What is it about getting lost in the middle of nowhere that makes you feel like you are finally somewhere? After an exhausting 6 mile hike along cliff sides reaching several hundred feet above the treetops of Northern OR, you'll find a powerful breath of fresh air walking through a tunnel, carved with TNT in 1908, that allows passage under an enormous and indescribable waterfall. The entire hike, elevated above a river through the mountains with water so clear, to properly perceive its depth is challenging. Its scary to think that our children will grow to know little of natures beauty given man's ways of destruction and pollution. The world has been reprogrammed with the internet and smartphones which is becoming the main source of experience to newer generations. As life requires us more and more to exchange our time for money only to provide a place to rest until tomorrows work day, we have become disconnected with what is real in life given the lack of time for it. What used to be considered common knowledge is no longer priority in life. We don't teach to grow and harvest healthy foods for ourselves as we've come to believe that food comes from the grocery store. We don't teach our kids the benefits of natures connections because they can see it all in a video online. We have forgotten that silence can speak to us in ways that allow wisdom to be conceived and revealed. Today's modern life revolves around status, style, selfies and how many people like them. It can get overwhelming to find yourself caught up in the unneeded fast paces that today's life demands. Your sanity's survival is important to nurture which is what bring us to the great outdoors. There we find an unexplainable connectivity to this vast universe. Is it that we are running away from society for a brief escape or are we running back to something we used to know so well, like home? As cities expand and evolve, it pushes these escapes further and further away from our attention. Will our children even know they exist in years to come or, a scary thought, will these places even exist for our children to know? There are magical experiences in the arms of the wilderness that you can not learn from watching a video or reading a post.
For example. Along this trail you are accompanied by a blanket of warm sunlight but as you pass through shaded turns hidden from the sun's hand, you can feel an abrupt change of temperature and consistency of the air around you. You can sense the absence of the sun's touch upon the hidden rock walls which result in a refreshingly cool summer breezes. Then turn a corner and walk through a wall of humidity and comfortable heat. To stand a hundred feet above an enormous bowl of mountain water and see the color of the rocks that lie 20 feet below is breathtaking. You can't connect to it unless you plug yourself into it directly. You can't see that in your local state's capital lakes. Instead, they are lined with caution signs that warn us to not drink or even swim in the water and most important, don't eat the fish due to contamination. Is is not funny that the lakes that represent our state's capitals are beyond polluted? This is the Pacific North West, one of the most beautiful and versatile geographical areas in the United States and we, as humans, turn a blind eye to its destruction by man. There are thousands of pathways that lead to somewhere or another. Places that can not be crafted by man. Places that only the universe and mother nature have the love and compassion to come up with. One by one those path ways are becoming scarce and harder to find. As a father of a 4 year old boy, I understand the importance in passing down a knowledge and awareness of this planet's beauty and magic and will be documenting my experiences for him to be inspired by in hopes that one day, after I'm long gone, he will have the will and desire to find a path of his own that isn't paved. This is the first post of this blog and hopefully will be shared and appreciated by those like minded adventure seekers of nature. I hope to give awareness of something/somewhere that can be appreciated by others before their gone and would hope that in return, the readers of these thoughts and experiences, have some of their own to share. I'm sure we'll pass each other along a trail one day and unlike the exchanges we have in the city, as two people pass one another on a busy sidewalk, it is uncommon to make eye contact or offer a "hello". But as you are familiar with mountain life, you know thats not the case out there. Don't ignore those around you. We are here for common median of life, love and memory. Lets make the best of it not only for ourselves, but also for our children and to those around you that are equally human. -Marcus Loyd
