It was an auspicious start to the day. A pack of local cyclists accompanied him out of town, one rider swapping his lightweight road bike for Schlimmer’s loaded-down Jamis. After saying their goodbyes, Schlimmer was alone again and facing a long climb to the plateau. But something wasn’t right. “It was one of those days where you say, ‘Man, are my brakes on? Do I have a flat tire? What’s going on?’ And I just took it as one of those days,” he says, “until I got to the point where I couldn’t push my bike.” In the world according to Schlimmer, adventure is everywhere. So it’s reasonable to conclude that danger is everywhere too, just waiting to throw a wrench into the works. In this case, the spoiler was his hosts’ four-year-old daughter who passed a nasty stomach bug on to him the night before. Thirty-three miles outside of Provo, Schlimmer collapsed on the side of the road and threw up. He eventually hitched a ride back into town and spent the night in the same guest bedroom, plagued by fever dreams of being lost and alone on the Wasatch Plateau.

As it turns out, the Wasatch Plateau was nothing like the nightmares. Once he recovered, Schlimmer spent four days rumbling along dirt trails that rose above verdant meadows worked by Central and South American sheepherders. From there, it was on to Arizona and some the most challenging terrain of the entire route; the sizzling heat of the Sonora Desert; rock-strewn streambeds where riding wasn’t an option. “I thought I was going to ride the whole thing border to border,” Schlimmer says. “I would ride and it got rougher and rougher and rougherÑrough enough to where I was carrying my bike.” (Schlimmer named this hike-and-bike technique “warrior style.”) He stayed off-road to the very end, riding beneath power lines and alongside gas pipelines to the border settlement of Lochiel, Ariz. “One day, you put on the brakes and it’s over,” he says. “A lot was running through my mind. ‘The route is done, the adventure is over. What am I going to do after this?’ I made the decision to share the tale.”

A lot has changed in the five months after Schlimmer wandered out of the desert. When I talked to him a few weeks after his ride, he seemed to be suffering from some post-trip malaise. He had no speaking engagements lined up and expressed frustration at the prospect of returning to seasonal employment. It was starting to dawn on him what the “professional” part of professional adventurer entailed. “To make a living, you have to be a hustler and you have to deal with people to get what you want accomplished,” says Defilippo. “It’s really been an eye opener for him.”

But that was then. It’s a sunny late-March afternoon in Stowe, Vt., stop No. 4 on Schlimmer’s 14-date speaking tour of universities, libraries, and outing clubs in the Northeast. Despite the summer-like weather, I find him inside a local coffee shop hovering over his laptop. He looks fit and well rested, and, for the first time since we met last summer, content. “A lot has changed and I’ve changed a lot,” he tells me. “I made the decision that I want this to be my lifestyle. I now think of myself as a professional adventurer.”

Schlimmer received a modest amount of media attention following his Western States ride from which he spun this current public speaking tour. But his moment of self-realization came after seeing his name prefaced with the words ‘professional adventurer’ in newspapers. “Sometimes it can be hard to examine yourself and figure out who you are. So I guess I’m a professional adventurer and a writer. I can live with that.”

But can he live on it? Schlimmer’s rates are still on the low end, ranging anywhere from a few hundred dollars to $700 per appearance depending on the venue, a far cry from the four- and five-figure fees more established speakers command. “This summer I may go back to a seasonal job-a backcountry ranger-but I am hoping this is the last one I have,” he says, and then adds, “In one night of speaking I will make more than I would in one week of trail building.”

Andrew Skurka is as close as they come to a professional hiker, with big-name outdoors sponsors and a 92-stop speaking tour underwritten by gear manufacturer Go-Lite. But even he’s not convinced it’s possible to make a living on the trail. “There are very few athletes in a non-competitive sport that have been able to make it work,” says Skurka, who was the first to hike the 7,778-mile transcontinental Sea-to-Sea Trail in 2005. “I haven’t even proven I can do it yet.”

Along with sponsorship stipends, Skurka generates income through freelance writing, public speaking, and the marketing and business development work he performs for outdoor companies. He estimates it takes $15,000 to hike approximately 11 months out of the year. “From my experience, the most important thing is that you’re a great ambassador for the hiking community, exposing people to the outdoors, educating them how to do it,” says the 24-year-old Seekonk, Mass. native. “If you’re good at that, the other things will fall into place.”

And what if they don’t? What if Schlimmer fails to find an audience? Skurka, for one, doesn’t think that will happen, suggesting that Schlimmer’s message of attainable adventure strikes just the right chord with people searching for a vicarious outdoor experience. “If you’re so far out there that people can’t comprehend what you’re doing, then that becomes an issue,” says Skurka. “But I also think it’s important to establish your credibility, to do things that make people say, ‘Wow, that’s cool.’”

Nick Gully says his friend’s greatest contribution may not be what he does on the trail but what others might do as a result. “All of this, when it’s added up, what does it amount to? Are we creating a better world? No is the quick answer, but if you’re inspired by hearing someone like Schlimmer speak you go out and maybe that is making the world a slightly better place because you found something that makes you happy.” And for now at least, Schlimmer is happy. He’s already started scheming his next adventure. On his short list is a traverse, by foot and by boat, of the 611-mile Maine-Canada boundary and a sea-to-summit hike up Mexico’s 18,500-foot Pico de Orizaba. Neither has been done before, and probably for good reason. But so what? “When you look at adventure as defined by Schlimmer,” adds Gully, “it’s unlimited.”

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