Tiny living? Sure. It all starts when they get married. But what happens when a couple decide to buy an Airstream and travel to communities to learn about small space living. It’s a little bit travel and a little bit learning, but always full of hijinks and humour as Alicia and Tyson decide whether they can sell the house and live in a small space long term.
Produced with the support of:
Whalesong Studios
Andrew Younger/strong>
Andrew Younger
Alicia Simms and Tyson Breland
It’s wedding day in rural Nova Scotia. But there’s a surprise. The groom drops a suggestion that maybe they should downsize their living situation and start out with an experiment in a trailer. So they drive their new trailer back to Nova Scotia and begin their adventure to find out how other people live.
The first capital of Nova Scotia was in the Annapolis Valley. Alicia and Tyson travel first to Bear River to meet people who have packed up their lives and started new businesses far from the hustle and bustle of the city. Simpler living, but not simple living. Then its off to Annapolis Royal to find out about the first capital.
Generations of a single family have operated a farm in Nova Scotia’s Annapolis Valley. But they’ve had to change and adapt with the world. Alicia and Tyson come to the family farm to hear about the journey back to the farm for generations of the Spurr Family.
Halifax is more than towering skyscrapers. There are the people who have come to the city from other countries and started businesses, bringing their own love of food with them. Then there is the history of the Irish stone masons who build a canal, the Shubenacadie Canal, that crossed the province and remains a defining feature of the landscape.
Nova Scotia is an ocean playground. On the south shore, Alicia and Tyson begin by learning what helped people thrive before the modern conveniences of major highways. They realize the history itself is not all rosy, and hides some dark moments. Then they are taken to the sea where they learn to sail, before wrapping things up with a Hubbards area tradition – lobster.
Maitland could have been Nova Scotia’s capital. While exploring the community of Maitland, Alicia and Tyson find out about the shipbuilding industry that once thrived here, and the newcomers who have reinvented the oldest general store in Nova Scotia, before taking a spin on the river tides that empty into the Bay of Fundy.
Rain and storms are something fishermen have to deal with all the time. Its stormy weather that greets the Trailer Travels crew in Yarmouth where they stop to learn about Nova Scotia’s firefighting and fishing history. Then, despite Alicia’s misgivings, they head out on the water yet again to go Haddock fishing off Pubnico and find out what being a fisherman is all about.
The rich Acadian history thrives in Pubnico where Alicia and Tyson find out how people lived in such a remote place. An Acadian museum and a restored Acadian village greet the crew as they explore Nova Scotia’s Acadian culture, and wonder if this simplified living is for them.
In Guysborough Nova Scotia, a man arrived on a bicycle tour and loved the area so much he decided to invest. And invest. And invest. It’s a story of a man with a dream who saw potential in a forgotten part of the province. From a distillery, to inns, and a field of Yurts, the drive to leave the hustle and bustle of Ontario life is something which seems to connect with Alicia and Tyson as they figure out their own future plans.
Nova Scotia’s ferries are always an adventure, and Tyson isn’t quite sure about putting the trailer on a car ferry to head to Prince Edward Island for a couple days. But travel they do, and on the island they receive a warm welcome from the Inn Chef who sought out his own piece of paradise away from the cities before heading off to hear from someone building a business around savoury pie.
Gaelic isn’t an easy language, but the story of the Gaels arriving in Cape Breton is rich in culture and history. Alicia and Tyson spend a day at Nova Scotia’s Gaelic College, meeting a former premier, and seeing if they can turn Tyson into a Scottish warrior.
The Cape Breton Highlands is more than just a park. Many areas now traversed by trails in fact were once homes. Alicia and Tyson find out both about what it took to live in such a harsh environment, but also about all the work that people who now live there do to make the highlands accessible to the public. As they find out about what living in the highlands is like, they find themselves at a goat farm where a modern business based on an old way of living is thriving, before heading off to the top of a mountain.
With their adventure nearly at an end, Alicia and Tyson visit an immigrant chef who has set himself up in rural Nova Scotia to offer cooking classes. As they discuss what brough him to Nova Scotia and kept him here, they begin their journey home where they have a big decision to make. Is it time to sell their house and live in less space.