Finding your way and how to still get lost

I have been a long-time adventurer who always started an adventure with the sole expectation that I was going to learn something new, meet new people, and experience something only a handful of people can enjoy.
Through the years I have had the pleasure to be able to mountain bike, hike, explore via horseback, go caving, rock climbing, road trips, fly fishing all over, and much more.
In the beginning my adventures were a way for me to connect with my father, escape the day to day grind of life, and to find my limits. Why am I writing this? The answer is that I have met some people who are site seers and others that are site doers. What does this mean? It means that an adventure is as good as your expectations so the key to my adventures is to only rest expectations on the act of going on the adventure.
Let’s start with a way to connect with my father. Without too much detail, my dad found solace in being in the outdoors. It is a way to take he baggage of life and leave it somewhere safe for another day. The only rule was that you had to try and be willing. Be willing to look for yourself and be willing to accept what you found and very special occasions be willing to get lost in a world that you don’t know what is ahead, what the outcome would be, and lose yourself to the environment.
My dad and I first cross-country ATV ride.
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The Honk

​The friends that I have met…. oh yes, the friends.
I am not a collector of friends, but I am a collector of people that are not only like-minded, but people who push me to be the best I can be. I do not find solace in knowing 500 people in a digital world, but meeting a handful of people I can talk about UFOs, history, science, Sasquatch, and much more. Those people help create memories that can be referenced by a simple “do you remember?” or even a way of a smile. Those people are priceless and cannot ever be recreated because those moments are one of a kind moment that belongs to that very specific place and time.
Nothing in life goes as planned and it never fails that on an adventure those plans sometimes go awry. I will never forget the time when I first got my Polaris 570 Sportsman Touring and my riding partner Kris got a flat a mile into the ride. See exhibit 1.
Exhibit 1:

Now this 5’ 8” Sasquatch of a man did not want to give up and decided to ride Dutch on my ride. See exhibit 2.
Exhibit 2

​That day we had one hell of a ride. Later we found out that even sitting on the back he could still be a kickstand for the ATV for those moments when I bit off way more than I could chew. Needless to say it was an adventure that I would never forget and we sometimes found ourselves even when we got lost.
The Yoro Gang

​One would argue that any great journey in life is not the journey itself, but the challenges you had to overcome and prove to yourself that you could do it. It is not my standards or others that defines those moments, it’s the times when you did something extraordinary when there were no witnesses, social media posts, or pats on the back.
As I sit here at my desk staring at my laptop screen, contemplating the unopened beer, fiddling with my estate pipe, and looking at pictures of all of those adventure moments, I find myself not only reflecting on those moments, but trying to connect the dots of those moments and how it guided me later to find my way. Connected by those memories.

​Now today my adventures are driven by another way and most definitely a need. The way is to show and teach others to look for those moments and a need to share. My wife and I ride 3-5 times a week typically in the afternoons. Even today those little ways of inserting adventure in my life still brings little surprises, new people we meet on the trails, and yes…even challenges. At the end of the day I guess I have never changed that internal compass that pulls me to new places.