Category: Retreat Locales

Mr. Rawles, I bought your book “Patriots” a few years back and just came across your web site in the last month. I loved the book (and have lent it to a few friends), and I am trying to get through the extensive information in the archives on the site. Today I ordered your other book Rawles on Retreats and Relocation. Anyway, I currently live between Salt Lake City and Provo, Utah. My wife and I have been of a preparedness mindset for at least seven years and are blessed to be completely out of debt. We have a good …

James, I have been looking for 1-to-200 acres in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. Ouch!!! I think that they think there is gold in them mountains. Right now I sit on 47 acres north of Dallas, Texas. Since land is so high I have moved my sights to other areas. Currently I have looked at land in Upper Peninsula (“U.P.”) of Michigan. It is very remote, very few people, gets up to 100″ of snow, has good forest, has water and just a good out of then way place. I have also been told they are firearms friendly. Land is cheap. …

Jim, I wanted to comment on the retreat areas in Nevada. I’m a native rural Nevadan. I fully agree with your last reader on the [Big] Smoky Valley. I have lived and worked in that area in past years. He was dead on about Tonopah. I want to share a little about Ely and Elko. Ely has one of four maximum security prisons. Ely also has two medium security prisons–also called “Honor Camps”. Ely the town has been under the direction of the State. They are bankrupt. Also, there is a fair amount of mining going on in the area. …

Sir: I am writing in regard to posting about Advice On Retreat Locales in Nevada, particularly about the Big Smoky Valley area. I am very familiar with the Big Smoky Valley and surrounding areas, I have camped, hiked, hunted, etc. there. There are numerous hot springs and ghost towns peppered throughout the valleys . The mountains are impressive and Mt. Jefferson is one of my favorite areas. Now here’s the “but”: as for a retreat area: the area is very remote, everything will have to be brought in. The summers are very hot with range fires every year and the …

James: I’m a retired Christian, a widower, living on California’s central coast. I’m a ham radio enthusiast. I don’t feel safe anywhere in California. California is only going to get worse as time goes on. So I am looking for a retreat location that is away from large population areas. I now have a few resources available to do this. Please let me know if you know of anything in the $40-to-50K range. I’m thinking about Nevada. Somewhere quite remote that will not be on the “shopping list” of looters, or in the path or refugees in the event of …

Jim, To answer your key question: “Are there some particular towns that are well-removed from the major population centers on the east coast –perhaps up in The Wet– that would be well-suited as safe havens?” You would need to define what constituted a major population center. There are five cities/regions with a population over a million [people]: Sydney (due to their close proximity to Sydney I would include the cities of Newcastle [pop 510,000] and Wollongong [pop 275,000] as part of Sydney), Melbourne (including the city of Geelong [pop 165,000]), Brisbane (including the Gold Coast/Tweed region [pop 485,000], the Sunshine …

Jim: 1) I traveled around Australia for several weeks a few years ago. Australia’s main problem as a survival retreat is shown by a comparison of its population with that of its neighbors to the north: a) Australia: 20.5 million b) Neighbors: 1,869 Million ( China: 1,321 million, Indonesia: 223 million , Vietnam: 85 million, Malaysia: 27 million, Philippines: 85 million, Japan: 128 million ) Note that the invasion route to Australia from Asia is a chain of islands with short distances between them. Australia would probably have been occupied by the Japanese in WWII if not for the US …

Saying that Australia is unique sounds clichéd but in so many ways it is true. It is the world’s largest island and the world’s smallest continent. It is one of the least densely populated countries in the world and yet one of the world’s most heavily urbanised. It is the flattest, driest, least fertile inhabited continent on earth but which through modern agricultural practices is one of the world’s largest food producers. The list of its unique features goes on. Selecting a retreat location in Australia requires this uniqueness be taken into account. Failure to do so will be fatal …