Hier mal wieder etwas auf meinem Mist gewachsenes... War eigentlich für ein kanadisches Klettermagazin gedacht, ist dann aber doch nichts geworden - deshalb auch auf Englisch.
The search
What is it about being on the road? Why are there certain kinds of sports like climbing, skiing, snowboarding or surfing where people seem to never stop searching for there own little place of happiness?- The question arises: Should those kind of activities even being considered ´sports´ in an ordinary meaning or do they have more in common with an attitude of mind? Of course, this is kind of a polemical question, since they fulfill every definition the term ´sport´ has to offer and it certainly would not only be cocky, but arrogant to think of them being more than that… Still most people I know considering themselves as being a climber or a skier or… - somehow search for this very special places and moments in reality and in mind and therefore have their whole life influenced by what they do. Because of that they may think of those activities more in a ´lifestyle´- meaning than in a ´sportive´ - meaning.
Not only in order to may find an answer to those kind of questions, but to find out what the road is like, we set off for one year of travelling, climbing and the search for those special places in Canada and the US, with most of the time in winter searching for the one or the other great ´ice-line´. And what place would be more favorable for that than the Rockies.
It is Mid-January, so about one third of the (winter-) game is over, two more to go… Do we regret the whole adventure (that´s what it is) or anything we´ve done by now? – No, not at all! Well, to be honest, we (ok, I) would get another bottle of single malt at the airport duty free, but that´s about it… Of course, there are a lot of things you have to learn when visiting a country like Canada in the winter, and quite often you are forced to learn them the hard way, but this is just part of the experience I guess… Back in Germany we never had to think about which propane supply in a camper might be the right, how to fix things in there when broken, how to have access to energy in the cold and in remote areas and much more.
In times of “live-streaming” every single step out of once remote areas and from mountains that are actually unknown or unclimbed (or both), we – of course – do have a blog! Not to get me wrong here, I don´t think the future of mountaineering shall be a simple result of the amount of technology someone has access to, but that is a different story… For us this simply is an easy and usefull way to stay in touch with friends and family and share experiences (and write about them) as long as they are still fresh and haven´t formed a different picture. – It is called the ´dirtbagdiaries´, this may not be the most original name but it stands for an attitude of mind which we feel connected to. Of course, we are far away from being real dirtbags and since the term seems to really have a clear definition in North-America, we wouldn´t dare claiming to be dirtbags… But once again, for us it represents a way of thinking and a lifestyle – even though if only for a certain amount of time. Well, this makes for an interesting question! Do you stop being a whatsoever called ´dirtbag´, only because you stopped being on the road, only because you returned to your ´normal´ life? Descartes became famous for the saying corgito ergo sum – I think therefore I am. If you go one step further, you could say – I am what I am because of what I think! Under this circumstances you don´t just stop being a ´dirtbag´, even with a garage, a garden and a mortgage, because it is very unlikely that all of the sudden you stopped thinking like one… Your adventures, your experiences, the people you met and spoke to, all of that most likely will live on with you – in your mind, in the way you act and behave, in the way you raise your children and of course, I the spot where your climbing has its place – in your heart…
The question haven´t all been answered jet, and may never will be, but that doesn´t matter, it is the search that count´s, the willingness to explore, to throw yourself into the unknown – and if you´re lucky, you´ll eventually get some answers, even though you may never asked the question… So that´s what we will do (always will do) – to keep on searching…
