John Peltier is hard at work preparing for the trip of a lifetime…to share photographs and writing from the perspective of someone who lives a free and simple life on a sailboat.

Having grown up in southern California and Lake Tahoe, John always had a passion for the ocean, camping, writing, and photography.  But it was all a low priority while he served ten years as an officer in the U.S. Air Force flying F-15E Strike Eagles.  During the few big trips that he was able to take, such as hiking through the jungles of Costa Rica or backpacking solo through the Scottish Highlands, he dreamt of the day he could do these things full-time.  That day came where the opportunity presented itself, and John seized it, trading his secure dream job and good income for his other dream of living on a sailboat and focusing on his photography.  Money and stress gave way to simple living, happiness, and health.

John’s photography captures the simple beauty of the natural world and mankind’s place in it.  His message is one of conservation and respect for the power of nature, but his vehicle is photography instead of doomsday prophecies.  He strongly believes in the power of images to evoke emotional responses more than written threats do.  His photographs have been featured for the Triangle Land Conservancy, the Eno River Association, on exhibit for the Carolina Nature Photographer’s Association, published with an accompanying article in Camera in the Wild magazine, and won an honorable mention in the first national juried exhibit that he entered.  Other photographs made under employment with the Air Force have been published in the L.A. Times, London Daily Telegraph, on exhibit with the North Carolina Humanities Council, and selected as one of Wikipedia’s Top 25 Photos of 2010.

John’s final day in the Air Force is August 1st 2012, and he’s made the decision to start heading south with California in mind as a final destination – but how he gets there is anyone’s guess.  He’ll go where the winds and the tides take him, and be in no hurry to get there.  He’ll photograph his journey and the world as he sees it from his sailboat, as someone who is a guest in our vast ocean, and not as someone who is there to control it.  He sets sail in the fall.