Mari (she/her/hers) grew up on the coast of Connecticut in the town of Westport. An abundance of travel to the Adirondacks and the Pacific Northwest as a kid engendered a love and wonder of nature from an early age. She diverged from this for a number of years, studying filmmaking at Carleton College in Northfield, MN while searching out how to best connect with others on a deeper level.

After college she traveled extensively in South East Asia, managing media for a hospital in rural India and a travel agency in Nepal. She returned to the US, fixed up a 1977 Honda motorcycle and rode from New York > Florida > California and back, connecting with people across the country. During her travels, she paused in Michigan to teach students the basics of expressing their inner landscapes through filmmaking.

Mari strove to connect with others for so long, and during the pandemic she was given the opportunity to connect with herself. She officially came out as transgender and queer and opened up to her latent love of nature and the outdoors. She studied wilderness survival and scout tactics at the ROOTS School in Vermont before joining True North as a guide. Her role as an Established Lead Guide combines her two loves of being in the outdoors and working with adolescents to better understand their own personal journey.

When not guiding, Mari can be found dancing, playing guitar or swimming in mountain lakes. She is working towards another countrywide motorcycle trip, this time presenting as female, as well as a subsistence kayak trip from Seattle to Alaska in a handmade kayak.