Daphné Robichaud is a 32-year-old outdoor travel leader who makes her living guiding hiking and biking trips across the world. (@thewanderingdaph)
Daphné spends her summers leading back-to-back adventures in places like Patagonia, Iceland, and the French Alps: solving problems on the fly, adapting to new groups every week, and spending long days on trail. We talk about what it’s like to build a life around seasonal work, the thrill and exhaustion of constantly resetting with new teams, and how she structures her year to maximize both income and time off.
Daphné breaks down the financial realities of trip leading: why she saves nearly 40% of her earnings despite an unpredictable schedule, how free housing and food change the equation, and why she feels more financially stable now than she did working a salaried government job.
Earlier in her life, Daphné studied criminology and international development, struggled with anxiety throughout her 20s, and deeply questioned whether she was on the right path. Now she doesn’t worry about what comes next—just whether her next winter will be spent in the mountains or by the sea. Despite the constant movement, she’s found ways to maintain deep friendships and a committed relationship, proving that stability doesn’t have to come from staying in one place.
Full transcript: dirtbagrich.com/daphne
Recorded in December 2024.
Transcript
This is an AI-generated transcript. Typos and mistakes exist!
Blake Boles 00:00
Daphne Robichaud, welcome to Dirtbag Rich.
Daphne Robichaud 00:03
Thank you, Blake. Thanks for having me.
Blake Boles 00:06
Tell me about your dream job.
Daphne Robichaud 00:11
Well, right now I feel like I am working in my dream job. And that is as an outdoor travel leader, trip leader. And I never thought this would be necessarily my dream job. I’ve had many dream jobs in my life where I was trying to study towards that. And this one kind of stumbled upon me, which is kind of beautiful how I fell into this job. And now I can’t imagine myself doing anything else for the time being.And I spend my time outdoors. I get paid to hike, to bike, to interact with people, to find solutions, to discover new places in the world, you know, travel and work in many different countries and work with some of the coolest people I’ve ever met are my colleagues. And I just, I grow every day in this job. And that’s, I think that’s the main thing that I love about this job.
Blake Boles 01:15
And we’re going to keep the name of your employer private. We’re just going to call it the company.You and I definitely share a lot in our love for group trip leading and getting the chance to travel internationally and working with people. We, we really enjoy, um, can you share just some stories that maybe stand out to you from recent years? Uh, where did you go? What kind of activities were you leading? What were the people like? What, and you said you, you solve problems. What are these interesting problems that you get to tackle?
Daphne Robichaud 01:45
Yeah, well, I’ll start with the where, I guess, but I’ve worked in Canada, in France, in Iceland, in Argentina, because I, you know, the trans-entribaries speak the language. While I don’t speak Icelandic, that’s unexpected for that country, but I speak French, English, and Spanish. And I was lucky enough to be sent to all these amazing destinations and work with really everyone in this company has had such an incredible life.But what is beautiful in this company is that we, one of the key motives is that it’s better to be interested than interesting. And it’s just full of people who are interested in meeting others and hearing each other’s stories, in sharing experiences. It’s never about things or stuff, or we’re all, you know, kind of nomad. And I found a beautiful community there, which made me feel normal in my alternative life. So I just get so much out of that and always, I’m surprised, you know, how amazing humans are, and what I have to learn from my colleagues. And in this job, I change colleagues in a team every week. We rarely, rarely ever work the same team two weeks in a row. And so in a season, I have, you know, 10 or 12 or different trips. And I work with different people every week, which when you talk about solving problems, well, it’s like adapting to someone else’s personality, adapting to the new group, adapting to the weather, to a new trip, a new region. And for me, it became kind of real life problems that are really fun to solve. You see the result right away, you see the satisfaction of the, you know, of our guests, you see the good flow of the trip. And that’s a very good feeling when you find a solution to a problem right away, and everyone’s happy and can enjoy it.Just focus on nature and enjoying what we’re there to share.
Blake Boles 03:47
How big are these groups? How many, guess how many trip leaders? You mentioned they’re all one week long.
Daphne Robichaud 03:53
Mostly in North America and in Europe, they’re all one week long and abroad when they go a bit further because our client base is American mostly. And then they maybe go a bit longer, eight days, nine days. So in Argentina, I was leading eight day trips, but yes, approximately. And our groups can vary from four to 26.They can be very different. It gives it a very different vibe. And then the number of leaders with the group will vary according to the number of guests on the trip. And it’ll also vary if it’s a biking trip or a hiking trip or a multi adventure trip, depending on how many, you know, how many of us is needed to handle the equipment, et cetera, et cetera. So a lot of parameters, but usually on average is a team of three leaders is the most common combination, two main leaders and a third person there to support another leader who’s just there to support a bit more behind the scenes for that week. So always three, which is a fun, which is a fun number to have on a small but mighty team.
Blake Boles 05:01
I’m a big fan of the number three. It’s enough to have some coverage and to have some diversity of personalities and approaches exactly.Yeah. Like more than four people on a traveling program, more than four trip leaders. That just sounds like too many cooks in the kitchen.
Daphne Robichaud 05:16
For sure, to make decisions, you need to, yeah, too many people. It’s hard to agree sometimes on the path to take.
Blake Boles 05:23
With one trip leader is a dictator, two trip leaders you can have a stalemate, but three, there will always be a decision that gets made. And I’m curious, you seem pretty satisfied with these trips that are one week or maybe eight or nine days long. When I was working in outdoor education right after finishing college I was working with groups that would come for for five days, usually fifth and sixth graders in California, and I found that the churn was a bit too much for me I would get to know a group.We would build some rapport and then they’d be gone, and I found myself gravitating more towards the summer camp kind of two-week session. But I really loved the summer camp kind of advanced programs where they’d come for four weeks, I feel like we could really get to know each other and work well together. So when I started running my my own trips, I decided on six weeks as this ideal length where you can really you can really get to know a group you can come to function well together. And six weeks for teenagers is is a pretty big leap. And so I’m curious how you find your your sense of satisfaction with these these shorter week-long programs, and kind of reinventing the wheel so to speak ,over and over again with these brand new groups and new leadership teams.
Daphne Robichaud 06:43
That’s a very good question. I don’t know if I could do six weeks, but I think the context is quite different because our clients are older than what you’ve described. You’re with students of a school age, but we are with older adults. Our trips can be quite expensive. And I think that partly explains that we have people more in their 40s, 50s, 60s, and even 70s coming on trips, sometimes multi-generational, some family trips. We do have some trips with some younger kids, but I think what we’re trying to fill in our offer is more of a vacation. Understanding that most North Americans have one week of vacation here and there in the year, which is another thing that I don’t miss of my previous life is just the one, or three weeks off in a year. So they have to oftentimes be squeezed in between two weekends to fly from North America. That’s the general, I think, idea.And it works for me because from, or I’ll speak for myself, but I give so much in a week and it’s very physical. We bike almost every day. We bike every other day. If we’re hiking with them, we could hike every day. They’re quite big distances. You have to always be on, positive. Yeah, we were really long days. You’re dying with the guests. You go to bed really late, get up really early. And so six days in and out like that can get to you and we’ll line up a couple of trips in a row like that, maybe two or three, and then we’d have a week off or a few days off. But more than that, I don’t think, I’ve experienced it and it’s too much for me. So I think a good rhythm they found, it’s two, three weeks and then a few days off. But I agree with you. It is very hard to leave a trip after day six where we’ve bonded, we have a bunch of inside jokes. We’re really comfortable with each other. We’ve learned about each other, even between me and my colleagues, who I might have not known before that week. And then two days later, brand new team, brand new group start again. And if you line them up back to back, it can feel a little odd on that second one. You kind of missed the group before, but you can’t compare day six connection to day one connection. And so you go again, you have to be open-minded, see what people have to offer. You have to bring your A-game Korean environment where people feel comfortable to open up and be themselves and have fun. And then the magic starts happening. So you have to be mindful of that to bring the same energy in and out week after week. Yeah.
Blake Boles 09:20
It sounds like you really thrive on the intensity.
Daphne Robichaud 09:25
On a short term basis, I can give a lot, but I’m very, well, I’m very passionate and I, I can’t really do anything at 50% when I do something. I do it a hundred percent.And in a way that’s why it works for me to have shorter stints and then a couple of days to relax and to recharge and then give it up my all again. So in this sense, I think perhaps six weeks would be a bit too long for me. I don’t know, but this is the, this is the format that this company offers. And that’s all I’ve known and I’ve just kind of grown to, to work with it. And it works really well.
Blake Boles 09:57
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Maybe sprint and then rest is the better way to describe this. Yeah, totally.Yeah. Okay. I’m going to ask you one more question about why you love this job so much and then we’ll move into other territory. Um, can you just tell me about some moment where you, you’ve been a trip leader with this company and you just stopped and you paused and you’re like, Oh my God, this is so cool that I get to get paid to do this. Like this is happening right now and this is my job. Does anything stand out to you?
Daphne Robichaud 10:29
Oh, many. The first image that comes to my mind is in Argentina, in Patagonia, where I’ve worked the past two winters. I didn’t go this winter. But there’s moments where you end up, I don’t know, you’re maybe the leader that’s more on the back end of the hike or the front end. We don’t keep the group in. We don’t have a leader in the front leader in the back squeezing them. They really can go at their own pace. We keep an eye on them. We wait for them at strategic points. But you can end up just being one-on-one with a guest for an hour or two, where you can really deepen conversations.And people have told me about so many things and big illnesses in their families, really touching moments, careers, loss of loved ones. And you find yourself in the middle of the beautiful forest in Patagonia, looking at glaciers potentially. There’s really a lot of magical moments that I’ve had, where I think of my previous job, where I was in a cubicle in government. And this is really where I tell myself, I’m so glad I got out. I’m so glad I changed. And I live my life focused on being outdoors and having meaningful conversations and meaningful connections with people from all walks of life, people I would have never met otherwise, but from who I learned so much.
Blake Boles 11:53
I really identify with getting to be outdoors, using your body, having these conversations that seem like they’re probably not going to happen in other parts of life and getting to facilitate this, this perhaps once in a lifetime magical experience for someone, whether they’re older or younger and, and like you are the linchpin that is making that happen. You, you are the person they look to, uh, to have this wonderful experience and this cherished memory.
Daphne Robichaud 12:23
Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes it can be a lot of pressure when you think about it. As you said, some people say for so long to come on this one trip and they know they might not be able to do it again for illnesses or, you know, injuries or anything like that. And when I think about it too much, it gets a little nerve wracking to be, to take the pressure of this.Some of them, it’s their dream trip that they’ve dreamt for for 50 years, you know, finally making it happen. And as you said, I’m curating that, that experience. And, but I have to go back into just being in the moment, being myself and everyone just, yeah, just trying to give everyone what they dreamt about.
Blake Boles 13:00
Just big, big guns. So you mentioned that you really like that when you’re not working this intense job, you have genuine time off in between your missions, between your gigs.How do you spend that time?
Daphne Robichaud 13:16
In the summer, which is when I work my seasonal, this is a seasonal job for me, I’ve worked five or six summers now with the pandemic, kind of the numbers don’t match fully, but I have worked also a couple of winters. I’m Canadian, so my Canadian winter is where I’ve gone down to South America. But the summers are five or six months long, and in those six months, the rest times can be quite short, can be one day, there can be no rest days for three weeks in a row sometimes, so it really varies.You have to find micro-resting times where you can go for a run or meditate or I do a lot of yoga and try and find my way to centre myself and recharge quickly. Once in a while, you’ll have a week off here and there, because you can’t go six months nonstop. And then I have my big rest that I call, I mean, I have long, long winters where I choose to do whatever I want and that really recharge, I miss the job again, and that’s really how I do the big internal work and do what I love, and that gets me ready for another season. And so there’s kind of two different types of resting throughout my year.
Blake Boles 14:31
So during the long break, you just mentioned that you do like internal work. You really gear up and prepare for the season to come. What does that look like? What are you actually doing?
Daphne Robichaud 14:41
done many things, but over the years I realized that what really feeds me are long hikes, long walks. And to have months off at a time, I mean, it’s such a privilege, such a gift that is a big part of why I love the job.It allows me to not be committed all year to a certain job. But I have had the opportunity to go to Nepal a few years ago to hike for, do the Annapurna circuit, which took me 17 days. And this winter I went to Portugal to hike part of a fisherman’s trail along the coast of the Atlantic coast, a multi-day hike. And I found that that is what allows me to feel fulfilled, that those are the things that would be really hard to do if I had only three weeks off a year in Canada, perhaps in my past job. And when I do those things is really when I feel like this is working for me. This is what I crave to do in my time off. But hiking as a general is my way to recharge and feel alive.
Blake Boles 15:54
Hmm, tell me practically where do you live, where do you store your stuff both when you have the short breaks during the high season and the longer break during the low season?
Daphne Robichaud 16:06
Well, another big perk of my company is that during this season, I’m housed in whichever region or country I work in. And so we have multiple houses all around the world in every region where we run trips. And the night, let’s say the night before a trip, you can sleep there, the night after a trip you can sleep there, and the shared accommodation, you live with your colleagues. So that also adds a bit to the complexity of this job. It’s not for everyone, but I love being friends with people I work with and sharing more than just work together. And so you share accommodation off-trip, you share accommodation on-trip. And even if you have longer breaks, the company is committed to housing you as long as you’re kind of active in that summer that you’re still working actively, even though you might have a week off. You can even go to any house in the world that has a bed for free in our system and you can go take a vacation. I went one summer, I never worked in Spain, but I went to Andalusia and we had a house there and I went and it was completely empty, so I had free accommodation for a few days and rested there in the south of Spain to recharge my battery before going back to France to work. And so in terms of living condition in the season, that’s what that looks like.And for me, that has allowed me to let go of an apartment, of a rent. So for many years, I’ve not had rent to pay. I did this job for two years before the pandemic and I’ve been back since 2022. So I did have an apartment again during the pandemic back in Canada because I had a regular job. I went kind of back into that for lack of options. In the pandemic, tourism didn’t really exist. And that was the only little stint in the past few years where I’ve had an apartment, but otherwise I’ve been rent free. I had a storage for a long time with my stuff, what was left, what I thought I was attached to. And then after a few years, I realized that I was not attached to it any longer and that the even just paying for the storage was adding pressure and just knowing that I had all this stuff. I mean, there’s nothing that stresses me out more than the accumulation of things, of stuff. So last winter, I finally emptied it. Every last bit, I kept only the most important stuff, mostly my sports gear and a few important pieces of art. And I drove everything to my parents’ house, maybe agreed to take everything that could fit in my childhood bedroom closet. And it’s packed, but it’s all I have. And now I have a couple suitcases here with me in France where I spent most of my time with work and outside of work. This is where I want to be established now.
Blake Boles 18:52
Congratulations on the downsizing. I know how nice that feels.I know how kind of annoying it is to be paying that monthly storage unit fee. And you’re like, why, why am I doing this? Why do I need all this stuff? And I’m also downsized into roughly five plastic bins that are sitting in a disabled, uh, 15 passenger van on my friend’s property in Colorado.
Daphne Robichaud 19:17
It’s so freeing.
Blake Boles 19:19
It’s very freeing.
Daphne Robichaud 19:20
Mm-hmm
Blake Boles 19:21
So we’re going to circle back to the question that I have about you putting all your eggs into one basket with this, this company. But first I want to talk about money and I want to ask how easy is it for you to save money and how well are you paid?And you can answer that like with numbers. You can answer that relevant to other positions that you’ve had or what your friends make and then how easy is it for you to, to save money or do people in this line of work generally not really save money. Do they just sort of coast along and they do this for a while and then they have to leave the field to go find a quote, real job.
Daphne Robichaud 20:00
Yeah, that’s a big question. But for myself, I live very well with this job. Given some of the perks that I explained earlier, paid housing during the season, they feed us most of the time because we eat with the guests when we’re on trip. So really, when you’re on trip, you have no personal expenses at all.We receive a small stipend for the use of our cell phones because we use that a lot and they want to compensate that, which they recognize what it means to live this life. And they value us. And I really appreciate that. And in terms of paid salary, I’m on an hourly pay. But it adds up with overtime because you work long hours. So it adds up with overtime. And we are a company that we’re in the industry, in the tourism industry, where we work with some gratuities and tips from the guests, which that adds a bit of a twist in the finances because it’s never the same. You can’t depend on that. You can’t know exactly how you’re going to receive. So that’s a particularity that you have to be able to live with to not know exactly the exact number you’re going to have at the end of the summer. As well as you’re not sure exactly how many trips you’re going to get in the summer, we get our schedules just about six weeks or two months ahead. And so in April, you’re not sure how much you’re going to end up with in October, how much work, what’s in store for you. So there has to be a comfort level with a bit of unknown or a bit of various income year to year.And then as the years go on, you can take a bit more control of your schedule, I would say, and try to have winter work, as I mentioned before, which we don’t have enough winter work for everyone. But if you’re more senior, you have more chance of doing that. And so when I really worked on my Spanish, knowing I wanted to work in South America and extend my season, and that increased my quality of life even more because I was working more, so making more money, and spending less, even house during the winter. So it really depends.I’ve not had a normal year, per se, with the pandemic. Seasons were cut kind of in the middle. But I live close to the salary I now make with everything added up, close to what I used to make in government. Mind you, it was a few years ago. Maybe the economy wasn’t the same. But as an entry level position in government after my studies, I mean, almost the same, or just a little above. But I had such huge expenses. I had an apartment by myself that cost so much. With all the utilities, I had my car with a parking in downtown Ottawa. And I think I was spending more as well. I wasn’t as fulfilled in my jobs. I think I was allowing myself to eat out more and do more activities that cost a lot. So I had a bigger lifestyle in a way. And now, doing just slightly less money, but I’m more aligned. I’m more focused on experiences, less on stuff. I’m able to save a lot. I mean, over 30%, almost 40% every year, putting aside for the future, for other projects. And so I am very comfortable in this lifestyle.
Blake Boles 23:24
That’s fantastic. Tell me a bit more about your earlier life and your trajectory through, let’s say, higher education and your first employment experiments, kind of everything you did that led up to taking this trip leading job.
Daphne Robichaud 23:43
Yeah, well, that’s the whole life story. I’ll try not to take too long, but I went into, I did an undergraduate degree in criminology, initially wanting to go into law. Um, I wanted to defend, you know, the least fortunate for a long time. I felt a lot of guilt about all my privilege in this world. And from a very young age, I felt like I need to give back to, um, to merit my, my fortune, my health, my, my living condition in Canada. And that was, that was very much the engine, you know, directing me to do good in the world.I decided not to go into law for many reasons, but I changed my career path a little bit and decided to do a master’s degree in international development and globalization. And within that, I decided to focus on immigration in the end, which is really is still a passion of mine. And I could see myself working in that field later again. Um, but I volunteered with asylum seekers in Canada. I worked at our immigration department and internships and, and further on. And after finishing all my studies, I was offered a full time job at the department of immigration. And I, I couldn’t, I, there was just really something. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t see myself working in the government in a cubicle for years on end.It was my second internship in government and I hadn’t found more fulfillment than the first time. And back then I had a partner who lived in, in Colorado. So I was kind of a perfect timing, right? I decided to leave and go live in Colorado for a bit. I finished my master’s thesis there and I kind of opened up everything. I had no apartment. I didn’t have a job. I was just finishing my studies and I wanted to really think about what I wanted to do. And I wasn’t, I wasn’t very happy.I had some very difficult years throughout my studies, both in my undergrad and my master’s where I really felt like I wasn’t fitting in. I wasn’t sure if these were my dreams truly or, or molded by society’s expectations or, or, and I didn’t find, I don’t know if I was really happy. And a friend of mine kept reaching out for to work for this company and she reached out a first time and I was like, no, not good timing. She reached out a second time. And then a third, and by the third time I was back in Canada, I ended my relationship. I didn’t have a job still, didn’t have an apartment. And they were just about to close the application process for that year. And I jumped in just at the last minute and was, you know, so lucky I got it. And that truly changed my life. I found so much in this job and I can’t, you know, sometimes I don’t know, I don’t know what else I would have done at that point to, to get to this level of happiness here. I’m sure I would have found my way, but this was really a blessing.
Blake Boles 26:48
Hmm. You mentioned the word privilege and good fortune. Um, so I have a few questions.First, was your trajectory towards law, was that molded by your family? Do you have a, come from a professional family where you’re expected to do, to do something like that? And, um, second of all, do you, do you feel like, um, you wouldn’t have ended up where you are right now, able to be a seasonal trip leader, um, because you, you came from some sort of, of great privilege or, or good fortune?
Daphne Robichaud 27:20
Yeah, so for the first question, I come from a professional family, both my parents had great, you know, good careers, busy careers, not lawyers, but I had a good family friend who was a lawyer. I did all my, you know, bring a student to work day to discover that career. And I felt really called to that for many, many, many years in my early years, you know, my high school and before that, even I felt there was a certain pressure. I think my parents made that made it clear that they wanted me to get an undergraduate degree. My siblings as well, we were very strongly encouraged, but they were, they were supporting us through it. They were paying for it. So it made that easy. But I remember really not wanting to even go to school and wanting to prove that I could figure it out without a formal education. I really struggled with that finding my way and seeing if I really agreed with the system. But I went with it and I did that undergraduate degree. And I am very glad now that I did that.I had so much to learn just as a human, to live independently, to make my own decisions, to discover things that, you know, jobs and careers and people I never would have met. So I’m very thankful for that. But, and then the master’s degree was very much my own decision where I don’t think I knew what I wanted to do with this undergraduate degree. I didn’t know what I wanted to do for work. I left a backpack for five months in South America between the two and didn’t really find more answers. I think I was kind of set on continuing to study as potentially a default and try and change and find a path that matched my values more. But all that to say that I do live this life because I, well, I truly think that I live this life because of where I came from and my parents. We didn’t, we never lacked anything. They helped me through school. And so I left university without any, you know, school debts, which is not as expensive as in the United States, but this is very expensive in Canada to go through school like that. And so I think there was never a question of having to repeat debts. And if I don’t have a stable income, that was always okay. It was never a big, I only had to take care of myself and really could live day to day. I didn’t have anything hanging over my head financially. So for sure, that was a big help in making that decision.
Blake Boles 29:36
And since leaving higher education, have you been self-supported or have you been assisted by family or any other outside sources that have made this life possible?
Daphne Robichaud 29:49
Not directly, financially, no, I’ve been self-supported completely in this path, but I can’t, it doesn’t feel right to say this because I go to Canada and my parents host me for a couple of weeks every year, my best friend hosts me for a couple of weeks every year, my sister as well, so that I get to go visit them and, you know, short-term rentals are very expensive there. So I know they help me in that way so that I can keep a relationship with them and come back and they’ve supported me, just moral support in terms of this big transition into a bit of a different life.So not financial, you know, direct financial support, but a lot of moral support and encouragement.
Blake Boles 30:30
Mm hmm. I want to hear a little bit more about your five month solo trip in South America. What was it like? And was this it? You said you still didn’t figure out what you wanted after that.But was that a big part of you deciding you wanted to become an international trip leader?
Daphne Robichaud 30:48
I think the word international was always central, and I didn’t know what I was going to do internationally, but I had such a fascination for the world, and that came from early on. I think my mom, they allowed us to travel a little bit when we were young, and my mom would bring in a lot of culture and international knowledge from inside our house.We had a very diverse listen to a lot of music, or she’d show us art, and so I was always very fascinated. And so that trip in South America, I did when I was 21, or I just turned 22, I think, and oh, it was 10 years ago right now in January, yeah, and I left for five months by myself. I just had that strong feeling. I studied Spanish in university in my undergrad. I felt strongly that I need to do something on my own, fully to maybe, I don’t know, prove something to myself that I could do with, I had figured out, and just to get out of the context of school, of the internships, of I felt a bit claustrophobic in that life, and I just knew there had to be something else, something more. And so I did travel through five countries in South America, and practiced my Spanish, learned a lot, met amazing people, some friends visited. It was very freeing. I’d never been so happy at that point, you know, so it was quite a revelation.
Blake Boles 32:12
Again, you and I are quite similar in this Daphne because I had my three month South America escape when I was 24 and it was a revelation. It just changed everything in my life for the better when I was very confused.Um, so anyone out there listening, if you’re thinking, should I run away to South America, the answer is yes, it will solve all your problems. Uh, all right. I want to come to my, uh, my biggest red flag when I hear you tell your story, which is the, the idea that you’re entirely wedded to this one company and it from everything you’ve said, it sounds like a wonderful company to work for. And they provide all of these benefits. And so this is much more about, about me than you Daphne. When I hear people talking about working for these great tech companies or working for other companies where they provide incredible, you know, vacation and incredible perks and benefits. There’s always a little voice in the back of me that says, yes, this is how they get you. This is how they tie you down. And then someday they’re going to ask you to do something, uh, that you don’t want to do and you won’t be able to say, no, it’s the golden handcuffs. And, um, and I also find myself concerned when I put myself in your shoes about feeling like a lack of autonomy, uh, feeling like, is this really a choice? Um, and, and I think when we spoke previously, I said, it sounds like you’re working for the company town, like, like the mining, the mining company, where you also shop at the, the grocery store owned by the mining company and the mining company sells you the pickaxe and you go on the vacation sponsored by the company. And so maybe tell me how you feel about, about these concerns. Do you share any of them? Do you have any of these, these thoughts where you’re like, am I wedded to this one company too much, or does it really not, is it really not that bad? Is it not that scary? And you don’t feel like you’re, you’re stuck.
Daphne Robichaud 34:11
That’s a very interesting take on this because I feel stuck in many, many jobs, but not this one. And maybe it fits because it’s a seasonal job and I wouldn’t even want to commit to a year long job anyways at this point.And so somehow it works for both parties, but I have always appreciated how it’s treated. I appreciate the growth and the growth perspective in the company. And so I think there is a future in this company if I keep, if the values keep aligning, but the company is growing, it’s changing. You know, I’m not saying that I’m going to blindly stick with it forever. I’ve been with it quite a few years now, but I think I have a specific example of why I don’t, it doesn’t make me nervous as much because with all this education that I gain and these connections in another, you know, in another environment, which is the government in Canada, the federal government in Canada. But when the pandemic hit, I had been with this company for two years already and everything crashed. There was no more employment. And luckily it just happened that that winter I was in Canada and I had gotten a short term contract for the winter with the government just because I wanted to stay there to see friends, to be with my family. I was going to become an aunt that winter and I wanted to be present and I didn’t, I wanted something to do. I wanted, you know, even though I could have probably afforded not to work, the city life is quite expensive. So I, I decided to take a contract with government and that’s when the pandemic hit and I was very lucky that they were able to extend me and I worked, I ended up working back in government for about two and a half years there. And for me, that’s a very clear example that I have skills. I have worked really hard to get two degrees and I have, you know, trilingual, I have, I have things to offer and I have confidence in myself that I will find something else if this doesn’t work out. And I know it’s never good to just, you know, put the blinders on and think this is my one and only opportunity or one only career. But I feel like I’ve already worked in so many different settings, so many different kinds of job. I just know that this, I don’t think I’m going to be leading trips for another 30 years physically. I don’t know if I’ll be, you know, if I’ll be in shape to do that. So I think I know that I’m just trying to enjoy it for the moment for what it is now and that it might become something else potentially with another company. And I trust that I’ll figure it out when that day comes. And I’m also always looking at what else I can do. And so I’m about to embark in a month, I’ll be doing my yoga teacher training to further that passion, but that could also become an income. Potentially one day, I have some writing projects I’m working on. I have other passions that fuel my fire. And this work right now that allows me to have all these months off is a way to feel my other passions as well. So for now it’s a very beautiful synergy that goes between all my, you know, my interests.
Blake Boles 37:20
All right. That really helps me feel better.
Daphne Robichaud 37:23
I’m okay.
Blake Boles 37:25
Yeah, because you have that specific example of falling back to your government work during the pandemic and realizing you can get hired again, but also in these long chunks of free time that you have in the low season, you’re spending your time learning new skills, things that you feel confident you could develop into another form of paid work if necessary. Essentially, your freedom comes from having options, having genuine options, ones that are either potential or proven.And that’s why you’re not putting all your eggs in one basket.
Daphne Robichaud 38:03
Yeah, I would agree with that. Options is freedom, and education is a freedom, you know, getting that education.And in that sense, I’m really grateful for the nudge of my parents to get that education because it is, you know, in my back pocket, no one can take that away from me and can open a lot of doors.
Blake Boles 38:20
Yeah, and as an advocate of alternative education, I feel necessary to step in and say, you seem educated in two different ways, Daphne. You have the credentialed formal education that will open certain doors, but you also have this self-directed learner ethos that is propelling you to become a yoga teacher, even though you don’t need to do that to make money right now or to explore writing and that having both of those together seems like the ultimate safety net.
Daphne Robichaud 38:48
Yeah, yeah, thanks, Blake.
Blake Boles 38:51
We can just make each other feel good about ourselves. You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Tell me about your life right now since we’re recording this in the middle of the winter. Where are you? What are you doing? And tell me a bit about your personal life. I’m sure that there are people who wonder like, okay, you have a pretty cool action-packed life for these five or six months, but then in the other half of the year, do you have a meaningful existence? Or are you just waiting around doing yoga, twiddling your thumbs, waiting for the next contract to appear?
Daphne Robichaud 39:24
Yes. So the winters have been all different. I mentioned that they have been dictated by whether I work or not work and I can fill my time quite fully. In one winter I felt like I didn’t really have a break at all from work and so I didn’t need to really figure out what to do with my free time.But this winter I decided not to work, to stay longer in France and where I am currently. And I’m just, I’m resting. I’m living, I’m living a beautiful calm life. I’m staying with my partner here in France and while this job has been an impediment I think to some, you know, personal lives and relationships, friendships as well as romantic. I found my balance over the over the years to make that work and I’m very fortunate. I’m in my partner over a year ago and he understands my lifestyle. I have a place to come rest in my head and feel very good about projecting myself into a life in France. I feel connected to this culture. It’s exotic enough but I share my first language is French so I feel like I can integrate very well. And so that’s what is currently going on but I also have moments where I feel really antsy. The contrast between the summer and the winter are difficult sometimes and the transitions between the two. So November is typically, you know, my deep rest month but even through that I got a, you know, I can get a little antsy and decided to leave very last minute and I just went to hike for a week in Portugal as I mentioned. So that again is a proof of my freedom and that is provided by this lifestyle but I’m able to make it work now. Every year I go back to Canada, I have to renew a work permit or work visa for France to come back if I want to keep working in France and that also allows me to spend about two months in Canada to see all my family and friends and I think that’s essential because for my first few years of traveling, not just with this company but with other things, my semester abroad, internships abroad, I often left without looking back and didn’t keep in touch with family and loved ones and friends and I would come back expecting a little bit them to jump in, you know, in the air and be so happy that I’m back but their lives kept going on. I didn’t call, I didn’t text, I didn’t really make an effort and I had to really look at that and think of what I want to build with this job, if I’m always gone, how can this work with the personal life and maybe I shrunk the circle a little bit but I have very strong relationships, beautiful friendships in Canada, I’m very tight with my family and I make an active effort to see them every year and to keep those relationships going because that wouldn’t be worth it if even if I love my job so much, if I don’t have something outside of it, that would be too much of a trade-off.
Blake Boles 42:22
I agree, and it’s reassuring to hear you say that with just a couple of months back home each year, you’re able to really maintain those relationships. You know, a theme that’s developed as I’ve done these interviews is that people who are very actively in the travel and adventure mode of life, they all say, yeah, like romantic relationships. That is by far the hardest part.And so if you’ll allow me to, to dig a little bit here, Daphne, how did you find someone who’s totally chill with you being away, working intensely for five or six months during the summer? And then also during the winter, going off to Canada for a few months or going to hike in Portugal. And when I do the math, it sounds like you guys maybe only have four months, maybe less together solidly throughout a 12 month period. Tell me how it works.
Daphne Robichaud 43:13
What’s the secret? Well, I don’t have a secret, but I can share what I’m experiencing right now. But my partner works for the same company. So that is very helpful. He truly understands what the job requires and what the job provides for me. And so he gets my passion for it and obviously would never get in the way of me, my professional life. But also sometimes has to be a way himself. And so we really understand and try to make the best out of our schedules in the summer, which is always the more complicated time. And in the winter where we’ve tried this, this winter we’ve stayed put to spend more time together. That was our priority.And it felt very good to put work completely aside for me and to focus on us and do things that we’re passionate about and go ski and hike and camp. But I think it was very clear from the beginning that we’re both very independent. We have different projects going on and that we’ll have to support each other through that if we wanna be fulfilled and aligned in our relationship. And he’s also an expat, he’s not French. And so he has to go back home as well and visit his family. And so we share that, I think that strengthens our relationship even more because we both live this kind of external life in France, but we get homesick and we understand the importance of going back home and visiting family.And so I think it’s just a very good match. I think I just got really lucky and very good match, but we deeply understand each other and our needs and both love this alternative life right now. And we’ll see how long, if the job gets to be an impediment eventually, I think that’s definitely a conversation that I’m willing to have to shift it or diminish it or have something else more locally. I wouldn’t want that to prevent me from growing in my personal life.
Blake Boles 45:20
You know, my friends have, have given me a little bit of grief in the past. Uh, when I, I talk about my, who I’m interested in meeting in a romantic relationship and they say, you’re just looking for a clone of yourself, but Daphne, you have found your clone. You are very happy with your clone. This is what I’m hearing.This person sounds like the male version of you. Is this, is this incorrect to say?
Daphne Robichaud 45:44
Well, I’d say it seems like it in some ways, but also we’re very, you know, there’s many ways where we’re very different. I have a more of an anxious personality and, and he’s very, very chill. It balances me out really well.So obviously we’re not exactly the same and what has been a beautiful learning curve, and that’s where I feel like I’m growing a lot this winter is that he has a son and that adds a lot to, you know, to the dynamic. And for me, who I thought I was going to travel, you know, for many, many years and not have a, uh, you know, a clear place to call home. Um, I have that now and we’re a bit more stable than I imagined. And in the past year, I’ve just found that it’s been truly a blessing to, to be able to have this double life. I think I’m like part-time nomad now. And this works so well for me because I remember the previous winters where I’ve actually spent most of my time at my parents’ house between my seasons. And it was too big of a clash. You know, I felt so fulfilled, so outgoing, so independent in the summer. And I wouldn’t have really anything to fall back to while I traveled a little bit. I never traveled the full six months in the winter. That’s too much for me. And so I think I was looking for a balance that I didn’t know how, I didn’t know how that would work out. And it seems like I found it and I’ve, I’ve grown since I got this job. I, I’ve, I wanted different things when I started at 25 then now at 32. And I’m just trying to follow, you know, those feelings and needs. And, and it seems like I am able to start developing a little community here now, which is community is very hard to build in this lifestyle. Um, very hard to feel like, you know, knowing your neighbors and going to the same yoga studio and starting to, you know, get familiar with the city. That part of me was, was really depleted. And that feels very good to, to, to build that here while still knowing that I have all my independence in this crazy job in the summer where I can, you know, travel the world. And so for now it’s, it’s working just so perfectly.
Blake Boles 47:59
I’m really glad to hear that.And everything you just said is a perfect segue into my final question for you, which is when you think towards the future, are there any parts of your life that feel like huge question marks or anxieties or something that’s very unsustainable? You already mentioned that you don’t assume you’re going to be leading trips in the same intense fashion for the next 30 years. And it sounds like you have found a pretty good balance of this kind of hybrid family life and rooted community during part of the year while still getting your adventure fix the other half. Is there anything else that maybe you wake up in the middle of the night and you think, how am I going to solve this? Or what’s this going to look like down the line? Anything that keeps you up.
Daphne Robichaud 48:45
You know, Blake, I think I don’t have those moments right now. And this, for me, is such a beautiful realization because I spent most of my 20s completely anxious, sometimes paralyzing anxiety about where would I find my happiness and how would I make this work. And I think I knew then that I wasn’t on the right path. And I just didn’t know how to get there and what I wanted and what made sense, what was acceptable in society. Then I had a lot of questions where that truly kept me up at night. And for all those years of hurting, I think I am allowing almost the same amount of years of healing of trying to not ask myself those questions and not panic.And I think the 30s have been very healing. And I’m so much calmer. I’m so much happier in not knowing, but also knowing that I’ve found I’ve proven to myself that I don’t need to follow the regular, I’d say, typical path of society. And then I’ve deconstructed what success needs to look like, what I thought success needed to look like.And I have a small anecdote, but I had a guest once who I think liked my presence, but maybe didn’t value my job as much. But I was driving him somewhere. And he asked me about my life, and he was interested. And he asked me if my parents were ever worried about me. And I thought he meant my safety, my physical safety. But we were in France. And so I started telling him, not at all. My parents, I’ve traveled by myself in South America. They’re used to this. I speak French. This is so not at all. And I saw in his eyes that I wasn’t answering the question. And then I said, oh, you mean for my future, for my career? He was wondering if my parents were worried from my future. And it was such a wake up moment that I realized that I think my role might not seem like a success for many people.But I was so proud that I got out of the path that I was taking, where I could have easily stayed, and not fight, and just went with the flow. But I think I would have been miserable. And I’m so glad I went out of it and chose this path less traveled by. And luckily, to answer the question of this gentleman, is that my parents are so supportive of this. And at some point, I can’t remember if it was the first time I joined the company or the second time after the pandemic. But I remember talking with my mom. And I think she just called her many times with anxiety and just needed her to calm me down. And at some point, she was like, are you going to quit that government job or what? And it was a slap in the face. And I don’t know if I would have had the courage to do it again or to keep leaving. But it felt like she was almost giving me permission in a way. And it really helped me. And not too long after, I left and came back to work my dream job.And I’m just really proud of that path to find and to let myself just live it in the moment now and not question the future too much. I think I’ve said, like, I feel equipped to face whatever’s going to come and to figure it out as it comes. But for now, what I need is just a few years of not questioning things.
Blake Boles 52:15
Yeah, yeah. And I don’t want to contribute to any unnecessary second guessing here.It sounds like you’re really doing well. And that’s a wonderful little story about your your mom nudging you to quit the government. Yeah. Daphne, do you have any sort of online presence in case anyone wants to like see what you’re up to? Or are you a private person?
Daphne Robichaud 52:39
I’m quite private, but I do have a bit of a travel Instagram, which I’ve used for different projects in the past. So I’m happy to share that if especially if anyone feels like this is a life set that they could potentially see themselves living or a job that they see themselves doing.I think I I got this through word of mouth and someone really kind of nudging me hard to apply. And it changed my life. And so for me, it’s always a mission to give that back and help anyone else maybe jump in the jump into this great adventure. So I’m happy to share my Instagram. That’s at the wandering daft, which I can also write down after.
Blake Boles 53:15
We’ll put it in the show notes.
Daphne Robichaud 53:16
beautiful and I’m truly happy to have strangers reach out and see if this might be a good fit. We’re always hiring every year that company is growing, which is a great time to join a company and it truly is quite the adventure, quite a journey.
Blake Boles 53:36
Daphne, thanks so much for coming on Dirtbag Rich.
Daphne Robichaud 53:40
Thank you, Blake.