I Don't Need to Prove I Can Hike in the Rain. Black Beads.

Sometimes when I'm out trying to enjoy the great outdoors the weather is not exactly cooperative. It's rainy, or it's too cold, or the area is lousy with biting insects. (Okay, mosquitos aren't weather, but work with me here....) What to do in those situations?

"Life's not perfect," part of my mind jeers. "Suck it up and hike."

"You and your hike-in-the-rain guilt trip can fuck right off," another part my mind responds. I've hiked in the rain enough in the past to know it's not much fun. And I've done it enough that I don't need to prove anything.

The Story of the Black Beads

When I was in the Boy Scouts as a tween and teen my troop awarded activity beads. Each time we went on a hike or camping trip we'd get a small, colored bead to hang on a leather strand on a belt loop. I've included a picture right/above that I found online of another troop's activity beads. Ours were similar though simpler. We had only plain discs, no fancy stars or crap..

Not every troop did/does activity beads, though mine was quite proud of our tradition. We scouts would wear the belt loop every time we dressed in scout uniform and would count coup (literally) by seeing who had the most beads.

The color of the bead indicates the type of activity. Certain colors indicate the weather. In particular, black beads indicated a camping trip where it rained— and more than just a sprinkle. Well, my bead strings didn't look like the picture here; mine had way more black beads. On my coup strings it was like one-third of the beads were black. Basically I camped in the rain a lot.

I've taken a lot of things from my childhood experience as a Scout into my adult life. One of them, of course, is my love of the great outdoors. Another is the conviction that I don't need to prove myself outdoors. I don't need to prove that I'm tough or able to deal with bad weather or whatever— because I've done it enough times already.

So, how does this apply in practice?

You Can't Find Gold in a Silver Mine

Like I hinted at the top, I'm willing to pull the plug when things are not good. As an adult who's toughed through enough misery already in my life, I don't need to prove it to myself or anybody else.

Moreover, it's not just about not needing to prove I can handle adversity. I've also learned through gaining life's wisdom that when I'm in a way-less-than-ideal situation I've got to ask, "Is there a better situation I can spend my time and energy on?" Like I wrote in explaining why I bailed out of hiking a trail I had really wanted to hike in New Zealand, You can't find gold in a silver mine. You can't drink whiskey from a bottle of wine.

My numerous black beads are reminders of that.

Karekare Beach

On our last full day in New Zealand— yes, this is part of my catching up from over a month ago— we drove out to the coast west of New Zealand to hike some waterfalls and visit the beaches. Alas, the weather wasn't great. It rained a lot. But the rain was nice for making the waterfalls at Karekare run full... even if it did also result in me slipping and falling on the slick trail. 😨

Karekare Falls is right near Karekare Beach. We figured as long as we'd driven all the way out to this remote area we might as well see multiple things around, even if the weather didn't exactly scream "Beach!!"



Towering over Karekare Beach in the distance is The Watchman. Hundreds of years ago there were fortifications built atop it by a powerful Maori chief. Those are long gone now, though some Maori descendants still live in modern-ish cliff-side houses in the area.



At the start of the footpath out to the beach is this Pou, or guardian spirit statue. This particular one represents the Maori chief who build a fort atop the mountain.



Hawk and I walked out toward the beach together. I got as far as where the path gave way to sand and turned around. As you can see in the photo above, it was not "Enjoy a lovely day at the beach" weather. Keeping in mind my observation that You can't find gold in a silver mine from when I bailed out on a rainy hike several days earlier and my story of the black beads I decided other hikes on our long itinerary for the day would be more worth my time and energy. I went back and sat in the car to rest.

Up next: Indeed, the next beach was slightly more worth it....

Taking it Easy Weekend

This has been another taking-it-easy weekend. April and May seemed to have so many busy weekends that it still feels nice not to go anywhere in particular or have to do anything major. This weekend has been even more relaxing than last weekend... because while we didn't travel out of town for the day, we went hiking regionally every day last weekend. Oh, and we hung out at the pool one afternoon. Well, this weekend we skipped the hiking and just hung out at the pool every day. 😅



...Well, okay, we did do a bit more than just hang out at the pool. Saturday morning we went to the monthly flea market at DeAnza College in Cupertino. It was... a good excuse to walk around in the sun past folding tables of stuff you'd have seen in your parents' or grandparents' basement in the 1990s.

After lunch we had a friend come over and we hung out at the pool together for a few hours. Then we changed back into clothes, went out for dinner together, and came back to hang a bit on the back patio before bidding him farewell around 8:30. I went to bed not long after that.

Sunday we thought we might go out hiking after lunch but the place we picked up in the mountains was getting fogged over, so we turned the trip into just a scenic drive. That also let us get home to hang out at the pool an hour earlier. Hawk took the photo above while I was floating in the pool. All I'm missing there is a floating drink holder for a margarita! Seriously, if I could have just hung out in a pool like this, with nothing bothering me, in Cabo or Phoenix last month it would have been amazing. We'll have to make more time to hang out at the pool like this, here at home, this summer.