Going Feral in South America

So Long, And Thanks for the Fish

2007-05-23T10:41:00.000-07:00

Life is full of false bottoms. And to all the non-believers who thought the road and seabound memoirs of Latin America would end without a proper wind down. Well. You don't know me. I am fickle and the backdoor-sneak-out-of-the-party guy in the singular, only in the moment. But for those of you who have foolishly befriended me over a period of time know that I try my damndest not to let people down. And I certainly wouldn't dare let down my fans. All 6 of you, who I suspect patronize me out of friendship. Well, thank you for praising the bare bones and cryptically (often invention-based) worded skeleton of a story that is too grandiose to transpose into blog form. It would be blasphemous to do so. Rest assured that you know 5% of the story. And it is not far flung from the map of truth. The remaining 95% is rather condemnable (of Ross mostly) and absolutely terrifying. The Government and Internet ratings committee would surely drop the hammer if all were exposed.

Ross and I mutually observed at the outset of our journey that things would probably lead to blows between us. Compounding things even worse, we have known each other too long to have considered abandonment and the pursuit of our own routes if and when the temperature boiled to the level of beastlike violence. It would have lead to blame and guilt and rumours and neither of us wanted that. Or maybe not. Nonetheless, we stuck it out side by side with the ease of well-seasoned vagabonds. In fact, after denting some bottles of $2 rum with a few retired Cubans while in the surf town of Montanita, Ecuador we pursued the very human need for self fulfillment. For 3 and a half months we were engaged in a battle of self preservation and bravado positioning, just in case the fight that we joked may happen, would in fact happen. The tension built you see, not out of rage, but of impending doom that we may exchange fisticuffs that neither of us wanted to trade but we pretended to each other that we did. Very confusing indeed.

We stumbled down the beach to our tent camped in front of the triple overhead right handed pointbreak. About halfway there it was concluded that we should get the fight out of the way. I derobed myself of my (Bryant's) (sorry) headlamp and Ferg ridded himself of his hat. The dukes went up and we fought at 3 am, in the waves, landing faceshots and splitting jabs to the temples and kidneys. Falling over and trying to drown each other. All while grinning wildly. And shouting the most profoundly disgusting verbatim at each other. Using crabs and rocks as weapons was not innovative weaponry. It was a damned necessity of survival. After about 5 minutes we were exhausted and the rum was pumping steadily again through our bloodstreams. We forgot our headlamps, flashlights, and problems and stumbled onshore to continue down the beach. Notably more wounded and drunk.

"Man, I was worried there-" Ferg started, gasping noticeably.

"Yeah, me too, I'm glad we got that over with, it was a long time coming." I blurted with a timing to ensure that I was agreeing with the 6'4'' Irish brawler next to me.

"What? No, I mean you're a fucking pussy. I beat the shit out of you." And it was done.

Only 30 seconds had passed. And round 2 had begun. I can only imagine what it had looked like to the casual observer. And you know what, Ferg is a fucking prophet. I yelped away like a dog afraid of being bathed. My lips swollen and split. I woke up at about 3pm being washed around in the fleeing tide with a conglomerate of fishmongers talking around me in a befuddled latin garb. I returned to a high-fiving and bloody Ferg who thought the whole night was a tremendous success. And, I had to agree.

We spent a wonderful remaining week in Montanita and opted to not see the rest of the country. It is simply too beautiful in this throe of the land to bypass for jungle, mosquitoes, jackets, and rainboots instead. Living on $1.50 a day is whacky. In fact, our whole trip can be summarily contained in one word. Whacky.

On our last eve we stayed up all night for my customized handmade balsa fish surfboard to be finished off by former surf champ turned shaper and minister of retro, Rasty. And then boomeranged off to the airport for an internationally inadequate flight through Costa Rica (for the 4th time) to Nicaragua.

Costa Rica is like Disneyland, expensive, brash and corrupt, and manipulated if not superficially built by man. It does have lush jungles and amazing ocean views. But goddamnit you have to be pretty Christian about the whole thing. Sharing so little land with so many tourists is a little claustrophobic to say the least. I have never seen so many rich nortes or Gringos try to justify the price they want to pay versus the actual price of something while gesticulating wildly at a Lonely Planet and speaking solely in English. Like it's the fucking Farmer's Almanac or New Testiment. I now understand why ticos or locals are so bitterly aggressive and unfriendly to North Americans. And towns like Tamarindo have been renamed by oblivious tourists to Scamagringo. And that's why we used CR as a vortex and coverup as to our true final destination of the trip.

Nicaragua is all dirt and dusty roads and civil war and CIA drug-fuelled land. Oliver North and corporate Banana plantations and spearfishing and Flor de Cana and sincerity. Bandanas, guns, and paramilitaries, bitch. You can actually see the divide from jungle to desert once you cross the border from Costa Rica as Central America tears up the lines of latitude towards the deserts of the Baja and into Texas. But My God Man, Nicaragua is a quietly outspoken nation. It's pink flowers and rose bushes that occur once every some 50 odd miles along baren wasteland are as breath-taking as seeing 12 tails from 15 foot plus sharks hanging out of the back of a taxi cab in San Juan del Sur. And nobody points out these curious occurrences. It is just daily life in Nicaragua. Where families of 14 live in 20 by 15 wooden shacks, with garbage bags for roofs and cockfights for entertainment. It's kind of like Mexico some 25 years ago. And it is fucking brilliant.

But in the 3 short months that we have been gone from these Christian doghouses things have changed. The 60 acre 5 star resort construction is underway on that remote beach. The line-up on those perfect almond-shaped hollow tubes is littered not with dolphins, stingrays, baitfish, lobsters, and sharks any longer. Only Southern California neon brahs! & Australian loud and drunk waveshredders & some sad looking locals. And this paradise will go to the wayside, as have all of the other places we have stumbled upon. And it may be good for the economy. But this should be categorically separate from what is good for the people.

And on my sunrise walk along the beach I saw that final bit of evidence. Lying halfway between the new real estate development and the 5:30 am maddening lineup of 30 surfers, it washed ashore at my feet. I picked up the hypodermic needle and dropped it in the wastebasket. And thought to myself that all of you still reading this should go to expedia.ca and book a ticket somewhere that you know very little about. And keep it a secret. No blogs, no heartache when you know you're piece of paradise will no longer exist once you're gone, no Lonely Planets. Keep that false bottom in place and protect your secret paradise.

2007-05-12T10:56:00.000-07:00

The end is near unfortuantely and I really havent written much on this blog so I thought I´d put in my 2 cents. I hope you´ve all been enjoying Jeffuardo´s entries, my favourite I´d have to say is about the Swiss man´s passport. They are exquisite documents by the way. There are a few thingts that Jeff forgot to mention in his previous entries. For starters, he forgot to mention the Peruvian buses which have been some of the most unique experiences as far as transportation is concerned. The buses look like any other, but, because there has been many muggings by banditos, the staff goes around with a video camera and tapes the faces of everyone on the bus before it leaves. There are also numerous checkpoiunts where a cop will get on the bus and ride along for an hour or so. I guess that they do this in the areas where the muggings are known to occur. Not to worry though if you are planning on coming down here. The bus staff has many ways to keep the passengers entertained. Steven Segal m0vies are plentiful and when you get bored of those they start to play bingo. If you win one of these gamers you not only get a free bus ticket next time you use the company, but you also0 get the honour of performing kareokee infront of the rest of the bus. Jeff thought he won a game but it turned out that he had to have four lines completed and not just the one that he had.

On our last bus, from Trujillo to Mancora, a guy came on with an oversized kazoo. He performed a monologue in spanish intertwined with his kazoo music which reminded me of snake charming music. After this, he walked around and gave out candies, played a little more giant kazoo, and tried to make people pay for the candies they ate. After that bus ride, we got off, asked a cabbie to take us to our campsite and he charged us the equivalent of one dollar for a 30 second ride. It may not sound like it but we actually got ripped off.

Jeff and I bought surf boards in Mancora for $160 a piece. Mine is a 6´8´´ and Jeff bought a 6´1¨¨. The waves were pretty good there, all left handers which I like because I can´t really surf rights. Mancora is an awesome little beach town. It has one main drag with tons of cheap restaurants and a few surf shops. You can get 3 course meals for 5 soles which is about $1,50
Canadian. We could have spent a few weeks there but only spent 10 days because our time is running short.

We are now in Montanita, Ecuador. It´s another sweet surf town that´s reknown for the surf boards that they shape. They make boards out of Balsa wood which is from the amazon jungle. Some of the boards have foam centres and others are pure wood. I tried one out the other day. It was only a 5´7 but I could still catch waves on it. I think it was about 21 inches wide or something though. Anyways, Jeff and I met a shaper in town here and he´s going to shape a custom board for Jeff made completely out of balsa wood. We´ve been stopping by everyday to check out this progress. It´s looking pretty sweet. We´re planning on staying here until the 15th and we´re flying up to Nicaragua to surf with Cassidy for the last 2 weeks of our trip. Looking forward to seeing everyone in June.

Cheers.

Royal Class from Mancora to Montanita

2007-05-11T16:18:00.000-07:00

April was a slow month in the blogging world. Get out of the tech game people, Google´s IPO is long gone and commodities are starting to soar again. Get into soybeans for God´s sake. Mark my words, Apple´s stock prices are about to fall like a sack of yams.

I am about to get into the woodgame myself. A bearded baron of balsa for the great northwest, amidst bears, beaches, and bonfires. Slanging devolution to bring people back to paraffin wax, keds, a guy named Woody, beavertail wetsuits, otters, beards, vans, and Redondo beach circa 1965. Things will be less cryptic when we return, but we have set a plan in motion.

We are still living in a domed house of fabric built for one atop sand and crab villages. We have surfed many waves along the Northern Peruvian coast and into Ecuador. Lobitos, Organos, Mancora, Punta Blanco, Montanita, Chicama, and more at all times of the day. We paddled out over reef and a large amount of marine activity at 11pm one night under the light of a full moon, beach fires, and coast guard search lights for a midnight session. The pursuit of pleasure endures. And the simplicity of it is astounding.

So it is with great disdain that I bid this blog adieu. I have more natural things to get my hands into. And some dogs to bark at and teach to surf.

With Love from the Southern Hemisphere,
Jeffrey

The Sloe Tide

2007-04-24T13:11:00.000-07:00

¨You frighten me Richard Fowler,¨ Hissed a weary and cross-legged Frederick Noble. Peppery perspiration was stained and seeping through his Amazon shirt made only from the most gore-texy of gore-tex items. Richard Fowler grinned as his sinewy bulbs of knuckle searched over to Noble and fished into the blimp owner´s breast pocket for a cherry cheroot. He struck the waterproof-ed match and lit his tube of fire. Noble watched the gaunt and possibly drunk man inhale. The smoke lingered beneath the foliage and bananas leaves before being expounded by beams of dusty sunlight cutting into their cavity of canopy.

The two were sitting, facing each other like two ripened and faded and worn rooks of your grandfather´s ivory chess set variety. Beside them, outside of their Sodom of restitute ran the Black River. They hid beneath foliage some 171 kilometers away from where this voluminous vestige of abundance collided with the Amazon River itself. 171 kilometers from their starting point. 13 days since their bottled water ran out and they turned defiantly to the jungle, instead of to civilization for salvation. 13 days of return to indigenous roots.

Frederick Noble vaguely recalled that he had been in the Amazon prior to this. His mind searched, vacant yet intently, on where. Bolivia. The name came to him like the sound of a drunken man falling over. But...it was Jeffgryh Makriin, no Jeff Masarl, no...Jeff Martin in Bolivia. Who was this man? No whatsabouts-about-it Noble decided. A punctuated snap of the heels ended that silly ooglewoosery going about his brainium. Frederick was perversedly pleased simply to be out of the burg of Cusco and it´s tchochke peddlers, hogsworblers, boondogglers, and mountebanks.

He had decided to be led on a fantastical voyage of cheese and pictures and 12 course desserts through the Amazon some months prior. He needed to rid himself of bedsores and felt that the Amazonian Basin would be swimmingly swimming with remedies. Frederick expected a quiet journey where he could pass the hours with his abacus and theories on the ten dimensions. Old Noble here was quite positive the trek would be reminiscent of the kindly hands of his turkish robot butler, back in his ice burrow home of central Antarctica, who would lead Noble to his tea parlour for the old 3 o´clock mug of warm milk and lie down.

But the fool hired Richard Fowler as lead guide. The ex-Navy Seal and 10 year Amazon resident and hero of people whose personal libraries consist of exactly: Soldier of Fortune back issues, Gary Larson cartoons, Apocalypse Now: The Picture Book, and Heart of Darkness. The jungle survivalist. The machete weilding maniac. The baron of terror in the atrium of the Amazon. The heavy drinker and the wrong man for the job. Noble hired Fowler.

And now Frederick Noble has kissed an Anaconda, punched an alligator in the face and eaten it raw, fended off phallus seeking protozoans and other predators, eaten a variety of hallucinegenic cacti, shrunken heads and been branded by various indigenous tribes, and has not even begun to deal with his bedsores.

What a soar to madness the fable could have been. But alas! This is a story I will not tell. I cannot hide behind these fallacies, this grotto of phonetic subterfuge. This is the meeting of my two cryptic subplots from previous entries, and exactly what I imagined would occur when they met. But they will not. For travel writing is good to read but hellishly off-mark from preconceptions when the words hit the papyrus. You see, a hodad pickpocketed me in Cusco and we have waited three weeks to get my VISA back. So, like good Canadian lads, we traded in our hostel going ways and jungle potentialities & climax, if you will, of blog entries for a 5´8¨long tent and 6 weeks of beach time.

We seek refuge and surf and a pilgrimmage to solitude, literature, and fire roasted coffees. We have travelled like forgotten characters in an unproduced Star Wars Episode some 1200 miles across the gray and brown Northern Peruvian desert to the Pacific. Stopping only to drink too much, fall over, and realize how insufficient we are at making adequate campfires. The Africanesque tribal drums and Mexi-audience accompanying claps of Peruvian music have been the heartbeat to our journey. And we shall continue to forge our way up into Ecuador and finally to a familiar Christian doghouse on a remote beach in Nicaragua before our return. The prodigal sons. The wayward bastards of the Great Northwest.

But we have found it. In an Endless Summerean way we have trekked across that dune and found the contestably longest left in the world. It peels perfect fast tubes, head high, in immaculate shape for over 1.8 kilometers. You stand on a wave, and surf harder than the icy superhero, Quicksilver, for 3 entire minutes. It is so long you have to take a taxi back to the beginning.

So, it´s possible that the dream of Richard Fowler meeting Frederick Noble may have to be put off. Or I can put you in contact with Mr. Fowler if you so desire.

But that freaky left pointbreak across the Northern Peruvian desert is reserved for two lost Canadian boys and a pup tent.

Contestable Sanity Amongst Corpses: A Chronicle

2007-04-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

Ross and I sat in silence finishing off our last breakfast before expediting our expedition to the Andes for 4 days. Before me sat a dish known as "Camarones for Tree People" that tasted oddly of avocado and ramen noodles, and in front of Ross lay a half finished "American Loin". We believed that these magical platos would bring us good fortune and a steadfast heartiness to last 96 hours.

The night previous I learned that Ross truly holds no biases in his heart. I reminded him of the hostel's viewing of his romantic wrangling of an African woman all over the lawn of the center court in our hostel. It was 5 am and I had just come from the 4th consecutive viewing and analyzation of Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise's late 80's cultural acception of moderate retardation hit "Rainman" with a man I knew as Khan and Ross knew as Ricard.

It was a ramshackle of peculiar nocturnal activities indeed and quite a North-of-the-Great-Divide way to kick off an arduous trek to the bold society of the Incas. The next few days would find us a combined total of 3 hours sleep; climbing through far too many mountain passes; and a visit to the barbaric site of forced cannibalism due to the crashed plane of a Uruguaian rugby team in the 1970's.

What follows is a chronologically sorted experiential diary of madness.

DAY1

7:03 am: The Swiss have terrific passports. It is exactly what you would expect from such a rich and beautiful nation (I have no idea what Switzerland is actually like apart from possibly a James Bond movie, possibly. And of what Kit Clancey tells me of the nation, but he is the most overt man I know. And I do not trust him. I am not sure if you are allowed to leave periods dotting along rythmically within parentheses. It looks odd and scares me). The simple red and white aesthetic of their nation's flag stylized in the upper-right corner of the crimson cover makes me crave cheese. The myriad of well sorted and unique European styled tidbits of information held within make me want to have blond hair and a stupid accent and a turtleneck sweater. I may move to Switzerland to get a passport. Or I may eat the man next to me if stranded in the Andes to acquire his.

7:11 am: Huzzah! The Swiss Man next to me is in my trekking group. My stomach rumbled in a fartish manner. It is possible that my Camarones for Tree People didn't fill me up. Or it is possible that the food knows that I am not a Tree People. But more likely it is a sign to eat The Swiss Man next to me. He looks soft.

9:26 am: The hike has started and I find myself conversing with Freddie Zapata, our 26 year old guide. We talk superficially of soccer and politics and soccer politics over the next 4 kilometers. I do not know much about these three subjects so I recite facts from a Chuck Klosterman novel about why soccer is ruining the world from the youth up. I insert my own conjunctive thoughts and tell him that I saw a man mistakedly kick a ball into his own goal in Cusco. And I told him it gave me hope because this man's career probably ended due to his err. I mention that it would be terrific if each soccer player in the world would, from now on, score the only goal of each game into his own net causing the sport to evaporate from our biosphere. Freddie stops talking and spits at my feet.

9:42 am: Freddie still hasn't spoken so I disrupt the dim of silence with a diatribe. I tell him how I have an alter ego that shares his name (this being Frederick Noble; story: Salt? Salt!) created in Bolivia. I tell him that Mr. Noble owns a blimp. Freddie smiles and asks me if I was in the army. This makes me feel like a warrior and I decide to jog the last 7 kilometers.

4:57 pm: We arrive at the Base Camp in the foothills of the Andean Mountain Range with the Salkantay Glacier to our south-southwest and the Victoria Glacier to the northeast. But I never was good at directions, or being instinctual. Will I be the first to be eaten if we become stranded? We sit down to a 4-course meal provided to us by our porters. I believe it involved SPAM.

6:01 pm: I begin to wonder why we ate so much. Are we going to have a challenging day tomorrow? Are they actually going to eat us?

6:40 pm: I listen to Joel Plaskett´s ¨Natural Disaster¨ and dream of Bishop's. Snakeball, knives throng into our kitchen wall, Humphrey Bogart´s funeral, Dicky. Honkshuuush, honkshuuush, honkshuuush.

DAY2

5:17 am: I wake up to a pitchblack valley and a governing grey sky. The hike begins. We have 9 kilometers total today. It seems easy, but Freddie advises that the altitude we reach plus the steepness of the steppes could be fatal. I push half a bag of dirty coca leaves into my mouth and munch away. Yum yum. I pretend they are mashed potatoes and sing and smile to myself as I keep up pace with the porters while they look at me in utter confusion.

12:17 pm: We have made it 65% of the way to our first mountain pass. We have climbed almost 2 kilometers vertically. I am growing jealous of Ferg's Jolly Green Giantish legs. He is a brute and a phallandering philanthropist. My lungs feel like they are trying to erupt out of my ribcage and flee to the heavens. There is not enough oxygen in the air to quench my brain's thirst.

3:52 pm: Fuck...you...lungs. Fuck...you....legggs. Fuk...yuuy...mowntan. I...ham....dissy.

4:48 pm: (200 meters later) I make it to the top and immediately fall asleep for two hours in the 28 knot winds and frigidaire like atmospohere. Oxygen deprivation and sleeplessness make the sustainability of conciousness as possible as marrying a unicorn with Meatloaf as your minister.

7:31 pm: I have made it down to the valley and to our campsite nestled amidst the clouds and riversystems of a drenched Andean valley. My legs are as hard as cinder blocks but feel like those of a newborn fawn. I am ashamed of myself. The Swiss Man appears to me drowning within a fiery fondue plate of cheesy glory in a mild hallucinated state brought on by well masticated coca leaves and ayahuasca.

DAY3

2:00 am: I have not slept and will not. My leaky tent has become a nomadic aquarium of insomnia. Damn you rains and snow. I am only man, my legs those of a baby cement deer. My sleeping bag reminds me of a cold, dead placenta. I feel my skin growing white and prunish. I am dying and they will eat me. The Swiss Man and his incredible passport shall perish before myself though. This I will make sure of.

5:09 pm: I survived the night and have now completed my second mountain pass of the day and third in total. I am no longer using the cliffhugging trail. I stalk The Swiss Man from the bushes for the totality of our day's 15 kilometers. But he is growing sickly and thin, making him less appealing. Additionally, I do not know if my canine's are refined enough to chow through his Goretex. It looks formidable, fortified, I just farted. Did he hear me? Am I speaking? I see Ross in the distance. He appears to be 2000 meters tall and passing over mountains with a strident pace of authority.

6:31 pm: Another quatranically divided dinner. Why these shirtless and shoeless men provide us with so much nourishment ceaselessly brings me wonder. I believe I ate pasta. Or it was Tuna. I am unaware, I stared at The Swiss Man for the entirety of the meal.

6:33 pm: I understand everything now. I see past, present, and future. These men who carry 60 pounds a day, running past us, past the pink and soft and chewy. They are taking us to a site of sacrifice and cannibalism. There is no Machu Picchu. There is only a cage of inferno driven death and a large pot of white man stew. They will devour us by Easter-time. I must eat The Swiss Man and bury his treasurous passport this eve.

DAY4

3:00 am: Still no sleep. My legs still feel like 600 pound drumsticks from a mutant KFC slaughterhouse. They move with robotic grace closer to the alleged ruins. Or to my slaughter. Fitter. Happier. I am a paranoid android. I think I should take Radiohead off my playlist. The sky is beginning to burst into a chromatic kaleidoscope of pink and yellow wonders. I almost fall 600 meters to my death as I am not watching where I walk. My eyes move from the skies and the glaciers to The Swiss Man and back.

6:30 am: Machu Picchu and brain surgery and astrology and meteorology and science and woman sacrifice and ripping the hearts out of llamas to feast upon their life sustaining purple blood and brutal war and mummies and murderous kings and my camera battery has run out and The Swiss Man has escaped my grasp. Ruined, ruined, ruins...

It is now what would be DAY5 and I have returned to Cusco. I am currently searching out the lady with the largest hands and forearms to massage the craziness out of my crinkles. I have also spent 2 hours describing a custom-made artifact that I wish to bring home as a gift to my friends. It will have the head of a monkey, the bones of a llama, the horns of a bull, and the feathers of a condor.

Picture Update 5!

2007-03-31T16:14:00.000-07:00

Our driver and cook: Mom and Dad
Hot springs with the only other people within the 20,000 sq. km (total estimate) desert

Laguna Colorada and La Refugio in the background

Fergador Dali

Moonscapes and curious rock shapes

Desert Fox and isolation 5 km above sea level

A tribute to the fallen people of the land

Coral Island

Bolivians love Einstein

6 Easy Steps to Make a Supermodel Fall in Love with You

2007-03-31T15:47:00.000-07:00

1. Grow a really terrible moustache. Due to side effects from Malaria Pills you will dream about it in a cop TV show and it will have an alias. Meet Daddylonglegs and Mr. Trifecta.

2. When you meet said model teach her your father´s favourite dance move. This is inevitably ¨Frying Bacon¨. Even if your father is Patrick Swayze. And definitely if it is Kevin Bacon. 3. Tell her how you have not bathed with soap in 2 and a half months and you don´t intend to for another 2, then invite her to smell you.4. Go to a party in the desert where all attendees are wearing amulets made of peyote. Meet a man who speaks like a troll and claims to be a wizard who died 21 years ago. His name will be Fernando and he will invite you to his circular house (and this fact is of great importance to him, for some reason) made of mud. He will try to introduce the two of you to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. (Don´t try the Peyote)

5. At this point she will kiss you. The order of this verbatim is of the utmost importance.
6. Tickle her feet as she is reading a book recommended to her by David Bowie as she is sunbathing in a Brazilian style bikini. Then flee 800 kilometers to the coast. She will follow.

Salt? Salt!

2007-03-30T14:56:00.000-07:00

Something peculiar struck me when we were in the Amazon and I just sorted exactly what was so odd about the feeling. Sorry to go over old news but it is essential to the story.

Ross is like Papa. Ross is like the pink dolphins. Do not worry this is not going to be a haiku. Ferg imitated the pink rubbery fish with such detailed and fanatical intensity that it kind of scared me. He created their sounds, he knew their swimming techniques, he perfected their breaching patterns. He explored every corner and crevasse of their territory. He held his breath for 7 minutes. He studied their habits and perhaps, dated their women. They nibbled and pulled and rubbed him in curious and totally unnecessary ways. He introduced them to me, formally.

It was kind of like that time when you were 5 and hanging out with your Grandpa. It was not necessarily but most likely on a river in North Ontario in 1989 and you were both baby toad hunting. You felt his hand on your shoulder and instinctively you knew to stand up, remain silent, and gaze ahead of you. Looking back is a 10 foot moose. Your Papi has just introduced you to nature. Magic is real.

Possibly a grey owl lands on his headgear and vomits nutritious mouse skeletal frame mash into the mouth of the giantly stupid beast, and then whips off to be eaten by a griffon. The web of life, the cyclical pattern of organic creatures like mastadons and algae. Fucking mother nature eh?

Ross is like Papa. I think he is also possibly a descendant of Noah, carpenter and all. It would have been completely natural at that moment on the Beni River if Ross were to have disappeared under the surface for 4 minutes to return with a slimy juicy little infant dolphin that he just birthed from an ill mother. He would have freed it with an all too dramatic and lingering pause after throwing it 100 feet upriver. The mare would breach, it would jump, and Ross would howl out a proud dolphin call. A symphony of bleating.

He would return silently to the dugout canoe and sit contentedly and wordlessly squinting at the sunset. Myself and Bismarck would offer genuine comments of awe but he would just stare off for 6 minutes as the sun slunk to sleep. He would command that we should paddle back home, upriver for 6 hours, despite our beautiful, idol 15 horsepower Yamaha on the back. I would object. And he would just put his hand on my shoulder. Quietly, instinctively we would paddle home. Ross is like Papa.

We are now in San Pedro de Atacama of Chile. From one desert to another we have roamed. We have been travelling with two older ladies for the past 8 odd days. Aged 26 and 32 to be precise. A model and her agent, respectively. Blondes. They have been on and off the road for more than half a decade travelling the world from remote photo shoot to another. Monique, the model, also hosts Celebrity Poker Holland and is the star of a fictional police comedy called ``Heels on Wheels´´. Her agent has an unfortunate face and a problematic personality. But Monique is a blonde, dutch model. Did I mention that? She also holds a wealth of knowledge in the field of botany, she likes my moustache (this is not factual), she drinks vodka at 10 am on Sundays (possibly), and definitely may have fallen in love with me hopefully.

We also met an oil trader and his British reality TV star girlfriend who joined our group for an expedition into the Salar de Uyuni. Am I the only one who finds this odd? It is a little like the Muppets movie where they travel across the Sahara on ATVs. Or maybe I did drugs as a kid.

The ground, for thousands of hectares is pure white, we were anywhere from 5 to 6 kilometers above sea level. This is a salt desert in a massive mountain range. The only other entities besides salt are the dead coral islands and fossilized dinosaurs. This was once a sea. And at some point, due to tectonic plate shift, it burst over 12,000 feet into the lithosphere. Away from its intended brethren, the Pacific. Pangaea, bitch.

This land is depressed and utterly poor. A few families mine the salt and barely make enough to live. It would not have surprised me if we were to have stumbled upon a hard, dry, half skeletonized Bolivian man in our trek across the salinic desert. Gaunt, haunted, and poor souls make the shoeless pilgrimmage across miles of nothingness to find work. And tourists, models and commodities pioneers, people like us fly by listening to techno music in yellow Land Cruisers. It does not give you a particulary good feeling knowing that people here rely on their lack of anything to hold a unique tourist attraction. Perpetual poverty for amateur photography. Rubble and adobe half finished homes, terrorism, odd military activity occupy these lands.

But I had an all too easy escape from my paradoxical state of thought versus action. I found myself nestled between the model and the reality TV star at half past four in the am, in the back of our Rasta motif Toyota. I kind of felt like Gilligan, and it kind of felt fucking awesome. It was 25 degrees below central centigrade as we drove through the portion of desert that Salvador Dali used as inspiration for over a half dozen pieces of his work. There was a lone fox stalking the lonely moonscape land. I was wrapped under two sleeping bags with my lovelies. At this point I decided that sleeping bags make girls horny. But to no avail, perhaps my theory was in its infancy stage of development just as Einstein´s Theory of Relativity was at some point. Unfortunately, no romance was to be had. Maybe sleeping bags make me horny. Maybe pretending that Ginger and Mary Ann are on each of my arms makes me horny.

As I defeatedly gave up the pursuit of forcing attractive pheromones out of my pores I listened to the drone of conversation concerning the pros and cons of all independent elite luxury airlines. I began to fantasize about my alter ego, Frederick Noble. Frederick Noble is an air balloon enthusiast and has a hand in African politics. He secretly ended the apartheid, and he personally freed Mandela. He knows Bono, but does not particularly like the cut of his swath. He saves stock markets from doom, like Lee Ioccoca or JP Morgan. But he´s more subversive, not even analysts know it is in danger. Noble is not at all famous but he owns a blimp. Frederick Noble ended animal rights and started them right back up again in June of 1982. The man uses words like caterwaul and he wears a red toupe and a black ascot. But he is not bald, or pompous, or colorblind. Noble designed the Panama Jack and invented sunscreen. Frederick Noble is friends with models and agents; reality TV stars and industry tycoons.

And these oddly successful people in the car with me probably have friends like Frederick Noble who exist, actually. But I bet if they were to fantasize about our friends (which I concede is equally unlikely as it is completely odd) they would be scared and most certainly jealous. And they would be right to feel that way.

Drinking wine in the way up in the atmosphere, visiting totally deserted Italian refugios, sleeping in scientific research stations under Alpaca wool, living a generally wealthy and beautiful existence was exactly that. No more, no less. A lot of driving, and some really expensive pictures. Ross and I are in search of adventure and cheap prices. Peru seems like a fine destination. In fact, Frederick Noble owns 12 percent of Peru and not even the Peruvian government knows of it.

In other news, I just emailed Richard Fowler, and I believe we should all be terribly excited and frightened about that fact.

That was good.

2007-03-23T11:26:00.000-07:00

Bad luck and apathy found us stuck in Panama City for 6 days, approximately 5 days more than any other traveller has spent their in all of history, ever. Panama Jack on top, fur on the upper, glasses shading the old eyeballs, and my Holga medium format SLR about my neck. I looked like a Central American investigative journalist from 1957 as we snuck into the prominent Casino Veneto 7th floor social area for a dip and some conversation with the class and crass. A couple of gentlemen, only 5 years our senior, informed us of their intentions for travelling over a few complimentary sasparillas. They were in charge of appraising the value of Veneto for an acquisition by the Bank of New York. And they were indeed receiving quite a number of perks from casino management for a favourable quote. I need not go into detail, except that they were keeping their bill non itemized.

At some point during our time I found myself ambling through the financial district attempting to find a replacement digital camera. I was looking for something less expensive than $899, and newer than the primitive models from pre 2000. Indeed none exist in this land that satisfy either of those criterion. So, I totally fucking lucked out when I was able to quick order my exact camera that was stolen for the same price as I paid back home. Bla bla bla. I was literally skipping to the store, grinning my ass off, and totally willing to hand over $400 (nearly my monthly budget) to get my grubby hands on the little bastard. I missed the canal, but met a relative of Manuel Noriega, and we drank green beer until we got to the airport for our 24 hour flight to Bolivia. That was Panama City in a nutshell.

La Paz is the most towering capital city in the world at over 10,000 feet above sea level, and oddly lies in a jagged canyon below the barrio El Alto. It was 2 degrees celsius upon arrival and we found a hostel in a microbrewery behind a big steel wall and a 2 by 3 foot hidden door. The inside can be categorized as grande as the taller than normal rooms were adorned with French windows framed by thick red velvet drapes, the walls littered with full length, brass rimmed mirrors. It is a villa in itself, with artwork of Mozart and Beethoven, there are large brass knobs on every staircase, red and white tiles and wallpaper, they boom metric calculator laptop love rock and serve dark ale pints, everyone is Irish. La Paz itself is somewhat strange. It is kind of like Prague or some other Eastern European city. They have witches markets, museums dedicated to cocaine, and an active prison which you can live in and get into all sorts of chemical mischief for months at a time, if you wish. But I have no clue why people do this. Authors and backpackers use different logic. While you were learning geometry, they were learning algebra. Considering that Bolivia is in a state of national disaster from massive flooding, we were very lucky to hit a window of clear skies for a few days and we headed deep into the Amazonian basin, pampas, rivers, and jungle for a trek. My only knowledge of the Amazon is of an adult film shot there and a sociopolitical environmental computer game about saving the rainforests when I was 8.

Rurrenabaque lies in the lowlands and is surrounded by jagged cloudforest clad peaks and brown river systems. We landed on a short grass runway cut into the jungle as the dusk mist was pouring over the hills and into town. We met our guide, who was peculiarly named after a 19th century German military general, Bismarck. He took us a substantial number of hours away from town and plopped us on the riverbed like unneeded feces. We then set out upriver for a few hours and found our camp. As we climbed out of the boat we marvelled at the sheer size of the stuffed alligator the camp hosted, positioned beside the boat landing. Then the 7 foot dinosauric creature shuffled into the river and ate a dolphin. We spent our days being the most macho and brave motherfuckers you can imagine. Basically we were every girls wet dream. We hunted for 15 meter anacondas, teased 2 and 3 meter crocodiles a la Steve Irwin, fished for Piranas, we did midnight beer and coca leaf runs to bizarre cabins in the depths of the jungle, we swam and played and were nibbled and pushed around by pink dolphins. It was fucking amazing, and I have way too many mosquito bites. I am no longer human, I am a giant pulsing cyst of twisted, swollen flesh and sinew. I am now the most singularly large mosquito bite in the world. But I am not going to complain because what we just did was probably the greatest feat any Martin or Ferguson has ever done before in history, ever.

However, in Bolivia you will shit your pants. Even if you are as constipated as an old woman who has consumed nothing but dry roast beef for 17 weeks, you will shit your pants. Your bowel movements will burst out of you like a premature baby on crystal meth. It will occur on a bus, 12 hours from your next scheduled stop. So wear pants that you hate. Wear the pants you were wearing when you got dumped by your girlfriend. Wear the pants that you were wearing the day your dog died. Wear the pants that you were wearing when you realized Santa is not real. Make sure you hate those pants a lot.

On a side note, I deleted the pictures off my memory card by mistake and wept like a 6 year old girl who got a chupa chup stuck in her hair. However, if I have learned one thing on this trip it is to truly let go of the triviality of such things, and the Trivial are a larger category than you would think. We have been travelling with some older Dutch people for about a week. One of them, Renee, a 29 year old chicken slaughterhouse manager lost 2 friends to an active volcano on a hike in Indonesia. Pictures shmictures. Fergy and I still have each other. Big spoon, little spoon.

We just arrived back to La Paz last night after being stuck in the jungle for 2 bonus days due to a freak monsoon and thunder storm. Our flight with the Bolivian military would not go so we braved the 12 to 20 hour Jeep ride out through a wet single lane treacherous mountain pass, with a 1-2 kilometer sheer drop on the side, landslides, and no seatbelts. Our driver was fucking bueno. Thank you Armando.

Travel advisory Canada - What the fuck are you still doing in Canada? (Bring hated pants)

Travel advisory General - There are a lot of Canadians hunkering down, and we do not like the looks of it. It is possible to update a blog without using an apostrophe once.

Panamania!

2007-03-09T10:31:00.000-08:00

Carnivale takes place on the main strip outside of our hostel on Bocas del Toro. It is a 24 hour party that lasts for 5 days. Moreso, it is a time to remember and relive the slave-driven past of the Carib indigenous communities and the African immigrants who were forced into bondage here. A number of people who have attended Carnivale for at least 15 years are selected to don masks of the devil and are expected to whip all party-goers with genuine cat o´nine tails, thick 8 foot long leather whips. This occurs for the first few days, and the last day of the tradition marks the day of liberation when the party goers and locals hunt the Spanish conquistadors and slave owners down. Many people die and many houses get burnt down. The diet for such an event is totally limited to Ron Abuelo (rum), Cocaine, and Fried Chicken.

For better or worse Ferg and I were en route when the party finally ended. So, upon discovering a mysterious gypsy brew gathering dust in the local supermarket, I decided to have a little Carnivale myself. The strange drink was a 17% alcohol called Magnum Jamaican Tonic. On the label were two neon ghosts having sex. And the ingredients boasted Vigorton2 as a mineral, and main ingredient. Naturally, I bought all of the bottles available and consumed them immediately. Already sweaty and clammy, with a touch of the Dengue, I figured I couldn´t get in too much worse shape. Somewhat of a social experiment with benefits to the scientific community I suppose.

¨Mild hallucinations and a painful swelling of the entire loin area (testicles included) were reported by the subject.¨ A doctor of medicine would have reported.

But I woke up this morning feeling refreshed, and I found 2 dozen servings of ramen noodles made and ready to be eaten with spoons placed individually in each bowl waiting in the fridge. Apparently a side effect is the peculiar desire to cook cheap food for 25 people and then totally forget about it. Maybe it´s just coincidence but my fever is gone.

Bocas is a lush garden of champagne green and electric blue waters. Red, purple, green, blue, and yellow reef that extends for thousands of acres. Palm trees and a very present police force. Panama hats, coconuts, Swedish girls, and French Canadians. 30 foot Sailboats flying British flags and hosting some very foolish but brave young adventurers. Stilted homes and a gangland torn beachfront ghetto named Saigon that belongs in Morocco for International Arms dealers to do grave business in. Waves named Paunch, Caranero, Bastimentos, Bluff, Silverbacks, Wizard, and Dumpers. Hammerheads, reef sharks, and barracudas. Rum, coke, and chicken. It´s all here for the taking, but caution should be taken in large doses here.

I learned of this my first day surfing Paunch. The westward facing reef was being hit with an earnest 10 foot Atlantic swell. The wave punches up and becomes very steep with a lip that is quite thick and pit that is nice and hollow. Getting caught on the inside of the reef after a ride is not usually dangerous. The coral is a few feet shallow but not too bad. Unless of course a rogue wave, not part of a set, catches you offguard.

A few days ago I was wearing a beauty of a tshirt emblazoned with a fluorescent race car and big bold letters stating ¨DICK TRICKLE¨ on my chest. My spare digital camera and waterproof case dangling around my neck. I had caught a fast right in and on the paddle out I met one of those bastard kamikaze waves set on destroying your face. I duckdove until my knuckles found reef. As deep and low as I could make myself I waited for the wave to pass. I opened my eyes and through my seasalt milky vision saw the roll of chunder coming my way. Bracing myself I was tossed into a horizontal spin. Much like an underwater human frisbee or boomerang. I scrambled back up gasping for air like a newborn baby after being spanked with a triumphant ¨Hfwack¨ by a doctor. Totally nude, I swam to a photo boat, left with only a sigh and a Panamian moustache. The shirt ripped clean off my back. My camera surrendered to the Caribbean. My board to the reef.

I retired to the more mellow, user friendly Caranero for long connecting lefts. Very pumpable 200 meter rides alongside the north end of the archipelgo. I honed my skills, found my chi, aligned my bravado, my wit, my testicles in the Feng Shui style to return to Paunch and rip the shit out of it. Ferg has done the same but has found solace in attending Scuba University with reckless abandon. I can´t make him stop studying. He is a brain, an automaton, he has found his calling in life. To live under the sea with mermaids. He now idolizes Jacques Cousteau. Speaks with a french accent. Wears an ill-fitting blue beanie. And talks with much empathy for whales and dolphins.

Our wanderlust is still quite strong and we have come to a crux in terms of our next move. We have an invite to live in a house overlooking the world famous Santa Catalina lava flow break on the Pacific coast with a scientist from the US. The man is a patent writer and inventor for Stanford University and is currently on a promotional tour for his latest creation. He has taken the concepts of the vaporizer bong, commonly referred to as a volcano, and designed a pipe capable of vaporizing. For those of you unfamiliar with the technology, it essentially allows you to inhale extracted THC vapor without the smoke and toxins. However, I do believe we are going to continue on a path out to the Archipelago of San Blas to live in Robinon Crusoe style huts with the Kuna natives. Apparently a home to the most autonomous tribe in Panama, Colombian narcotic trafficking, shipwrecks, pirates, and packages of thousands of unmarked bills washing up on shore.

If I were in charge of writing travel advisories and warnings for the government I would advise that all people should come to Bocas del Toro. But watch out because a Panamanian with a ponytail will threaten to kill you in the line-up at Paunch, you will need to be in shape to run from the cops for not wearing a tshirt in public, and stay away from the Magnum Jamaican Tonic.

Robbery!

2007-03-04T09:41:00.000-08:00

My shoes were stolen on Ometepe. My camera and 2 months of memories were stolen on the Carribean Coast. These events occurred shortly following an out-of-character examination of my bank statements. My cash, colones, and cordobas are in order minus a displeasing $96 from a 10 minute call home using a VISA instead of a calling card.

I cursed Ometepe to damnation and fled with Ross atop a banana boat one morning, smugly confident that all inhabitants would have blankets of lava steamrolling their culture within minutes. Summoning an eruption before coffee and some light calisthenics in the morning is a little arduous. Defeated, I had to take the events in stride.

But isn´t it the case that invention and innovation are born out of necessity? I recall a conversation with Colter, a 22 year old big game hunter and math teacher from Montana. In fact, this is the very man who takes to impersonating Bigfoot sightings, down to the finest detail. What follows is as much a guide as it is an observation. It is the questions and the mantra for ferals. An endless brook of information that may one day be assembled into gospels and volumes of encyclopedic proportions. This is not C++ programming for Dummies. This is not a sewing instruction manual. Nor is it a guide to surviving a mountain lion mauling.

This is How to Attack a Buffet. A truly unique environment to travellers used to rice and beans in an equatorial cloud forest. It´s a hunting ground that requires a savage swiftness, heightened mental state, and a precise strike.

1. What are your objectives? Are you trying to maintain a predetermined ratio of calories to the penny at your hostel´s buffet? Are you fending off jaundice? Are you lullabying a craving for variety? This rule is of deep introspection and must be determined by yourself. If, however, you decide that you want to experience foreign cuisine of the highest calibre you should probably stop reading now. Go back to your couch and watch television. How dare me, right? Well, I am not trying to be smug or exclusive but you may not like the jungles of this land. They can be...unpleasant at times.

2. What are your plans after? Remember that the tantric form of buffet feeding is to tame your hunger for 24 hours from a single feast. Additionally, this single feeding time per day should not leave you lethargic or sluggish. So what meal will you choose as prey? What do the days activities include? Upper body workout like kayaking or surfing? Lower body like a machete trek up to the waterfall? Mental pressure? Chess, reading perhaps? What sort of calories do you need? How much protein? How many carbs? When? What will the temperature be? How about the humidity index? Good. Consider all variables. We are hominids and seek variance in recreational activities. Larger mammals such as lions feast and then loll about in the sun all day. We on the other hand prefer more challenging and unique ways to fill our leisure time. Do not let this meal thrust you into a sweaty food stupor.

3. Know your environment. This refers to anything outside of your digestive system. Those slacks, are they adjustable? That cardigan, is it moisture wicking? Where is the lavatory in relation to you, the food, the windows, doors, plates, stalking areas, sauces, and kitchen? Are y-front knickers really a good idea? Feast under a fan, if present, to cool the beads of sweat rolling from your unwashed hair. Cool them to a chill in order for you body to burn more calories while eating. Eat ice, get your money´s worth. Always refer to Rule 1. Know the method to your madness and it´s relevance to the tangible in your environment. Attract as little attention as possible. A perceived deviance from the routine of the pack will induce the other hunters to increase their gluttony and pace as well. Things will escalate to a frenzy very quickly. People will be withdrawing food from the buffet dishes, but this is not a Sizzler. You are on a volcano, or in the jungle, or a deserted island. There are no deposits apart from the first. Deposit 0. Supply is finite. By God, don´t start a Black Monday. Once a hostel buffet is corrupted for the first time it is forever contaminated. Only with the enforcement of strict feeding regulations will its existence continue. And it will only ever return to a superficial level of its potential and abundance. Much like a national park, you will no longer be able to devour it´s contents. Only appreciate them.

4. The Food, the Drink. What are your objectives again? This is very easy. Don´t be distracted by that first dish. Look past the salad. Are those empty carbs or enriched? Be true to yourself. What do you drink? Or do you at all? Is water potable on the island anyway? Is juice a good idea? How many cups of coffee can you handle? Drink as many as possible to empty your digestive track of its waste. Whole fish is a waste. Too many bones, too much time.

5. The Etiquette. While food is being prepared and you are waiting for the short Nicaraguan man to ring the dinner bell stalk as well as you can. Don´t start a line but make small talk with those closest to the feeding grounds. Be first in line. You are the dominant super alpha male, make this fact known. Grow facial hair and don´t bathe for 2 months. Never return to the line with a dirty plate. Appear as if you are eating for the first time everytime. How long does that unattended plate of food next to you have ownership rights if the hunter has left table to go to the bathroom? Three minutes and then you may steal it. Protect your plate, don´t let a cook collect it. Do your own dishes. Become friends with the source but don´t tip. Remember you are the super alpha. Make it known.

I can only imagine what kind of doctrine this will turn into.

Ross and I jettisoned our plans to further explore Nicaragua in favor of seeing a familiar face. We travelled for 30 hours, standing room only down to Panama. Upon arrival to the reef islands of Bocas del Toro I was initially struck by three things.

How poorly treated the tumor ridden dogs are down here.

The scenery which is the most awe inspiring I have ever seen, my imagination is belittled in a place like this.

And the first piece of trash I spotted on this island, a small flyer for a Moustache and Cleavage party. We were indeed hot on the track of a famous Carribean pirate, Captain Grinnell.

After a warm welcome at the Heike Hostel, with people who already knew our names and nicknames, we went in search of the man who made us famous. We found Corey at a Happy Hour with two of his best friends he has made down here. Both of whom locals to the ghetto on the island. Both of whom have spent more than 6 months in prison. One of which is a gunshot victim, and the other apparently due to be. Corey has indeed made an impression on the island.

We have spent some notable days exploring the surrounding islands. Getting dropped off at fire coral reef breaks to surf fast and churning waves next to palm tree laden uninhabited islands. Walking through jungles to find empty beaches, strong rips, coconut lunches, and pulsing sets of enormous Atlantic waves. Panama is certainly the most memorable place we have travelled to so far. It is suiting that my camera is gone, I can only hope that my memories of this place will be more complete, less selective than if I did have a camera.

A Wonderful Fear!

2007-02-27T10:07:00.000-08:00

Ross, myself, and a commercial fisher from Alaska, Tristan, spoke excitedly and grinning under the moonlight last night about our personal highlights of travelling, what we missed about home, and our impressions of our current surroundings. Although our projected-memories varied from person to person we all agreed that it was the people that we met on the road who created our most bursting memories. You knew you met a genuine person if you could tell a 2 minute anecdote about said human that could sum up their character, the feel of the place where you met them, and their dynamic with yourself.

I told him of Nick and Colin. He told us of a friend who disappeared into a restaurant bathroom on the Corn Islands, after having too much rum, and emerged 5 minutes later slowly ambling through the wilderness of the restaurant. He was imitating bigfoot in the famous sighting video, and as he strode out of the restaurant, the 6'4'' 230 pound, hairy red man, glanced with a 1000 yard stare over his shoulder and vacantly into the eyesight of his friend. He was naked.

We told him of Shane and his knack for peculiar crab hunting ritual dances at bars where he would imitate a sideways marching crustacean arms up warily and in a defensive position. Then he would transition into the hunter and appear as a fisherman hauling in his crab. And finally he would leave the dance as if it were a tangible object, pointing at it on the floor with an upward facing open palm, one arm tucked neatly behind the small of his back, and gracefully leave the focus of the dance circle. Normal dancing (if that's what you can call Ferg's unorthodox style) would ensue, everyone not quite sure of what they just witnessed.

The thing with travelling is not the destination. Location I suppose is the vehicle that transports you to unique experiences made possible by absurd people.

There is a ferry to Ometepe from San Jorge. It is short in length and tall in height. Very narrow in the waist. This ferry transports livestock and rations to the island nation which is a home to two active volcanoes and a small population of wonderful people. The captain of the ship drinks on the job and listens to opera at a very high decibel level while navigating the 10 foot swells produced on Lago Nicaragua which is 1/3rd the size of Nicaragua itself. I theorized his drinking on the job counteracted the endless tossing and turning of the little boat in the high seas. While passengers stumble around very frighteningly almost going overboard and gaining speed while running towards the side of the slippery metal floored ship, 3 stories up, he is able to stand perfectly still. The air about him was dignified and nonchalant.

On the ferry we befriended three 20 year old Swedish girls and persuaded them to come to the southern tip of the island with us, past the jungle laden isthmus of the main island. Before we had even docked locals were leaping into the water and scaling on to the ship to meet the three beautiful girls and offer them pleasantries and rides to where they needed to go. Kajsa, Emily, and Elien negotiated a price with a thinly moustached man and we climbed into the flatbed of his pick-up truck and rode for an hour and a half through a purple twilight to our hostel.

The poverty on the island is so thorough that they do not know what it means to be rich. They have absolutely no perception of what that state of life is like. No one asks you to buy anything or to give them handouts. Their only request is that you watch a baseball game on the burnt field with them, which is littered with consequential objects. Namely chickens, cows, donkeys, horses, pigs, wild dogs, burning piles of rubbish, an electrical tower, and old lava flows. Nicaraguans are fine sportsmen, and righteously proud. Along the coastlines children bathe in the lake in the morning, next to their nomadic camps and few tattered possessions. Along the dirt road they live in cramped wooden and garbage bag adorned shacks. They are some of the most friendly and warm people we have met thus far. The ladies who work at the hostel and feed us give us hugs and compliment our good looks each morning. They also all wear jewels in their teeth like rap stars. It makes me think that Nelly and Li'l Wayne may be truly decent individuals after all.

We spend the days hiking, kayaking, reading, biking, swimming, and horseback riding. Playing bandito shoot 'em up games with the children and listening to them squeal and laugh at our bandanas and fist and finger made pretend guns as we gallop with them chasing us. Or we kayak up to their encampments and take them for little tours to monkey-governed islands. To a certain extent it is an ideal life out here. There is no known crime and it feels like they get along in order to not upset the active volcanoes which occasionally clear the island of its inhabitants leaving only charred artifacts for the next nomadic group who will establish. I assume from the good natured character of the place that this only happens once a century when a crime is committed. We did witness a fistfight between two drunk locals. Both were too intoxicated to connect their clenched paws with the others jowels. And the whole time the scene was unfolding I had a vague but eminent feeling that the volcano was just sitting and watching, waiting to blow chunks as soon as that first punch landed.

But we are off to Panama now, to meet a particularly deviant pirate who goes by the title of Grinnell. Before leaving I managed to do something of much consequence for Northern relations. Acting as an official diplomat three Americans and I cleared the air about the animosity between Canada and the US, officially and for good. We even shook on it. That's the kind of place Ometepe is. Secret meetings of great importance and goodwill occur here.

Picture Update 4!

2007-02-25T08:30:00.000-08:00

Howler Monkey Homestead

Earl & Eddy

Gypsy-Bendiness Competition

A little luxury

Tamarindo's most dignified Mariachi

Ferg, 2.8 seconds from disaster

Earl, 10 tacos deep into the Competition

Casa del Doghouse

Ometepe Sunrise

Flor de Cana

Christian Kitty

El Jefe

Senor Rocks

Ferg being all Romantic-like

The British.

Short Hike to the Goods

Duck the DragonTail

Nick & Imaginary Fu Man Chu

High Seas on Lago Nicaragua; home to the world's only freshwater sharks

Volcan Concepcion y Volcan Maderas a Ometepe

From the Devil's Mouth

Frothy Distraction

Hostel on a Volcano

A 7-Hour Picture Update (1-3) in Progress

Pics Finally

2007-02-23T10:51:00.000-08:00

Hola amigos! it´s been a while but i´ve finally managed to put a few pics on the web. The wolfman picture is my favourite one. It was painted on the side of a 14 wheeler in Montezuma. We´re in san juan del sur now, just posting a few things before we head up to ometepe. Ometepe is a volcano formed island on lake nicaragua where there are very few cars or any type of modern conveniences....supposedly. Looking forward to it though. We´ve got about a week left here then we backtrack all the way across costa rica down to panama. You´d think we were wasted when we made that route but it was a pretty conscious decision. Hope everyone is bueno back home and abroad. Everybody be sure to fire me some emails to let me know how what you´re up to. sorry about the sideways photos. Go Canucks Go!!!!

Escape!

2007-02-23T10:12:00.000-08:00

Balls chaffed, choda looking like it was bedazzled (TM), and walking like a faberge egg was in my bum I had had enough of sweaty, seedy Costa Rica. We fled to the border with a sense of urgency. Crammed into a bus and sleeping while standing for 4 hours at 5:30 in the morning we awoke to a robbery which quickened our necessity to flee.

Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the western hemisphere, after the half island nation of Haiti. The Costa Rican/Nicaraguan border crossing is not as stringent as some may expect from two countries who vary so greatly in wealth, and have been warring with each other for the past century. I doubt the methods of luggage scrutiny would do much to deter many ruggedly determined drug and gun runners, contras, or people fleeing from the CIA. The process of crossing the border is reminiscent of the circus on an acid trip.

Once one arrives at the border you hand over your passport as it goes through a mysterious process in a shack for twenty minutes with about 1000 others. During this time you deposit your luggage, if you decide to, on a table. Eventually a man will come up to you holding a stop light and a button. When you finally discover that he wants you to press the button, you do so. If the stoplight shows green, you amble off into a crowd of border dwellers desperately trying to sell you cashews or brooms. If the light shows red you take your luggage to a room, where a man will look at the size of your backpack in despair and tell you to leave. You will then notice the commotion outside of the passport scanning thatched-roof hut and run back to try to claim your passport as it is thrown, rather, frisbee´d into a crowd. Ultimately, this crowd will consist largely of German Carpenters and Gothic people for some reason. Who look like Amish Disco Cowboys and French Dukes respectively. You will then notice your bus leaving without you, after chasing it down for 200 fun meters with 50 pounds on your back you will board.

You go through a carwash, and voila. Welcome to Nicaragua.

Once across Ross and I bartered in Spanish with a man who owns one of twelve cars in this dusty and barren, but beautiful land to give us a ride to San Juan del Sur. After negotiating a price of 4 dollars each we were shuttled for an hour to the coastal fishing village. We immediately booked a ride on the back of a paramilitary bus into the outback. Whisked away through valleys, shanty towns, cockfighting pits, and abandoned coca cola refrigerators we found ourselves on one of the most remote beaches in Nicaragua.

Playa Majagual is where we shared a Christian doghouse on the beach for 5 nights, literally. A local tip-off and 10 minute hike around the spearfishing point, what the three locals called the supermarket, brought us to Playa Madera. Three feet overhead and almond shaped waves blessed our sand blasted vision and in the water we were. It was not uncommon to be paddling out towards the zenith and see a 15 pound tuna leap over the person paddling out the channel in front of you. The waves were powerful, fast, and hollow. Outrunning the whitewash became more of a fearful addiction then a swell time. A buried nose or caught rail would mean being held down for what lungs would deem as too long or landing on a stingray as Ferg almost did one morning.

Unfortunately, I had stumbled upon a massive bible of science fiction short stories and often swayed away the swell-less hours with the book. This particular literature in combination with my anti malaria pills gave me the most deeply and vividly terrifying dreams one could imagine. Usually the subject or antagonist was something silly, such as a baseball cap. But it would stalk and haunt me, the protagonist, for years in my dreams. All of which were narrated by Leonard Nemoy who would commentate on how ¨the girl across from me in the cafeteria would swing the blue baseball cap around on her finger, from side to side as it´s one shredded eyeball would gaze at me while it´s snout would sniff the unsuspecting girl´s hair on each westward penduli-upswing.¨ Or other such nonsense. Essentially this hat slowly killed all of those close to me and would leave me for last: totally incapable of fighting back as my subconscious held me feeble and petulant. I would wake up each morning, crammed into our doghouse, screaming into Ross´ ear.

Now sandcaked, dirty, and peeling we have headed inland and back to civilization to bike down a volcano and wrestle some freshwater sharks. On a separate note my camera connection cable, spare camera battery, towel, and water bottle were left in Tamarindo with my sanity and self respect after our last night. Which involved too much caffeine, drinking purified urine like Kevin Costner in Waterworld, machetes, and no sleep. So enjoy Ferg´s pictures for now.

From Guanacaste with Love

2007-02-14T12:55:00.000-08:00

Monteverde is a Quaker settlement located in the Alajuela province of the central midlands of Costa Rica. In the mid 20th century a number of Quakers were conscripted to pick off a few Asians at war for the US. In protest of not having their beliefs accommodated an entire Quaker town in Texas packed up their pacifist lives and decided to move. A figurehead for the community threw a sharpened cheese knife at a world map posted on the side of a barn. With a mighty thwang it pierced the demilitarized nation of Costa Rica. Since, they have successfully lobbied the Costa Rican government to not accrue any funds to road maintenance for the single access point to the town.

Three and a half hours winding up monstrous cliffs on a 10 foot wide, two lane, blind corner, dirt road, and we headed into the National Park locale of Monteverde. Immediately after arriving I hoofed a solo mission around the jungle-laden national park. I spent 6 hours doing the outer loop and decided to attempt a new zone about 8 miles west of the reserve. On the trip up I had spotted a ribbon of water pouring out of the mountains, from across a 4 mile wide valley. I was picked up along the road by a foreman and his crew of 20 laborers. I squeezed into the chicken coup like quarters on the back of the altered pick-up truck with the workers and jumped out at a farm close to La Catarata San Luis. After negotiating with the farm owner, I payed $1 USD, and began my hike up through her banana plantation to the falls. I enjoyed my three favourite things once I reached the top. Hardcore rap music, a tuna sandwich, and swimming.

At this point, two brits, Shane and Lacey, have joined with us for some inland volcanic experience, and we pushed farther, towards Volcan Arenal and La Fortuna. We booked a “Jeep-Boat-Jeep” (pronounced without moving your mouth, only your lips and tongue, as fast as humanly possible, so it sounds more punjab than latin) to get to our new destination. A more apt title for the tour would have been bus-ferry-bus. However, I have a renewed love for air conditioning and paved roads after spending three weeks without them. I don’t miss TV. I don’t miss getting pay checks. I don’t miss not being sunburnt. I don’t really even miss my immediate family. I certainly don’t miss showering or shaving. But good god, give me a paved road and mechanically cooled air wafting over my deliciously peppery aromatic body. Fuck, I was in total bliss. It’s like that moment right after you, for lack of a better phrase, release a loin emission; except it lasted for 2 hours.

Our time in Arenal was spent largely in our hostel’s pool with a swim up bar, and occasionally ambling into town wishing we had enough money to go zipping through the forest suspended half a kilometer above the canopy, or riding horseback around the Volcano, or something fairly imaginative, but equally preposterous in monetary terms. We swapped stories, made Quaro punch with some new friends, and did some hikes up to a hotspring. And most notably, Ferg fell in love with a Vietnamese woman. Her name is Tam Pham, and she has three other sisters named Tam. Quite a doll.

We have travelled back to the Guanacaste province on the Gold Coast, through lakes and wind farms, directly into the tourist central nervous system of the country. Tamarindo is host to 1 part local surfers, 1 part backpackers, 1 part American families, and 1 part total mutants of human excellence. One man here, Earl from Bellingham Washington is on disability. He is 6’7”, 70 years old, staying at this exact hostel for 5 months, has played guitar for 30 years but only knows one song, which he made up, named “Beaver Moon”, and is the champion of my first annual Fish Taco eating competition. In which he polished off 10, beating Ross and myself who tapped out at 9.

We have met another interesting Brit couple who are on a world tour for 2 years. Shaun and Tracy from the middleplains of the UK are both 26. And they both freelanced for two years as clinical studies volunteers. They have so many stories of holes being drilled into their heads, dismemberments and reattachments, induced seizures, morphine overdoses, and antidepressant drug testing. Shaun also claims that he holds the unofficial world record for pants shat in one day, at 16, while he was in Bolivia. Their South and Central America leg of the tour is based loosely around what they refer to as a drug taste testing adventure of mass proportions. Their plan may be ill-advised, their strategy may be risky, but my god their tactics are impeccable. Every morning you can find Shaun passed out dangerously close to the edge of the pool. While Tracy is lying in their bed covered in his urine. As he claims to think it is better to leave her sleep if he inadvertently pisses the bed while they doze.

We celebrated Tracy’s birthday two days ago, wherein Ferg displayed the most amazing dance maneuvers this hemisphere has ever witnessed. A combination of leaping kicks, closed eye pelvis lunging, and deeply cyclical spins made up 50% of the dance floor, and the other 50% of the time he spent recovering from those very dance moves. Usually by using crossovers, or just running backwards, slowly sitting for about 75 feet until he was on the ground. One of his attempts of this braking system found him running backwards through the DJ booth into the backroom of the bar.

Our times in Tamarindo haven’t been selectively at the bar though, we have managed to surf at least twice a day. Both Ross and I have learned how to pull drop-kneed into barrels. To see a lobster of a man, standing 6 foot 4, with a shock of red hair pull into the hollow of a wave that is big enough for a large boy but not a small man is a feet of human bendiness.

Alas, the swell is pumping and I must go stretch out my sunburnt and salty skin before one of our sundown sessions.

Ferg´s 1st Entry

2007-02-04T09:21:00.000-08:00

hey peoples this is ferg using jeffuardo's aka heffe's account. We are currently in montezuma down on the nicoya peninsula its a laid back spot with not a lot of surf but a bunch of strung out locals who wander around drunk and mumbling. one kissed jeff on the hand today and said "god bless you". we got here two nights ago and went for a hike up a waterfall. we got a tip that once you see the first waterfall your supposed to hike up and around to another one where you can jump off into a pool. we started hiking then got lost ubntil a local kid led us to it. we drop was about 35 feet, in to a fresh water pool, i've got some sweet videos which i'm going to try to get on this thing later. there was also a rope swing. that night we were doing some waterfalls of our own playing kings and i fell down to the ground when i put my drink up to my lips. they have a type of booze here called guaro that goes down like water but totaly messes you up.

We are staying right next door to bradner and nick roos, they've mut up with two brits who are pretty cool. we went on a boat tour to tortuga island yesterday where we did some snorkeling saw some fish but no dolphins or sharks or sea cows which was too bad. we were out there all day and they cooked us marlin for lunch and gave us a ton of beers. after that we just digested drank and played beach volleyball.

A few days ago when we were in mal pais i was surfing on a rental 7'6 board and was paddling out to a wave. i didn't manage to get over it and it broke right on top of me. the board snapped in two and i rode one of the halves in like a boogey board. it was the second broken board between me and jeff. i got lucky because the guy said he could fix it and he only charged me 50 bucks. the surf was good out here though we had a few days when the wind was blowing off shore and the waves were really big. i even managed to catch a few and ride them out. we had a few fun nights with gercsak and scotty and that crew drinking guaro and fanta. one night there was a reggae party at a bar that was about a 30 min. walk from our hostel. we hitchhiked and were picked up by a van taxi with a roof rack. jeff got in the inside where there was about 13 other people and i got on the roof with about 9 others. just as we got on the rain started coming down in buckets, the first rain i've seen down here. so anyways we all showed up drenched but it turned out to be a fun night. so we're off to montaverde next which is inland. we just newed to figure out how to get there first. hope everyone is doing well and i was glad to see the canucks are kicking so much ass. pura vida. Adios.

Picture Update 3!

2007-02-03T13:09:00.000-08:00

Picture Update 2!

2007-02-03T11:47:00.000-08:00

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Picture Update!

2007-02-03T10:45:00.000-08:00

In Search of Captain Zero!

2007-01-29T16:58:00.000-08:00

Mal Pais directly translates into Bad Country. And it is a perfect definition of this townless land in an obscure and artistic form of place-naming. The waves are large and violent; it is not uncommon to see a roadside surfer making their way to the pharmacy for stitches, or a grinning Tico with a snapped board. The town is as dusty and hot as all hell. Everyone walking or dirtbiking wears bandanas and appear as banditos at first glimpse. And the reggae parties occur deep in the jungle under long dancehall roofs, thumping songs, and sopping wet locals.

However, this is the most relaxed and tranquil place I have ever been. It took at least 4 days to truly let go, adjusting to Pura Vida is worse than jetlag. I sensed a particular familiarity with this place. I couldn't quite put my finger on the sensation, until I learned that the province of Guanacaste is a separatist region. The people are so amazingly friendly and peculiar. Just like the Quebecois.

We hitch-hiked into Cobano one hot morning and were picked up by Julio, a Tico with 24 bottles of Guaro and 7 machetes in the back of his truck. We were on a mission into Banco Nacional to extract funds in order to replace a pair of snapped surfboards. The bank was littered with shotgun-hosting security guards, all individually armed with belts of slugs in case of a large and well manicured heist by some Nicaraguan badlands folk. There was a multi vault access into a single room with a table, 2 more guards, and a teller. We would foolishly fumble through broken spanish in order to recoop some cash before walking back towards the door along an outlined path on the ground. Which, I assumed, would be a poor idea to deviate from.

We walked a few kilometres before being picked up once again and headed back into Mal Pais. Our lovely chauffere, Jen from Hawaii pointed out a horse drawn carriage pulling a large cage adorned with sombreros, enclosing a single white donkey. Also hanging off each side was a shirtless and sweaty surfer, as well hitching a ride. I jostled with my camera for a few too many instants before looking up to see that it was indeed Colin Bradner and Nick Rous. I missed the picture but laughed out loud in place of a camera flash and shutter click.

The heat emanating off of the sun and the Earth, and anything metal is so intense that I had thought it an excellent idea to move my belongings as well as my body into the deepfreeze alongside some frozen shrimp for about a week. I walked into the Super Ronny to check how much space was left inside. To my surprise I found 3 dutchmen stacked on top of each other taking a quick nap in the cold. Defeated I purchased 8 bags of shrimp and cooked up a mean fucking pasta for 25 people.

These dinners have turned into quite the event, and each travelling group takes on the responsibility each night. You surf until dusk with everyone from the hammock hostel. In fact you surf until it's afterdark and you get that feeling that something blacker and more evil than nightfall could be lurking hungrily below you. I won't bore you with the sunset details because you already know they are romantic as can be with vivid neons, amazing shades of golds, green waves, white foam, twinkly stars, and the harvest moon all at the same time. One night there was a whale breaching on the horizon. It was so dramatic and heart warming that I puked on a couple of french brothers from the hostel as I dropped into my last wave. That night was so perfect that I had to do some nude sperm-like bodysurfing at midnight just to really feel like a king.

The one most beautiful thing about this place is the people. Genuinely good people. All adventurous, off the beaten track, with quirks, personalities, and stories to boot. I have played so many sweat-inducing ping pong matches with short short wearing Argentinians that I am considering joining the circuit. Let me tell you, Argentinians know their table tennis and their bikinis quite well. And 2007 is indeed a notable year in bikinis.

We have made friends with Dutch, Swedish, Swiss, German, Israeli, Canadian, American, Brazilian, Parisian, and Russians. All of which would be life long friends if we weren't so itchyfooted. I have made friends with a few different species to. A local warthog stops by once in a while to get orange rhines from me, a cat comes and cuddles with me before he begins grotesquely licking his bum, and a few monkeys like to treat the broken plastic roof of our hostel like a trampoline.

But that time did come. Just as the septic tank truck and pump arrived with the two 8 year olds running the damn thing, and probably driving too we decided it was time to hit the road. We weren't feeling particularly long in the tooth, or in the beard in our cases, but this train has now moved on to Montezuma. Still on the Nicoya Peninsula we are travelling now with a 27 year old Blond German girl, a 21 year old bronze skinned Canadian, and an 18 year old brunette Dutch girl. This is God's Equation my muchachos. Es Bueno.

Notes from Dogleg 1!

2007-01-18T07:13:00.000-08:00

We flew down in an albatross that appeared to have the engine of a washing machine. However, the measly plane got us to Houston, Texas. I believe the pilot aimed for a jet stream in order to get the mongoloid vessel far enough into Texas that it seemed viable for stiff drink, moonshine to be served on our connection to San Jose.

The landing was unorthodox and the plane resembled yourself as a child, age 4, balancing on one of four legs of a barstool. You probably should have toppled over with wide eyes and automatically clenched muscles, but you always managed to pilot yourself in safely. In fact you probably shared the same level of motor skill and sensibility as our captain.

Upon landing Ferg jolted awake with a sense of urgency, "I WANT A HAMBURGER" he cawed out, almost crying. It was quite an impressive transition from a state of bodily and mental shutdown directly into being awake and very disruptive. Half drunk and sweating I tried to soothe his apparent worry for his baser desires of cooked meats.

"It'll be a cold day in Texas when you fellas can't find a good steak in the mighty Houston airport praise the lord thank you Jesus." our evangelical butcher seat companion declared. Smiling to myself, imagining how many times Bryce and Jill have heard Rossiekins yelp something about putting animals into his stomach, abruptly discontinuing his naptime.

"Amen." I replied solemnly while ambling off the plane into 1 degree centigrade weather. The flight to San Jose was not necessarily noteworthy except for the fact that we watched three hours of I love Lucy episodes.

There is a lot of drugs and barbed wire in San Jose, that is the extent of my knowledge of the place. A very transient city I should note.

The next morning, after a shitty night of listening to a symphony of snores we awoke to Immanuel, our Panamanian shuttle driver at the front desk looking for "Senor Hoss and Senor Heff". Once packed into our car, we bumbled along into the nucleus of desperation in San Jose. Immanuel possessed an impressive and frequently used plethora of cat calls. As we drove by heavily guarded Salvation Armies and sad looking tin houses, the Panamanian listed prices and services offered by each hooker we passed. Tottering and jostling along beside them he often blurted out hilariously accented phrases like, "Whoo Whoop, Sexy Ass Tongue Babayyy!", brief interruptions into the ongoing list of acts of questionable legality in their own right. Despite his morals & the subject he spoke with authoratative repute.

We drove out down the hill of San Jose to Puntarenas. On one side of the road there were fires, multicolored corrugated metal steel shacks, shoeless spitting children, and limbless & listless locals. The other side was flooded with a shocking amount of wealth in catamarans, yacht clubs, plush jungle, and satisfyingly sweet breezes. "Bazar Nury" said one storefront window which hosted resident tshirts of Disney characters caught in the midst of emblazoned lewd acts. "Indeed", a closeup of Steve Mann said in my imagination. "Indeed".

The ferry went at a truly Central American pace of 2 knots per hour and the bar onboard had no prices, being based on something I am growing to appreciate, the barter system. We sailed aimlessly through massive jungle encrusted rocks and amidst palm tree laced beaches. We had found paradise.

Once on the other side we were picked up by Immanuel's buddy, who didn't say a single word the entire time. After about 30 meters we were driving down a makeshift road, through jungles intertwined with cow pastures. I had the unsettling sensation we were en route to a coca plant, or to a mass grave as we barrelled along the unpaved highway that had potholes growing now to the size of ATV's.

Finally, sweat-laden and thirsty we saw ocean. We secured hammocks for the night, lockers for our gear, and surfboards for the afternoon. We strode along the dirt road, bandanas abound our faces for dust protection, a couple of quick kilometers to Santa Teresa and ran down to the beach. The water was not refreshing at all, but we didn't care. We surfed until sundown riding in towards bronze tans, g-strings, white sand, brilliant green hills and jungles, and a golden mist from water vapour covering the whole damn thing.

I woke up at 5 this morning and was the first person on the beach. I surfed til 9, made myself some coconut pancakes, and now I am going for a siesta before we head into "town" to drink 30 cent beers. Don't come, it's not worth it.

Pie!

2007-01-15T14:30:00.000-08:00

Wanderlust!

2007-01-15T13:01:00.000-08:00

This weekend in the news...

A storm rolled in over the Toronto region. A mix of a foreign high pressure system and the existing low pressure system created a funnel-like whirling dirvish of pandemonium. The resulting storm and cold front swept in from the west and delivered massive amounts of disruption and chaos to Torontians and wildlife alike.

The city has estimated damage in the billions. Specifically to the Toronto Convention Centre, Royal Ontario Museum, Disco Bowling Paladium, Alleycat Bar, and Human Interaction Pong Development Centre on Merton Street.

Many religious leaders are calling it the first coming of the apocalypse, and the Pope has gone as far as writing a new chapter in the Bible wherein the event is simply stated as "That", occurring on the Sabbath.

One local man was witnessed to remain in the eye of the storm for its duration in the area. The jury is currently out on whether he created it himself, but it is more likely to be a freak accident.

Experts warn that the storm is moving in a violent and unruly fashion down to Central America, and has collided recently with an Irish front that could create the largest natural disaster known to Panamanians.

Local Area Man Trapped in the Eye of the Storm

Paleantologists and archeologists are agreeing that this sort of phenomenon may have caused the mass extinction of dinosaurs.

"A creature, nay, a beast of destruction this powerful threatens our very biosphere and we may have no choice but to move to outer space, or into the sea." stated famed biologist David Suzuki.

Critics are quick to protest. "Now what Mr. Suzuki may not realize is that these sort of alarmist statements cause pandemonium and add even more risk to the equation of protecting our populations." Noted Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper.

Luckily for the city of Toronto, this storm pattern occurs biannually. And is not a constant threat. It is expected to return in June of 2007.

Drafted!

2007-01-10T17:34:00.000-08:00

Hitting the Roster this coming April...

None other than famed magician...

2 Sips Goose Lips!

Pictures courtesy of Great Aunt Sylvia and her $25 Sears Gift Certificate for Christmas. Thanks Sylvia!

Jump Ship!

2007-01-10T10:20:00.000-08:00

"Ferals form a sub-culture whose members resemble animals in some superficial way (although obviously they are still human). They often have untethered hair (impromptu dreadlocks), are unwashed, and wear an assortment of torn, aged, although sometimes colourful, clothes. Their social system is based upon the following practices and philosophies: environmentalism (usually radical), refusal of most property systems founded on tenure or ownership (often resulting in nomadism and/or squatting), Marijuana-smoking, long-neck swilling, dog husbandry, suspicion of non-ferals."

-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feral_%28subculture%29

Christ Almighty!

2007-01-07T21:35:00.000-08:00

My bag is packed, my pocket is full, and my heart feels like an alligator. I am a sweaty, nervous, excited, palpitating bundle of human. And I am ready to explore the jungle, get bitten by 3 pound mosquitos, sleep on potato sacks, and put undercooked animals into my stomach-Fiesta Style!

After a tiresome and nerve-racking adventure to accumulate funds for this trip I have finally reached my goal. A combination of discovering my dormant japanese garden and grotto design/construction skills mixed with a wild ability to sell ridiculously priced composite skis and snowboards to people who possess a bizarre fascination with sliding down mountains have aided in my savings. But more importantly, my family has graciously provided me with financial and moral support to get far , far away from them for 5 months.

Joining me in this adventure will be the messy and occasionally incoherent Ross Ferguson. Whom after forgetting his snowboard pants and jacket in the city on our recent trip to Whistler has instilled a wholly new type of fear into our parents and comrades alike concerning our well-being and safety. It is now apparent that forgetfullness is one of the many plagues that could hinder our trip. This is added to the list of potential maladies that threaten to crumble our journey into a bizarre mix of hedonism and deprivation.

I have successfully involved myself in some sort of unofficial dryland training for this trip by surfing as much as possible despite the fact that it is winter and we have been doing it in snowstorms in the Great Northwest. Photographer/Cinematographer, Bryant Bell has joined me on these bizarre rituals of driving through the night to a land that shares it's water with Japanese and Siberian Tides. We have driven through sleepy mountain passes thick with snow, and directly into a rainforest of potentially harmful wildlife. Instead of saying "Welcome to Tofino", the signs should say "Welcome to Violent Storm/Rapid RipTide/Rabid Raccoon/Great White Shark/Bear Country you Poor Poor Fool". With a renewed sense of knowledge about what my body cannot handle (gasoline and tainted water) I am ready to explore the lower part of this piece of land that broke off Pangaea billions of years ago.

I have driven that mangled highway to the overdeveloped Whistler community for my last time this year, plunged down that last chute of rock and ice next to the Peak Chairlift while observers holler and poles clank in excitement, and generally eaten up my last morsel of pacific northwest living for the next 6 months of my life. Thanks for housing me family, and thanks for hi-fiving me friends. Adios muchachos.