Those who follow us know that every once in awhile I can go off  on one of my self-discovery narratives contemplating life, the length scale of quantum gravity or the zen art of tire rotation.  Well I’m overdue.

Driving is my meditation.  Lately I’m laying down 150 miles on my daily commute which provides a truck load of time to consider my life…  or at least how I’ve rewritten the history my life.

When I look back 20 years, I see a life seemingly foreign to me now. A rock-n-roll, party your ass off, hard drinking life style.  And when I say hard drinking, I don’t mean a calendar full of red solo cup, beer binging weekenders.  I mean years of scotch all night, every night black outs with tequila and nicotine for breakfast just to put me right, life style.

Like many twenty somethings, I lived as if there were no tomorrows and I paid no attention to the past.  I had all the answers. At least the answers to all the questions I cared to ask.  Bashfulness and insecurity hidden behind outrageousness and arrogance.  To me, my life made perfect sense: lust and adventure, my liver hanging by a thread and one foot over the ledge.

I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life in two words: “It Changes!”

These days I don’t drink. Unraveling the insecurities I worked so hard to hide, has lead me to a deeper sense of understanding.  Lust has been redirected into love and an appreciation of the joy and sorrow that accompanies it.  Through the past twenty some years of travel, friendships have anchored me in the present without having to give up the stories of my past.  I no longer believe I have all the answers, because I now ask better questions.

I understand adversity. I know failure. I still stumble but it does not define me.

My sense of adventure has matured like a fine single malt (I said I don’t drink…  I didn’t say it was easy).  I retained the courage to step outside of my comfort zone to explore what is different and unknown.  I’ve been richly rewarded on these journeys.

Everyone needs to have their wild years.  We all live in change.  I am a the result of what I bring forward from my past.  It shapes how I approach the future.  I’m living in the now, recalling the past and looking to the future.

The adventures I’ve had and those in front of me continue to drive my  lust of life and a quest for answers that can never be found, only searched for.

I never could have imagined my current life and who knows what this chapter will look like in the rear view, twenty years from now.  All I know is objects in the mirror are closer than they appear.

It’s been three years since boy and I went on our road trip adventure to Ouray Colorado so when Mark over at Metal Tech extended an invitation to their party at the 2011 FJ Summi in Ouray, it seemed like perfect timing.

Flying into Telluride on a cloudy day is an experience best describe as 45 minutes of complete boredom followed by 60 seconds of shear terror. The small plane which had to leave two passengers and six bags behind because of weight restrictions seem to fall from the sky as it descended from cruising altitude to landing strip in less time than it takes to say a quick Hail Mary and beg forgiveness for all the sins of my past.  As the saying goes: “Any landing you walk away from is a good landing”.

You would expect to see lots of FJ Cruiser photos and descriptions of wheeling trails like Black Bear or Corkscrew here. After all this is the 5th annual FJ Summit with some 500 folks gathering to drive the high mountain passes, compare rigs and talk wheeling. But today was more important than that.

Today was about meeting new friends and reconnecting with old ones. Metal Tech sponsors a party at one of the local watering holes where the beer comes in their famous MT Pint Glasses (green this year if your collecting the set). If you don’t know about their pint glasses check on ebay… you can probably find someone willing to part with theirs for the right amount. Of course you may have to sell a kidney to afford one on ebay. Metal Tech doesn’t sell their pint glasses, instead they hand them out free at lots Land Cruiser events as their way of giving back to the wheeling community across the country.

Mingling through the crowd, I found myself in a sea of new faces.   There is a strong community bond among this sport and  I quickly found everyone extending a hand and inviting me into their circle of friends  Some were here with friends, others with their wives or girlfriends and a few father bonding with their sons.

Walking through the bar, filled with hundreds of unfamiliar faces, one suddenly stood out.  I have a strong bond with Frank…  We wheeled The Rubicon Trail together.  The bond that formed on that off-road adventure is hard to explain but it will last a lifetime.  In no time the years melted away and we were sharing stories of our kids, work  and life.  Frank is one of the good guys that I’m fortunate to call my friend.

Parties have two phases.  Phase one is filed with folks talking, sharing stories, and exploring the ties that bond us all together.  When the sun goes down and crowds thin out…  Phase 2 takes over.  I wont name, names or go into details, but when Metal Tech throws a party, debauchery, mayhem, tramp stamp competitions and nudity are a real possibility.

In the morning, I’ll be wheeling as a guest of Metal Tech and have an opportunity to try out their new FJ Cruiser rear long travel I’ve been eying for a while now.  What Hula Betty doesn’t know…  That Metal Tech long travel is a done deal…  its just working out the timing now.

Yes, every woman in this website is referred to as Hula Betty…  She is an independent spirit.  A woman who knows what she wants and has the drive to reach out and take it.  Hula Betty is a way of life that embraces adventure.  More than a name, more than a pretty face, Hula Betty is a way of life and a sense of self.  Which brings us to this adventure.

Leaving your parents’ home and going out on your own is the ultimate adventure.  Its the big adventure every parent looks forward to watching with pride and dreads with all their heart.  You hope that when they leave, they take with them the knowledge you’ve tried to impart, a strong identity of who they are and a compass in their soul that will always guide them home if needed.

Hula Betty has that and more.  And she wanted to make sure she never forgets her roots.  Her idea was to combine flesh and ink to create a permanent reminder of all those temporary feelings of her youth.

We set out for the city on a day painted with sunshine as the ferry boat pulled out into the sound.  Leaving the sleepy little poulsbo behind, the Seattle skyline grew closer as we talked about things to come and what led Hula Betty to her decision.  Two adults discussing life.

One thing about the ferry schedule…  you are either an hour early…  or hour late…  the boat never seems to line up with the time you planed.  But an early arrival gave us time to walk around, taking in the sites and the smells of Pikes Place.  We stopped to enjoy a little people watching from the calm of a barista’s paradise, and even managed to explore the world from the pages of a map as we chatted about the places that remained to be explored.  Today’s destination was a little closer…  but no less exotic.

Madam Lazong’s was where I first had my adventures etched into flesh and I was proud to be asked to accompany Hula Betty as she marked her adventure.  She had spent considerable time contemplating designs, placement, and the emotions this marking would evoke for her.  She was ready but Steph was running late and you could tell Hula Betty was getting a little nervous as the realities of the needles sunk in.  But she is nothing, if not strong in her convictions, she knew the butterflies would pass.

Some times its the little things that have the most meaning in our lives.  For me it as a day spent with Hula Betty.  For her it was the elegant simplicity of the Seattle skyline to reminder of home.

The second universal truth of the Buddha is that everything is continuously changing. Life is like a river flowing, ever-changing. It flows slowly and sometimes swiftly. It is smooth and gentle in some places, it snags on rock crops out of nowhere. As soon as you think you are safe, something unexpected happens.

Pain finds men no matter where they are, no matter how good they are, how hard they try. Struggling to make ends meet, make relationships connect, make life work out. Men live on a piece of rock that makes us weak.

Some, find a friend, a brother, to lean on. A brother in arms to help in the struggle, to stand shoulder to shoulder in the battle for life. A brother who, without question will lay down his life for another. A man who will walk the road of hell because someone is needed to point to the light, calm trembling eyes and show the way out.

These are not just words rolling out to the world. These are echoes of hope heard among the trees, on the river, soaring among the stars in the night. Men struggle at birth, through sickness, with old age and death. The world changes, life flows.

Thank you Lord for another day. Help my brother along his way, please; bring peace, to the soul. Grant us all peace, serenity and the courage to change.

Those of you who have read through our stories here know that pictures are a big part of the last great road trip. And like boho chic runway models you will find one or two of our images that are better than average. But most of the time I rely on point shoot… shoot a lot and hope something interesting comes out.

But when I see someone with an eye for composition and an editing flare I realize I just hack at it…

You know who they are. Artist who tell their stories with a single image. William Shafer (Raggler on Flickr) is one of those guys who tells his stories with pixels. Stories that convey moods and transmits an energy without ever writing a single word. When I look at these images my soul changes.

For me there are hundreds of stories in each of these images. I don’t necessarily see only Raggler’s story… I see mine. I look into these images and I feel my past adventures and I imagine adventures still to come, I take his story and make it my own.

When I first came across Raggler’s images I felt the need to travel… around the block, around the world, it didn’t matter I just needed to travel. I see these images and sense the energy of the road, I hear the road calling to me, I feel its pull on my life.

My life has been dragged across blacktop and dirt around the world. I’ve encircled the globe four times, seen 17,504 sun rises and loved deeply.  I’ve driven to places I shouldn’t have and met people who surprised me in so many wonderful ways. My life stories are spread across the Internet and tattooed in flesh. But it is images like these that humble me. I see these images and know I have to keep moving.

Until the other day I didn’t know Raggler but now he’s inspired me to create better stories in life, words and images.

…Ok this photo, just screams Hula Betty to me! What do you think?

Off road adventures and sharing the experience through the lens of a camera is something we all reach for but only a few like Raggler will grasp.

Thank you Raggler for sharing your images and allowing us to post them here.

2009 was incredible for off-road adventures… Tahuya OVR Park,  Bill Burke training, Tillamook State Forest and of course the Rubicon Trail off-road adventure.   It wasn’t so good for economic adventures.  Without much work we had lots of time to hit the 4×4 trails…  A little too much time.  Fast forward to today, 2010 and economic times have improved.  Good news for business…  not so good news for wheeling.  Over the last six months we’ve racked up more air miles than trail hours, flying back and forth to Texas, Montana, Oregon, and around Washington.   But all that is about to change…  at least a little.

The good thing about nights on the road and working out of hotel rooms is you have lots of time to Google trails and research you next off-road adventure.  This time we were looking for a multi-day solo run to wash off the stress and airport grunge.

Turns out the Olympic Mountain Range is the wettest place in the lower 48 states…  If you live in northwest you may think your back yard is the wettest place on earth this year but really the Olympics are it.

It also turns out that there are forest and old logging road encircling the majority of the mountain range.  While not the gnarly boulder filled “roads” of Rubicon, the back roads of the Olympics offer seclusion in one of the most beautiful places in the northwest.

At just under 8,000 feet high, Mount Olympus is the big boy in the range which includes Mt. Deception, Constance, The Brothers, Warrior, Eleanor and a host of others.  The range is filled with rain forest, beach, alpine meadows, rain shadows, clear cuts and some of the world’s largest trees.

This off-road adventure is not going to be about raising our testosterone level with gnarly terrain or testing the limits of our suspension.  This adventure is about getting back in the saddle, connecting with the soul of the open road and freeing the demons in our head through quiet reflection alone in the middle of nowhere.

We’ve printed the maps and loaded 500 miles of GPS way points.  Now to finish up a little rig maintenance and wait for the sun to warm up the trail…  or at least the rain to stop for a bit.  We haven’t figured it all out but looks like we have a plan…  And a good plan today is better than a perfect plan a year from now.

I’ll be the first to admit…  We are not high on the cool scale of 18 year old seniors. But when prom rolls around…  the laws of physics and high school insecurities are suspended.

Turns out that even the lines of limos didn’t draw as many looks or photo ops as our FJ Cruiser.  Of course after you’ve seen 10 stretch hummers…  you’ve seen them all…  But the Blue Bunny… There is only ONE.

So to all the kings and queens of the prom we hope you have a great time and stay safe.  As you graduate and venture out into the world, heading for college, work or military service remember…  The world is yours and it will become what you make it.  We hope you make it better than you found it and your life is filled with adventures just as special as Prom.