We met our hosts, Jeff and Samantha, at their home in Sigel in the afternoon. They are both super hippies and that's why we decided to stay with them!! Sigel is an incredibly small town and they live there because Jeff works for a non-profit company doing trail maintenance for the National Park Service. Samantha used to work for the NPS but is now unemployed because there isn't much industry in or around their town. They're in their late 20's and met at a ridiculous-sounding private university in Massachusetts where there are no grades or degree programs!!
They took us on a short hike in the nearby National Forest. I think the weather was the coldest we've experience so far... it looks very pleasant in the photos, but there was a strong and bitter wind! I was actually wearing a t-shirt, sweater, hoodie, fleece jacket, rain jacket, AND Samantha's fleece jacket.
Josh did a little dance (and jump!) to stay warm..
There was a very neat tree that had grown around a rock, and the sap from the tree had frozen into a strange yellow fin and icicle.
After the hike, Jeff and Josh worked on Jeff's truck changing out glow plugs. Jeff's first car was an old Volkswagen bus that he converted to bio-diesel, and his current truck was already converted when he bought it. Josh also helped him heat and filter used vegetable oil to use as fuel! (I love the photo with the vegetable oil... Jeff's super long dreads are also in the shot!)
Samantha and I talked for a long time over tea and she told me about their intense organic diet. It's like a cleanse, and the first two weeks they just ate vegetables they had fermented themselves, plus bone broth that they had made themselves by boiling leftover chicken bones from the butcher. They've been slowly reintroducing vegetables and meat back into their diet, and now it kind of sounds like the "paleo" diet, where you eat food that a caveman would've eaten. Samantha made a fantastic coconut broccoli soup for dinner - even Josh liked it, and he's not a big fan of soup! - and she also roasted a chicken with beets, carrots, and potatoes. All of the vegetables were from their medium-sized garden in their backyard, and the chicken was from their neighbor. It was fantastic!
We stayed up talking for a long, long time before finally going to bed. Our high for the day was definitely meeting Samantha and Jeff... they are one of the most unique couples we've stayed with on our whole trip!
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