“Go where life is lived out of stuff sacks and gourmet meals require only hot water.”
This caught my eye this morning and I would be remiss if I failed to follow up with why I love this line so much.
As I said this morning I begin my travels to hike Pikes Peak shortly. My kids (including spouses), will be joining me on this adventure. This in of itself will be wonderful time, but there’s more. These words invoked a kind of Indiana Jones image of adventure travel (at least in my mind, but maybe with less bad guy Nazis).
It’s one thing to travel around and live out of a suitcase, as I have many times and I know the vast majority of people who travel do as well whether for business or for recreation, it’s just not inspiring. It sounds like a burden. To exist. To slog from point A to point B with the least amount of joy. So to pare down your luggage to simply living out of stuff sacks and eating meals so simple they just need some hot water to make them wonderful, implies you are not traveling the beaten path, you are not stopping long enough to unpack, you relish even the simplest foods, the journey is the destination. Imagine yourself traveling across the a continent with little more than a few essentials in a small satchel. It’s not about what you take on a trip which makes it an adventure, it’s about what you leave behind.
It’s a little difficult to put in to words, why there is a certain joy in adventure traveling and why these words so exited me. Admittedly there can be some boring moments and there is a level of some slogging which happens. But some of it is the euphoric feeling when you crest a summit, when you break out of the tree lined trail on to a mountain bald, you drop you gear in the grass, and just sit in the warm sun for a moment looking out across the mountains and hills of the earth all the way to the horizon. Or the feeling of awe when you are walking along the trail and discover a new fawn laying in the ferns just feet from you. I think it’s these moments when you connect with the natural world which drive the desire to do it again. To travel new places, to experience new things, to push out to the edge of your comfort zone. The words which caught my attention this morning as I was sitting drinking coffee, were almost like a blessing for the upcoming journey, “Go where life is lived out of stuff sacks and gourmet meals require only hot water.”
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Joanne
Looking forward to hearing the stories from this adventure!!
Bob Brayman
I have learned, especially in the last five years is the less we have the better life gets. Both literally and figuratively.