Home. As the days shorten and the temperatures drop, home is where we all want to be. But for a trio of dreamers and gypsies, home is a space that doesn’t stand still. Home follows the snow. Storm by storm, chasing memories made one powder turn at a time, home is a 112-square foot Victorian cabin on wheels. Home is the Outdoor Research Tiny House.
Two winters ago my partner Zack Giffin, our buddy Neil Provo and I joined the Tiny House movement. We built a miniature cabin on a trailer in Colorado, hitched it to a funky old diesel truck, and set out to chase winter. Two full seasons have passed living in our rolling house. We’ve been everywhere from Silverton to Roger’s Pass, tapping into local scenes and killer lines. We have a blossoming bouquet of new ski friends, and we’ve even started a tiny house band – one melodeon following two guitarists. Last December we were snowed in at Mt. Baker, Washington, and had to gift a friendly snowplow driver beer in exchange for spending his afternoon digging “Tiny” out. We’ve had the truck catch on fire, skied from the Whitewater parking lot in the moonlight at 3 a.m., and hosted cozy parties for over 20 new friends in a space hardly big enough for three.
Livin’ tiny has been an exercise in downsizing everything tangible in our lives in order to magnify the experiences.
We’ll never forget the way the mountains looked as we stared out the teensy windows every morning, how piles of gear avalanched from every nook and cranny of the house, how much patience was needed to stoke the wood-burning stove after charging non-stop on a day that started under the moonlight and ended the same way.
In these two years on the road with Tiny, we’ve found home everywhere we’ve been. Each day we look out our petite front door, a new snow-covered mountain in our new backyard, and we think, “Today, home is here. This must be the place.”
Here’s wishing you your own season of adventures in the mountains we all call home. Via a tiny house, a friend’s cabin, a tent or even your climbing skins, incredible experiences are waiting out there, ready to come to life, ready to inspire you for the rest of your years.
Look for us. We’ll see you out there.
Happy Holidays, and Happy Winter from the Tiny House Crew!