Posts Tagged ‘Expeditions’

It was nice to see Justine again. On Tuesday she flew over from Manchester to Chicago, then hopped in a rental car and drove straight up to Wausau for the Open Boat Nationals that begin tomorrow. On the way she stopped in at the house for a quick chat.  My hope is that we’ll get a chance for another quick chat when I get over to the UK in September.  It’s a very weird thing how we make friends at such distances, stay in touch by email, blog and twitter and then only stand in the same room once or twice a year.  Speaking of distant friends, I’m twisting one distant friends arm to come and paddle a bit of the west coast of Scotland with me. Lord knows he’s done it enough.. Someone’s got to keep the silly mid-westerner safe in those tides!

Many miles away there’s a shadow on a door
Of a cottage by the shore
Of a dark Scottish lake
– the police

A new day, a new bowl of Haggis! Well, something like that anyway.  Thanks to everyone for their emails and encouragements. It’s hard sometimes to translate emotions to print but I’m certainly not down or out. Speaking with Kelly last evening I’m sure he’s more disappointed than I am, at least in the fact that I can still get my stuff together continue my Nessie hunt. The only real change comes in that I have to pick up on some logistics and at this point, maybe even those original plans will still go through. Plus there are lots of good folks around that I’m sure I can pester someone to give me a ride to the water’s edge.

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I close my eyes, only for a moment, and the moment’s gone
All my dreams, pass before my eyes, a curiosity
– kansas

It’s that time again.  The time where I can’t let another day go by without making one decision or another about my upcoming paddling adventure. This time of course,  it’s Scotland.  Some of it is easy enough.  Buy this, buy that, read this, read that.. take notes!  What is different is that with a little experience I’m trying to travel as lightly as I possibly can.  Traveling light is harder than you may think given my past BCU training.  You come to believe that anything less than everything is irresponsible. I still remember the days when I carried practically 2 weeks worth of gear just to teach a class because that’s what a “hard core” coach did. Or at least I thought so.  Read the rest of this entry »

What has happened to it all?
Crazy, some are saying
Where is the life that I recognize?
– duran duran

I was walking out of the Tescos in Holyhead, Wales. There was a police car in front of me, one of those tiny ones with the Cheap Trick paint jobs. I walked by it to the right hand drivers side of my rented white Vauxhall Astra. Adjusting my grocery bag in one hand I got the keys out of my pocket and hit the clicker. The Astra beeped back. I put the keys back in my pocket to free up my hand and open the door. I tossed my bag filled with sausage rolls & mars bars (see: The Penrhyn Mawr diet) in the back seat, and sat down behind the wheel. There with the door open, just sitting, surrounded by the muddle of traffic, voices and banging carts of an ordinary day and I thought… “How great is this!?”.

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Lord Byron had a lot of luggage
He took it when he traveled far and wide
He didn’t get to bathe very often
But he liked to change his clothes all the time
-warren zevon

Do I really have to think about gear? September is a long way off at the moment but that does not mean I don’t have to start taking a bit of inventory. For the most part over the years you collect all the gear you need for a few weeks on the water. Still, over time things break, fall apart or get left in far off lands and need to be replaced. No one wants to paddle in the shadow of the “Paps” without proper gear.

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Islands from the first time we saw
we could wait for this moment, like rocks on the shore
we can never be closer somehow
for the moments that lasts, is this moment now
- mike oldfield

It seems humans were on living on Sardinia since at least 250,000 BC. During the early Neolithic period the Nuragic culture were building conical rock towers called Nuraghi (Nuraghe) throughout the island. By the 8th century BC the Phoenicians made their way to the island and created a base of sorts that connected ports all over the Med. When they arrived they found a mainly agricultural people who were more or less happy to trade and  leave the island’s shoreline and harbors to the Phoenicians. In time the Carthaginians took control. ( I can’t say Carthaginians without visualizing George C. Scott) In time they were defeated by the Romans and on and on it goes until next week when Justine & Barry show up…

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Brezhnev took Afghanistan
and Begin took Beirut
Galtieri took the Union Jack
and Maggie, over lunch one day
took a cruiser, with all hands
apparently to make him give it back
- Roger waters

I’ve got my spots. Those marks on the map of places I want to paddle. About a year ago the Falkland Islands were still on that list. I started feeling out what it would take and before long I realized that it was a bit more daunting than I was ready for. . . yet. So I’m pretty interested in following along with Marcus Demuth who plans to begin his circumnavigation of the Falkland’s and all of its 776 outer islands beginning in January. Read the rest of this entry »