It would be great when traveling if everything went smooth and there was never any trouble. Of course in life this is unrealistic and when adventure traveling not always desired. Part of the experience and the joy is overcoming obstacles and reaping the benefits once those road blocks are cleared.
Think of the greatest travel stories that you tell again and again. Some of these stories could be how everything went perfectly, but the best travel stories that never seem to get old are the travel debacles.
The canoe trip where a tornado touched down near the river and whipped up 70 mph causing us to to get off the river and huddle in the driving rain. The time when you got so sick in the middle of the trip that you had to stop for three days and recoup in a grimy hotel or guesthouse until you felt somewhat normal.
What is memorable about these tales is not the experience themselves as they sucked, but the fact that we are healthy and happy today, lived to tell about, and most importantly overcame the obstacle and continued the adventure. Many times once these mini disasters are cleared is when the most incredible experiences happen. Karma is like that.
Waiting out a rainstorm in Canada
One could define adventure travel as a series of inconveniences one puts up with in order to experience something incredible. No matter what the adventure is there is a journey one must undertake before the goal is reached. It might be something as easy as a two hour drive or a long hike depending on the destination or it could be a near disaster like the ones outlined above.
Trail on the Big South Fork
In the next two days I will recount interesting occurrences on an adventure travel trip that were horrible and not fun at the moment, but opened the door for an amazing experience. The first one was a bus trip from Bangkok to Siem Reap in 2005. The second trip was a recent canoe trip up the falls chain in Quetico Provincial Park.
Stay tuned,
TT
The goal of Traveling Ted TV is to inspire people to outdoor adventure travel and then provide tips on where and how to go. If you liked this post then enter your email in the box to get email notifications for each new entry. Daily travel photos are excluded from your email in order to not flood you with posts. There is no spam and email information will not be shared. Other e-follow options include Facebook (click on the like box to the right) or twitter (click on the pretty bird on the rainbow above).
[subscribe2]
