When Going The Wrong Way Is The Entire Point

Everything will work again if you unplug it for a while. Including YOU.

My 52nd birthday is this weekend and I’ve decided to gift myself with a repost. I published this story last year when I only had 27 subscribers on my list. Today this went out to 3,453.

Republishing this has given me a week off from thinking and it’s giving 3426 of you a fresh, new adventure to embark on. So here we go!

I’ve never understood when people post a Facebook selfie with a caption like, “So…this is 50.”

Insert 30, 40, or 60 if you like, but I’ve always wondered what kind of responses or validation stamps they’re expecting.

Since when does a birthday selfie or any selfie require approval from the internet? Selfies in general are just weird. We already know what you looked like at 39. Trust me, it doesn’t change the morning you turn 40.

In the true spirit of searching for Wildhood, you know what’s really wild? Going missing on your birthday. Signing off the mind-numbing internet and finding yourself in a place where the word ‘approval’ doesn’t exist.

On my 50th birthday, I staged a photo shoot all by myself in front of nobody but my dog and a tripod. I was in the middle of the woods in the Canadian Rockies with no internet service, no phone signal, and no notion of who I could share my personal moment with.

The photo shoot ended up producing one of the most delightful pictures I’ve ever taken of myself and to this day, it has never seen the light of social media.

Talk about bathtub goals, right?

Congratulations on being one of the very first humans to witness this old broad marinating in a vat full of Lush bubbles. 😂

Two years later, the temps are almost as cold as this day. I need this tub again!

I’d seen at least a hundred versions of this photo on Instagram and so, I booked the same cabin specifically for the bathtub. I had already planned my escape to this spot so why not choose the cabin with the best tub?

I didn’t know at the time of booking but the days I had planned to spend there turned out to be the coldest week of 2022. Temperatures hovered in the -25 to -30 range for my entire stay.

Elsa was not playing around that week. ❄❄

I guess that’s what you get when you're Canadian and your birthday falls on November 30th.

If any of my old social followers from my former life as a Jamaica destination writer had known where I spent my 50th, surely they’d have thought this journey came straight out of a movie called, “You’re Going the Wrong Way, Lady!”

They may have wondered if I was experiencing a massive identity crisis. After all, I’ve spent at least ten birthdays in the Caribbean and every single one of them was broadcasted online.

Back to the woods…

This cluster of cabins at Baker Creek calls itself a resort. Bougie people might call it a last resort. Out here they actually boast about the fact that there’s no internet or phone service.

That’s their whole point. Disconnecting.

The funny thing is, they charge more than most Caribbean resorts I’ve ever reviewed…and believe me, I’ve reviewed some doozies.

It’ll cost you upwards of a thousand dollars per night to run away from your life out here. If not for all the online shopping points my mother and I had accumulated during the pandemic, I could have never paid to stay here. Thankfully, our points got me a free stay.

I had no intention of digitally entertaining myself on this trip but monitoring the weather forecast as my travel dates approached, I thought it best to download a few Netflix movies. Streaming on the fly would not be an option, and with soul-crushing temperatures, neither would going outside.

Surprisingly, my dog Dezi and I spent way more time outdoors than I thought we would. We’re Canadian…we should know how to do this.

We executed our frigid outings in short bursts because even though I had rugged winter boots, Dezi didn’t. Sure, she might behave like she’s part wolverine but no domestic dog’s feet can withstand more than about fifteen minutes of knee-deep snow at -30 degrees.

She LOVES winter though. She was born for it. I don’t know what breeds she’s mixed with but I’m certain there are traces of snow leopard in her genes. I got so much joy out of opening our cabin door each morning and watching her unleash her inner mad dog in pristine, white mounds of sugar-coated terrain.

Immediately following her Zoomie time was my coffee time.

Can someone please tell me what makes coffee taste richer, bolder, and so much more caffeinated in the wild? The coffee bag in my cabin was labelled Devil’s Head and I can assure you it was all devil. There were no angels in my mug.

What the hell does one do in a place like this?

You might wonder what a person does out here alone, with no internet, no TV, and weather too cold to fully enjoy outdoor activities.

For starters, you revel in the fact that there’s a bathtub big enough to kayak in. And of course, since you came solely for the tub it’s only logical that you brought every smelly bath bomb you own.

Next, you eat like a queen without having to cook because you toted enough fully prepared takeout for four days. There are no butlers and no room service in the wild and I refuse to cook on retreats. (Who are we kidding? I refuse to cook in civilization, too.)

You might bundle up at night and go outside to watch 8 trillion stars in the darkest sky you’ve ever seen. That’s roughly 7.999 trillion more than you’d see from your balcony in the city.

It is positively stunning how black the wilderness is at night.

You definitely take advantage of the free firewood and brave a couple of evenings beside an outdoor fire pit. Somehow, -25C doesn’t feel like such a death trap when you’re snuggled up beside a campfire with your dog intently gnawing on sticks beside you.

My professional wood whittler. Talk about icicle beards!

When you’re out there in Siberia and manage to build a raging fire all by yourself, you feel a genuine sense of triumph. Sort of like being on those reality survival shows in the wilderness, except I didn’t have to kill any rabbits for dinner and I could have hot cocoa next to my indoor fireplace later.

Once my fire was fully ablaze I felt like I owed it to the fire gods to sit out there as long as possible, enjoying the gift nature had given me. So, I popped off my boots, put my stocking feet up on the rim of the pit, and let the flames live out their destiny of keeping a grateful human toasty warm until darkness set in.

I’m not sure what I expected in the way of fellow wild ones at this property in late November. There are 19 cabins and surprisingly, I met a total of zero winter warlords during my stay. Either the rest of the world got the memo about the forecast or nobody else was dumb enough to come play outside with me.

Regardless, I did manage to accomplish early bedtimes and late, lingering mornings. At this time of year, the sun sets around 4:30 and doesn’t rise again until 8:30. I finally understood perfectly why bears hibernate.

Each day, I leashed up Dezi several times for walkies through the maze of pathways around the tiny cabin community. At night, I could peep through the lit windows of the other cabins.

Some were laid out differently than mine. Some had ladders ascending to their lofts, mine had a log staircase. Some didn’t have lofts at all…just main-floor little bachelor pads, perfectly suited for one person.

I spent a lot of time wondering what it would be like to live out there and wishing communities like this actually existed.

Somebody needs to plan and build small, year-round hubs like this, precisely for antisocial people with dogs. We could all be reclusive in winter and come together in summer to plant community gardens. We’d live off the land as much as possible and let our dogs run wild and free.

Nobody would ever get fat because we’d have actual physical work to do. I’d volunteer to be the woodchopper since I’m not a fan of gardening. And I’d be lauded for my community contribution each night when we congregate around the bonfire.

Our bodies would earn and burn the food we eat.

We would only turn on the internet in the evenings (you know, for blogging and newslettering).

And the person with the biggest truck would hit up Costco in the city once a week for the good of the community. We’d need toilet paper.

Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a while…including YOU.

The truth about this little heaven on Earth is that it’s only a 90-minute drive from where I live and yes, I do consider myself fortunate to live so near to the Rockies. It’s sort of magical knowing that I can leave home right now and be there by lunchtime if I want to.

During the pandemic, I adopted my mutt and then made the silent commitment to trade in air travel for road-tripping. So far, Canada has not let me down and I’ve barely even left my province yet. If I can find places like this in my own backyard, imagine what I’ll find when I really leave home on four wheels.

**Considers taking out a mortgage on an RV**🌲🌲

Here’s a little slideshow I put together of just how perfect and lovely this getaway was.

Have you ever intentionally gone away to disconnect from civilization?

Did you miss anything from the old world?