Sailor, social anthropologist, mountain guide, queer anarchist & Outdoor Lover, meet Tomas Salem
There's a certain kind of person who doesn't just question the rules — they sail away from them entirely.
Our newest Outdoor Lover, Tomas Salem, is a social anthropologist, sailor, mountain guide and self-proclaimed queer anarchist who recently sailde from the Med to the Caribbean with his sights set on a Pacific crossing. He grew up between Patagonia and Norway, shaped by the philosophy of the right to roar - the belief that nature belongs to everyone, unconditionally.
His current voyage is part adventure, part inquiry: a non-stop circumnavigation in support of ocean conservation, planned for completion in 2027.
This Pride, we celebrate every person who has ever felt more themselves outdoors than anywhere else.
You’ve lived in many different countries and landscapes throughout your life. What are some of your earliest memories of being outdoors, and how did those experiences shape your relationship with nature?
I was born in Patagonia, and as a kid, my parents would always take my brother and me out in the woods, to the lakes and in the mountains. My first real hike was to Refugio Frey on Cerro Catedral—one of Argentina's biggest skiing and climbing meccas. We were caught in the rain without raincoats, and my parents dressed me and my brother up in trash bags to keep us dry.
We hiked down from the mountains singing and laughing in the rain. I learned that the outdoors is always available to you—you don’t need a lot of gear or money to enjoy nature. It is giving and abundant—a source of joy and adventure that you can access no matter who you are or where you’re from. This was reinforced when my family moved to Norway in the early 90's, and my childhood was shaped by the Norwegian outdoor tradition, which is heavily influenced by ecophilosophy and the right to roam: the idea that the outdoors should be freely accessible to everyone.
You’ve spent time in places as varied as Patagonia, the Arctic, Brazil, and now the open ocean. What have these environments taught you about yourself?
More than teaching me anything about myself, they are places that have shaped who I am. The Norwegian philosopher Arne Næss has argued that the environment is an extension of the self, and that different environments allow for different ways of being. I think Patagonia has been the place where I’ve been most able to connect with the part of me who feels happy and fulfilled with very few material possessions and has taught me the most about community life. In my twenties, I spent almost every summer guiding people on the glaciers, peaks, and valleys in the area around El Chalten, and became part of a village whose identity is largely shaped by people's relationship to the jaw-dropping mountains in the area.
Living within the confines of a National Park and being in remote areas where few people go has really hammered in an awareness of the incredible beauty and greatness of our planet. It has awoken a spiritual side of life that I missed growing up, and taught me to value the deeper connection that we have to the land.
Your work has explored why so many people seek meaning and fulfillment outdoors. What have you learned about the role nature plays in people’s lives?
As a social anthropologist interested in modern people's relationship to the mountains, I've learned that appreciation for nature almost always comes back to the spiritual dimension of life. For many people who spend a lot of time in the outdoors, the landscape is alive, sacred, and full of deeper meaning. Our relationship to land is bigger than what our rational minds can grasp—it is much more than a space for leisure or play—it is one of the places where we get to experience joy, awe, wonder, and the feeling of being part of a much larger web of life. Being in nature has the capacity to put us in touch with something deeply human, I’d even say some essence of what it means to be alive, that is shared across time and societies.
For many of the outdoor lovers I’ve met, being in nature is a religious experience, and I think that’s something that is often overlooked when we debate how we should relate to the environment in the future. Every time we cut a forest or mine a mountain, we’re creating a wound, chipping away at a piece of our own humanity. I hope that the future of conservation takes the spiritual meaning of the environment more into account.
Throughout your travels and research, have there been any encounters or conversations that fundamentally changed the way you see the world?
During the journey I'm on right now, I've done my little rituals out in nature, and had moments when I speak or pray to the mountains, the ocean, or the lakes—or sense the energy and personality of a landscape—from the stunning northern shores of Mallorca to the wild rock formations of Bryce Canyon. When I set out to cross the Atlantic in December 2024, I ran into an old Norwegian sailor in the port of Motril, on the Andalucian coast in Spain. He was allegedly in his 80's but looked at least 20 years younger. I don't know if it was the sun or the sea that had preserved his youthfulness. Perhaps it was his body's response to an uncompromising commitment to aliveness. The old man had recently solo-sailed to Brazil and back, and offered me his pragmatic wisdom: Don't cruise at full speed, leave room for slack.
Treat nature with reverence and care. Pray. A few months later, I was in Guatemala, where I spent some time with a family of Mayan midwives and spirit guides in the highlands. They taught me how to pray to the land, and since then my relationship to nature has deepened and taken on a different shape. I like to pay attention to what kind of emotions the landscape awakens in me and what kind of energy it gives off. Every place has its unique character and capacity to affect us in different ways, and becoming attuned to that has really opened up a new way of experiencing and perceiving the world.
Many people dream about making a dramatic life change but never take the leap. What gave you the impetus and confidence to embrace an entirely new challenge and lifestyle?
I just wasn’t happy with how I was living my life. I was hustling at work and somehow still managed to always feel like I was falling behind. I lost my partner to cancer in 2020 and had been on antidepressants trying to rebuild my life in Barcelona, but I realised that I was moving in the completely opposite direction of where I wanted to go.
The big city with its status hierarchies and quick pace felt overwhelming. And I knew that I didn’t want to keep living that way and that life has more to offer. It was scary at first, and it hasn’t been easy to transition into the way of life I'm living now, but I have a lot of faith that I'm guided on this journey and that there's a purpose to what I'm doing right now. That has helped me overcome many emotional challenges and obstacles. I haven't been a person of faith in the past, but this journey has shown me that the world is full of miracles when we stay attuned and stop forcing outcomes.
Life at sea seems to offer both freedom and uncertainty. What have been some of the most rewarding and most challenging aspects of living aboard a sailboat?
I’ve had many times where I’ve wanted to give up. Especially when the boat breaks down in some small town in a foreign country, and I have to spend money that I don’t have on repairs, it can feel like I’m in over my head. Knowing that everything I own is on my boat, that I’m far away from my home port, and that there are usually no easy fixes to whatever challenge I encounter can make the journey feel like a never-ending ultramarathon. But the encounters that I have with people and places wherever I go make it worth it.
I love collecting stories, and I love connecting with people from a completely different background than my own. Realizing that we all feel the same emotions, that we’re all on a journey in life with ups and downs, and that we can rely on each other despite our differences has been the biggest gift of sailing. And of course the moments of pure magic in the middle of somewhere, with the ocean, the dolphins, the sunsets, the squalls, and the saltwater sticking to your skin. It makes me feel alive.
Your current journey is about way more than sailing. What questions are you hoping to explore, and what stories are you hoping to uncover along the way?
I've wanted to put the theories from my research on happiness to the test and to show people that joy can be found in the small encounters as well as the bigger ones, even when it feels like the world is falling apart. Sometimes happiness is a night around the bonfire with new friends; sometimes it is found in a freshwater shower under the rain. I want to challenge the idea that there is a right and wrong way to do life, and that success is about status--about having a career, a nice home, or the right partner.
The questions I’m most interested in exploring are how people relate to nature and faith in the places I travel through and how they give meaning to their lives. I want to contribute to the ongoing debate about what we can learn from each other, and explore what different wisdom traditions share across cultures.
Spending so much time outdoors and on the water means constant exposure to sun, wind, and salt. How are you taking care of your skin, and what role does sun protection play in your daily routine?
Out at sea, the sun can be relentless, especially when you sail in tropical waters. It can also be challenging to get a shower, and often I can go days or weeks just rinsing off in saltwater. Having a good sunscreen that doesn't leave residue or my skin feeling sticky makes all the difference. In the past, I've relied on off-the-shelf products that keep me from getting burned, but that doesn't really feel like skincare, and at times, I've probably been a bit too lazy with my routine.
I also don't like the fact that many sunscreen brands use chemicals that might be harmful for the environment and contribute to plastic waste. With Utu, it feels different--I'm really impressed with what you guys are achieving, and knowing that what I'm putting on my skin isn't ending up in the reef makes it an easy choice.
As you prepare to cross the Pacific and continue your voyage toward Australia, what are you most looking forward to, and what do you hope this journey will ultimately become?
I’m looking forward to exploring the Pacific Islands and New Zealand. Island cultures, traditional ways of life, slow travel with no set dates, and to keep uncovering the small and big gifts that this journey is bringing. I’m creating a living storytelling project around the journey, and I see it as my little contribution to a better future.
I hope it can inspire others to pursue their dreams, to break out of the hamster wheel, to reconnect with joy, community, and nature at a moment when it feels like we are all a little lost. I hope that by sharing my story, I can contribute to the debate about what it means to live well on a damaged earth, and how we, quite literally, might turn this ship around.
Please share one piece of wisdom or learning that has impacted your life that you can share with those wishing to make a major life change and follow their dream?
Your mind is the biggest challenge standing between you and the life that you’re dreaming of.
Please also share anything you'd like to say about the Utu products that we can use as a testimonial.
"UTU's products have been a game-changer for the way I take care of my skin. The fact that the sunscreen leaves no residue on the skin and that it also acts as skincare is alone enough to make me want to put this on first thing in the morning. That it's also created with the environment in mind makes it even better. Thank you guys, for creating a product that I don't want to be without.
You've made suncare sexy again."
Utu is a queer-founded brand built on the belief that the outdoors is for everyone — every body, every identity, every life lived on its own terms. Joy, awe, wonder, and the feeling of belonging to something larger than yourself: these aren’t privileges. They're birthright.
Get Outside. We love you.
-Utu
