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“I remembered the fox. One runs the risk of crying a bit if one allows oneself to be tamed.”  Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince South and North Arapaho Peak (13,500ft) with Geoff. Mt. Elbert (14,433ft) with...

We make every effort to keep things as they are, because human beings, alone, lament transience. Yet no matter how we grieve or protest, there is no way to impede the flow of anything. If we but see things as they are and flow with them, we may find enjoyment in transience. Because human life is transient, all manner of figures are woven into its fabric. – Shundo Aoyama, Zen Seeds Catching the swell on my journey back north from the desert. In order of appearance: Santa Fe Baldy (12,632ft) partial ascent, Mt. Wheeler (13,161ft), Sand Dunes National Park (exploratory peak up some elk trails ~ 12,900ft), Pikes Peak...

I need this wild life, this freedom. Zane Grey I leave Hell's Gate at mile 23, excited in anticipation of the section to come. I'd heard the trail would get more technical at this point. My body is feeling great having picked up the saccadic rhythm of the choppy desert single track. I put my head down, push into the thick manzanita and engage in the exhilarating chase of Catlow, who is just over a minute ahead. I pass a cairn, then another, orange ribbon hangs at waist height, but soon the trail dissolves into a mess of brush and cacti. Fuck, I'm off course! It's OK, it's OK. At this race, it's not a matter of if you get lost but when. I backtrack down to the last cairn, stopping to assess my options. There are clearly more cairns to...

UltrAspire team retreat – 38 miles from Lee Pass Trailhead to The Grotto in Zion National...

“And the air was full of Thoughts and Things to Say. But at times like these, only the Small Things are ever said. Big Things lurk unsaid inside.” Arundhati Roy, The God of Small...

“Where are you from?” asks the 3 year old Suzannah Sky “From here and there.” I reply. She looks at me perplexed. “Where is here? And, where is there?” She pokes back with the same quizzical expression. I wasn’t meaning to be clever with my response. Here was Boulder, Colorado. There was, well for the past year had been, Victoria, BC. But, there had never truly felt long enough to become here. I’d criss-crossed back and forth across North America, across the world, at times with just the clothes on my back, or weighted a tad more, sitting at the wheel of a truck, with my lady friend or two now, since dog tagged along. And, with all that, I never truly found myself neither here nor there.   My journey back...