18 RAD THINGS THAT HAPPENED IN 2018

December 29, 2018

2018 was a blur and it felt like it flew by incredibly fast! I decided to come up with a list of 18 rad things that happened to remember 2018 by. (Roughly in order by date they happened)

I got a new job at an amazing company (Shopify) and love it!

I quit my job that I spent 9.5 years at and could not be any happier about it!
I got my first pair of legit hiking boots.

I got a fishing license for the first time in my adult life and started fishing again (Got Josh into fishing with me). I still haven’t caught anything yet… Josh caught a flyswatter once though!

I started tying my own fish hooks.

Josh and I road tripped to Vancouver Island for a few days.

Josh and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary!

Josh and I did our first multi-day backpacking trip!

Got rid of a lot of useless things/clutter in my apartment. (I had boxes of things I didn’t even open since we moved here)
Revamped my storage room into a kick-ass walk in gear closet. (I still need to organize it a bit better)

Experienced some incredible sunrises and sunsets.

Sunset Astotin Lake Elk Island National Park Alberta

Went trail biking for the first time and loved it! (I also got a bike rack for the Jeep, so we can go biking outside of the city)

Josh got a new job (and quit his former job) – super stoked for him!
I launched an online store. (and have plans for a couple others)
Paid off my LOC!
Starting to shoot video of my adventures (quite late in the year) still practicing and have a long way to go.
Did a 1 second video a day project.
I did not have a major allergic reaction! (If you know how bad the last few years were – this is a huge accomplishment)

And because highlight reels don’t share the full picture, here are the misadventures of the 2018:

My desktop computer broke down, and I lost A LOT of photos. (Friendly reminder to back up your photos often!)
Was halfway up a mountain trail (after driving nearly 5 hours) and was like – nope, not feeling it today…
A bison charged at my Jeep while waiting patiently for another one to cross the road. (It was a false charge and he stopped a few feet away) but my window was open and it was pretty scary!
Drove 3 hours just to turn around due to a severe thunderstorm that was not dying down where we were going to go camping for the weekend (also hydroplaned a bit on this drive – the rain was absolutely ridiculous) we sat in a parking lot contemplating to continue to turn around for quite some time, stopped at a rest stop on the way home to ponder some more – but the clouds were really sketchy and there was a lot of electricity in the air. We did not want to be hiking up mountains or camping in that weather.

I didn’t book campgrounds in advance (as plans can change on the fly and I’d rather not deal with cancelling/rebooking campgrounds while travelling) and we had some pretty close calls on our road trip with no campsites being available and last minute searching

We were camping near the beach on the ocean, and a siren went off – no one knew what it was (or seemed concerned about it which was very unsettling) – it could have been a tsunami warning. There was no cell service where we were, so we were communicating to a friend via text feature on my GPS and got him to check for warnings (there were none) but we definitely did not sleep well being on alert. (Thanks Brad!)

I got sick on my road trip and decided I just wanted to go home (and I drove 24 hours straight to get home as soon as I could from Tofino – I do not recommend doing this! Thankful for long summer nights we only had a few hours of sheer darkness)

My backpacking trip to Berg lake was a bust – we didn’t make it to our first camp in time and had to stay at the one before (thanks to the wonderful couple who let us use their tent pad!) and we turned around the next day due to massive blisters and mental unpreparedness.

My Jeep and I got rear ended. Thankfully (and surprisingly) there was no damage and no one got hurt.
The ceiling in our apartment started leaking in multiple spots (again!) For a few days our place was an obstacle course of buckets and towels all over.
Josh and I’s schedules rarely matched up for quite a few months. I still got to see him on his days off as I work from home – but we didn’t have much days outside of our vacation days to get out and do things together.

Here are to the adventures (and misadventures) of 2019!

Until next time, chase the stoke!
– Tracey