What a life .. what an adventure. Wish I could do the same or something similar.

I think it's the fantasy of having no bills to pay, no mortgage, no deadlines. Nothing but the wind in your hair.

Hair. Yeh, I remember hair in much the same way I remember thinking it might be fun to ride the rails. I decided to follow the Grateful Dead around for awhile, bumming around Europe and the Middle East, ski bumming, etc. - I think that was my generation's version of a similar desire to get away from it all. Before we had anything to get away from. At this point I'll happily take the bills and mortgage - actually we already finished paying off the mortgage. And occasionally the wind freezing my increasingly bald head...;)

-Ray
 
I think it's the fantasy of having no bills to pay, no mortgage, no deadlines. Nothing but the wind in your hair.

Not being able to pay for food, medical, or a warm sleeping bag. And in that wind, there is rain, sleet, and snow. Cops busting you, people shunning you. And if you don't get killed, what do you do as you age? I do not think being homeless is a romantic lifestyle, even if you ride trains.
 
I was thinking of the photographer himself, and the very unique photographic opportunities he had while on the road (tracks).

For me, I've always wanted to travel the world with my camera but I can't for a variety of reasons. It's a fantasy of mine to be able to just take off for a month somewhere, just my backpack and my camera.

A friend of mine took off on a backpacking holiday to Asia for a few months.... and didn't come back for ten years. She travelled all over Asia and Europe, when one leg was over, she'd get an easy job somewhere, work for a while, save up a bit of cash and then take off on the next leg wherever she felt like going.
 
Well, I have certainly traveled out of a backpack for months on end. Like most things, its perception and its realities are very different. And then to add photography on the top of it, makes it very hard--I don't many that can do that. And if the purpose is photography, you cannot let it all hang out, not unless you actually want to get some photography done.

Still, if the adventure beckons and you find yourself at the start of the trail with your pack on, then go. The details tend to work themselves out, one way or another.
 
Perhaps I'm weird. Never wanted to get away from it all... it's wherever you are, you have to take yourself with you. These kids are escaping into something horrible. Brodie was lucky he had choices. Those kids he photographed don't seem to. I loved the one where a few were sleeping on the ground, dirty, and it looked pretty wet, too. That's their reality. Poor kids. Who would choose to continue living like that if they didnt have to...
 
Perhaps I'm weird. Never wanted to get away from it all... it's wherever you are, you have to take yourself with you. These kids are escaping into something horrible. Brodie was lucky he had choices. Those kids he photographed don't seem to. I loved the one where a few were sleeping on the ground, dirty, and it looked pretty wet, too. That's their reality. Poor kids. Who would choose to continue living like that if they didnt have to...

Yes, some of those kids look like they were in trouble, less following an adventurous dream than running from something.

I lived in a primitive house in the country for 5 years -- solar panel, water transported in, composting toilet, wood stove heat (you spend the whole year gathering and cutting fuel). A lot of work, so not really an escape, especially when I had to drive to the city for work. Then and now, when I wanted to escape, I shut out the light and called it a day. But now when I wake up, I just turn the thermostat up for heat.
 
Well.. if I ever had the time and money (I mean big money), I would hire a couple of ex-special forces to train me up for a couple of months. Then I'd take my team and join the para-military anti-poaching patrol in Africa to hunt down the poachers there. It's horrific what the poachers do to the animals there. We'd have to be prepared to live in the wild for a few months to surveil, monitor, and hunt.
 
ohhhh I just realised I should explain something. I studied documentary filmmaking as a post graduate degree so I have this frame of mind where I would be prepared to go into difficult places or difficult situations, or just very unusual fish-out-of-water circumstances to film a documentary.

Amin and BB know exactly what I'm talking about.
 
I definitely feel where you're coming from, James... from a practical point of view I'd say your big money would be better spent equipping the current anti-poaching patrols, who are often severely outgunned by the poachers.

On a somewhat related note, as soon as I manage to stop spending (wasting?) my time on SC.com and finish my thesis, I'm gonna make that pack-up-and-see-the-world dream come true and go on a backpacking trip in africa that won't stop until I run out of moneyz or enthusiasm :) Looking forward to it very much! Now I'll stop dreaming about it and work on my thesis a bit more :dash2:
 
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