Do you know anybody who lives "off the grid" and if so, how do they do it and where do they live?

“Living off the grid,” meaning living autonomously, not hooked up to any public utilities, i.e. electric, sewer, gas, being totally independent of “the grid.” I have been watching a show on the Alaskan railroad, and each episode usually features a family living off the grid. In Alaska, obviously, it’s got to be terribly cold. In thinking about these people’s lives, I think about what I consider the bare minimum. I would think a shower once a week would be the bare minimum. For me, if I couldn’t take a daily shower, then every other day would be the minimum, but for the purposes of surviving living off the grid, then I would think I would need one once a week. To think about how they do it, these people living in these little cabins in the woods, going to the bathroom in an outhouse when there are many feet of snow on the ground, animals in the woods and it’s freezing, how do they do it? I would think living in a warmer climate is easier, but in the US, unless you’re in Florida, you’re going to experience some freezing weather at least a few weeks a year.

These people walk through the woods a few miles and hail the train to “town.” The train is their lifeline.

I know there is solar energy, but these people in these Alaskan cabins have fire places and a “shower house” which is like an outhouse but for a shower, and it has to be drained and disabled in the winter so the lines don’t freeze.

About a year ago, my hot water heater went and until I had a new one put in, about two days later, I had to wash my hair in the tub with cold water. The water was so cold my head hurt. I can’t imagine living off the grid.

Do you know anybody who lives off the grid? If so, where do they live and how do they do it?