Your doing what!? And what!? All while doing what!? AND ON A BIKE!!?

I have already been asked, so I might as well share, just how I am going to take online classes when I am camping with no power or internet? Well, when I don’t have to work a shift I can work for a few hours on school stuff, or stay after evening swim lessons.

Here is what a full day looks like for me, at least last year. I wake up about 8:15, grab breakfast and head to the pool to make sure its ready. Teach from 9-11 am. Lifeguard either at the beach from 11:30-5:30 or at the pool from 11-1 then beach from 3:30-5:30. Evening swim lessons go from 5-7, then the closing shift at the pool from 7-9. Any time I don’t have to lifeguard I can use the school’s internet to go online. If I don’t have to do the evening shift then I can grab a little dinner and work as late as I want. Then its a 18 mile bike ride mostly downhill back to the campsite.

Yea, I know, 18 miles to work and another 18 back is a lot...here in Iowa, add another 4 miles to each and your traveling an entire county twice a day. Back when the US government was restricting where Native Americans lived, the land given to the natives was land that no one else wanted. In the case of the Bad River Reservation, which is where I will be camping, its mostly swamp land. The nice thing about swamp land is it is relatively flat. Between the campsite and the beach I guard at (16 miles difference) the overall elevation climb is only about 10 feet. Assuming no headwind, I can do that in just a little over an hour.

The bad part is going from the beach to the pool. Northland College sits just over 100 feet above the lake, and only a mile away. About a mile of this trip, no matter which method I take, either the highway or the corridor, is fairly flat. It is the other mile is the 100 foot climb. I already know I can go from the beach to the pool in about 20 minutes, so I am not too worried.

I will have my car and bike rack up there too, so if I need to I can take my car to and from work, but that costs money. Good thing I have a third option...the BART bus. Six times a day a bus will stop in Odanah, about 3 miles from the camp site, and can take me to Walmart, the beach, and the pool. Each bart bus has a bike rack, and a ride costs between 25 and 50 cents...well for you. For me and as a student of Northland College last semester, and still carrying my ID card, I, like all Northland students, have paid for unlimited access to the BART system. Just meet the bus in Odanah just before 7, and be at County Market by 7:30. A quick bike ride or walk just 6 block and I am on campus with an hour to work on school work before lessons.

From the guy with his eye on the sky, Travis...the camping lifeguard