I'm going out on the F@#$ ....ok I can't talk about it here. I'm going out on the best .....ok well I'm going out on a boat (minus some really really cool explatives, and narratives and other " 'tives'.) Its like the deal with FIGHT CLUB. The first rule of (I can't say) is that we don't talk about (I can't say). Let me compare this whole experience, that I'm going to have with.....well I'll draw an analogy with caving. Cavers, who never, ever call themselves "spelunkers" unless of course they are European tourists, only use superlatives as loosely as I am at this moment, when they refer to "never ever" tell other people where the caves are. It is a very very secret deal the cavers have. I now have a complete respect for them, not because of the arduous journeys they take to the beautiful armpits of the earth, but because of the quiet nature they do it with, because of the intelligence of keeping things to themselves, in spite of the huge call we humans have to "brag" about our experiences. Thinking about all this now, please expect my facebook posts to be much more boring and vague (and yes I realize they were pretty bad already). I guess it's one sad thing about the internet...the more you talk about an experience, the more one "brags" or "boasts" or even just "enjoys" an experience "out loud" the more that "experience" has the potential to be adulterated by others with no respect for how hard your journey to that place was.
My first little example of this, which I share often, is of the great time I had in Alaska. Two months, homeless with two really great people in kayaks. We explored 1000 miles of shoreline, saw things up close and personal. Killer wales beside us miles from shore, Humpback wales under the kayaks....there just isn't time here in this analogy to completely describe the beauty of being there in person bearing witness to so many incredible circumstances (I have to throw in "Grizzly Bears"). I brought back thousands of pictures when I returned home to Ohio. A thousand pictures not just from me but from the rest of us in the group, and our extended hitchhiking group. When I went to share them with people, with all the excitement of just having come home from this extrafabulatitistic journey, I narrowed the number of my pictures down to 50. I thought, knowing the patience of people looking at vacation pictures that 50 was pretty good. 50 out of a thousand. I think the second person I showed them to said, and yes I sadly quote "yea I saw that on the discovery channel". I stopped showing pictures after that.
Ok, that example is is not a great example of why cavers keep their stuff secret, more of me bitching. The real example or reason not to be to detailed online about the locations you visit that people are too lazy to discover for themselves, is that it will completely ruin it. People find it, and people screw it up.
We played ultimate tonight. Paul showed up. He's not only a great frisbee player but he's part owner in a trimaran that has been around the world. He's basically a hero for me. He told us, while we sat around having a few beers after frisbee, about some of the places he had been out here a while ago, and how he has recently revisited them. One place, had a phenomenal beach break for surfing. Ten years ago, he said, he had it all to himself. When he went back last month, "the second richest guy in the world" was there with huge catamarns, and noisy helicopters, and he was "clearly not happy about me being there". He had other stories about other beautiful places adultrated by people. I guess that's how we roll unfortunately.
I also got an invite to go sailing Tuesday night with a great group of people out here on a Trimaran that has been out and about for 2 years with Paul, TC and John.
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