Blake Rowe Music

For the second time, the Northwest Nomads gathering in Fort Rock, OR was a wonderful experience. It's hard to believe I'm well into the second year of living on the road. Last year, I was only three months into the journey, and just beginning to settle into the role of solo traveler. Meeting fellow nomads, learning about other gatherings, getting tips for staying connected, it was all so new and informative. I jumped in to the community like a kid on the first day of school. This year, I felt, well…

After Sharon died in March 2024, grief showed up for me as hyper-functionality. Aside from all the estate paperwork, I was internally frantically dedicated to not falling apart. Saying, “Yes to Life!” Was my mantra. I vowed to keep going as normally as possible, not running from grief but feeling it, processing it, sharing about it. I had to convince myself I wasn’t betraying my love for Sharon when I allowed myself to laugh with friends. I did therapy, went to a grief group, journaled, anything and…

The Road to Joy is not without its detours. 

My son Julian has decided to estrange himself from me as well as his entire family. This has been a long time coming. I’ve spent the last two years trying to understand his and his partner’s judgement against us, and my incomprehension only further inflamed the tension. The best I can do is this; Anyone who at this point is not declaring that the State of Israel must cease to exist is a Zionist, and anyone who accepts such a person is therefore complicit of…

Whew! They weren't kidding when they called this trip “Ultimate”. I left the van at Donna Rae and Don's place and flew to Fairbanks, barely catching my connection in Anchorage. This 67 year old can still sprint! Thankfully I had no bags to check and my carry-on was only 16lbs. Laura, our guide, took me to the hotel where we all met and had our orientation for the trip. There were only 12 of us, mostly retirees. This was not going to be strenuous travel. In fact, over and over I felt pampered wherever we…

OMFG. Now that it's over it feels like I was in a dream world for the last few days, a vast ecosystem of interdependent wilderness, with brown bears (aka grizzlies) at the center of it all. We were neutral observers, not contributing or taking away from this environment. The bears here in Lake Clark National Park have never been hunted, nor habituated to people as a possible source of food. Our guide, Shawn, modeled how to move amongst them without entering their ORD (overt reactionary distance). We were no…

I passed a milestone yesterday, the 36,000 mile end of warranty on Joy. I bought it at 9,000, so, easy math. You can't go on an epic road trip and not spend a lot of time driving. Other milestones; The Alcan Highway was 1500, then the Purple Heart Trail from Fairbanks to Homer was 900. (Today, August 7 is Purple Heart Day, dedicated to those in the military wounded or killed in action. I play MapTap every day, and learned this: WWII was over in Europe but not in the Pacific. The U.S. was planning an…

Vanstock.org is the brainchild of one person, Lindra. This was the second year, and I was very impressed with the organization and attention to detail. You know there was a ton of work put in; find the musicians, rent the toilets, erect the tents, etc, but because it was all done so well, it seemed like it happened all by itself. The bands were top notch. Check out Ira Wolf, Tim Easton, Power Play, The Dirty Turkeys. Ira Wolf sang a song, “Second Act”, that was basically my story. I told her later she wrote…

I met Christy and April at the X-Scapers Bash in Lake Havasu last January. Christy and I discovered we both planned to drive to Alaska, so on July 3rd we met in Dawson Creek, the official starting point of the 1387 mile route. April joined us as well, and we had a little van caravan. It was an interesting experiment for three very solo, independent travelers to travel together. I think we found a good balance between accommodating each other and doing our own thing. It was good to be on the road together…

Leaving Glacier National Park, I drove into B.C. and spent a day with my friend Ed, with whom I had reconnected last August in Colorado after almost 60 years. He's the one who found the movie we made with Coronet Films, Getting Ready For School. Here it is again in case you missed it in the post “LARPING and Being With Family.”

While I'm sharing old movies, here's the other one, Your Wonderful Body; How it Grows. I found this one on eBay and had the tape digitized, but edited out titles and the science…

The way the story goes, and I've told it lots of times, is that I was sitting in my chair in the living room, having my coffee and thinking, and Eva came downstairs. It was a few months after Sharon had died, and she hadn't yet returned to New Zealand. I said, “Eva, I think I have my two year plan." She said, “OK, let's hear it." I said, “The first year, I'm just going to cope. Lean on my friends. Not change anything. But the second year, I'm going to go on an epic road trip."

I needed something I could be…