Mayday, Mayday for Sierra Lima!

November 17, 2010, 4:45pm

I watched my bright orange hat blow away, tumbling along the sharp rocks in the wind. The canopy had shattered, its pieces flung away during the impact, and I could see my sunglasses perched, strangely intact, on top of…

The Great Divide

April 28, 2010

Rain has always been romantic to me. Not the kind of rain that relentlessly ruins your leather shoes and freshly pressed trousers on the way to work in San Francisco, but the kind of rain that you can prepare for, best enjoyed while wearing waterproof…

Welcome to the Real World

As I write this, I have only two weeks left with my current employer, and for the first time in my life I’m going to spend a significant amount of time with no income, no concrete plan, and no certain outcome. Thinking back on my life, there was always a Master Plan. For thirteen…

What is gliding?

This is a common question given the relative obscurity of the sport, and since I plan to be making posts detailing some of my flights, I’d better explain up front.

The closest corollary to gliding is sailing, where success is determined by knowledge and successful…

At the End of the Earth

May 8–11, 2010

With our existence on a near-perfect sphere, there is no reason that any one point should be intrinsically more alluring than any another. In fact, there are many reasons to remain within a comfortable climatic band like any other sensible…

Exceeding All Expectations

May 3–5, 2010

For some reason, Dunedin never appealed to me, and as I drove north on SH1 under darkness, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Perhaps it was one of the young tow pilots on the airfield, a Dunedin native, who managed a guttural grunting sound and…

Happiness and the corporate You, Inc.

This is an impossible subject to tackle in a single blog post, but allow me the indulgence to relate some of my thoughts as I’ve been reflecting during my time off. As I indicated in my initial post, a large part of taking this break is to come to peace with…

What Lies Beneath?

May 19th, 2010, 1:53am

Awoken from my warm cocoon by an unbearable pressure in my bladder, my brain fought to return to the comfort of sleep. Losing the battle, moments later I reluctantly steadied myself on the bunk’s frame and swayed in the darkness of the cabin as I…

The Great Barrier Reef

May 19th, 2010, 9:54am

The vessel was a lot smaller than I thought it would be. A converted trawler, this tough ship had taken us 300km to the north overnight to our first dive site for the day. Known to the diving community as a “liveaboard,” these ships carry…

The Land Down Under

May 14, 2010, 9:03am

Rubbing my eyes and putting my glasses back on, I willed myself awake and excitedly looked out the window to survey the new continent beneath us. I caught glimpses of whitecaps on the waves below between puffy white clouds, an endless field of…