So the title of this site is “Nick’s Excellent Camping and Backpacking Adventures.”

But there haven’t been many adventures to write about in the past year, and zero since Joyce broke her ankle last September.

That is about to change.

Retirement

Luckily, or actually by plan, I didn’t work for decades with the goal to do a lot of fun things after I retired. I did all the fun things I wanted to do while I was working. This is the only suitable plan for living a good life, because we don’t know when our time on earth will end.

One result of living a good life while working is we put off many house repairs and remodeling. Instead, we save our money for the house and spent up to 100 days a year camping. Add in all my backpacking trips, there wasn’t time or motivation to complete the house plan.

This worked out well, because once I retired I had plenty of time to work on the house, and I was able to do most of the work myself — saving a ton of money. Once all of this was done, it was time to get back into a life of adventures. Camping adventures as a couple and my, mostly solo, backpacking trips. Then COVID hit.

COVID

Who would have thought something like this would happen, other than  movie producers.

But here we were.

I have written about how it has impacted us, and not making light of all those who have suffered greatly, it really has just been a minor inconvenience for Joyce and me. We did cut back on camping and my backpacking trips were reduced. We were, and have been, just fine during the pandemic. We have gotten our vaccines too.

The Big Adventure Hinderance

Last September Joyce broke her ankle during a camping trip. This occurred during the first week of a planned multi-week, or even a multi-month, adventure. It was an accident. Accidents often destroy plans or even worse.

Joyce is healing. It has been 6 months since her surgery and she is almost done with physical therapy. So we are getting reading for some awesome camping trips. We’ll probably do a couple shake-down trips in April. At least that is the plan.

What COVID has taught us is plans can be disrupted or even destroyed.

Kitchen Passes and Backpacking

One great thing about Joyce is she never complains when I go backpacking and she is left home alone. Years ago I wrote about this in My Wife Won’t “Let” Me Go Backpacking. This isn’t really a husband vs. wife thing. It happens to couples whether they are married or single, and it isn’t gender-based either. Often one partner discourages the other from backpacking.

When I go backpacking I always check with Joyce, mostly to make sure we don’t have something else scheduled for the dates of my proposed trip. If nothing is planned, she never objects to my trips. I call this a “Kitchen Pass.”

Not that she is tied to the kitchen, but rather she has banned me from the kitchen. Seems she was unhappy when I was caught curing freshly painted motorcycle parts in her oven.

I Miss Backpacking

So why haven’t I done any backpacking trips during the past 6 months?

Since Joyce hasn’t completely recovered (her recovery is going well), I think it is unfair for me to just take off while she still isn’t 100% back to normal. This is what happy couples do; they are supportive of each other. She wouldn’t complain or really wouldn’t mind if I took off for a backpacking trip, but it would bother me.

It is all good. I am able to keep busy and be content with life.

So maybe next month I’ll be writing about our camping adventures again, and perhaps even a backpacking trip or two.