Most of the adventure is deprived of comforts. For this entire month, only one night has been in comfort, spent doing laundry in a hotel to avoid the 100 degree evening heat. Every other night has been spent on the side of the road somewhere. It’s been quite hot lately. It’s been 4 weeks in the desert with occasional unseasonable highs, and only a few drops of water have been seen falling from the sky. Food is basic yet nutritious, variety may not be the spice but for those that worry, don’t think we’re eating cardboard.

A lot of our basic and common luxuries are stripped. “Living on the edge” for us is drinking tea at night. While it hits the spot and tastes so good, we risk needing to get up in the middle of the night – not necessarily an easy task sleeping in a van. All the things that should be easy to do in life aren’t easy at all. I count how many of liters of water I have remaining when doing the dishes, carefully using as little as possible – all trash must be carried with us, and here in the desert, water is miles and miles away – and we’ve been needing to drink over 1 gallon per day per person.

But this deprivation isn’t without cause. It allows us to experience things in places we’d otherwise not be able to. Most of the time, we’re quite careful with money. There have been many places we’ve skipped solely because it cost additional money. But then there’s time when I don’t care the cost, we need luxury. Our luxury we splurge for isn’t the Hilton, it’s not even a hot meal at a restaurant (cheap or expensive), it’s adventures we seek. Whitewater on the Colorado, Helicopter rides in the Grand Canyon, and boating in Glen Canyon National Recreational Area. Our luxury and splurges come in the shapes of adventures, experiencing things we’ve never – or at least very rarely – have experienced before, things we would otherwise be unable to experience.

The costs aren’t always cheap with sometimes steep “location” price hikes, but that that is why we will consider swimming in a river a shower and to save $2. These splurges don’t come frequently and often the splurges are picked carefully. These splurges provide access to otherwise unattainable adventures that we badly seek and are well worth our day-to-day deprivations of comfort. After all, that’s why we are here.

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