Things I've learn by living off the grid

 The most important thing I've learn about living off the grid is to be prepared! After we bought our property, Pa started going to garage sales and buying every nut, bolt, screw, nail and tool he could find. Living 25 miles from the little burg of Saint Johns, it would be a great inconvenience to have togo  50 miles round trip to buy one bolt or screw. Plus it pays to have 2 of each tool you use so you don't have to stop in the middle of a project to run 170 mile round trip to Show Low to replace that drill, saw or what ever.

 The second thing I've learned is your life revolves around the sun. Why? Because it charges your batteries via your solar panels. I run the big appliances like the washing machine or dishwasher when the sun is shining and after 9 am so the batteries have had a chance to charge. We usually charge up our phones when the sun is shining also. I rarely use the dryer because even on the coldest day, your clothes will get dry with the sun shining. On cloudy days, we run our 7 kw generator for a couple hours in the morning to charge the batteries for most of the day and then again at night to carry us over thru the night. It run on gas. We also have a 17 kw Generac propane generator than can run the entire house if need be. We never use it so it is practically new. Pa just used it to weld something. We are going to sell it so if you know of any one who needs one, let us know. $3000.00. We are going to replace it with one that starts automatically when the battery power

 runs low. Otherwise our 12 solar panels and 8 batteries run everything including 2 tv's, 2 computers, washer, dish washer, fridge and freezer. That brings up the subject of being sure you buy the most energy savings appliances you can find. You don't need a kizillion solar panels and batteries to run your house. We know of people who've spent $30,000 and $50,000 on their set up and don't get near the out put we do on our smaller set up.

You need a good wood stove. Ours is made by England  Stove Works and heats up our whole 2020 square foot house. We do have a furnace, propane, but it isn't hooked up cause we don't need it. We just discovered last year that we don't even have dual pane windows! I hope to replace those one at a time maybe next year. ( We bought a floor model)Our outer walls are 6 inches thick and the house has what is called a winter package which includes thick walls and the properly pitched roof. If you are going to buy a manufactured home, buy one close to where you live. We bought ours in Kingman, AZ and they had to haul it all the way across the state. When I saw it I almost fainted, knowing it would never look like a real house ever again. Cracks everywhere! The sales office didn't know anyone in this area so used his own people to travel from all over 3 states to put everything back together. The carpet guy was a disaster so someone else had to come and redo a lot of his work...at the expense of the sales office.

 Another thing: You have to be able to make it thru life without other people around. Our nearest neighbor lives 2 1/2 miles away and we see him once a month or so. I am never lonely out here. We have 3 sets of friends here that we know would drop everything and rush over if we had an emergency. Well, maybe 2 since Tom never has his phone on! It is a rare occasion for someone to drive down our road unless they are coming to visit.

 Money: Every thing costs more here than in a big city. Want the internet? $100.00 a month on satellite which is the only thing available here . We get 15 gigs a month and always run out before the internet resets. You can't stream live videos, listen to the radio on your computer, watch TV programs or watch craft shows on YouTube. Cell phone? $100.00 a month. I've got Tom on our account and my mom also but mom never uses hers and Tom seldom does. As for Pa? He uses it more than anyone. He usually uses 5 times the minutes I use. Groceries? EXPENSIVE!!!! We were used to the 99 cent only store, Mexican grocery store and Costco when we lived in Vegas. Our choices here are Safeway...expensive! Basha's ( in Springerville...120 mile round trip) or Walmart and Safeway in Show Low (170 mile round trip) We do have a very small IGA store in St. Johns but they are too expensive, out of date stuff and the dogs won't even eat their meat. The nearest Costco is in Phoenix or Albuquerque, NM. There is a Sam's Club in Flagstaff which is a 3 hour trip one way. We usually wait to see what is on sale at Basha's and then buy just the sales items and buy the rest at Walmart. We shop once a month for the most part. Wood for the stove is pretty pricey if you buy it already cut and split. Or you can buy a permit  go out  into the forest and haul out half burned logs. The log bit and the forest is for younger folks, not us older ones. Luckily Pa made friends with a guy in Reserve, NM that gives us a great, great deal on pine. He has his own saw mill. For around $80.00 we get enough wood to last the winter. We can also cut up the juniper that was pulled down when they put in the roads out here but it is full of sand and eats up your chain on the chain saw. One thing that is cheap here is car insurance since we live in a poor county. We went with Esurance which cut our bill in half.

Entertainment: What entertainment? Saint Johns is so dead, the grim reaper just looks and laughs. We stopped in once at the Senior Center to see if they offered sight seeing trips or movies or dances or any kind of entertainment. We thought we had entered a mausoleum! There were a few old folks that looked like they didn't have the energy to lift a fork. So all the Senior Center had to offer was lunch. Nearest movies? 170 mile round trip to Show Low. Eating out: We have one Mexican restaurant, one fast food Mexican restaurant , a tiny pizza place and a Subway sandwich shop. We do have 4 gas stations tho...for a population of 3500. There is only one chain restaurant in Show Low and that is Denny's. They do have McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell ect plus a few home owned places to eat. We usually eat at the Chinese buffet but after 4 years, it all tastes the same. We sure do wish Olive Garden, Outback, Golden Corral would come to Show Low! I hate to cook!
Hobbies: You definitely need a hobby living off the grid to keep you from getting lonely or bored. Unfortunately Pa has no inside hobbies so goes stir crazy when the weather is too cold, too snowy, too rainy. During the decent weather, he keeps busy piddling around in his shop, a 40 ft storage container. Most people out here think he is a workaholic cause he is always busy. He checks on other people's places out here to make sure no one has broken in and ransacked their place. We are fortunate that we got every thing done and in place within the first year we lived here so it's mostly maintenance which keeps him busy.
I have my craft room where I spend the majority of my day when I'm not cleaning house or something. And I love to read. I can honestly say I have never been bored or lonely during the past 4 years. And in the summer, I garden.
Speaking of gardens..... you have to have a way to collect rainwater living out here. We currently have 4000 gallons of rain water stored just for garden use. When it starts to get low, the monsoon season starts and that  fills the storage tanks back up. You have to accept the fact that you will be sharing your garden with birds, rabbits, mice and rats. Oh, and ground squirrels too. As soon as my grapes started to grow, the birds ate them all. We pretty much have the rabbits fenced out but they do get in once in a while. There is no way to fence the other critters out. Decorative flowers in the front of your house? Even tho we have each individual flower fenced off, the rabbits have learned to turn the cages over and eat the plants. I tried hanging pots off a lattice and the ground squirrels climbed across the window screen and chomped on the petunias. They sure were cute tho! We use water buckets to catch mice and rats. They fall in and drown. You'd think that after 4 years, they would be gone by now. Gardening is downright hard out here. You have to keep your plants under shade cloth most of the time because we are so close to the sun, they burn up pretty easy. You have to buy seeds or plants with a short growing season unless you have a green house which we don't.  Some times I don't think it is worth it. Last year was a waste of time, we got so little out of it.
Drinking Water: If you can't afford a well....expensive!... you have to haul water from town at 2 cents a gallon. We have a community well that is 11 miles from our house so we haul water from there. We have a 4500 gallon holding tank for water so big lesson here....DON'T WASTE WATER! We take short showers unless I'm washing my hair. It takes forever to rinse out conditioner. It also takes forever for the water to get from the water heater to the bathroom so I've been filling a bucket with cold water till the hot water hits the shower. I use it to water the dogs, inside plants and fill the bird bath. We use a front load washer that only takes 8 gallons of water as opposed to a top load that takes 40 gallons. Plus it really spins the clothes pretty dry so it doesn't take so long hanging on the line. Pa usually makes a water run twice a week to keep the big tank filled.
Water heater: Only buy an instant water heater living off the grid. It will save you big bucks on propane since it only runs when you want hot water.
Big lesson for me: Learn to live with dust, sand and ashes. We get a month long wind in the spring and when we first moved here, I was sweeping the kitchen floor 3 and 4 times a day. What a waste of time! In the spring , summer and fall you have to deal with dust and sand. In the winter you have to deal with ashes from cleaning out the wood stove. Just accept it and only dust when it gets an inch thick or you have company coming or you can no longer see the TV screen or computer screen.
Buy a good handgun! We have coyotes, wolves, bobcats, puma's , bulls, mad cows with calves and rattle snakes ( I've never seen a rattler here but Pa has) and an occasional badger. It is not safe to go for a walk unless you have a handy gun. A big dog would help also and I'm working on that. Pa is just a tad resistant to having another dog around but all our friends tells him he needs a large dog one to protect me if nothing else. Our Mini Schnauzers let us know when someone is coming but wouldn't be much protection if some one wanted to do us harm.With my Christmas money from last year, I bought myself a nice Ruger 38. Thing kicks like a son of a gun and dislocated my thumb when I was practicing with it. Might help if I held it right! Always carry a knife. They come in so handy in case you shoot something and want to take the skin home. Always carry your cell phone with you in case of an emergency.
Most people here have 4 wheeled drive. Since we don't absolutely have to go anywhere being retired and all, we've gotten by with 2 wheel drive. A pick up truck is a necessity. You never know when you will find something interesting along side the road you need to pick up and haul home. Plus you need one to haul water.
Enjoy Nature: Since setting up the bird bath, we get all sorts of birds. They are so much fun to watch. We get one kind or another all year long. My favorites are bluebirds, our local road runner and humming birds. We have some beautiful king/rat snakes out here. The coyotes are gorgeous! They have plenty to eat with the bunnies and such. I throw out my left overs and meat scraps and the coyotes snatch them up right away. Don't tell the local rancher I'm feeding them! Depending on the rain and what time it arrives, we get all sorts of beautiful wild flowers. We have close to 1000 juniper trees on our 40 acres and a few cedars so I get to see something green all year long. I got so tired of the brown of Vegas. We have breath taking sunsets. We love the monsoon season. There are all sorts of National Parks around us....I just wish I could get Pa to go. We have fishing and hunting , Pa put in for a hunting license but didn't get picked. Maybe next year?
So, all in all, living off the grid in the middle of nowhere is absolutely wonderful. We wouldn't have it any other way. I'm sure I've learned a lot more than this but this is all I could think of off the cuff.
Till next time!