two, getting to civilization doesn’t mean starting the car remotely and driving for ten minutes.

Here’s the process for getting to town:
1. Bundle up! Snow pants, boots, buff, three coats, and mittens.
2. Uncover and fire up the snowmobile. Hook up the pull behind sled to the hitch if it’s grocery/laundry day.
3. Drive ten minutes to the parking lot across the river and park the snowmobile.
4. Scrape the ice off the vehicle.
5. Drive 55 miles to town on the two-lane Gunflint Trail where there is no cell reception.

If the ice isn’t thick enough for the snowmobile, I pull my groceries/laundry across the river using a plastic sled with a rope tied around my waist like a sled dog.

I smile thinking about it because that little trek is always an adventure! The snowmobile ride lets you know you’re alive and the rural Gunflint Trail always holds surprises around each bend.

You Are Often at the Mercy of Mother Nature
This is a good lesson in expectation management.

“Oh, you wanted to go to town today? No…It’s October and the river is going to freeze half way this morning so you’re going to stay put.”

Mother Nature runs on her own schedule here and we are simply bearing witness. “Freeze Up” and “Break Up” during fall and spring respectively are the trickiest times. Since we don’t have a road leading to our property, we rely on a clear and safe passage over the river to get to the car, something we don’t always get.

When Something Breaks…You Have to Fix It

Something is always in need of maintenance. Luckily, my dad is a retired shop teacher who knows how to fix/build/macgyver/juryrig just about anything.

However, if there was something that requires a professional to come help…well, you just read the bit about the car and the snowmobile. It’s not as easy as sending Charter over to fix the internet.

So there you have it, the challenges of remote living. For some people, the threat of wildlife might be a concern they’d add to my list. We do have a healthy wolf population but I’m more frightened of the healthy wolf spider population, those suckers are just as hairy!

In all seriousness, I know there a plenty of people who love the romanticized idea of a cabin in the woods. I love that notion as much as the next guy. Most days I live that dream but most days I also crap in the woods so there’s a balance. Hopefully, I’ve shed some light on the topic for you.