I don’t want to sound curmudgeonly, but the truth is that I would generally like to be away from other humans. Obviously, I have my friends, but there’s a reason I work a job that has me solo the vast majority of the time.
When I make my way to natural spaces, including local parks, that desire for solitude is even more prevalent.
That’s why today was a bit of a surprise to me. I didn’t seem to mind the humans in this park. I even spoke to a few of them voluntarily.
Getting Started
I found myself beside Harbor’s Edge Park and in need of a break from driving, so I parked the car, set my timer for 20 minutes (I try to hit the 20 minute mark when walking because I understand that to be a significant tipping point when it comes to health benefits), and started walking around the park on it’s delightful loop trail.
The trees alone were worth the visit.
But in addition to the trees, I’d seen that there were fitness park equipment placed sporadically around the park. I don’t always use such tools, but if I see them, the options that they provide make me much more likely to stop.
Which brings me to the fitness stuff. In the end, I wound up spending a bit longer there than originally planned, but you won’t hear me complain.
While I was looping the park, one gentleman on a bike passed me going in the opposite direction, and not only did he acknowledge me, but he wished me a wonderful day, and you know something? I think he actually meant it.
Weird.
Going to the Dogs
If you know me at all, you know I love dogs. All canines, really. And the more they are in their natural state, the happier I am. The don’t have to be spending their time with me really, as long as they’re enjoying themselves, that is what I’m really looking for.
First, I came across the older couple below. They were playing with their dogs down at the water’s edge. One pup (the poodle) was doing its own thing. I think it was chasing lizards, based on it’s movement / actions. The Irish setter was fetching a ball in the water. Neither could have been happier.
Shortly after, the girl with the chair arrived with her own dog (the black lab) and everyone was off leash and having a blast. Seeing the excitement in their body language was enough to make me actually laugh out loud.
The Cooper’s Hawk
I’d noticed a young woman walking around the loop with me. She was young and attractive, and that always makes me a little extra cautious. Well, the young part does at least. I’m a big guy, and I never want them to be concerned with the big dude in their orbit. So I work pretty hard at remaining harmless. I keep my distance etc. Simple, really, and as I see it, just common curtesy.
I noticed at one point that she’d stopped a ways ahead of me and was clearly staring up into the trees. I assumed she was watching some animal, and she was.
I slowed, so as to not startle her or whatever she was watching, and eventually I saw it myself.
We discussed it briefly, and made some WAGs (Wild Ass Guesses) as to what it might be. Eventually, I used Google Lens to determine that it’s a Cooper’s Hawk. She seemed impressed, and I explained that I’ve learned to use Lens for everything from butterflies to plant types, and how it works remarkably well as I continued on my next lap around the park.
When I got back to the same spot, both she and the hawk were gone.
The King on His Throne
The last thing I saw that was of interest was this squirrel. Nothing life changing, but it was just kinda cool the way he was perched on his little throne, munching away, all backlit by the sun as it came down in dappling little bits through the canopy.
I saw him as I was making my way to the ‘doggy fountain’ to refill my water bottle, and I wished him a wonderful day.
I took the day off today. That may not sound like anything interesting, but it’s uncommon for me. Generally, when I’m off (and it’s not one of my mandated breaks), it’s because the weather is bad and I can’t work. That’s not some sort of humblebrag – it’s just how people doing my job work. Today was an exception. The sun was shining, though it was a bit cool for this neck of the woods (I think it was in the upper 40s / lower 50s). Perfect walking weather.
So, since I had some time available (woke at 7am) I grabbed some breakfast at the place which is rapidly becoming my favorite local food spot – The Moonlight Diner and then figured I would go for a walk.
I’m doing more walking these days in an effort to get a bit more fit. So I thought ”Why not go someplace nice and take a real walk today?”
Walking the Perimeter at Mangurian Park
At first, I screwed that up. I’m not really a patient man. This surprises some folks, because I feel like I have a whole lot of patience for others. But when it comes to myself? None. So I picked a place that looked ’big and green’ on Google Maps. Oops. That big and green? Private golf club. The park I went to (Mangurian Park) was a tiny thing. But still, I felt like I wanted to get something out of it, so I waled the perimeter a couple of times.
20 minutes a day is kinda my ”I really shouldn’t do less than that per day.” limit. I don’t always hit it, but that’s my base target.
So I could have called it, but I had some more time before my only scheduled thing for the day, so I thought ”Let’s see if I can’t improve on my choice of locations.”
I succeeded.
I made my way to Fern Forest which is in Coconut Creek Florida. I highly recommend it!
Palm fronds make for some great shade.
It’s a beautiful preserve with over 30 different kinds of ferns (one of my favorite kinds of plants) and I got some more steps in. Spent another hour walking around and walked about another 3.25 miles. I also took lots of pics. I won’t bore you with all of them, but all of the photographs in this post are from there.
Rosary peas.I absolutely love when one kind of living thing grows from / on top of another living thing.
And this last one is for my friend Shelle. It’s one of several Zebra Longwings I saw throughout my walk. According to Wikipedia, their wing coloring is aposematic to warn predators that ”Hey, I’m not worth it – trust me.” – which in this case is because they process pollen in a way that makes them generally toxic. How frickin cool is that?!
Potential alternate title: Where in the World is Matt?!
from one of my first ‘walk in a random park’ breaks in FL
Well, after a nice long holiday break (I took almost a full month off) I’m back on the road. What’s more, it’s in a way that feels much more ‘real roaming’ than what I’d been doing previously in the New York City / Mid Jersey area. North Carolina was good, but still felt mostly like ‘my back yard’ because of the similar climate / terrain.
So… Florida! More specifically, the area outside Ft. Lauderdale. The project I’m working on isn’t huge (~7,000km) and it’s already half done. In the meantime, I’m enjoying the change of scenery / weather.
The area I’m working in currently. Map courtesy of OpenStreetMap.org
I’m loving the area in general. There’s a scent of water everywhere. Not like the shore, and not quite like a swamp – just… moisture and growing things. That’s really good for the mood of a person like me.
The trees are another cool thing. The crazy twisty trees are super inspirational for the whole fantasy art thing.
Yesterday, I was stuck waiting on some replacement parts for my vehicle, so I took the opportunity to go to the Boca Raton Museum of Art and check out their current exhibit on Machu Picchu. The exhibit was pretty great. I kept my mask on the whole time, and it wasn’t too crowded, so it felt safe enough. I took a ton of pictures, and here too, I found a lot of inspiration for RPG content / concepts.
From the Boca Raton Museum of Art’s Exhibit on Machu Picchu.
And lastly, the food. If you’re reading this, chances are good that you know I’m a sucker for a good ol’ fashioned diner. In fact, it’s become a bit of a thing for me to check out the local diners. They tend to be fairly universal, and don’t change much from one region to another. Perhaps that’s why I like going to them so much – a sense of ‘home’ or the familiar?
In any event, I stopped at a place called Lester’s Diner in Margate Florida. They pride themselves on being the ‘Home of the 14oz cup!’. Ummm. Okay, sure. (My cup was normally sized.) Nice place though. Clean, open, and the service was great. I selected the “Fort Lauderdale” which is a beef frank on a grilled bun, topped with their homemade chili, onions, and cheddar. Served with cole slaw, pickle, and seasoned fries. Yeah, not the healthiest option under the sun, but I’d done a lot of walking earlier in the day, so I said “what the hell”. Tasty and more than filling.
As a quick side note – my job means that I pretty much need to eat out – even during a pandemic. I eat in my hotel room more these days, but there’s only so many microwaveable meals one can stand. For anyone reading this and wondering, I’m fully vaccinated (including my booster) and I wear my mask the whole time I’m in a restaurant with the exception of when I’m actively eating. Stay safe and healthy folks. That’s the only way you can keep roaming after all! 🙂
Health food. Zero calories. Good for ya. Errr… something.
Mark and I left Jill’s at about 11:30 after a relaxing morning and some good conversation. We continued west on 70 and made our way to Indianapolis.
Welcome to Illinois
As we were pulling into Indianapolis, we stumbled on Long’s Bakery. Mark, a speed draw with Yelp, found that locals liked the place so we decided to stop in for a donut. We didn’t know it at the time, but this would become a bit of a recurring theme throughout the trip.
Mmm Donuts – at Long’s Bakery
The Pennsylvania Dutchman in me couldn’t resist – I went for the Apple Cinnamon glazed and Mark had the Cinnamon Glazed.
They were, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, delicious.
Once we’d finished sating our sweet teeth, we headed a short distance over to the IMS or Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
A torqued shot of Mark at the Speedway
It’s kinda a funny stop for us since neither of us are much into racing, but we were looking for something quintessentially Illinois / Indianapolis to do, and honestly, we couldn’t think of anything more appropriate. Sadly, we were not able to go round the track which is a service they offer for just a few bucks. They sold out shortly before we arrived. We did manage to spend some time browsing the museum.
I found the older cars of far more interest for their style and form. They will almost certainly (as I explained to Mark) show up as reference for some sort of pulp fiction sci-fi image from me in the future.
The Antique Racers at the IMS Museum
Once we felt we had a solid sense of the Speedway and the museum there, we continued down the road. Before long, we made a pit stop to get some White Castle.
Mark Has His First White Castle
Yeah. White Castle. Just call us Harold and Kumar. The truth is that Mark had never had White Castle from a brick and mortar shop before, and since we were in an area that had them, I kinda coaxed him into it. Why not? Randomness is good the road trips.
While I drove, Mark did some planning for the Memphis portion of our trip. We knew we were going to visit Graceland (I’d been once, a while back but Mark had never been) but we didn’t have much more than that figured out.
This arrangement, of course, played to our strengths. I drive for my job. The long hours I put in there make me capable of doing very long stretches – even on boring midwestern highways like route 70 and route 57 without suffering terribly. Mark, on the other hand, is much better at figuring out where the best places to go and/or see are. As long as he was able to keep a cellular connection up, he did some digging. He’d occasionally call out a couple of different ideas and we’d weigh the options, but mostly, he did a lot of filtering out bad options while I kept my eyes on the road. It worked very well indeed.
We listened to music after The Memphis Plan was decided on.
We talked briefly to Mark’s wife Moriah once The Plan had been pieced together. Just hearing parts of their conversation reinforced my opinion that they’re both remarkable people who are deeply supportive of one another. It’s enough to give a guy hope for the future.
The View from Our Window Reminds Me of a Batman Movie
We landed in Memphis at about 11pm. We ditched the car and our gear in the local DoubleTree hotel. I’d purchased our two night stay with membership points. Having been someone who lived out of hotels for five years straight does have its advantages. With our stuff secured, we walked down to Beale Street, which was a bit of a shock to me.
Beale Street at Night
I’m not sure what I was expecting, exactly, but Beale Street reminded me of Bourbon Street. It was closed off and had a bit of a block party vibe to the whole thing. That’s kinda funny since it was a Tuesday night and there weren’t many folks out and about. It gave you the sense that you arrived at the party after the fact – the red cups are all used, and the keg’s tapped. Should have arrived sooner, dude.
We were on a mission, though. Mark had a very clear mental picture of what he was looking for: A Memphis bar with a lone musician on stage. They’re plucking at their guitar and feeling the music more than they are playing it. That music would drift out of the place and draw us in like the floating cartoon characters following the scent of their favorite foods. The lights are low, and people are dancing to the blues. Something up tempo, but still blues. He’d find some willing partner and they’d have one really good, really connected dance, and we’d go.
My thoughts for the mission? Pretty much the same, but add me at a corner booth sipping on a nice cold whiskey.
That’s not exactly what we found. What we found was cover bands and desperate prostitutes just trying to find some work in the empty street.
We were approached three times. We politely turned them away three times. One even rubbed on my belly like I was the Buddha before I could make it clear that I was not interested in what she had to offer.
My paranoia sufficiently stoked into overdrive, I confirmed that my wallet was still securely in place as we made our way back up the street until we found ourselves at the Blues City Cafe for a little snack.
Mark at the Blues City Cafe
Mark got the stew, and I got the gumbo. Both were quite tasty. When we were done, we left the money on the table. Our server seemed overly busy with his other tables, so we just let him know the money was on the table as we headed back out.
We poked our head inside BB King’s Blues Club and found that the cover band who had been playing James Brown tunes earlier in the evening had wrapped and were packing up. So, we decided to do the same and walked back to our hotel for the night.
This post is part of a series describing the Road Trip west I took with my best friend. To read about our travels on the previous day, click <<<here. To read about our travels on the following day, click here>>>(Coming Soon).
My heterosexual life partner Mark is doing this crazy thing. He’s moving in with his wife. It’s a long story, but they’ve been bicoastal for a while thanks to school and career complications. That’s okay in the big picture because both of them are the kinds of supportive individuals who somehow manage something like that where it would break most of us. Impressive folks, my people.
Still, it will be wonderful for them to actually be able to have the same address finally.
So Mark has to get from the East Coast to the West, and we figured a road trip was in order. Sure, he could have shipped the last of his stuff and flown west, but where’s the fun in that? Where’s the sense of adventure?!
I’ve always admired Mark’s ability to take the mundane and ordinary and tweak it here or modify it there and build it into a grand adventure. Business trips start to sound like something James Bond would be jealous of. Need groceries? By the time he’s done with the trek, you’ll have a story you’re telling your grand kids. That’s really not an exaggeration.
Today we started that road trip. But before we could get on the road, we had some work to do.
Moriah and Mark have a ketubah of sorts. They’re not Jewish and it’s not exactly a traditional ketubah, but they both like much of the idea behind such a document and they decided that they wanted something like that as a part of their marriage. It’s a fairly large circular design at something like 42 inches in diameter. It’s mounted, and protected by glass. This caused some troubles with the way that Mark originally planned on getting it cross country – by shipping it.
After a consultation with a (thankfully) very honest UPS employee, we knew that he couldn’t ship the piece and expect it to arrive whole. That meant that we would have to bring it with us, but with the glass, and the car packed with our personal gear, we were worried about damaging it ourselves.
So we did a crazy thing to transport the piece of art across the country. We built a table – in the car.
“Don’t Worry People – We Have A Plan!”
It was a bit more chaotic a start than we hoped for, but in hindsight, it makes for great story fodder. It’s just the sort of thing that I was talking about earlier – about things bending towards adventure around Mark.
The interesting part of the whole table building process was the improvisation it required. Mark had limited tools and supplies since most of his possessions had long ago been shipped to the West Coast. My apartment and my (admittedly limited) supplies were over an hour away.
Thankfully, Home Depot will make some cuts in your plywood and shorten your 4×4 ‘table legs’ upon request. They also rent drills by the hour, so will some mental math and some determination, we wound up with something which worked quite nicely.
No sandpaper? Try your nearest pavement!
The ketubah protected, we got our gear packed back into the car, returned the rented drill, and got on the road.
We did as we did way back on our motorcycle trek – we got out of Dodge as fast as possible. When you’re leaving home on a road trip, you don’t want to look around and see familiar sights. You want to be in the New Place – The Wild Blue Yonder. So we put the pedal down and headed west via routes 76 and 70.
Sadly, that meant that there wasn’t much exciting about the travel portion of that first day, but we made some decent time, and the day ended in the best possible way – with friends. We landed in Columbus OH to stay with our dear friend Jill and her husband Greg. We somehow convinced Jill to be our friend all the way back in high school, and she’s been stuck with us ever since.
Good people make for good times.
I also renewed my friendship with another friend. Meet Lille Lort (which translates to “Lil’ Shit” in Danish. He seems to think I’m alright. He’s one of a couple cats that won the feline lottery when they got Jill as their vet/mom.
He also seems rather fond of Mark’s shoes.
This post is part of a series describing the Road Trip west I took with my best friend. To read about our travels on the following day, click here.
I’m dusting off the cobwebs here. I’ll be posting back dated entries to get the things I’ve done and places I’ve seen added to the site, but I want to burn the candle from both ends and start updating again as I visit places.
So here’s the first – Quebec City. I’m doing major roads in and around Quebec City for work. It’s a small project, but with the interchanges/chaos that are the road network of any older city, it’s taking me a while.
I’ve been doing this work for a little over three years now, and if there’s one thing that I’ve learned in that time it’s that I prefer the wide open spaces of rural areas over the congestion and chaos that is inherent in large metropoles. (Side note: had to look that one up. I thought it might have been metropoli.) There’s a greater sense of movement obviously, but my inner ADHD kicks into high gear when I’m in big cities and stress levels rise. I get overly frustrated when I miss a turn off or realize too late that a road doesn’t go quite the way I thought it would. That’s not a big deal when you’re visiting a new place for the first time, but when you’re doing that for 8 or 10 hours a day? Yeah.
I also feel a greater sense of alone-ness while I’m in Quebec. I didn’t do well in French class back when I took it – in junior high school. Now? Some thirty or so years later? Yeah. Je suis désolé, mais je ne parle pas français. So an already lonely job gets even more so.
All of that said, QC has been good to me. It is an old city and holds the delights of old cities. Grand architecture, amazing people, and the sense that there is always something to be doing.
That’s not all. Right at the bridge to cross over onto Île d’Orléans is a breathtaking waterfall named Montmorency Falls (or Chute Montmorency in French). It’s breathtaking, and I was happy to revisit. (The photo is actually from when I was first here in May of 2014.)
I also got to have a brief visit with two of my coworkers who were spending the weekend in the QC Hilton (see the first photo of the post) for a brief break. That place has one spectacular view from their executive lounge. I could have spent days just sitting up there working on writing/drawing stuff. While visiting, we went to get some rather tasty crepes at Crêperie-bistro Le Billig, which I highly recommend.
Lastly, the work isn’t entirely within Quebec Ciy. Some of it dips out into some of the slightly more rural (suburban) areas of Quebec surrounding the city. One such area was where I stopped to stretch my legs and get the blood pumping for lunch.
It’s a little park called Parc Richelieu. It’s a little hard to find on Google Maps, but it wraps itself around Lac Goudreault – which is easier to find.
There wasn’t anything about the park that was exclusive to Quebec, but it was delightful, and the little old man who greeted me in French as he prepared his fishing pole for the afternoon’s passing was pretty much perfect.
[Note: this was originally posted to http://fromthedriverseatdotnet.wordpress.com/ but I’m planning to remove that site, so I copied it over here for posterity.
The other day I had the good fortune to stumble on the fact that Minot, ND was having their annual Norsk Hostfest. As there are more than a few people in my life who call me a ‘viking’, it seemed only appropriate that I attend. Mother Nature was kind enough to bring about a rain day, so I was able to do so without leaving work undone.
The first thing I did was a little web based research. I found the location of the Hostfest via Google Maps and made my way there. Except what Google Maps shows as the location isn’t the location. (It’s where they have their offices.) This seems a little counter intuitive to me, but I didn’t really object too strongly because there’s things to see at their offices, which also is the Scandinavian Heritage Association.
The Sigdal House – Exterior
…like the Sigdal House. Typical of the life, furnishings, and size/shape of homes in the Sigdal Mountains early on. The place was disassembled by hand, shipped to the US, and reassembled by the same men who took it apart.
The Sigdal House – Interior
That’s one hell of a project.
The nice lady in the red coat (who’s name I’ve forgotten because I’m a terrible person) was very kind and acted as my tour guide and explained a lot about the furnishings and miscellaneous items in the place. The round ‘roller’ and flat board with a handle, for example, were early versions of a clothes iron. The user would hold the handle, and roll the board across the roller, which in turn, was on top of the wet clothes. This would effectively squeeze the water out and roll the clothes flat(ish).
I did eventually get my carcass to the fairgrounds which was the actual home of the Hostfest. There were many a vendor of food and crafts of all kinds.
A full night’s rest did me some good. When I woke up, I felt like I was able to function, if a bit… off.
Sadly, it didn’t last. It wasn’t long before my legs were again like wet noodles underneath my body. They just weren’t able to handle the trail + my gear + my 300lb body. What’s worse, it appeared that we wouldn’t be able to make it back in time to catch all of our connections which would allow Mark to go scuba diving off of the island of Yonaguni-jima later.
That one had me really upset. It’s one thing when a failure of mine limits what I get to do. It’s another thing entirely when it affects someone else’s plans. It didn’t matter that I was upset though – my body was having none of it. The hiking was painfully slow and filled with instances of me stumbling, falling, tripping, and bumping into things. I was moving like someone exceedingly drunk because my legs just would not support me and I kept forcing them to do so. I felt pathetic, and I’m certain that I looked worse.
After a while of this, Mark took mercy on me. He took my pack. Sure, it’s true that we weren’t carrying the 50lb frame packs of our yesteryear boy scout hiking trips, but they were still heavy. Mine still had the vast majority of my ‘regular life’ AND the equipment Mark had picked up for me for the purposes of this trek – things like sleeping pad, sleeping bag liner, water bladder, and my cold weather clothes.
The trail was vertical enough to warrant ropes at times.
I protested, of course. My pride insisted that I do so, though there really wasn’t any other option. Certainly not if we wanted to get back in any kind of reasonable time. Mark eventually not only took my pack, but soothed my pride enough that I let him. Embarassed doesn’t begin to cover it. My one redeeming physical quality (to me at any rate) is that I’m a big guy and I can carry the big guy’s load of stuff. Only here was living proof that this concept was simply untrue. I was as effective a hiking partner as a four year old. What’s more, I didn’t believe that the bag was really that heavy – that relieving me of it would do that much good.
Here again, I was wrong.
We started to make some good time. Far better time than the previous day, to be sure.
The final trail marker.
We eventually found ourselves at the last marker on the trail. That meant a number of things: 1. Cell phone coverage would be nearby (though we still didn’t have any at the close of the trail) 2. Most of our remaining hiking would be downhill – which, while still excruciating to me, was at least possible. 3. There was a chance – a very very slim chance – that we could still make it in time to catch our relevant connections in order for Mark to go scuba diving.
This gave me a burst of… something. I won’t call it strength (that just didn’t exist for me anymore) but something. Mark, in an effort to again ease my wounded pride, gave me back my pack so that when we eventually encountered other humans, they wouldn’t see him with both packs and me with nothing but my gasping for breath and my sweat soaked / mud caked clothes.
Just in the nick of time too. We came upon a group of hikers who looked to be stopped for a meal. While I tried to get some oxygen into my limbs and recover any semblance of composure, Mark started up a conversation. The very cute artsy/hippy/musician chick in the group was (of course) immediately enamored with him. She was taking a gentleman (who looked like a bored businessman) to the airport (which is where we were headed) and offered us a ride.
I followed this conversation because I know like three words in Japanese and because I know Mark well enough to follow tone and gestures and the like. Not because I actually understand all the words. It’s funny, but it’s this ‘tonal listening’ that makes me think I actually could pick up Japanese eventually if I was given enough time. Of course, I’m sure Mark would be well sick of me by that point.
Miho and Mark (with an annoyed O Gi-san in the background)
At any rate, while Mark and Miho (the musician) were discussing things, a truck pulled up and out hopped an older gentleman who looked… worried. We would quickly find out that folks called him O Gi-san. Gi for grandfather – not gangsta, though somehow, I feel like that would be appropriate too. He wore US Marines camoflage clothes and started to immediately lecture Mark in japanese. There was no debating that tone.
Miho was smirking at us like a big sister might smirk at the little brothers who were catching holy hell from Mom and Dad. It quickly became apparent that we should load our bags into the back of the truck and climb in with them.
Riding back to town.
On the ride back to town, Mark filled me in on the details. To summarize, O Gi-san is the owner of the ryokan that we were to stay at the night before. When we didn’t show up, he started searching for us. Then again the next morning. They had been extremely worried about the two gaijin who had gone off into the jungle after being told that they were NOT to camp out in the jungle, and that they were to be to the ryokan before too late because that would worry O Gi-san. Then we never showed.
A police officer showed up as we were driving down the mountain. He exchanged a few words with O Gi-san which we didn’t hear and then proceeded to follow us down the mountain.
I felt like such a complete ass-hole. What’s more, it had started to look like we might make our connections, and if the officer wanted to talk to us for a while? Or, worse, teach us a lesson by popping us into a cell for a few hours or overnight? That would completely hose any chance of Mark getting his scuba trip. I had come to see that as some slight redemption for me being such an incapable ass, and it seemed like it might again be slipping from us.
Victorious in the end with… Japanese Rocky?
I’m happy to say that things worked out in the end though. The cop only followed for a little while then pulled off to take care of something else. O Gi-san gave us a bit more lecturing, but eventually just asked us to pay for our night’s lodging as we’d made the reservation. We gladly did. We retreived the remainder of my crap, loaded up, and walked around the corner to the bus station. Took the bus to the Airport, and caught our plane.
That got us to Yonaguni-jima in time.
We were met at the airport by a grandmotherly woman who came up to me and asked if I was “Mah-ku?” I shook my head an pointed to Mark. A few minutes later we were in her car and en route to the mishuku. I was feeling so relieved by the time that we reached the place, I seriously could have cried.
Our mishuku on Yonaguni-jima.
The mishuku itself was fantastic. We checked in and dropped our stuff off. Mark wanted to go and check in with the scuba folks and get set up for the following day. He asked if I would go with him, and while my legs felt (I mean this sincerely) like jello filled with pain, I went anyway. It was flat paved ground and there was no risk of falling off a mountainside if they gave way, so why not? As long as they would keep moving, I might as well.
Getting ready for bed that night, when I took off my boots, I half expected some sort of cartoon-esque ‘pop’ and for my feet to inflate to three or four times their normal size and turn candy apple red. They didn’t, of course, but I did find that I had the largest blister I’ve ever had under my left foot (I wasn’t even sure it was a blister at first) and that I had managed to damage three toenails enough that I was sure to lose them.
I genuinely didn’t care. We’d made it. Mark could scuba, and I could have a day to recover. I’m not sure my head hit the pillow before I was unconcious.
Mark and I were discussing these posts and he made the argument that there aren’t really enough photo in each post to provide proper context for the posts. I think it’s a good line of thinking.
So, rather than go back through and monkey with the posts themselves, I thought I would try something a little different. I’m leaving the posts as they are, but I will be creating a gallery at the end of each post with additional photos related to that day/those events. In other words: you may want to go back and check out the previous Japan posts.
Took a chartered boat down the “Japanese Amazon” to the starting point of our hike. Beautiful vistas on either side of lush vegitation and deep jungles greeted us as we passed.
We entered the jungle at a dock built to allow access to tourists. The first portion of the trek was easy and well groomed. We found ourselves confident that we could complete the 8 hour 12 mile hike in the single day allotted. Or perhaps that was only me.
Maryudo Falls
We reached the beautiful Maryudo Falls fairly quickly.
Not long after the waterfall, we found ourselves at the start of the official ‘trail’ through the jungle. We had been warned that the trail would get tougher, but we (again – probably just I here) didn’t pay enough heed to those warnings. The Japanese (in my limited experience) will tell you something is “terribly dangerous!” when the reality is that it’s barely a blip on the danger scale. They have a lot of ‘rules’ in their lives that we westerners wouldn’t even think to pay attention to. Example? There could be no cars for miles, but if the pedestrian crossing sign shows “do not cross”? The Japanese will not cross. That would be terribly dangerous.
A little something at the start of the trail.
It wasn’t long after that where my confidence/cockiness quickly abated. The simple truth? I was way too out of shape to complete the hike in the amount of time provided. Had the whole trek been as well groomed as that early portion, I have no doubt we would have completed the trail in plenty of time.
As it was, we had to spend the night in the jungle.
Mark doing a river crossing.
Which, is ‘illegal’. Because, you guessed it, is ‘terribly dangerous’. Except that, in this case, it really is. The deadly night hunting habu snake, dramatically dropping temperatures the fact that it’s illegal to start a fire, and (really) no clear space to set up camp all make for a potentially disastrous night in the jungle.
I should point out here that I’m really lucky. I have people like Mark in my life. I was… ill prepared. Mark was not. He had done his homework when planning the trip. He had a tent for us. He had sleeping pads for each of us. We had discussed it in advance, and we agreed we should have these things “just in case”, but it was Mark who both started that discussion and eventually purchased the items so that we would have them in time for the trip.
Map showing the trail across Iriomote-jima.
In the end, we settled into our tent for a moderately comfortable night. I was feeling terribly defeated, and my body felt… well, broken honestly. I had reached a point where I didn’t think I could take another step long before we’d stopped. It was an experience I can only assume is like that of a marathon runner – when you simply do not believe that there is enough energy in your body to lift your leg one more time and yet you find yourself continuing to do so – over and over again.
Sleep came upon me very quickly that night.
Gallery:
Mark getting ready to board the boat which will take us to the trail head.
Heading up the “Japanese Amazon”.
Mark and I still fresh at the beginning of the hike.
Our boat captain after dropping us off.
They grow the trees big round these parts.
The jungle is nothing if not beautiful. Me, on the other hand…
Hey Shelle!
Did I mention the pretty setting?
Mark at the entrance to the trail.
The trail? Of COURSE I’m following the trail. Can’t you see it right here?!
