My name is Austin White, I’m 17 years old, and live in Austin TX. I have two Siblings, Kesley and Sunny: Which you’ll see in some of my pictures. I was born here in Austin TX in 1992. Me and my family lived here in Austin until 1998. My Dad worked for Dell Computers, and worked with them in Austin. We moved up to Seattle Washington in 98 and found a little house in the small town of Issaquah. Me and my sister Kesley went to school here, and my Mom and Sunny stayed home or went out while my Dad was at work.
Issaquah is a small little town on the outskirts of Seattle. Always a little drizzly or sunny. On sunny days you could see Mount Rainier in the distance between Cougar Mountain and Tiger Mountain. We lived in a two story house that was built in the 1900’s. It was right off the main street that ran through the town.
Working for Dell, my Dad would have to go to Austin sometimes for work. We love being together as a family and always doing things as one. So when he would get the call that he had to go down to Austin, we would all get in our little Itasca RV, and be on the road. We love taking these trips so much, we started taking them just for fun and experience. We’d spend sometime in Texas to see some family and our hometown. We were also on a schedule when we took trips for Dell, so we couldn’t stay as long as we wanted to. We’d stop along the way and see some of the famous sites on the west side of America. We saw the Grand Canyon (now we’ve seen it so many times, it’s just a big hole in the ground to us at this point…), Crater Lake, and the big Rocky Mountains.
One day after all our trips we took a drive out to the coast of Washington to go see the waves, and breathe the fresh ocean air. We played in the sand, walked along the big Driftwood pieces that had washed up on the shore. Me and my sisters were all young at this time. I was Eight, Kes was Six, and Sunny was Five. My dad was off wondering to himself: If I had all the money in the world, what would I do? He answered to himself: Put my family in an RV and travel. He won the mental lottery.
So after that we started talking about how we were gonna change of lifestyle. The plan was we would quit Dell, buy an RV, sell most of our stuff, and hit the road for about a year. We agreed, and got to work. My Dad quit his Dell job, we gave stuff away, sold stuff, and bought a nice 37 foot RV.
We had a house in Austin that we owned, sold that. And we had two cars: A Volkswagon Thing, and a 4×4 Ford Bronco. We sold the Bronco and kept the Thing as a tow vehicle. During most of the whole process, a Japanese film crew had contacted us about being on there show. They were making a documentary about families on the road. They needed a family that was just starting out, a family that had been doing it for awhile and somebody that had retired from the traveling part of the RV lifestyle and just lived in one. We were the ones just starting out. They had filmed us looking at RV’s, selling stuff, and me and Kesley leaving school. Kesley only went to school up to kindergarten, and me only to the second grade. We were planning to do homeschooling on the road, and have the world around us as our teacher.
After we were done with school and getting the RV ready, it was time to go. We sold the house in Issaquah, said goodbye to friends, and got in the RV and left.
From Issaquah we went all over. As far as Florida, Maine, and even Canada. After the first year on the road, we were hooked to traveling. But we thought maybe its time to settle back in. We got a small rental house back in Issaquah, and starting working for ourselves. We signed for about a year in the house, but only lasted six months. We got back in the RV and left again. This time our travels would take us down a path of traveling in the RV for almost seven years, 41 states, and tons of new friends. During that time, we were in Yellowstone National Park when my Mom came up with a name for our family. The BareNakedFamily. BareNaked meaning shedding all the access stuff and getting back to what’s more important: Family and love for one another. Soon after that we bought the domain for BareNakedFamily, and started documenting our travels. The website became more and more meaningful when we realized it wasn’t just our family looking at it. But it was other families getting inspired from what we’ve done. We starting talking and meeting new families that had been following our website for months.
By this time, we were experts at living in small spaces. We learned how to work with each other and respect when someone wants time alone. We learned how to fit things into small spaces, and be okay with not having our own rooms or lots of stuff.
In 2006, we traded the RV traveling lifestyle for the Backpacking lifestyle. We loaded up our Jeep Wagoneer that we had bought in Austin in 2005, with all our backpacks and headed up the Northern California. We lived with the Mcbee family, some very close friends that lived in MT Shasta CA. We lived with them for five months and had the greatest time ever. We’d go into the mountains and fish, swim, play in the snow, go shooting, and live.
After the five months of mountain living, us and the Mcbee family piled into there 30 ft RV and headed down to Austin TX. We fit nine people into the RV, with there family sleeping in the bed in the back, my parents on the fold out couch, sisters on the fold down table, and me on there dash (it’s a pretty big dash). We stopped in Las Vegas for a Nightline show that me and my family was on. They wanted to do a show on us because we were this crazy family traveling in an RV and not doing what everyone else was doing. They interviewed us, filmed us in the RV, and stayed with us for 3 days. After Nightline was done, we got back in the RV, and made our way down to Texas to surprise a friend for his birthday. His name was Isaac. He’s sinced past away due to cancer.
We now have a small 500 square foot duplex in south Austin. Were still traveling and keeping our family unit tighter than ever.
We encourage everyone to follow there dream no matter what everyone else says. To live the way you want to and not what everyone else thinks you should live like.
Screw it, Just do it.
Barenaked Love
Austin White