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Jim's Story...
 I
was born in
South Jersey as the oldest child of a military family. I spent most
of my younger years traveling throughout the USA and Panama,
constantly meeting new people and making new friends. These
experiences gave to me a love of travel and meeting new people that
I still enjoy to this day.
M arrying
at 18, the next 11 years were devoted to raising my children, which
left me little time to pursue my love of nature. Finding myself
single at the age of 29, I became very active in canoeing, hiking,
mountain biking and camping of all sorts, including tents,
motorhomes and pickup truck campers. I have taught whitewater and
flatwater canoeing and belong to a local paddling, hiking and biking
club. Have worked most of my life as a machine repairman or some
other type of manual laborer. Had my own small construction company
for a while in the ‘70s and have built both of the homes I have
lived in.
Being
in my 50s and having been retired for four years already, I was
living alone on six acres of wooded property with my own garden and
fruit orchard and living the good old “back to basics” lifestyle.
You know the type... I heat and cook with a wood stove, cut wood off
my own property, eat a very natural type of diet and try to keep my
life as simple as possible... the low stress, one-day-at-a-time sort
of life. Deciding I would like to have someone to share my life and
lifestyle, I took to the internet ...
Elaine's Story...
B orn
on an island in the Chesapeake Bay as the oldest child of a
waterman, I spent my early years living very close to nature and
being very aware of the surrounding environment. My father instilled
in me a love of nature and taught me to be thankful for everything
natural that God has bestowed upon this earth... even the unpleasant
things such as inclement weather. Being somewhat isolated on the
island, I always dreamt of someday traveling and seeing the world.
Marrying
at 18, I moved to the city and a new lifestyle which I thought would
expand my world. I didn’t look back until years later after my
children were raised. Being in my 50s and finding myself single, I
took some time to reflect on which direction I wanted my life to
take. I began to yearn for the feelings of being free and close to
nature that I had once had in my youth on the island.
Having
developed a career in computers over the years, it seemed only
natural to look to the internet for a like-minded companion who
would be willing to share this “back to nature” style of living...
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Our Story...
...AND
THEN... one day in the fall of ‘98 while surfing the
net... Jim ran across a personal ad from Elaine on
match.com ... of course, she wasn’t using her real name.
He enjoyed her way of writing and thought that we may
have some things in common, so Jim answered her ad.
After many e-mail messages for a week or so, along with
some very lengthy long distance telephone calls, we
decided it would be cheaper to meet in person, even
though we had not exchanged photos, our conversations up
to now led us to feel very comfortable with each other.
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Overcoming the initial awkwardness of seeing each other for the
first time and after regaining the ability to speak, we decided our
appraisals of each other were positive and warranted getting to know
each other better. This meeting went very well and led to many happy
shared experiences, many of which were new to Elaine, including
whitewater canoeing and mountain biking. The more time we spent
together, the more we found we had in common and the more we wanted
to be together. We’re both just big kids at heart with a great sense
of humor and feel fortunate to have found another big kid our own
age.
F rom
the time we met and for the next 3½ years, we enjoyed many things
together, including canoeing, biking, hiking and many short RV trips
around the country, limited only by Elaine's work schedule. We both
wanted to be able to do some extended traveling and had been
contemplating a trip to Alaska for over a year. Finally we decided to
go for it! In order to do this, Elaine would have to retire...
so on May 4th of 2002 we were married... Elaine gave her retirement notice...
and Jim started packing the camper. On June 2nd we left for an
extended RV trip/honeymoon through western Canada and Alaska that
lasted for 105 days.
We
both love traveling and especially love the mountains. After
several trips out west over the past 8 years, in
2006 we finally found
a beautiful piece of property in the mountains of southern Colorado.
We cleared the deadwood from the property in 2007 and then returned
in 2008 to install a septic system and drill a well... we hope to
start building a log cabin on the
property in 2009... and the story
continues ...
Send E-mail
to Jim and Elaine
canoer at comcast dot net
11/13/2008 |
RV Adventures
Across America