The Wandering Fox

    I wake up to the soft hum of coqui frogs and moonlight streaming through my window. It’s 3:00 AM, quite a bit earlier than I usually start the day. I’m happy to be up at this ungodly hour, though, because I am visiting a place that has been at the top of my list since I set foot on the Big Island of Hawaii three weeks earlier: Waipi’o Valley. Waipi’o Valley is a steep gorge cut into the East coast of the Big Island, about an hour up the coast from the farm where I am living and working. The valley is known for its black volcanic sand beach, dramatic cliffs, and rich history as the home of multiple Hawaiian kings. Waipi’o is one of the more remote places on the island, being only accessible by walking or driving down what is arguably the steepest road in the world . Given these constraints and the fact that I don’t have a car on the island, I assumed my chances of actually visiting this fascinating place were slim to none. As chance would have it, though, some locals I me...

Heads up: this post contains descriptions of violence and potentially upsetting events. 

      I take the last bites of my dinner; a tortilla filled with whatever vegetables were left in my cooler, and finish it off with a coconut cookie. It's simple but satisfying. I'm settled on the tailgate of my car in the backpacker parking lot at Grayson Highlands State Park . As I look around, I see birds returning to their trees for the night, and watch the sunlight soften from the bright rays of noon to the ambient glow of evening. There is a pleasant buzz of energy in the lot this evening as other backpackers mill around, preparing their gear and organizing their groups to set out for the night. I hop down from the tailgate and turn my attention to my own pack. It's time to get ready.      I have been looking forward to sleeping on the Appalachian Trail here for a while now. My plan is to hike a  mile over the gorgeous balds of Massie Gap to some campsites right outside the boundary of Grayson Highlands. Everyone I've talked to says the sites are...

 Photo by Bianca Gonçalves from Pexels This is how I imagine a conversation with a Mountain would go...      I crest the top of the mountain and drop my pack on the ground. I settle in a cleft between two jutting rocks and pull out my little one-burner stove. The flame stutters in the wind, so I cup my hands around it to shelter the heat like a baby bird. Once it is burning bright, I add my pot with instant coffee and water.      The rocky ridges surrounding me are crisp and bright in the sun. I can see wispy white clouds rifling over the peaks in the startling blue sky. Then, I feel a slight trimmer from the mountain below me, like a cough building deep in its chest. The pebbles and shale seem to hum with energy as the rumble grows. Then it is here, the heart of the mountain.       I can see it and not see it at the same time. A presence is obviously here, in front of me, but it is more like a collection of energy hanging in the ...

(A stop on St. Cuthbert's Way, photo by Julie Guthrie)      I am excited to share this guest post by Noah Guthrie. Noah is the mind behind The Green Phoenix , a website that "strives to use writing and online dialogue to cultivate a healthy and holistic relationship with the natural world." Without further ado, enjoy. --Cami Hiking The Sacred      Some of my favorite hiking memories come from St. Cuthbert’s Way , a Scottish pilgrimage trail that my family went on in the spring of 2019. The trail goes from Melrose Abbey to the Holy Island of Lindisfarne, and many believe that it traces the footsteps of St. Cuthbert , a 7th century hermit renowned for his miracles. My family took this journey mostly by foot (occasionally aided by taxi), and it lasted four days, starting at the Eildon Hills.      My most vivid memories of the Eildons involve the gorse. These were huge bushes, some of them as tall or taller than I was, rolling up and down the sl...

    Mount Pisgah has a rich and varied history. First populated by the Cherokee tribe, the mountains were home to rich primeval forests. In later years, the Pisgah area was used for farming until George Vanderbilt acquired the land in 1888 and used it to start one of the first forestry programs in America. The hike to Mount Pisgah is a quick but steep 1 mile trek that offers amazing views from the top. The trailhead is right off the Blue Ridge Parkway, making this a great stop during a day of exploring.  Getting There At the beginning of the trail you will see a sign, nearly encased in lush folliage, that reads: "This trail leads through Pisgah National Forest to the summit of Mount Pisgah. Named after the biblical mount from which Moses first saw the promised land. This peak affords a panoramic view of Western North Carolina."      The sentiment seems so poetic at first. I imagine travel-weary settlers looking out over the lush, achingly beautiful blu...

    Learning to rock climb is a tricky task when you live several hours from the nearest crag. This fact is obvious to anyone who uses logic, and yet, I've been bitten by the rock climbing bug anyway. This summer it has been my constant mission to find anything, literally anything, to climb on. In a flurry of increasingly obsessive internet searches, I discovered that there is, in fact, a place to climb closer to home. In the town of Great Falls, Google told me, there are some seldom-visited rocks next to the local river where I could go bouldering. Since then, I have been making the slightly-more-acceptably-long trek to Great Falls to practice my skills. I am lucky to have found what I expected, namely rocks. More unexpectedly, though, I also discovered a new town and it got me thinking...what follows is the fever dream that resulted.      Most boulderfields are found in pretty deserted places; the deserts of Indian Creek or the alpine slopes of the Rockies. Bu...

     I've been doing a lot of solo camping lately and it gave me cause to consider something that I haven't thought about seriously since I was eight: fear of the dark. In my normal daily life, fear of the dark seems almost laughable. I live in a house where I am constantly surrounded by electric lights that I can turn on or off with the flick of a switch. Darkness is simply a condition I choose to allow when I turn off the lights and go to sleep--nothing more. It seemed absurd to be afraid of something that I myself controlled. So you can understand how I assumed that fear of the dark is something that only exists in the realm of childhood. But then I went camping alone and I realized two things. First, that I do still feel afraid of the dark sometimes, and secondly, that that's not always a bad thing.  Car camping in an old-growth forest     You see, the kind of dark I experienced while camping is different than the kind of dark I experience on a dai...

    People have celebrated the Summer Solstice for thousands of years. In Ancient China, ceremonies were held to honor the force of Yin, or femininity. Vikings used the long midsummer days to convene meetings and hammer out legal matters between seafaring groups. They also made trips to healing wells to restore health and held bonfires to celebrate the longest day of the year. The Ancient Greek calendar places the holiday of Kronia near the solstice. During Kronia, Greece's customary social order was turned on its head as slaves and masters celebrated the holiday together, sometimes with masters even serving their slaves . The solstice has inspired a number of unique traditions around the world, and its clear that this astronomical event has a penchant for turning normal reality on its head in new and unexpected ways.      T he solstice didn't just affect our ancient ancestors though. Summer solstice celebrations are still going strong all over the world. S...

     Before traveling through British Columbia, Canada, I'd heard plenty of stories about campers having run-ins with bears. Nevertheless, I never really expected to experience one myself, even when I ventured into bear country last summer. Little did I know, I would meet a bear on my first night in brown bear territory...apparently I'm a bear magnet.      After WWOOFing on a farm in central BC, my farm friends and I decided to take a road trip back to Vancouver. I was super excited about this because our route would take us right through Manning Provincial Park , where we were planning to spend a few days camping and hiking. This would be my first chance to experience The Canadian Wilderness . For a girl from the Southeast US this is a big deal.    Manning Park spans the Cascade Mountains, right between the arid Okanagan Valley and lush Vancouver. The park is known for its vast cedar rainforests, many bird species, and rugged mountains. My fav...