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When I was a quarter of my current age,
and half my current height and weight, I dreamed of escape: in a Prairie
Schooner across the prairie and Rocky Mountains along the Oregon
trail; out of Tibet and across the Himalayas with the Lamas; even over
the Alps with the von Trapps (though I never thought of us being
accompanied by the sound of music). Naturally I never analyzed these
dreams much. Was I searching for adventure? A closer bonding for my
family? An escape from them? Or was it just a strong urge to travel?
Then in my late teens, the father
of my lifelong friend Mike Cambray took the two of us on an escape of
our own: 200 miles on foot up the backbone of England on Arthur Wainwright's
Pennine Way. It was just as miserable a trip as most of the people who
actually took the journeys of my childhood dreams found theirs, I'm
sure. It rained for days at a time, we got lost, we were up to our knees
in mud, we walked all day to a pub which was boarded up.
But it was also a revelation, an inspiration, an anchor
from which to tie myself as a person, and by which all other acts could
be measured. After three days of Roger making fun of our fancy backpacks
(his had already served him for a lifetime) he threw his away and bought
himself one like ours. And never brought up the subject again. In those
stricter times this was something I'd never witnessed before: an adult
make a mistake or change his mind. After three days of rain, and putting
up and taking down a soaking wet tent, we finally reached a bed and
breakfast. Standing, naked-but-warm, and even at full stretch not be
able to touch anything wet was a luxury that I never forgot. Coming
across a farm house five miles from anywhere with a "Teas"
sign propped against the garden wall where tea was served by the pint,
and bread and butter (just plain old Wonder loaf) served up 6 slices
at a time was a gift from the gods.
So now we're a generation further on, and it is time to
pass on this experience to the next generation. The times they are a
changing. My two children live on a different continent. My wife has
a son by a previous marriage, and his cousin also lives with a stepfather.
I can't tell them they have to do this--I can only make it seem interesting
enough for them to want to go. You can't understand, and you sure cannot
be told, the true benefit: you figure that out on your own. So my daughter
isn't coming. She with the most to gain.
So we're setting off as a party of 6: my wife Claudia,
her son Marty, my son Adam, Claudia's niece Alexis, Alexis' step-dad
Wayne (my brother-in-law), and me. And a laptop computer, a digital
camera and a bunch of software which we use every day to upload the
news to the Internet, so our friends and relatives back home can follow
our daily progress.
I dedicate this story to the memory of Roger Cambray, who
died over New Year 1998.
Richard Thomson
December 1999
Brief history
of the Web site
This site has gone through two phases. In the first phase,
we attempted to keep it up to date as we walked. This was reasonably successful,
but the entries were brief, and contained references to access problems.
In the second phase, I added a wealth of extra detail where
I can remember it, and I removed the logistics references. But we were
restricted to a 10 Megabyte Web site, which placed severe restrictions
on the number of pages, especially the graphics that were possible.
So this final phase is being published on CD-ROM, where
all the extra material has plenty of room. It also allows me to distribute
the CD so that we can share it with the many friends we made along the
way, and who played such a large part in making it the experience that
it was.
Richard Thomson
7 December 1999
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