Category: canoeing

adventure, Adventure Tourism, Affirmation, Camping, canoeing, Faithful Living, God, Lessons from Mom, Lessons from the Wilderness, Outdoor Adventures, Rainforest, Religion, Travel, Uncategorized, wilderness

Thanks Mom

This Side of the River

It is the last week of a month in France for us, and I find I have been thinking much about my mother, who first took me to France when I was eighteen.  She is no longer the robust, tireless woman of my youth, now frail in mind and body, though not in spirit. I have been missing her!

My mom taught me much of what I know about outdoor adventure. The first lesson in camping was how to squat to “go” in the woods: heels apart, elbows inside knees flanged wide, facing up a slight incline so the stream trickles downhill without pooling at your feet. My first attempt at the age of 5 exasperated her, as I haplessly filled my sneakers to the brim.

We camped a good deal back then, so I learned about tent setting and sweeping out, about food handling, about packing, site selection and more. We had a wonderful old tin breadbox that was the “kitchen” filled with cutlery, salt & pepper in Tupperware shakers, metal plates and coffee cups, tightly rolled dish towels, and, of course, matches. I still have it, and memories flood in whenever I open it.

My mom taught me how to ride a horse. And canoe. And row. And sail. And hike. And travel. I have climbed to high mountain tarns in the Colorado Rockies with her (she herself summited the 14-er Longs Peak). Together we climbed Mount Snowden in Wales. We paddled rivers swift and lethargic, and sailed and sailed and sailed. I owe my love of nature and the outdoors to her. Mom took me to Europe for a month before I started college, finding ourselves in Paris in the middle of the hottest weather in recorded history. We traipsed the city from end to end: Eiffel Tower, Tuileries, Montmartre, Notre Dame. This was when I learned that the French don’t like COLD drinks, and that asking for ice-MORE ICE S’IL VOUS PLAIT-only brings looks of disdain from the server.  My mother taught me to seek out the adventure, to get out into a new place and explore by foot. We had escargot in Nice because it was important to try a culture’s exotic foods. Today I recognize the privilege of such an upbringing, with a mother who worked fulltime to pay for the adventuring.

The world is a kind of wilderness in its beauty and unpredictability.

Still, I am a more cautious traveler now. Just the other day, two women surrounded me with clipboards asking if I spoke English. This is a typical scam in France-for gangs to send out emissaries to distract a tourist with a petition for a charitable cause and lift her valuables while she is signing. I said “no.” When they pushed further into my personal space, I shouted, “NO!” They jumped back as if I had a communicable disease.

My vehemence surprised even me, giving me pause. I must thank you mom for everything you taught me, but most especially for taking me to church week after week where I would encounter the adventure of a life with God.  I am learning that the world is filled with people wandering in a different kind of wilderness, where God is remote and survival is everything.

So, I have spent this week contemplating the wide gulf between awe and pain. Between beauty and baseness. Between the fist that holds tight, and the open palm that gives away. Between pushing away with a shout and beckoning the lost by gently saying, “Jesus loves you.”

It’s an uphill climb, and I have miles to go, but my mother taught me well.

~J.A.P. Walton

Thanks for reading!

adventure, Backpacking, Camping, canoeing, Creation, Creator, Faithful Living, God, Henry David Thoreau, Lessons from the Wilderness, Nature, Outdoor Adventures, Prayer, Uncategorized, wilderness, wisdom

A Song of Praise

This Side of the River

Why do people yearn to go to the wilderness? Is it as simple as wanting to get away for a break? Is it an escape? For some, these adventures take the form of a quest to seek out beauty and peace and quiet, to discover new worlds. For others, getting away- in a canoe, or a tent, backpacking or biking- is a form of worship. Thoreau once saw a man fishing, and described it as “a sort of solemn sacrament and withdrawal from the world.”[1] Even Jesus was known to draw away for time alone. But he was not really alone, because we are also told that he drew away to pray to his Father.

We should think about the reasons we draw away from our busy world. I have heard people laughingly say that they don’t go to church on Sunday morning because they prefer to enjoy God’s world out on the golf course. Nature is beautiful, and no doubt golf is fun. Time spent in nature is restorative. Instructive. But to worship the creation instead of the Creator, to create our own god out of nature, is a mistake because nature is not God.

Nature teems with life. We rise from our tent, look out across a fog-shrouded wilderness lake, hear the birds, and breathe deep sighs of contentment. We feel so alive! But where does all this life come from? Your life does not rise out of the deep waters, the sighing pines, the quick-footed hare or the soaring hawk. God made all this beauty. Heart-wrenching, breath-stopping, glorious beauty. Why? To point our hearts to Him. It turns out that all of creation is a road map to God, and the delight He took in making everything is the same delight we are to take in Him.

Job knew it was all too wonderful to understand. But he did appreciate that “earth will never be your savior…that God alone is able to give you life.”[2]

There’s more to living this life than we can see, just like there’s more to a river than what we see on its surface. We don’t go out in nature to worship what we see but what we can’t.”

The next time you pick up a paddle or a pack, and find yourself surrounded by the glories of the wilderness, take a moment to let the awe sink in that a Creator would make all this life, including your life, and that He takes great delight in you. A song of praise can’t help but well up out of your heart.

~J.A.P. Walton

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[1] Henry David Thoreau. A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, Viking Press, 1985. p. 22.

[2] Paul David Tripp. New Morning Mercies. Crossway. Wheaton IL. 2014. Devotion for March 24.

adventure, Campfires, Camping, Cancer, canoeing, Creation, Darkness, death, Faithful Living, God, Henry David Thoreau, Hope, Lessons from the Wilderness, Outdoor Adventures, Starry Skies, Uncategorized, wilderness, Wilderness Paddling, wisdom

The Brothers Gemini

This Side of the River

The two Walton brothers have spent over thirty years paddling the rivers and lakes of the far north each autumn because of their shared love of wilderness, canoeing, and one another. They paddled as young men in the vibrant prime of their lives, and still do today as seasoned and much older men. Not even Hugh’s cancer could stop these adventuring brothers, who know more than most that both the wilderness and brotherly affection have healing hands. Hugh stayed positive throughout the ten long years of treatments, too busy living to entertain thoughts of dying. And in his deliberate living and adventuring, he taught his brother Mark about peace and hope.

It often happens that the sicker man is the nurse to the sounder.”[1]

A favorite time of day in the northern latitudes is the autumnal twilight when the sun has gone down early and it’s too cool for bugs. An earlier sunset means the brothers can sit around the campfire for a few hours before turning in. The washing up is done, the canoes are put to bed, and the bear bag has been secured high in a tree. Such evenings are steeped in the reflections of the lowering sun as it briefly teases the landscape and water into a blush, while the spruces’ silhouettes go from stark outline to murky drab until darkness cradles them into its bosom entirely. Eventually, the young fire that started up with spits and mutters matures into a sedate, radiating murmur of glowing and hypnotizing embers. The waters warble a sultry lullaby. A loon mournfully trills across the water. The night in the wilderness is never completely silent, rather orchestrated with a subtle harmony, and it becomes clear, with careful listening, that the small voice of God is out here in this deep indigo twilight. Slow evenings are a necessary part of the adventure, for it is at night that the body is restored. The same can be said for one’s soul.

It is easy, when far away from the nonstop noises and lights of our lifestyles, to look intently at every natural thing out in the wilds and feel thankful that the planet still has these unadulterated oases of space, timelessness, stillness, color, and open skies. This is flair. Art. It is creation, imagination, beauty and adornment. This is how God made the world, speaking it out word by word, adding extravagant flashes of color, texture, and music in the everyday life of the wilds. We miss seeing it and hearing it, and we misunderstand its importance in our daily lives. Fire, water, and the waking creatures of the night all make for a mesmerizing symphony, a bewitching tonic for what ails us.

The brothers aren’t big talkers at night; still they enjoy each other’s company in a curiously uncommunicative way, on a shared adventure among best friends at the end of a physically challenging day. And though the fire and melody draw them in, they stay up late-on clear nights at least-because of the stars. This is especially true when camped beside a remote lake, where trees and rocky ledges can’t obscure the sky. The starry lights emerge one by one as the darkness encroaches. And, aside from the fire, the darkness in the wilderness is complete, no rival light pollution out here. Venus, Jupiter, and the Big Dipper materialize. And though Orion won’t show up until November, they know he’s on his way, the able guardian of the night and comforting friend to those who pray through the night watches in winter. The dancers of the Pleiades begin their warm up. Somewhere out there in the low autumnal sky the sleepy moon pokes its head out from under the covers. Like Orion, felt but not yet visible in the northern hemisphere, the brothers Gemini stand tall, side by side, arms raised in triumph and praise. I like to imagine that the Walton fellows are the Gemini twins, arms around each other’s waists, holding their paddles aloft in victorious self-congratulation and a joy that cancer could not squelch.

~J.A.P. Walton

[1] Henry David Thoreau. A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, Viking Press, 1985. p. 31 (The author originally published this book in 1849, detailing an 1839 river trip with his beloved brother John, who died in 1842.) Read it here: A Week…Thoreau

adventure, Camping, canoeing, Faithful Living, God, Lessons from the Wilderness, Outdoor Adventures, Uncategorized, wilderness, Wilderness Paddling, wisdom

I Wish I May, I Wish I Might…

This Side of the River

At the canoe shows, I like to watch people who stop to admire my husband’s and his brother Hugh’s Sea Wind canoes. These hardy vessels were both built by the famous Michigan paddling pioneer Verlen Kruger. The boats have handsome lines and a certain robust utility about them, and have rightly earned their reputation as having “cavernous storage and bombproof construction.”[1] They can even be joined with a cross arm for catamaran sailing on windy days. Some of the folks-usually men- are seasoned and avid paddlers, and the conversation wags excitedly back and forth around paddle characteristics, dry bags, portage-ability, steering, and stowage. But, by far, most of the people who stop by simply stare at the canoes with their bright yellow sail with what always transmits as a deep longing.

I resonate with that feeling of “I wish I may, I wish I might…” For one, the Sea Wind is a one-man canoe, so I cannot trip along with the men unless I get my own boat. For another, the boats weight 70 pounds, and the gear upwards of 200-300 pounds. I cannot physically carry that much on portage, and the first rule of wilderness adventure is that the group is as weak as its weakest member. More importantly though, the brothers’ yearly adventure trips are wilderness getaways that they’ve shared for 30 years or more, a time so sacred to their deep relationship that I really have no right to intrude. It’s okay, though. We all still paddle together plenty of other times each year.

No, the longing I observe is of the person who wants to be more than a casual weekend paddler who haunts the canoe shows. Who yearns to seek out true wilderness and pit him/herself against the fickle elements of nature, to share the nighttime stars with the moose and the bear. This person wants to do exactly what the brothers do, but can never get past the dreaming.

In all my years as a college professor and academic advisor, I had certain students with the same problem-they thought they wanted something quite badly, but simply could not summon the wherewithal to do what it took to make it happen. The biggest impediment was almost always their lack of confidence that they could, in fact, do this thing. As a result, they took few risks, settled too early, failed to do the hard work required, and missed out on a lot of life’s adventures. Of course, this same lack of confidence holds any of us back in myriad situations. We won’t risk the adventure of a job change, a move out of state, or going back to school to finally study the one thing we always loved. We long for a change we haven’t the grit to embrace and see through to its rewarding end.

I have to say that I think God himself is a risk taker.

He risked becoming a man in order to put the world back to rights. He certainly takes risks on us every day. The Bible is FULL of fragile people God bet on when they thought they couldn’t; just take a look at the weak-kneed lives of Moses, Jonah, and Peter. But, God equips us in every endeavor to which he calls us. And this is the secret: the strength is never our own, but God’s! What have you always wanted to do, felt called to do, but were afraid to try? Maybe it’s time to get in the boat, stop wishing and start paddling!

I wish I may, I wish I might, have the strength to start tonight.

~J.A.P. Walton

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Verlen Kruger

Quiet Water Symposium

[1] Phil Peterson. All Things are Possible: the Verlin Kruger Story: 100,000 miles by Paddle. Adventure Pulbications. Cambridge, MN. 2006. p.257.

canoeing, Creation, death, Faithful Living, God, Lessons from the Wilderness, Outdoor Adventures, Uncategorized, wilderness, Wilderness Paddling, wisdom

The Tired Barn

This Side of the River

“When God established the force of the wind
and measured out the waters,
when he made a decree for the rain
and a path for the thunderstorm,
then he looked at wisdom and appraised it;
he confirmed it and tested it.
And he said to the human race,
“The fear of the Lord—that is wisdom,
and to shun evil is understanding.” Job 28: 25-28

Wilderness paddlers never underestimate how much time and effort it takes to get afloat on a wild river untouched by man. That is because everywhere people go, there is ample evidence of repeated assaults on the natural environment. It is part of our conquering DNA I suppose, of a deep, inner impulse to remake, refashion, and call it “mine”. Although this drive to create is God-given, we often do so with egotistical abandon, unwisely usurping the title and glory of the Creator. Just visit ruins though-the great pyramids, the Acropolis, Petra, Stonehenge-all manmade things built in a race to command and control, intimidate and dominate. Even these are only temporary. The re-engineered rivers, the cement kingdoms we call home, and the miles of coastline we’ve tamed will, all too soon, crack, decay and return to the earth as surely as we do, victims of fire, flood, neglect, and time.

Not far from the Mississippi River there is a barn on a hill in western Illinois that has, at least in our lifetime, stood proud, defiant in the face of stinging northwest winds, its bones leached by decades of relentless summer sun. Sixty years ago it was a robust symbol of the agricultural subjugation of the vast prairies. We drove by it last week, and found instead a tired, sagging structure with sun streaming through multiple holes in the roof-only one generation left until it returns to dust.

Take a good, long look across the River of this life. We too are simply time-warped dust while God stands outside of time, unchanging, and all wise. We paddlers are apt to seek out the remotest rivers to escape into unsullied nature, and the beauty of what we encounter always hushes our hearts and makes our spirits soar. But, we are mistaken if we worship nature instead of the Creator who made it all. Everything but God is a tired, old barn. Wisdom alone knows what counts.

~J.A.P. Walton

Please leave your comments and suggestions.  I am happy to dialogue and debate with you!  Thank you for reading.