Travel Blog #5

Moments and Wonder

As you may have expected, instead of writing my next blog quicker, I took even longer to write this one! So it goes. Have no fear, I've been up to many things and having lots of fun. For your reading enjoyment, here are some highlights.

Mountain biking in Derby

Ambitiose sed ineptum - Ambitious but rubbish

I had such a good time mountain biking in Derby. Free camping, a great pub to watch the cricket in the evenings, bike trails 2 minutes from my tent? Don’t mind if I do!

Derby is an old tin mining town converted into a mountain biking destination. It’s reminiscent of a ski resort town. It’s basically only bike stores, shuttles, a couple cafes, and a plethora of pubs for post-ride beers. Amazing! The surrounding area is full of logging / forestry, but the town was able to preserve the beautiful trees by creating a mountain biking haven. How cool is that?

I rented a bike for a couple days and had a blast. The trailhead and shuttles are all in town so you can just ride from your campsite / cafe right onto the trail. The trails have a great variety of difficulties and terrains for all skill levels, which is nice, because people like me who are not very good at mountain biking get nervous when they’re in biking destinations as they can be oriented towards advanced riders. I made up for my lack of skill with enthusiasm and a willingness to suffer, as is my wont. It’s really quite a special place. It’s got: huge gum trees and ferns (a must for all my adventures, obviously), lakes and ponds and creeks and rivers, pademelon and wallabies everywhere, extremely chatty birds. The wallabies get spooked easily, which is sketchy sometimes when they just burst out onto the trail out of the bush, but it is fun when you get to chase them up the hill. They probably don’t appreciate being followed by a sweaty biker breathing rather heavily but it made my experience better that’s for some sure.

I’ve only ridden a dual suspension bike a handful of times - most likely when I traded my old single speed, Jacque The Jackhammer, with Keinan so he can have a better challenge. Turns out, it’s really nice! You just soak up alll the bumps. It’s probably better for the ol’ knee too - guess I have an excuse upgrade my bike ;)

The highlights for me were the echidnas, the kookaburras around my camp laughing ALL night, and the post-ride brownies from Two Doors Down Cafe - seriously the best brownies I’ve ever had. If you’ve never heard a kookaburra, you simply must. It’s extremely strange and disconcerting and hilarious. And they simply don’t stop. Maybe I’m just self-conscious, but I get the feeling they’re sharing a joke about me behind my back after a while. Which is okay, I do a lot of dumb stuff.

Quolls! Echidnas! Birds!

Okay, animals in Tasmania are amazing. The birds in Tassie are great, colorful, and they make the most enjoyable, bordering on annoying (see above kookaburra video) noises.I don’t know many of their names apart from the kookaburra and the Tasmanian Hen. There are simply too many to remember! Quolls are adorable little omnivorous marsupials and you should look up photos of them immediately if you want to have your day brightened. Echidnas are spiky little guys with an inclination towards rotundity and are possibly the cutest things that have ever existed? (Excluding Fenchurch, obviously). You definitely need to look them up too if you enjoy happiness and joy and adorableness. Okay I’ll provide photos but you should look them up anyway. Tassie echidnas are more furry than mainland echidnas and probably all the cuter for it.

I had the pleasure of accompanying a group of quoll researchers from UTAS / Tasmania Land Conservancy for a morning to check their traps on the property I was staying on. The researchers are investigating why Eastern Quoll populations are declining in the Midlands of Tasmania. They set traps to find and track quolls in the area, and later they will release bred quolls to see if they can bolster the numbers. We went out into the bush at sunrise and checked about 20 traps wouldn’t you know it, they got one! It was a Spotted Tail Quoll, which they let me release it after doing their thing. Such lithe, majestic creatures. This one, they named Himalaya, pranced away quite gracefully when I took the bag off her. Incredible. What a gift. Thanks Rowena for letting me do that!

That morning will stay with me for a long time. Driving a farm ute, a Hilux no less, around the bush at sunrise, amidst the most lovely of eucalypt forest, chatting with new friends, meeting a quoll. Sometimes, we are fortunate enough to have moments where time stops. Or you come out of your internal thought machine long enough to truly see where you are. The fog of thought lifts and sunshine-like clarity of presence takes over. What I find profound about these moments, is that they seemingly come out of nowhere. Sure, sometimes they emerge when you’ve made the intentional effort to do something special, like climbing a mountain at sunrise or getting married (I've never been married, so I can only assume those are equally special). But I think more often the most life affirming moments surprise you. What makes this tricky is these are inherently fleeting. Our days are not filled with them. We have seasons of life that are really challenging, filled with grief, pain, struggle. Seasons where you can forget why you get out of bed, why you even had the dreams you have in the first place. To me, these moments are a salve, an antidote for such dark times. They remind me that it's worth the effort to keep going. That life is so beautiful, so precious, so full of wonder. Seeing the eyes of your friend who loves chocolate more than is advisable by their doctor light up when you give them a piece of luscious dark chocolate. When you hear the full, rich laugh of that friend whose mirth infects everyone around them. When that song that reaches you in your heart of hearts comes on. When your team scores a goal in extra time to tie a match and you realize all is not lost. Anytime you have a blueberry. These are, for me, the moments that make life worth living. They've been happening pretty frequently lately as I’m experiencing so many new things all the time. I mean, I’m living out a dream that has enraptured me for the better part of 2 years; how lucky I am. Even so, it’s easy to get lost in the planning, worrying, and drudgery of everyday life. I have realized that I really struggle with this, have always struggled with this. I’m taking this trip as my opportunity to be better.

Forgive me if this becomes preachy, but we mustn’t take these moments for granted. I believe it’s imperative we don’t. These are the moments that make life special. It’s not the grand gestures, the big events. I mean, those are great. But we most often cling to the little things, the little wonders, when we need encouragement. We aren’t owed these moments, but, we can train ourselves to see them more often. Taking a moment to really hear those birds outside your window, breathe in the smell of fresh bread at the bakery, savor that most certainly GMO-filled, unnaturally plump yet still so dang scrumptious blueberry. I reckon the better we get at that, the most wonder and fulfillment we'll find in our everyday lives.

(And yes, I get that I'm saying this as I traveled across the entire world to fill my life with excitement and adventure. It's one thing to say and one thing to experience! It all makes sense if you read Joseph Campbell's The Hero With A Thousand Faces.)

Christmas, but it’s summer?

This is my first Christmas away from home, and my first Christmas down under, where it’s summer. The weather is getting warmer and the days are getting longer, it’s weird! I’m not complaining, I’m thoroughly enjoying the lack of snow and cold. I personally find it hard to get into the Christmas spirit, but that could be that I’m not experiencing my usual Christmas / Holiday events in Montana, seeing Christmas lights everywhere, grumbling about the lack of snow, spending time with friends and family.

Tree Talk

Another aspect of the weirdness of spring/summer in Australia is that new growth on eucalypts is often red. So the healthy little gums we guarded on the farm had red stems and leaves. And sometimes you see big, adult gums that are turning red on top with new growth. In my simple brain, red leaves = fall. The turning leaves aren’t quite like deciduous trees, but it’s close enough that as a Northern Hemisphere dweller it’s confusing. But also comforting, as my brain doesn’t fully recognize that it’s summer, not fall. Anyway, nature is amazing and gum trees rule and I continue to enjoy them more every day.

Music I'm Enjoying

My favorite Christmas album: Yule by Teitur, Dreamers’ Circus & Mads Kjøller-Henningsen

Nú Brestur Á Við Vesteurætt is my favorite on the album and a song that gets me through

Phillips Lake by Dreamers’ Circus - this has a holiday / Christmasy feel to it that is really nice

Fairy Tale by Seori

The band Cry Club - an Aussie band that has excellent rock energy and great production

Nine of Swords is an absolute banger

Quote for Inspiration

My friend Wyatt reminded me of this quote:

"Happiness only real when shared." Christopher McCandless' wrote this, inspired by this quote from Doctor Zhivago: "and so it turned out only a life similar to the life of those around us, merging with it without a ripple, is genuine life, and that an unshared happiness is not happiness."

My adventures are happening faster than I can write them down, so I'm a little behind. Expect another photo drop of all the cool places I've been lately, and probably some sentimentality and reflections on the year. Tis' the season. Until next time!

Courage,

Trevor

"Fill your life with meaning. Life is precious. Do not waste a single second."

 - Rog Bennett