This Couple Was Introduced by … a Mule?

Bernie Harberts: To really understand this, you need to meet Brick and Cracker. Brick and Cracker tied on the porch. So hang on, I’ll grab my gear and run out real quick. This is so fun. So we’re going to go out on the little door here.

Johanna Mayer: This is Bernie Harberts. You might remember him. He’s been on the show before. Last time we talked to Bernie, we heard about his travels through South Dakota with his mule, Polly, and a little wagon. These slow-moving, old-timey trips are kind of his thing. And as you may have gathered, Polly is not the only mule in Bernie’s life.

Bernie: Cracker is probably 15 now. And his head is huge. It’s like as long as my thigh. His ears are massive. They’re like almost a foot long. Cracker is solid. He’s the steady. Now, Brick, she’s like the youngster of the duo. She’s like a little doe. She’s like a little wood fairy. So she’s shy, very active.

Johanna: In 2019, Bernie set off on a great adventure with Brick and Cracker. Their plan was to travel across the United States, from their home in North Carolina all the way to Idaho, entirely by foot, or by hoof, I should say. No support vehicle, no wagon, just Bernie riding Cracker and Brick carrying a tent and a little gear alongside. On the morning they set off, the plan was that Bernie would have Brick and Cracker standing next to each other and he’d hang onto Brick’s lead rope while mounting Cracker. Then they’d walk away together into the proverbial sunrise. That is not what happened.

Bernie: As I’m swinging my leg over Cracker’s butt, my leg gets caught in Brick’s lead rope. Brick is like, what?!

Johanna: Brick bolts.

Bernie: And I’m like, holy crap! I’ve just lost my mule before I even got on my other mule and I was still inside of the mailbox. Like, that’s a really lousy way to start a trip.

Johanna: Soon enough, Brick comes back on her own.

Bernie: And she runs right inside, she runs by me, and runs up to Cracker and just slides in beside him and is like, “I’m ready to go now.” Like, now “I, Brick, the mule, am ready to go. So let’s go.”

Johanna: So, they go. I’m Johanna Mayer and this is Atlas Obscura, a celebration of the world’s strange, incredible, and wondrous places. Today, we hitch a ride with Bernie, Brick, and Cracker on their long walk across the United States. This isn’t Bernie’s first rodeo. He’s left home for plenty of long stretches before. But on this trip, for the very first time, there was something calling him home.

This is an edited transcript of the Atlas Obscura Podcast: a celebration of the world’s strange, incredible, and wondrous places. Find the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and all major podcast apps.

Johanna: Bernie Harberts is no stranger to solo travel. He once spent 14 months riding a wagon from Canada to Mexico. He sailed in a wooden boat to South Georgia Island near Antarctica. He once spent 63 days alone at sea, without seeing or speaking to a single soul. On this trip, Bernie, Brick, and Cracker moved at about 10 miles per day, traveling as much as possible on small back roads. Every night, Bernie would knock on someone’s door and ask if he and his mules could camp there that night. The trio started in North Carolina, traveled across Tennessee and through the Cumberland Gap, a low spot in the mountains where Tennessee butts up against Kentucky. And then, in May, they hit the Ohio River.

Bernie: And the river is so big, it looks like this big lake that is, like, just slowly sliding sideways. And I look up the river upstream, and I see this blue bridge, and it looks like a skinny blue cloud floating above the Ohio River. So I’m, like, kind of bummed out.

Johanna: Bridges are not a mule’s friend. They’re scary, unsettling. And Brick, in particular, really, really hates them. But Bernie’s got no other options. So he psychs himself up and pulls up to the bridge.

Bernie: It looks even bigger standing, like, in front of it. And I look over the side, and what used to be trees, they look like when you break a head of broccoli apart, like the little pieces of broccoli. That’s what they looked like. And my biggest fear was coming across an expansion joint.

Johanna: Expansion joints allow bridges to naturally expand and contract without cracking. They look kind of like a big set of metal teeth. When you drive over them in a car, there’s a little thump. No big deal. But when you’re on a mule? Different story.

Bernie: And I’m, like, can’t worry about it now. Let’s go. So I’m jogging along, and the sound, like, the pickets are, like, clink, clink, clink, clink, clink. And you hear the footfalls, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop. And the crack is, like, you know, breathing hard. And then a semi comes right by us in the opposite direction. Vroom! Now I’ve got to get into the girder part of the bridge, and I think this is where the expansion joint is. And I’m, like, that’s it. We’re screwed. Kick cracker, just totally running on adrenaline. It’s a shadow, it turns out. He jumps the shadow. Brick gets dragged behind him. We’re out into the middle of this 3,000-foot-long bridge across the second-biggest river in the United States. So we click, click, and we’re chick, chick, trotting along, trotting along, clink, clink, clink. It’s just so loud. I can’t believe how loud it is. And we get to the other side of the bridge, and I am jubilant. I’m, like, so happy. I’m, like, we made it! I’m, like, so psyched.

Johanna: After the Ohio River crossing, Bernie had about 400 miles to go until he had to worry about crossing another big, bad bridge. By that point, he says he was feeling irradiated, like all the tension of riding two mules alongside big highways with cars zooming past day in and day out had just completely fried his nerves. But then he hit Missouri.

Bernie: It felt like somebody added 1,000 acres to the sky, and I finally, like, started just breathing this sigh of relief. I felt like I was in the Promised Land.

Johanna: This was what Bernie had been waiting for. The rough beginning, the terrifying bridge crossing, it was all worth it for this feeling. He began to enter a deep, almost meditative state, one that he often slips into during his long solo travels.

Bernie: I was so grasped by the physicality of, like, being out there, hands on reins. I feel like I disappeared, which was a beautiful, blissful place to be. But I also felt, holy crap, like I have a wife, Julia.

Julia Carpenter: Well, hello, I’m Julia Carpenter. I’m married to Bernie Harbert.

Bernie: The biggest difference in my life, in this trip and the other trips, was I’d done all the other trips as a bachelor.

Julia: Bernie has always had this piece of him that it’s just instinctual for Bernie to take off and want to be traveling.

Bernie: It’s just an urge with me, and it lies dormant for a couple years. Then it pops up, and I just have to go. I just have to leave. And so this is why I waited so long to marry the exact right person, because she said, “Go, go.” She said, “Go.”

Johanna: Bernie and Julia got married a little later than average, in their early 50s.

Julia: We like to say we were introduced through a mule.

Johanna: Bernie had been on one of his long journeys, this time with a mule and a pony. But when the trip was over, Bernie didn’t have a farm or land where he could keep them. So he took out an ad, hoping to find the animals a home. Julia saw that ad. She has a major soft spot for animals. And she had her own farm in Massachusetts. She told Bernie she’d take in the animals, and the rest is history. Since then, Julia’s traveled with Bernie. Together, they’ve gone on weeks-long mule rambles. And that blissful state that Bernie was describing, where he felt like he disappeared, Julia gets it.

Julia: It’s that beautiful state that animals are in. He’s, like, looking at the scenery, seeing a tree, you know, feeling the wind. But there really is not a lot of thinking. You know, obviously, he can think really well. And he can focus really well. But Bernie’s very Cracker-like in that way. Cracker picks a middle distance, and he just stares. It’s really a good way to be.

Johanna: This time, while Bernie was away, Julia decided to go back to her old farm in Massachusetts. She still owned it, wanted to check in on it, see old friends. So Bernie and Julia gave each other a hug and said, “See you in six months.” Back on the road, Bernie, Cracker, and Brick had traversed Missouri, crossed through Iowa, and hit Nebraska. And Bernie loved Nebraska so much that he invited Julia to come out for a few days and visit him. They had a grand old time. They went to a lake, hung out in a little rented cabin.

Julia: I sometimes describe us as the two halves in a walnut shell. We just get along so super well. And from one end to the other, it was so nice to see each other.

Bernie: And then, of course, leaving, that’s what really hurt. To go back to this solo traveling with the mules … The first day back on the road, I swear I talked the whole day to the mules. I just talked to the mules.

Johanna: Back on the road again, and without Julia, Bernie kept pushing towards Idaho. Only Wyoming stood between him and his final destination. But the weather was changing. Winter was coming. He still had some tough road ahead. But the trio trudged on. And finally, at long last, they crossed into Idaho. On his second to last day of the journey, Bernie met up with some family who lived there, and they all went out to dinner. After months of eating oats and quinoa and other small provisions, Bernie was blissing out.

Bernie: The flavors, it was like—it’s a piece of shrimp, but no, it’s an IMAX movie about sex and the ocean and orgasms and salt, and wow, pass me the eel sauce. It was like this over-the-top sensual thing, and they’re looking at me like, “Bernie, it’s the eel roll. It’s the eel sauce. We eat here on Fridays.”

Johanna: After the best dinner of his life, Bernie spent one more night camping. He woke up to a lovely snowy morning. And for the last time, he hit the road. But before he could finish his 2,323-mile-long journey, Bernie faced one more obstacle.

Bernie: And I come to a bridge. And I’m like, really? Like, a bridge here? Right back where we started. Halfway across, a big truck with snow chains comes flying the other way. Vroom! It goes by, sprays the mules. I’m turning, I’m like, you asshole! But I was smiling because I was jubilant. I was across the last bridge.

Johanna: Nineteen million mule steps. Bernie did the calculations, and that’s about how many footfalls it would have taken Brick and Cracker to make the journey.

Bernie: I was sitting on Cracker, and I looked at little Brick, who’d been so brave and overcome so many of her fears. And I thought, you know, my life from here on out will not be this pared-back, simple, and beautiful again, in that sense that everything I owned at that point was either—I was wearing it or Brick was carrying it, and there was a gorgeous beauty to that. And then at the same time, I was like, hot damn, you know, we are here. But best of all, it was like, I’m going home. I’m going home to see Julia. That’s when it hit me, right there, sitting in the saddle. I was going to go home and see her. And it was a wonderful life that I’d left behind.

Johanna: Meanwhile, back at her farm in Massachusetts, Julia was also doing some reflecting. She still had one foot left in her old life, but she was ready to make a change.

Julia: I think some of those lonely evenings just sitting there allowed the place to just become solidified as a special memory. I was able to sit there one night in the sunset and think, “I’m ready to leave this place. I’m ready to let it go.” Julia got the farm ready to sell. By the time she was finished, Bernie was wrapping up his trip. And then they both came home. And life on the ranch these days, it’s pretty darn good for everybody.

Bernie: So, right now we’re standing under these huge chestnut trees and we’re going to feed Brick and Cracker some chestnuts. So this is what it sounds like when an 850-pound mule eats four chestnuts at once. This is Cracker eating four chestnuts. Here, Cracker. Okay, so here’s Brick. Brick’s going for five chestnuts. Here you go, Brick. Cheers.

Johanna: To keep up with Bernie and hear more about his travels, be sure to sign up for his newsletter. You can do that at his website, riverearth.com. There’s a link in our show notes. Also, Bernie wrote a fantastic book about his experience riding across the country with Cracker and Brick. It’s called, Two Mules to Triumph. And he’s looking for a publisher. So if you happen to work in publishing or if you know someone who does, get in touch. Bernie Harberd’s is a gem.

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Our podcast is a co-production of Atlas Obscura and Stitcher Studios. The production team includes Dylan Thuras, Doug Baldinger, Chris Naka, Kameel Stanley, Manolo Morales, Baudelaire, Gabby Gladney. Our technical director is Casey Holford. This episode was mixed by Luz Fleming. Our theme and end credit music is by Sam Tyndall.

This story originally ran in 2023; it has been updated for 2025.