The Questions We Ask

June 5, 2015

Some­times, we all need a bit of a reminder that adven­ture is nev­er too far away.

In this beau­ti­ful­ly-cap­tured 3‑minute  video, writer and adven­tur­er  Bruce Kirk­by  trav­els 150km over 5 days  on an inflat­able pad­dle board, from Van­cou­ver to Vic­to­ria. His jour­ney  brings about the many ques­tions we ask when we get out there, stray from rou­tine and find our­selves tru­ly liv­ing. The stun­ning cin­e­matog­ra­phy is met with a thought pro­vok­ing nar­ra­tion (which you can fol­low  below), and  will  have you plot­ting your next adven­ture in no time.

Why risk wind, waves,

and 200 k’s of get­ting lost

or being tossed in the sea.

Why play chick­en with con­tain­er ships?

Bal­anced one thou­sand feet over the ocean floor

Why sleep in a tent, and eat freeze-dried meals?

Why pad­dle a standup board,

from Van­cou­ver to Victoria?

Why not just take the ferry?

I didn’t grow up near the ocean,

but surf was in my blood and dreams.

For a city boy locked in suburbia,

it was the scenes of long hair and sun­ny days,

biki­ni tans and care­free ways.

Pad­dle­board­ing held the same hope for me,

An escape from the real­i­ty of phones and texts and traf­fic jams,

a glimpse of some­thing holy,

a reminder… I’m still free.

Why not pad­dle a standup board from Van­cou­ver to Victoria?

Sure, we grew blis­ters, felt tired,

burnt the tops of our feet

got grumpy when we didn’t eat.

Some­times lumpy seas and angry squalls.

slowed progress.

We had to a crawl over mud flats,

back­track, dodge ferries,

and their crash­ing wakes.

Why pad­dle a standup board from Van­cou­ver to Victoria?

white sand beach­es and crys­tal seas

fish and kelp beneath our feet.

Qui­et camps on for­got­ten isles,

Cow­boy cof­fee and drift­wood fires.

Silence. Friend­ship.

And hours that stretched to the horizon;

By the sec­ond day

It felt like we’d been on the ocean all our lives.

Why pad­dle a standup board from Van­cou­ver to Victoria?

Why ski the steeps? Or climb a peak,

And sleep on top?

Or under the stars in your own back yard?

Why learn to ride a bike, and skin your knees?

At six years old, or seventy-three?

What is adventure?

I’m not so sure we know these days.

Movies and mags all scream extreme.

Gore­tex suits and ver­ti­cal routes,

for­eign trips and big cliff hits

but that’s not the heart of it.

Adven­ture is about curiosity,

the will­ing­ness to embrace uncertainty.

Won­der­ing,

about the possibility,

Of doing just one thing

Dif­fer­ent­ly

than before.

So yeah, why take the ferry?