Back in 2016, Rob Vessels took a group of seven veterans to Keene, NY for a weekend of ice climbing. You can read about it here. After the Sierra Club Military Outdoors outing, one young man, Chris Cass, was especially inspired to pursue a forgotten dream of moving West. Here is his story: 
It all began in March of 2016. I had been living in Manhattan, working on Wall Street all winter in what was supposed to be a dream job. In the previous four months I had not stepped outside the city even one time. Four months: that’s the longest I’d ever been without experiencing the wide open outdoors.
Then a coworker heard about the Sierra Club Military Outdoors trip to ice climb in Keene Valley, New York, and she mentioned it to me. The trip was only a week away, but I jumped at the opportunity. I was missing the connection and camaraderie I used to feel in the Navy and I was eager to be back in the mountains. As I drove to Upstate New York, I felt like I was on parole from the intensity of city life and I enjoyed every moment of freedom. I felt the joy and playfulness of a kid again.
Three days of climbing were great. However, what set the weekend apart was the relationship I established with my fellow veterans. I’ve met plenty of vets and outdoorsy people before, but I think having both those experiences in common created a fast bond between us. By the final day we were a family, promising we’d all meet up again.
I followed the ice climbing trip with an 8-day solo trip to Costa Rica, where I took a wonderful road trip through the tropics. I knew when I returned home I had to keep pursuing that feeling of being alive--of tangible engagement with the world. I knew I had to leave New York as soon as possible; in fact I gave myself a six month deadline to head out and start fresh. Three weeks later I quit my job and headed to my parents’ home in Virginia to consolidate my belongings and make a plan. I reconnected with family I’d rarely seen while in college and serving in the Navy. I hiked the Appalachian Trail for a week. I thought hard about the life I wanted to live.
I’d always had this dream of living indefinitely out of a truck and exploring my favorite part of the country: the West. I had dreamed of living in Utah or nearby on the Colorado Plateau, but I put career ambition and financial success ahead of that dream. Somewhere in the two months of climbing with veterans, solo traveling in Costa Rica, and spending time with family -- it became clear to me that my priorities had all been wrong. I had nothing to lose by taking the leap.
So I bought a used red truck with a cabin top. My grandpa helped me outfit shelves and a bed platform, and on May 27 I hit the road.
In the Navy, I had been stationed in California and I had driven coast to coast before. Now I was eager to blend familiar places with new ones. First I drove to Telluride, and after that Montana, Oregon, the California coast, Las Vegas, Sedona, the Grand Canyon, and up into Utah to Moab and Zion. I didn’t tie myself to a specific plan. Rather I wanted to follow my gut and figure out my destination one step at a time.
As exciting as that sounds, it also meant some days were difficult to get started. I would wake up and have no direction, no place to be-- which is not a familiar feeling for a military person! I remember vividly waking up one morning, enroute to southern Colorado, feeling utterly glued to the mattress. I had been reading Joseph Campbell’s ‘The Power of Myth’ and lying there on the inflatable mattress in the bed of my F150 it hit me: I am the hero of my own story; life is meaningless and therefore life is a treasure because we are free to create our own meaning and give it purpose.
I continued my travels around the Colorado Plateau. Toward the end of summer I entered northern Arizona and it felt like a place I could call home. Southern Utah and Salt Lake City were next on the list, so I kept driving north. I felt ready to find a community, ideally a small town to settle into; but until then I was happy just living on road. The experiences of my travels and living simply showed me what I needed to have a sustainable, balanced life. Of course, it’s not perfect. I’ve had to accept financial and career risks and embrace the fact that not all opportunities work out the way I want. But out here there’s always the open road and a home in the back of my truck -- and that beats life in a NYC cubicle to me!
Chris's experience with Military Outdoors helped him reconnect with his passion for life, and realize that he's happiest when he can spend plenty of time outdoors. This summer he took a new job based out of California as an adventure travel guide, and he looks forward to connecting with more Sierra Club veterans on future outings out West. We look forward to growing the Military Outdoors program so that even more veterans and service members can have have supportive and awe-inspiring experiences in the outdoors. For more on Chris's adventurous life you can find him @wanderingwonderer and say hello.
