by Michele Coffill 
 
 photos by Bernadine Carey-Tucker 
 
 video by Tony Packer 
 
 Two people and two dogs are traveling the country, coexisting in 98 square feet of living space. 
 
 On some nights their backyard has been the vast openness of the Yukon Territory in northwest Canada, other nights it was Bridge Street in downtown Grand Rapids. 
 
 Kelly Tousley, ’11, and Curtiss O’Rorke Stedman joined the tiny house movement in June after purchasing a utility trailer and outfitting it for adventure. They took their dogs and some of their belongings and left their Juneau, Alaska, home in June to hit the road to build O’Rorke Stedman’s rising music career. 
 
 Also in June but in the southwest U.S., Kristin Connolly Schillaci, ’05, and Tony Schillaci, ’06, returned to Santa Fe, New Mexico, after spending a year on the road living in an 18-footlong, 1980 Coachman trailer. They traveled 25,000 miles to 30 juried art shows in 35 states to sell Kristin’s fine art photographs. They also were on the road with two big dogs. ||||| SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah couple with dreams of traveling quit their jobs, sold their belongings and spent two years driving from the tip of North America to the bottom of South America. 
 
 Salt Lake City native Sam Christiansen and his wife, Erica, said they both had dreams of traveling. Both had successful careers and enjoyed what they did for work but said they didn’t want to spend their money on expensive cars or a home. They realized “that the majority of our life was spent working.” 
 
 “With only two weeks of vacation each year, it was hard to see all the things we wanted to see,” Erica said. “Time is what we craved, and it was the one thing money could not buy.” 
 
 The Christiansens made plans to save money, quit their jobs and travel. They considered buying plane tickets and traveling around the world for a year. Then they found a blog that gave them the idea to drive the length of the Pan-American Highway from Alaska to Argentina. 
 
 “The benefits of this type of travel were immediately apparent to us — you get to see a lot more and you can spend a lot less,” Sam said. “We spent another year prepping for our trip — saving money and finding a vehicle we were ready to live in for the next two years. And then, we took the leap of faith. Not knowing if we'd have careers to return to, we quit our jobs to seek after our dream.” 
 
 The couple bought an XPCamper truck and in June 2013, they drove through Montana and Canada to Alaska where they began their Pan-American journey. They drove through 14 different countries and slept in their camper the majority of the time during their almost 30,000-mile, two-year trip. 
 
 “One of the unique parts about this trip is that we have the ability to get off the beaten path,” Erica said. “Some of our favorite experiences have been exploring hard-to-get-to places where there are very few tourists and we just kind of stumble into these amazing adventures and meet lovely people who are not used to tourists.” 
 
 Sam and Erica Christiansen "Kung fu fighting" at Machu Pichu in Peru. (Photo: Sam Christiansen) 
 
 The Christiansens were able to drive the entire trip except for when they reached the Darien Gap, a large swath of undeveloped swampland and forest in Panama, where they had to ship their truck around. Sam said they also felt safe the majority of their trip except when their GPS led them onto a hiking trail that they thought was a road in Guatemala. 
 
 “The road kept getting narrower and narrower,” he said. “We continually asked those we passed by if this was the road to Acul and they all said ‘Yes.’ Well, eventually the road was (a) single track. We couldn't turn around so we kept going. The road got narrower and then the switchbacks started as the road started going straight up a mountain. Finally, we got to a point where the mountain was just too steep, the road too narrow, and the switchbacks too sharp. … I ended up reversing down the road for about two miles before we found a place to turn around.” 
 
 The Christiansens said they have had amazing experiences during their trip, including swimming with whale sharks, taking “intensive” Spanish lessons in Mexico and Guatemala, hiking to glaciers in Argentina, visiting gorgeous beaches and ancient ruins and watching the Baja 1000 race. 
 
 The couple said they hope their trip will inspire others to fulfill their dreams. 
 
 “I think we live in a culture that can sometimes make us feel like we are frivolous, irresponsible or selfish for living our dreams if they don't fall into societal norms,” Erica said. “It is difficult to have the courage to do something ‘crazy’ like leave your career and comfortable life to travel the world in a truck camper. 
 
 "Everyone has dreams, and I think slowly finding a way to make them happen is the most terrifying and empowering thing we can do. I have never been happier in my life.” 
 
 The couple will finish their trip back home in May 2015. 
 
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– Alaska couple Kelly Tousley and Curtiss O'Rorke Stedman, both 27, vowed at the end of 2014 that they would quit their jobs as a social services worker and English teacher and spend a year traveling the US. "After four years of being 'professional adults,' we realized we wanted more out of life," they write on their blog, Pay Gas, Not Rent. To afford the dream, they sold almost every possession in their more than 1,000-square-foot rental home and spent about $10,000 turning a 98-square-foot trailer into a livable space, complete with toilet, mini fridge, sink, desk, pullout bed, and lots of hooks for storage. They left on May 31, 2015, traveling from Alaska to Michigan and from there to at least 13 more states so far. And Business Insider reports that seven months into their journey the couple is not only surviving but enjoying themselves—and is entirely debt-free. Not every month is equal. Their expenses were low when they spent a good chunk of the fall with family in Colorado, for instance, but they spent thousands getting to and exploring California. Stedman, a musician who goes by the name "Cousin Curtiss," plays two to four gigs a week to support their adventure, and the couple says it helps that they have no space to put new material possessions. Stedman admits that they had to learn as they built their new home, which had to hold their two dogs as well: Before this adventure, "the coolest thing that I built to date was a birdhouse in sixth grade," he told Alaska Public Radio at the start of their journey. Much of what they learned was through YouTube and trial and error, the Grand Valley magazine reports. But while they admit to Business Insider that they're committed to finding real jobs again when the year is up and saving for things like retirement, they'll never stop traveling. (The tiny house movement has a little secret.)