Oh wow, thank you so much for adding Eustace Conway to my radar. I'll be researching him throughout the week. I have pets, but do not have livestock of my own, I've just cared for and worked with livestock throughout my life, but haven't saved up the funds to get my own.
I've access to horses if I want to buy, but it cost more money than I have to board a single horse and I haven't yet worked out where me and the horse would stay for free if I couldn't afford to board her in the city. In the beginning it's likely to be just a horse, and then overtime in my journey the livestock I have would accumulate. It's not something that I'd be thrown into all at once, rather something I'm planning for and slowly building up to, one at a time.
I hear out west is really perfect for this kind of thing and it's my goal to head out there. My plan is to stay where I am for a few years just to wrap up a lot of ends that need wrapping. Then I plan to do one of three things:
- Head West towards the Canadian border and travel between the Yukon and Montana and settle (squat) somewhere
- Head abroad to Ireland (EU), Ireland (UK) and travel between points (would just camp in various locations until time to move)
- Head abroad to Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Georgia Caucasus (Each of these places have traditional nomads still in existence who herd horses, reindeer or sheep, maybe if the stars align I can visit those places.)
I don't mind the question at all, and didn't find it negative! Negative to me is someone calling my goals a pipe dream and telling me I can't or shouldn't even try to do it, shutting my ideas down without offering solutions or explaining why they think it couldn't work or what a better alternative might be. You didn't do any of that, if anything your post actually excited me because I've been wanting to travel and live abroad and knowing for certain there is a horse drawn traveller community out there is encouraging to me.
You are right that the logistics are hard and it's something I've been trying to resolve for the last few years. There are a few different reasons why I want to travel this way and they are not very practical.
I've written and deleted the why a million times because it keeps coming out as a book and I'm embarrassed about that. I often feel stupid after writing these long posts, but here goes my attempt at answering the Why's I want to do this:
Reason #1: I like the animals I selected and want them in my life
I'm on the autistic spectrum. Friends are hard for me to maintain and keep, in my life there are only really a few things that I really understand: Writing, Tech and Animals. As a child I didn't, couldn't speak around others and was very fearful (still am fearful) of a lot of things in the outside world, becoming overwhelmed in the modern day to day. The only time I wasn't overwhelmed was when I was out in the cold, working, fingers numb in high-stress environments consisting only of the animals I was working with on farms and rescues. I felt at peace with the rhythmic milking of goats, the mixing of the horse feed, the sound of a camels rumbling growl vibrating through my bones in a way that didn't hurt my ears or heart the way the world does (and though I didn't mention camels, they were the first animal I wanted to travel with before I hung my hat on that dream). The stress of having to be alert and on my toes around a herd of horses ready to kick my ass if I wasn't careful where I walked or where I stepped, forced me out of my head. As a child my first friends were the books I wrote, the games I played and the animals I cared for. As an adult I couldn't afford a farm of my own and so, the next best thing was volunteering on farms. I went from traveling with just a backpack and my car working various farms, to having kids and going into Tech, which meant I needed a wagon to haul my shit around and something to pull it. I had to pick 'a team' of animals to do it, but couldn't decide which to pick due to a list of pros/cons for each one. No one animal fit all that I needed to do...and so I ended up with the concept of traveling with a small mixed-herd instead.
It is not logistical or practical at all, but I feel happiest when I'm around them and I thought, maybe, I could still have my cake and eat it too (it may turn out that I can't do it at least not yet, not here, not ever, but, that's why I posed my original question
~ ).
Reason #2: Sustainability and Self-sufficiency is my goal
Self-sufficiency the kind I want (even just a little), I don't think can be had with just a pair of horses. I also don't want to hunt or spend my energy gathering, but I own no land and am currently geo locked to the Eastern United States. To understand this I'll share a little bit of my project that grew out of my tendencies to self-isolate. In my original post I only mention 'large livestock' and 'small livestock', but I don't mention the other types of animals that can fit inside my wagon! This is because parking the wagon with the animals inside feel easier than herding a team of oxen, a team of horses and a handful of goats down a road that need to graze.
- Long-haired goats for goat milk and cashmere to make wool clothes and blankets, which can be sold (haven't ruled out sheep)
- Highland cows are cute and people are kind to things that are cute, they also make a great backup to my horse(s)
- Llamas make great guard dogs alerting us to predators (while dogs just bark at any damn thing and can bring bears back to camp - mind you I could end up with a stray!), Llamas are also related to camels, which I originally wanted but hung my hat on.
- Horses are faster and better supported in the community (but they colic, founder, have high maint. costs and health, and higher cost food req. on the road)
- Volunteering on someone elses farm for these resources takes time away from my current projects, ruling out having horses but working on farms with these livestock (also I don't want to raise to kill and most farms do)
The other thing I haven't mentioned but maybe should, is that technically it is not one wagon, but a caravan of wagons that are built overtime each wagon with a different function and goal, each pulled by livestock. My concept is to build wagons for food or at a minimum herbs and medicine, and one for working on my tech projects, as well as sleeping when I don't have tent pitched for an extended place to sleep. I originally considered a wagon/cart for animals, but the thought got overwhelming. In the beginning I'll only have one wagon, but having more with the additional livestock is something I hope to work towards...if stars aligning that is.
Each wagon needs at least 2-4 livestock or teams to pull it;
but, if I could get my e-assist concept to work then maybe it wouldn't need that many. (I looked up to see if anyone had added E-assist to trailers, and Dethleff came up, so I think it's possible).
I may be wrong in my logic, but at the moment, I think horses make sense if they're just getting you from point A to point B, but in my case there is a lot I'm trying to do experimentally which may not be practical or possible at least where I am located. I think if I were just using my wagon as a simple house and using horses solely as a means of transport that would be perfect, but then I throw in trying to produce my own wool or soap and grow my own food on the go and well ::meh::. It complicates things a bit.
My question to you: The horse travelling communities in the UK do they grow their own food, some of it, or buy it? What kind of things do they produce to sell? Do they rely on working odd jobs in towns for income? Are they part of a community that they can fall back on, helping each other out along the way - or they more solo in nature? How many people live in a single wagon, or do they use an extended tent? How big are their wagons in range? Do they have to register their wagons?
Not sure if you know these questions, and my mind is whirling with a ton of questions as I try to solve my own challenges.
