Micro-Adventure: James River float

“But just as the river is always at the door, so is the world always outside. And it is in the world that we have to live.” 

― Lian Hearn

I'm not one to be pigeon holed into terminology, I often find myself avoiding hip words like "selfie" if only for the sake of not bowing to a perceived trend. 

That being said, some time ago I read about the idea of the "Micro-Adventure" from Alastair Humphreys, a true adventurer, Author, and motivational speaker. 

As described by Humphreys, Micro-Adventures are local, inexpensive journeys that get you outdoors on a smaller scale, but can have a profound affect on you just the same. 

With Ash being one week removed from being medically cleared from having our daughter, we decided to do a James River float. (If Ash is anything, she is not one to sit around).

I have found that as parents we collectively make an art of "what if'ing" things to death. The logistics of any endeavor often stifle the creativity of the adventure before it has a chance to get started.

So one of the very first hurdles to any outing is actually going...It really is that simple, because if you look for excuses you will most certainly find them.  

 The Adventure:

After 6 years of contemplation I finally pulled the trigger on a Jackson Coosa HD fishing Kayak.  (Review to follow) with the hopes of reigniting one a passion that had fallen by the wayside over the past 2 years.    

The canoe/kayak launch at Powhatan State Park

 A reoccurring question with any river float is "how long will it take"? I recently spoke with a gentlemen who got stuck on the South Anna River and had to navigate it at night with a head lamp because they misjudged the length of the trip.  The reason being that several factors go into a river float; river levels, where you are on the river, the flow, and how much time you spend exploring all go into the overall time of the trip.  I would add an extra hour to your itinerary just to be sure.   

The float from Powhatan State Park   to the Maidens ramp is roughly 5 miles. We cruised at around 1.6 miles an hour, paddling, floating, fishing, relaxing and stopping on a rock for lunch .  The water level was around 4.2 Feet, and was almost exclusively flat with a single ripple of "rapids" that were a non-issue. We put in around 9:30 and pulled up to Maidens around 2:30.  You could probably knock 2 hours off of that if you were in a rush...but then it kind of defeats the point.  I saw some gorgeous fish but fishing was "light" to say the least.

Powhatan State Park to Maidens (Rt #624)

Ash on her SUP 6 weeks after giving birth.

The water was an almost emerald clear and the bottom shifted from long stretches of sand with pockets of embedded shells to undulating rock formations and flowing river grass.

The "Coosa HD" in it's element

The float was our first real "date" since having our daughter and it was a welcome break from the chosen obligations of parenthood. It also reaffirmed our affinity for being outside together enjoying the environment, and each other's company.

Our constant companion thunderstorms, chasing us down the river.   

As a side note; fitness & healthy living are a bi-product of  "Micro-adventures". We are not professional athletes with disposable incomes, we are average folks who embrace the spirit of adventure,and chose to live a healthy life style.

Ultimately, it is always about choice.

SP     

From the Pacific to the Pirate Coast.

“Now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates.”

― Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi

Ash and I had just returned from Costa Rica with a renewed sense of adventure that we wanted to keep stoked. So keeping in step with the idea of "just going" Ash secured a last minute reservation on the Portsmouth Island Ferry, and we were off once again. 

For me, this trip was born from the idea that I could potentially surf both oceans in the same year. 

For me "surfing" is a relative term, it is certainly the hardest thing I have tired to do, and while I have been "surfing" for years I pretty much suck.

So the concept of surfing for me has always been about surrounding myself in the elements more so than the act of surfing itself. I feel that I have a personal relationship with the sea because of those experiences (both good & bad)  

  

Another aspect of the trip was that it was our second beach camping excursion with our son, who was now 18 months old. 

On that note,don't let anyone every try and convince you that this idea is impossible. In a time where kids are inundated with electronic gadgets we as parents are the driving force in building their foundation and love for the outdoors. Kids respond to nature, they embrace it, so feed off of their wonder. It will make you a better person and parent.  

This trip came with a special kind of souvenir, in the first hour of setting up camp I managed to slice my wrist open cutting off a zip tie. Being tired, and not paying attention has its consequences. If you plan on going remote, be it beach camping, backpacking or mountain biking, carry a first aid kit. This would have been a "trip-killer" without it.  

"There will be blood" 

"recovering" from the injury 

   

Consistently amazed by this woman

Coast to coast in 3 weeks.

Loving life, a new generation of pirates

After countless trips to the island, we remain awe struck by its effect. Turning the adventure into a family experience only adds to the story. This place, with all of it's bugs, sudden storms, and endless sunrises & sunsets has captivated us for going on 6 years. 

Stars, Christmas lights & craft beer

Sunset at the camp

follow their sense of wonder

Trust me when I say that I wasn't completely convinced on the idea of children,and the trade off has been having them at a much later age. But know this, I wouldn't trade it for the world, and what we give them is what they get. 

Realize and embrace the profound affect  of wonder in both you and your kids, it doesn't go away, we just turn our backs on it over time, my son has reinvigorated me, and restored my sense of wonder and adventure.

So here is to living the "Peter Pan" lifestyle, whenever it may be.   

These things that matter most...

"Wander Lust" Costa Rica

Ash and I got married in a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains, we served barbecue for dinner and drank craft beer with friends and family around a fire ring to celebrate our new life together. The majority of our adventures have followed a similarly rustic path with beach camping & back packing being our primary escapes. For us, renting a cabin was a luxury.  So the idea of a vacation in Costa Rica was far removed from our normal way of thinking. 

Costa Rica was in many ways the honeymoon we never took. So 7 years later we committed to make it happen. I want to avoid boring you with the endless details of planning  the trip, but I will say this.

If you talk too much about it, you will never do it.

The money will always work itself out in the end.

You can't cover every variable, so commit to it, and just go...

The ride into Tamarindo

Tamarindo is one of the more "tourist" oriented areas of Costa Rica but early on in the planning Ash found a "boutique" hotel that we became enamored with.  
Hotel Capit'an Suizo  is located toward the southern end of Tamarindo just outside the outskirts of the town. We flew into Liberia and took a short (50 minute) taxi into town from the airport.

Hotel Entrance

Standard room

The Pool (looking towards the ocean)

just outside the pool area (looking north towards town)

We went into this trip with the thought process of unplugging, with no itinerary, no trips planned, and no tours. When we were hungry we walked into town, when we were thirsty we strolled down the beach to the numerous watering holes between the hotel & village. 

The locals (most of which did not actually live in Tamarindo) were incredibly warm and accommodating. What struck me the most about the ones we had the pleasure to talk with was their intrinsic love for their environment. The hotel was centered around the environment and was set up to immerse the traveler in natural beauty.  As one of the staff put it, "The wind & waves are our music, you just have to listen"...

Howler monkey in the canopy on the hotel grounds

As far as food goes, Costa Rica is not known for it's "foodie culture", or craft beer scene. That being said, we had some fantastic fish tacos with Nogui's having the best offerings (and view) and we were able to find craft beer at the Volcano Brewing Company     

The view from Nogui's overlooking Tamarindo Bay

Encounters are a big part of the travel experience, and there were three in particular that struck me during the trip. Costa Rica has a robust surf culture and we happened to be in Tamarindo for the 50th anniversary of 'The Endless Summer" which is arguably the greatest surf film of all time. Bruce Brown even narrated an event at the Langosta Beach Club 

Endless Summer celebration at Langosta Beach Club

The World Cup was also going on during our stay and it was quite the experience watching the locals (who are ravenous soccer fans) celebrate the Cup. 

One night Ash and I struck up a conversation with a fit younger couple that were staying at the hotel. The guy, a robust soft spoken fella, talked about living in Coronado and "visiting" VA. Beach. It wasn't long thereafter that I was buying him rounds at the bar. Good luck in your endeavors Jake, you like you're brothers are an exceptional few and I was glad to have met you. 

While Costa Rica in itself would certainly be on the "bucket list" another life event became possible in almost an accidental way. As the summer progressed we committed to going back to our old haunt Portsmouth Island, and within two weeks time I had "surfed" both coasts. (but that's another post entirely). 

Surfing the Pacific Ocean

Ash relaxing

         

Sunset on the Pacific Coast

Obviously it is impossible to capture all of the moments in a blog post, and there were countless events that touched both of us during our visit. As a side note we left our son at home with the grandparents, (think honeymoon) but it would have been perfectly reasonable to bring him along as we saw numerous families with children during our stay. 

While life goes on, wanderlust doesn't go away, and adventure will most certainly continue if you cultivate it. One of the biggest decisions we made during our trip wasn't about traveling at all... 

In a few months our family will grow again with the addition of a baby girl, and the adventure will begin....again.

But that's another post entirely...

SP 

Passages

“May you grow up to be righteous, may you grow up to be true. May you always know the truth and see the lights surrounding you. May you always be courageous, stand upright and be strong. May you stay forever young.”

 

~Bob Dylan

 

Keep on Keeping on...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I will show you the Pirate Coast

"But the love of adventure was in father's blood"

-Buffalo Bill

It would be an exercise in futility  to try and describe the expressions on some of our friends and families faces when we first hatched the idea of beach camping with our 4 month old son, and while I was not surprised by their reaction, it should come as no surprise that we would carry out what we had said all along.

The baby would be an extension of our lifestyle, not a detractor.

To say that I didn't have a measure of anxiety as we slowly cruised across Core Sound would be shortsighted, I was well aware of the unique challenges that come with beach camping on Portsmouth Island and I was about to introduce my infant son to an environment that can go from pristine to violent in the time it takes for the wind to change direction.

 

As things go, mother nature appeared to mock my decision making and thick rain clouds began to stack up in the distance  while we set up camp for the first night.

 

While I love adventure, I try not to be fool hearty about placing my family in compromising situations, should the need arise,  our "back-up" plan would be to retreat to the Tacoma if things got too sketchy for the tent.

Our first 2 nights on the island would test my resolve with seemingly endless bands of thunderstorms that rumbled in from the sound then drifted down the beach only to regroup off shore.

 

Emotions collide with reason in these situations, and there was a degree of unspoken tension as Ash and I sat on the tailgate of the truck sipping beer  watching magnificent lighting strikes out over the sea wondering if we had made the right decision.

To say that these situations are surreal would be an understatement, think what you like, but camping on an uninhabited island is not Disney Land and there are certain risk that have to be taken into consideration.

That being said, the feeling of sitting there with Ash in that moment is still with me, which is the entire point of going.

 

 

So the babies' first camping trip went off without a hitch, there were no boogie men lying in wait, the mosquitoes did not carry him off, wild animals did stalk our site (that we are aware of), and not a single shark breached the depths of the ocean to try and rob us of our newborn son, and while a few thunderstorms did create a short lived pucker factor, the trip and the memories it created illustrate that life doesn't end with the introduction of a child, it begins... again...  

Stephen
 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday Mr.Cash

"You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don’t try to forget the mistakes, but you don’t dwell on it. You don’t let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.

 ~Johnny Cash (Taken from Rogue American Apparel)

 

 

Kindred

I'm nearing the end of a book called "To the Last Breathe" where the Author, Francis Slakey who is a physics professor at Georgetown University chronicles his adventures around the globe of climbing and surfing the world's oceans. The book is as much about self discovery as it is about going to physical extremes and I identify with Slakey's observations about odds and  improbability, and the realization of how so many things are entwined.

A few months ago I had made a decision to "get back" to the place I was maybe 3 years ago, where I was riding more, running more, and generally doing more. That's not to say that I had become stagnant, in fact I was probably healthier & stronger than I had been in recent memory due to a home work out routine that was all about "functional fitness" and I was committed (and still am) to the core, working out as many as 6 days a week.

This next part might be a bit confusing, but a while back I seized an opportunity that would allow me to increase my riding potential 10 fold with most if not all of my riding occurring at night in an "urban setting".

 

This opened up an entirely new chapter for me, and fanned the flames of adventure that had subsided over time.

Such is life that no sooner did I decide to document these rides, we went out on maternity leave, so the night dweller that I had become was instantly replaced with the adventure of being a  new dad.

Fast forward to this week and seizing upon my decision to "get back".  Sensing an impending head cold I loaded up the truck (in broad daylight) and headed to James River Park. I hadn't ridden there in quite a while and the combination of me being "out of the saddle" and having recently changed the gearing on the single speed made for quite a bit of "hike a bike" sections during the ride.

 

I rode the park north to south ending up at the "skills park" on Belle Island, which I have as of yet not ridden. There was a family checking it out as well, and it was cool to see kids swirling around the course.

The strangeness of Belle Island never gets old, as there was a production company filming some type of Jeep commercial on the rocks, an assortment of derelicts, and fitness minded folks all taking advantage of the fair weather.

After cruising around the top of the island I headed back to 2nd Street and as I pedaled up to my truck I noticed another vehicle with a bike rack parallel parked in front of me.

"A kindred person" I thought to myself as I got closer.

Then the familiarization hit me, inside the other vehicle was my wife and new son.

She had left much earlier in the day, and we had no intention of crossing one another's paths, yet there she was smiling at me.

"I figured you would be done around now" she said, "want to go to Hardywood and grab a beer"?

I was floored by this.

 

Even on a small scale Improbability, opportunity, and kinship are amazing things to stumble upon.             

Stephen           

FMLA

"FMLA", those 4 federal letters that have given me the last 20 or so days off for the birth of my son.  Federally mandated time, mine for the taking...It has also been one of the more frequent topics of discussion between friends, family, and co-workers. The conversations almost always play out like this;

Questioner:  "How much time are you taking"?

Me: "All of it"

Questioner: "Really"?  That's ALOT of time off".

Me:  " I have 100's maybe even thousands of hours I can burn, and my wife and I wanted to do it together".

Questioner: "What will you do? You will be at each other's throats in no time".

Me: "I suppose we will spend time with the new baby, and my wife and I actually enjoy each other's company".

I understand the typical argument, I sincerely do. It's not like my wife and I are impervious to getting on one another's nerves, and I will admit that the last few weeks were similar to "Groundhog Day" where they somehow managed to pull of making a movie about Bill Murray reliving the same day over & over.

But there has been a by-product of FMLA that I wasn't prepared for, and to be quite honest I am still having trouble wrapping my mind around.

The "insinuation" that a man who takes the full ride off to be with his newly formed family, is somehow "less manly".

I can assure you that it is not my overactive imagination either, as demonstrated by the fact that a co-worker surmised that I was a "derogatory slang word for a feline" when he found out that I was taking 3 months off.    

To say that my job doesn't harbor folks that are a bit "rough around the edges" would be putting it  mildly, and our humor typically starts at crude then devolves to downright inappropriate.  

But it's 2013, and to even suggest a man is anything otherwise for wanting to be with his newborn son is simply ridiculous.

I'm pretty sure if I handed my resume to a total stranger they would read it and have thoughts of Chuck Norris & Surviorman, with a dash of Wyatt Earp.

Read that again if you know me, as I said given to a "total stranger".

My friends would say that I am more suited to one of the "Village People".

But I digress. 

After 25 years on the job the trick is to get out with your family in tack, and I cherish this time with my boy & wife.

I would shout this from the highest peak,and I don't believe I have anything to prove.  

Less of a man?

Look in a mirror...   

 

FMLA...It's fun to sing about it

Pork, We Salute You

So the  McRib sandwich was  "re-introduced" to McDonald's menu this past December to help bolster their  end of year/holiday sales.

That's right, the "McRib" is actually a hot selling sandwich for the fast food juggernaut.

The McRib is a product of "restructured meat technology" that is then "molded " into the shape of a rack of ribs...

Restructured meat technology.

Technology is awesome when you're talking about a smart phone, or even an unmanned military drone, but do you really want it associated with your food?

The "McRib" doesn't even have bones, but it is molded to LOOK like it does.

Sounds delicious...   

Enter Pink House Farm 

The gravel driveway meandered towards a traditional farmhouse nestled amongst ornamental pines and pasture land. Within minutes we saw the first sow grazing in a field.

The owners of the farm greeted us warmly at their front door, and after a brief introduction we were walking around the grounds meeting the pigs and getting a crash course in "porkology".  

Pink House pigs are "free range" pasture grazing fun loving swine that are void of growth hormones or antibiotics.

Once we had finished with our tour, we were escorted into the families' kitchen, the owner disappeared into a back room only to return with a sampler of all of the pork products that the farm has to offer.

We decided on a rack of ribs, some chops, bacon, chorizo sausage, and a bonus buy chicken that they also raise on location. 

We cut the family a check, and we were on our way.

Needless to say we fired up the grill, and Ash made a chorizo and cheese appetizer followed by the main course and star of the pork show, grilled chops over grits and parmesan crusted kale with a splash of lemon.


 

This pork is fantastic, and YES you can taste the difference in every single bite.  it even cooks differently.

Fresh local food, from a local farmer who has the integrity to do things the right way, which is almost never the easy way, but there is NO comparison, and I won't even ramble on about the immeasurable health benefits of eating grass fed pork & beef.

So this is where we want to be, my wife and "soon to be son" are no different than anyone else, were average folks, we don't come from privilege, and to answer your question, Yes, at times eating this way can be more expensive, which is a risky proposition in this economy, and while I understand that concern, the goal is to live on our terms as healthy and active as possible.

Adventure is where you find it, even in food.

Eat fresh, Eat local.

Stephen

Rage Against The Machine

Enough already...If this post seems pointed, if I come across as argumentative or dare I say even pugnacious it is with good cause.

For 9 months my wife and I have endured the onslaught of thoughts and comments that come with pregnancy...  

"Just you wait"...

"You will see soon enough"

"Cloth diapers?"

"Making your own baby food"?

"Say goodbye to sleep"

"Life as you known it will change"

Really? So let  me get this straight, bringing another human being, that you created, that you are responsible for, that knows nothing in its baby world but what you will teach it, changes your life?

You don't say...

"What exactly did you think would occur when you decided to have a child?

Was it similar to the life ending  utterance of saying "I do" when you were married?

Did you think of  these things at all, prior to the commitment of actually doing them?  

"Sounded like a good idea at the time"...

Now that I think about it, my life style has frequently come under scrutiny because of my propensity to "go my own way".

Rest assured that this "philosophy on life",(as flawed as it may be), will be a driving force in the upbringing of my son as well.     

Alas it is not all "Doom & Gloom".

There are small pockets of resistance, I have seen them with my own eyes, I have passed them on the trail, I know some of them on a personal level.

Families that aren't about the status quo, they rage against the machine...

“Let us, then, be up and doing, With a heart for any fate; Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait”

 ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow