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Feel it

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Feel it

Feel it

How often have you thought about climbing to the highest precipice within your reach to remember the sensation and the rawness of nature, only to fall short several steps before tying your boots, living off the thought and neglecting your instincts?

I’ve done it. But soon there comes a time when you can’t break another promise. You leap into your car, you jump on your bike, or you take to your feet with a boundless energy that will only subside once you have reached your crown. Climb to the craggiest cliff edge, scarred with hacked-off boulders, bowing trees and a relenting wind, as roaring waves crash into the rock face a hundred metres beneath your feet. Feel the sea spray across your face, smell the ocean and remember, that at one time, deep into the depths of your blood line, this was once your home.

Why walk like a snail?

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Why slide like a snail?

Why walk like a snail?

Some days I’d rather walk like a snail, or rather, slide like one. Let me explain. In 1995, Archie, a garden snail hailing from Pott Row Farm in Norfolk, England, completed a 33-centimetre sprint in a breathtaking two minutes. Indeed, the speeding snail was so fast, that he (or she, it wasn’t obvious) swiftly found himself in the Guinness Book of World Records. Yet, in spite of his clear talent, Archie still lagged behind even the world’s slowest of animals – the tortoise, the sloth and the lethargic Koala bear.

Reaching speeds of up to 0.01 kilometres per hour, it would take Archie the garden snail 172,595 days to slide around the globe. With his small stature and quiet demeanor, Archie would go widely unnoticed, viewing the world from a snail’s-eye-view, humbly, innocently and with no other motive than to broaden his own experience. It may well take Archie several lifetimes to complete the journey, but what a wondrous adventure that would be.

If snails tickle your inspiration buds, check out snailaday, a wonderful collection of one of the planet’s greatest creatures.

Hiking to the rainbow’s end

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Looking south from Mt. Branden

Looking south from Mt. Branden

This weekend I took a hike up to the 500-metre peak of Mt. Branden in Sooke, Vancouver Island. With cloud resting in the deeply vegetated valleys, the Olympic Mountains aglow with patches of sunlight and the chirrups of the forest birds, my possibilities for day dreaming were plentiful. Yet, in spite of these patent blessings, it was a show of opalescence earlier that morning that stole my mind for the day: the magnificent arch of a stooping rainbow cast across the Victoria Inner Harbour.

Seeking the rainbow's end

Seeking the rainbow’s end

Seeking the rainbow’s end will not bestow you with a pot of gold, but instead the greater gift of venturing into a land unknown, pushing your horizons and invigorating your soul.