Death: A Tight Shoe Taken Off So You Can Find A New Way To Dance
Last year, seven of my lifelong friends made their transition back to the greater dimensions of the universe. One very young and the rest spread across a time line of decades. Each lived a spectacular...
View ArticleMountains for Breakfast, Sunsets for Dessert, Camping for Your Dreams
This year, a longtime friend asked me to go on a bicycle journey with him down the West Coast from Canada to Mexico. The journey encompassed 2,000 miles of the Pacific Ocean, mountains, beaches,...
View ArticleSpeak Up About Something: Courage To Create Good In The World
Henry David Thoreau said, “The masses of men (and women) live lives of quiet desperation.” That equates to the fact that most people lack the courage or incentive to get involved with the great events...
View ArticleLiving In The Conversation of Your Life
Six days a week, I wake up early, pull on my jeans and head to the recreation center where I commit my body to a two hour workout. I swim a half-mile, lift weights, run, bicycle and meditate along with...
View ArticlePulling On A Life-Coat That Fits Your Aspirations
Too often, countless Americans stumble out of high school into ill-suited jobs, incompatible relationships and no plans for the future. They hang with discordant jobs in order to write checks for food,...
View ArticleThe Voluptuousness Of Living
“Everything is downhill from here, ‘cept what’s up…it’s all in your attitude.” Katie Lee, 95, Jerome, Arizona, singer, environmental activist. Long ago, before modern communications, before electric...
View ArticleBetrayal: How It Feels and What To Do About It
Throughout my life, I have considered every human being on an even keel with me. I treat each person I meet with dignity and respect; and I expect them to return the same. I’m the guy who walks into...
View ArticleHow To Empty Your Emotional Backpack When It Gets Too Heavy
Each winter I load my backpack up for mountaineering skiing to 10th Mountain Huts in the Rocky Mountains. I load survival gear to make sure I don’t die while I cross-country up to the top of...
View ArticleDementia’s Terrible Legacy For Her Kids
At 93, my mother Vivien lives daily on the edge of the “long sleep” awaiting her after a dynamic life of work, dancing, sports, travel, golf, gardening and raising her children. While her body...
View ArticleYour Destiny Sings In Your Ears At the Darnedest Times
Each time I stand up in front of an audience, I invite every person in the room to accept himself or herself unconditionally. “You are a one time miracle of the universe,” I boldly state. “Accept your...
View ArticleBe Free In The Problem
Problems! Everybody experiences them. You might call “life challenges” your classroom for living. If you notice—every movie, play, sitcom, drama, thriller and adventure story features problems for the...
View ArticleAlong Our Life Path: Death Hides In The Bushes
At the age of 17 while driving home from baseball practice, my father’s best friend pulled me over in my Chevy clunker. He walked up to my window with a sad look on his face. “Frosty,” he said. “I’ve...
View ArticleLife Is Too Short: Get Off Your Cell Phone
During my youth, my dad took me fishing. My mom took me on bicycle rides. My dad shouldered me with a small daypack for hikes in the woods. He pointed out chattering squirrels. He helped me see my...
View ArticleLosing Your Friends: Vacancies of the Heart
Along life’s highway, you will befriend countless people from school, work, sports and church. Each person offers you different degrees of friendship. Some casual, some close and a few become best...
View ArticleYour Spirit of Adventure: It Carries You to the Ends of the Earth
The difference between an average life and a fantastic life of adventure as defined by you, hinges on three things… Your thoughts that become realities by your hand; actions that move you toward your...
View ArticleA Blind Man’s Quest To Backpack The World
From the inception of the human race on planet Earth, intrepid men and women followed their ‘adventure inclinations’ to explore the continents, oceans and outer space. Some raft, some swim, some climb...
View ArticleWhat Do You Do With Despair?
On your life journey, different events take hold of you whether you like it or not. One day you can be riding high; and the next, you feel lower than a well-digger’s rear end at the bottom of a...
View ArticleAn Enormous Mountain of Emotional Bliss
Backcountry mountaineering takes guts, gumption and strength. Al and Frosty standing on the Continental Divide at Columbine Pass on the Colorado Trail. Photography by Frosty Wooldridge. Not for the...
View ArticleOF MYTH AND LEGEND: STURGIS MOTORCYCLE RALLY
They say, “Good girls go to heaven and bad girls go to Sturgis!” That’s why ALL the boys, including preacher’s sons, go to Sturgis! On the back of one motorcycle rider’s shirt, “One week of Sturgis...
View ArticleHigh Altitude Adventure: Hut-to-Hut
“Have you known the Great White Silence? Frosty, Steve and Al at the top of Homestake Peak, 13,209 feet. Continental Divide in the background. Photography by Frosty Wooldridge Not a snow-gemmed twig...
View ArticleARRESTED FOR HAVING TOO MUCH FUN!
“When something becomes too much fun, the government will move swiftly to tax it.” -Disgruntled Taxpayer Outside Vicksburg, Mississippi, on Route 80, my brother Howard and I cranked east through the...
View ArticleBear Scare: Why Is My Hair Standing On End?
Adventure is not always comfortable; however, it’s still adventure. It’s not always safe, either. Whatever it is, it beats a couch, remote control and the indolent TV any day of the week. Our first...
View ArticleWildflowers in the Mist: Mountain Climbing
“A person should set his goals as early as he can and devote all his energy and talent to getting there. With enough effort, he may achieve it. Or he may find something that is even more rewarding. But...
View ArticleBicycling the Continental Divide—Grizzly Attack
Yellowstone National Park: when Gerry and Dave pedaled westward, I felt my heart grow sad. At the gate entrance of Madison Junction campground, I paid my bill for the “Hike-biker” section. No laughter...
View ArticleEmotions: The Weight of a Sack Full of Potatoes
In a presentation I attended years ago, the speaker asked the audience, “How much do you think this eight ounce glass of water weighs?” After many guesses, the speaker said, “The weight depends on how...
View ArticleLife’s Coffin or Life’s Highway to Heaven
What do your really need in your life each day? Food, water and a place to lay your head! Maybe a few friends to support your journey and share conversations! You need some kind of activity that...
View ArticleA Marmot’s Words: “Welcome To My World!”
Verdant green lodge pole pines blanket the Mount Holy Cross Wilderness region. A cobalt sky profiles rolling mountain tundra while gray rock peaks push against the universe. In the valleys, snow-fed...
View ArticleIt Happened To Elvis Presley: Infidelity & Betrayal
Over the years, one of my friends married a beautiful woman and fathered two boys. He shared his pride with me as they grew to become men. I watched their pictures fill the entire front of his...
View ArticleMeloti and Isabel Wijsen: Bye, Bye Plastic Bags on Bali
Two sisters, Meloti and Isabel Wijsen, 12 and 10, noticed plastic bags clogging the beaches, streams, streets and highways around their tiny island of Bali. What they witnessed appalled them....
View ArticleCoulter Bay, Grand Tetons, Fleeting Moment
On your bicycle, backpack, canoe or any journey, there’s always that special “moment” that pops out of nowhere. It flashes in front of you much like an ephemeral lightning bolt out of the heavens. It...
View ArticleLosing My Anchor At My Mother’s Passing
This summer, after two years existing under assisted living, my mother passed away peacefully in her sleep. My two younger brothers and I stood near the bed watching her life energy ebb, wane and...
View ArticleDifference Between An Average Life Vs. A Spectacular Life
Do you work a nine to five disinteresting job? Do you watch four hours of television everyday after work? Are your weekends filled with powerboats, beer and grilled ribs? Do you lust for the thrill of...
View ArticleWonder of Bicycle Travel: Magic Moments
It could happen in the morning when you pedal down the highway to see dewdrops sparkling off the leaves of a cherry tree. You stop to pull cherries off the tree along the Lewis and Clark Trail in...
View ArticleLearning To Live Above Your Demons
You’ve got them. I’ve got them. Everybody’s got them. They haunt our dreams. They foment our insecurities. They make us doubt ourselves. They play with our subconscious. They cause us to make silly...
View ArticleTalons From The Sky: Coiled Scales On The Ground
Heading eastbound across southern California, the sun set low in the sky. We looked for a campsite in the rocky terrain east of Joshua Tree National Monument. “We better find a spot soon,” Sandi said....
View ArticleYour Edge Equates to Maximizing Yourself
No matter what you learned in your youth, good or bad, you can change that orientation by understanding what happened to you. With understanding, you can rewrite the hard drive in your mind. You can...
View ArticleWill You Live Or Die On An Adventure?
Mark Twain said, “The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” On my first trip to Alaska as a young adventure-seeker at 24, I woke up in my...
View ArticleLeap For Death Or Leap For Life
Heading east on Route 92 out of Provo, Utah, Sandi and I cranked hard through the afternoon. Above us, craggy 10,000 foot peaks poked into a cloudy sky. We sweated our way through deep canyons. We...
View ArticleCycling Nepal: Face To Face With A Cobra
“The sublime and the ridiculous are so often nearly related, that it is difficult to class them separately. One step above the sublime makes the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous makes the...
View ArticleYour Most Powerful Passport To Adventure: Self-Confidence
In my early years friends warned that I would get killed by bicycling, mountain climbing and scuba diving for a year in South America. They feared I might die by traveling across the Outback of...
View ArticleAustralia: Dancing With Dolphins In The Water
“Let’s cage ourselves and let the animals run free. Let’s find new stars and new songs to follow. Let’s build some foundations under our dreams. For if we have the prowess to destroy the earth, then we...
View ArticleWorm’s Eye View Versus An Eagle’s Eye View
Worm’s Eye-View During my high school years, quite a few of my classmates hung out in the parking lot—smoking, drinking and wasting time doing nothing. They didn’t complete their homework assignments....
View ArticleHigh Speed Chase: Wile E. Coyote & The Rabbit
On Route 72, near Parker, Arizona, I headed east into the twilight. A blistering day scorched my body into a dishrag that had cleaned out a pot of greasy spaghetti and hung over the top tube to dry. My...
View ArticleI’m Happy Being Ugly
“Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while...
View ArticleTwo Degrees Of Effort Over Time Equates To Exponential Results
Energetic people, dedicated people and individuals with passionate missions utilize the “Two Degrees of Effort Over Time” model in order to bring success into their lives. Introverted, quiet and even...
View ArticleWe Turned Up A Dirt Road Today: Hawk And A Mouse
“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” Robert Frost Doug, a seven continent world cyclist with 130 countries under his wheels, and I...
View ArticleBillions On Bicycles
Millions of people around the globe ride bicycles, but I have never been so affected by bicycle riders than when I rode through the streets of Beijing, China. That country houses 1.35 billion people....
View ArticleExploring the Last Frontier of Alaska: Hyderized!
“We can never have enough of nature. The sight of it must refresh us with inexhaustible vigor, vast and titanic features. The sea coast with its wrecks, the wilderness with its living and decaying...
View ArticleStan The Road Warrior: Cycling Through Time
“The trick is to die young as late as possible.” Ashley Montagu Through the years, I’ve picked up pedal partners during my travels around the world. They’ve pedaled through 50 states with me for a...
View ArticleNew Zealand: One of the Rarest Phenomenons on Earth
Even the dogs don’t bark at bicyclists in New Zealand! If ever there was a paradise for a touring bicycle rider, New Zealand is it. The South Island with its 12,000-foot glacier covered summits...
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