The Need to Explore

Pema looked at me like I was insane. And I probably was.

We were two hours into a nasty bushwhack, having descended through thick trees strewn with deadfall, and I had just plunged waist-deep into a mud bog. Laughing and swearing in equal measure, I turned from the bog back uphill, into a new drainage, Pema dutifully-if-reluctantly following behind.

We had done this before, she and I. Seemingly endless rambles through the backcountry, following deer paths or making our own, over ridges and into the next valley for no other reason but to see where it went, what it looked like, what mysteries it might have in store. Despite her questioning gaze, I think Pema secretly enjoyed these missions as much as I did, her enthusiasm for a given adventure increasing exponentially with the first step off a trail and into the unknown realm of new sights, new scenes, new scents.

Over the years, Pema and I have discovered old mine shafts and towering cliffs hidden in the depths of the forest. We’ve scared up elk and bear, fox and bobcat, and been tracked a time or two by a mountain lion. We’ve drank heartily from bubbling springs, and sat under towering pines, listening to the music of their twisting and bending in a mid-winter gale. We’ve gotten lost more than once, and had to rely on our sense of direction (me) and sense of smell (her).