Ready to Go Off-Grid?

I can say, looking back, that my quest to try and go off-grid dates back to those crazy days of 2020, when suddenly we all lost a bit of faith in the stability of the world in general.

No matter what your views on that period, it was terribly unsettling. Unsettling enough for me to want to grab my little girl (who was just 7 at the time!) and whisk her away to Mexico!

I first settled in Tulum and felt right at home, and despite the naysayers, I still love Tulum, and the Caribbean coast in general (I guess who wouldn’t!) and visit often, but after deciding that I wanted to create an off-grid home, it didn’t take long to realise that this was not the place for me.

You have the unwanted visitors (snakes, tarantulas etc.) which makes basic gardening somewhat hazardous (especially for a dyed-in-the-wool arachnophobe such as myself), then, during an organic farming workshop I attended near to Tulum I learned that the list of foods you could not grow in that climate and with that soil type, was way longer than the list of foods you could grow. Then there was the problem of shade, netting, pest control and all manner of additional complications that were enough to put a fresh green prepper off the whole idea for life.

I had literally zero experience back then, of living off-grid or growing food (except maybe some cress once with my daughter, just for fun!). My specialist subjects in those days were more related to where in Quintana Roo there was a Zara (there are two in Cancun and just one in Playa by the way, but it is quite big), where to get a really good matcha latte in Aldea Zama, and which oils would stop my hair from frizzing up on the beach.

However, on arriving in San Cristobal, the journey to off-grid living just seemed, well, easier. The land is rich and fertile and great for growing, and land prices were a fraction of what I had seen in QR. Then the climate – plenty of rain, a good amount of sun but not too much and not too scorching, and no scary bugs, arachnids or reptiles that could turn picking some strawberries into a trip at warp speed to A&E.

I found my perfect land plot, in a breathtakingly beautiful spot in the mountains approx. 25 minutes outside of the city. The neighbouring parcels had been bought by people just like me. I wanted to be independent but not alone, I wanted my own power and water source (just in case!) and I wanted to be near nature, but still close enough to civilization.

Land found, everything else just flowed. I met the most amazing architect who made everything as smooth as silk and really fun (I can share him with you too, if you like!) and the whole team of experts who contributed simply showed up (on time), did exactly what they promised to do, and did it well, and the entire project was completed in around 18 months.

In my 25 years experience developing real estate all over the world, I have never experienced flow like it. Maybe there were issues and bumps in the road, like in any build, but maybe I was so excited I just didn’t notice them.

One of the best things was how my architect’s team laboured seamlessly with the workers we made friends with from an indigenous community living near to the land – in particular there was one family we have gotten to know, love and respect enormously and who have helped me with so many things since.

One of the other best things is now looking out from my house, which some days feels like it is literally in the clouds, and seeing the miles and miles of mountainous land and the river below, and pinching myself that this actually happened.

Or actually I think the best thing is being in bountiful nature, every day, and knowing that come what may, we have power, water, fresh air and plenty of space - and this is real freedom.