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Sandilands Ski Trails
This might be a farewell to a sad ski season, but every opportunity to ski these trails is a gift. The Sandilands trails were initially created and maintained by foresters in the region, but were handed over from the province to the care of the Sandilands Ski Club in 1992. Since then they’ve seen a…
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Caminante
When I once told a Latino friend of my desire to learn Spanish (probably in my own broken vocabulary), he told me I was wise, as Spanish was the language of heaven. I didn’t disagree. I first read Antonio Machado’s poem Caminante no hay camino in a book by Brené Brown, and it has since…
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Grouse will scare you sockless
What? Me? Scared of some little bird that just flew up out of nowhere making that heart-pounding sound? No way, hehe… But unrelated, did you pack extra TP?
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Winter Trails
It’s winter trail season. I’ve highlighted desire lines before, as well as some of the cool things winter reveals, but the phenomenon is new to discover every year. Some methods of moving through the world occur only in this season, only when the conditions are right. Some for essential transportation, others for the pure joy…
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Desire Lines
Winter is the best time to observe “desire lines”, those trails designed and enforced by repeated use. Like-minded and like-footed travelers, if they agree on a destination, can combine forces over time to create trails to benefit all future travelers. A few weeks ago I stumbled upon these deer highways cut through the deep snow…
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The Things Dad Brought Home
Last weekend I ran on the frozen Seine River. Because of the rumours of wildlife along this twisting urban waterway, I kept my camera (the kind that also makes phone calls) handy. Sure enough, within the first couple kilometres I’d chased up a fox, later a small herd of friendly whitetails. And at about the…
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The Right Path
Lately I’ve been reflecting on a recent read, On Trails, by Robert Moor. Looks like we’ve got a little impromptu series of posts going, you can read other thoughts from this book here and here. This book’s cover, even in its Dutch form, drew me in last summer, and this winter I finally had the…