Entrance Ranch, Hinton Alberta 9/19/12

J - Yo, Peace Rider where you been for so long, missed hearing from you.  What took you so long to get back on your bicycle - dude?

 

PR - It's a long story.   But I'm back, tilting at windmills perhaps but peace on earth and peace with the earth is possible.  I ride with hope and a sore back side, something you might understand. 

 

J - Now you're talking my language.  You do like to abuse your body.  You have a destination in mind?  You beat your head against a wall in DC the last two times with climate change..  Going for a third!

 

PR - No, of course not, it wasn't the destination that was important in any event but the journey and friends made along the way.  It really is about conscious raising following your dreams, inspiring others letting it all hang out.  As Einstein famously said, to paraphrase crudely, you can't solve current problems at the same level of consciousness.  The good news is that's changing and I'm meeting more folks who are moving in that direction.   it's change, evolution, a revolution of a different sort.

 

J - Back to your question of destination.  For the moment it's Colorado and Mexico also beckons for the 12/21/12 Maya calendar cycle end date.    

 

PR - I'm recovering at Entrance Ranch, just north of Hinton, AB check it out on the web.  I met Rocky Notnes on my first ride through here in the winter of '09.  His vision is to create a healing/retreat center here,  more than just a place to stay with trail rides.  Tell your rich friends about it.  He could use some of your pocket change.

 

J - Yeah right, and me with barely a pot to - -.

 

PR - All right forget it.

 

J - So you started in Grand Prairie?

 

PR - Yeah, my friends John Brucker, daughter Wendy and Vi Anderson dropped me off just south of town and out of heavy traffic.  John and Vi continued on to Calgary so John could catch a flight to Germany to visit his brothers.  Vi was going to see her daughter in Vernon.

 

J - You made pretty good time for an old f---  if it took only three and a half days.  You're pushing yourself  hard amigo.

 

PR - Maybe so, it felt like it when I rolled into the Ranch late on Monday.  Fewer ups and downs and less walking up hills the last day but more miles over a little flatter terrain.  The physical demands and fatigue are just part of being on a bicycle.  But there are moments that make it worthwhile, the onset of fall colors  splashed on the hillsides, an elk bugling behind camp one frosty morning, a lone wolf crossing up ahead, and the warmth of a camp fire on cold fingers.

 

Then my arrival at Entrance Ranch late in the day was really sweet.  Mario greeted me coming down the steps of the main house.  He's  taking a Oneness mural (8'x12') on the road across Canada to the United Nation. www.unfoldingdreams.org.  The latter site has a graphic of it.  Then I met shaved head Thekla, Reiki master, a self described roamer, servant to the world who arrived here again the day before to help Rocky. 

 

She's the only person who's ever offered to draw a bath for me then have dinner waiting.  Sinking weary bones into a hot tub and then food was about as close to bliss as you can get..

 

J - Where to next?

 

PR - West to Jasper then over the Icefield Parkway, weather permitting.  But first a visit with Kim Wallace and Dave, friends the '09 trip.

 

J -  That route through the Rockies is supposed to be one of the most scenic - right?

 

PR - That's what I've been hearing and fall colors in the park are nearing their peak.  My friend Don Laird from Edson and I drove in to Meiji Hot Springs in the Park and had a great soak anc conversation.  Pretty sweet, yes?

 

More down the road, held in the arms of the moon and the bosom of the Earth.

 

  

 

Yeah, when the student is ready a teacher comes.  She has enhanced my appreciation and interested in energy healing and its application.

 

What's the next stop.

 

Probably leave here Friday and head for Jasper and connect with Kim Wallace again (met on '09 ride).  But for tonight it's soak in a Hot Springs near Jasper with friend Don Laird with some fine dining thrown in. 

 

  

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peace Rider Back On The Road Again

In brief or maybe not, I left Alaska 5 September.  But this time hoping to catch a ride further south to get ahead of winter in the north before climbing on my bicycle.

With this in mind for ease of transport my Norco Quest bicycle was modified with  two S&S couplers and bought a carrying case to go with a now break apart bicycle.

I caught the Borough bus as far as the Salcha store.  The White Line there is a relatively new route on the Richardson Highway.  But I wasn't traveling light.  My bicycle case 26"x26"x10," was the lightest and least bulky, a disassembled B.O.B trailer and assorted gear in a very large duffel and another with food and more gear plus a day pack.  I held up my sign with destination Whitehorse and four rides later I was there late in the day thanks to the kindness of strangers.  I had a very enjoyable visit with Malkolmb Boothroyd, a young environmental activist, whom I had ridden with a year before from Chicago to Washington, DC.   I am friends of the family.  He's a take charge young man working on a campaign to set aside the Peel River watershed from mineral development.  The public and First Nations people want it protected but the government supports development, an all too familiar circumstance where values clash.

I intended to catch a Greyhound Bus to Ft. Nelson the following day but at the terminal I was told the northbound bus had broken down and the next bus wasn't leaving until Monday.  My friends in Ft. Nelson were leaving on Wednesday, I had learned, so it was back to the Highway and hold up a sign.  It started to rain and still no ride.  It didn't help that two people were trying to do the same thing within site of me.  They were also stuck.  They left under a steady rain.  Shortly thereafter I caught a ride to Marsh Lake and accepted an offer to sleep out of the rain for the night on Ian McIntyre's shop floor.  The next morning Ian drove me to a likely spot of the Highway and I alternately held up my sign, jogged back and forth to stay warm and uprooted invasive White Sweet Clover at road side.  A couple of hours later an RV with a family from Minnesota stopped and I was south bound to Watson Lake.  They were headed down the Cassiar Highway which turns off just short of there.  

On my winter ride in '09 I had stayed with a Warm Showers (volunteer hosts for bicyclists) in Watson Lake and called ahead to see if there was room "in the inn."  There was.  Joe and Nicki Schmitz and four children had a sign to add to the many thousands at the Watson Lake sign forest in town.   I got off there and Barry Drury picked me up.  His wife Susan had left to pick up their son Jason and girl friend in Whitehorse.  When they arrived back in Watson Lake, it was they, I learned,  who were ahead of me on the road out of Whitehorse also trying to hitch a ride home.  

The next AM Barry dropped me on the edge of town near the weigh station and 13 cars later I was south bound at a high rate of speed to Ft. Nelson.  Kenny Gilmore a contractor from Deese Lake was kind enough to drop me at Liard Hot Springs for a quick soak while he ate lunch at the lodge on the other side of the Highway.   The burger was greasy and expensive but the soup edible he angrily related when we were back on the road.  

Even with construction of a new access platform and change facility the springs are wonderful and I was grateful of the opportunity.  Had I travelled by bus I would have missed it.  South of Coal River a small herd of bison was bedded down on the shoulder and grazing on grass in the road right-of-way 

Mid-afternoon we arrived in Ft. Nelson and I connected with John Brucker and Vi Anderson.  I had met John and his young family 46 years earlier in Nahanni Butte when I set out on my first long distance kayak trip in the north.  I planned by route to at least pass by the "Dangerous River," the Nahanni described by Raymond Patterson in his book of the same title.  

I'm in Ft. Nelson at this posting leaving 9/13, with John and Vi for Grand Prairie where his daughter lives.  They are continuing on to Calgary where John will catch a plane to Europe.  Vi will go to Vernon,BC to see her daughter.  The plan of the moment for me is to start bicycling from there to Hinton via Grand Cache on the Big Horn Highway.  A few miles north of Hinton is the Exchange Ranch and another friend to reconnect with from my winter trip.  

The route beyond is less certain but the destination for the near term is a friend's place outside Denver, Colorado.   

I regret you weren't with me to savor the brief peak I had at the lives and circumstances of the folks who cared for and helped me.

The Why of It

I suppose some might shake their heads in wonderment at someone riding a bicycle working to bring peace on earth and peace with the earth.  But here's the thing, each of us has a larger purpose in coming to this life.  And as I said to a group of high school students you can live an ordinary life revolving around yourself or you can live an extraordinary life dedicated to something larger than self.  Perhaps it's less important that you ultimately succeed at the latter than having the courage to set out into the unknown in the first place.  It's a choice.  Once you've taken that first step all others that may become necessary down the road become just a little bit easier because you took that very first step.  

But how do you know then if you've found yours?  Does it expand you, put another way is there juice in it for you, does it give a sense of inner peace even though your outward circumstances may require changing?      

The Universe exists to support you.   It is one of the three principles of happiness according to Shimoff I've found true in my own life.  This is not left brain logic show me the facts and proof beforehand way of perception but rather apprehended by right brain intuitive sense of things reinforced by first hand experience.  In the end it is the willingness to proceed and overcome in the face of one's fears and the unknown trusting that events and life will unfold in a manner that work to the higher good. 

In the way of the seeker you can avoid slamming the door in your face at the outset by aligning your life with universal values of honesty, integrity, courage, compassion, love and kindness.  A large injection of humility and open mindedness are help aids in the process of discernment. 

It's all too easy to look at the state of our world and outward circumstance and conclude it's hopeless.  I wouldn't be on the road again if that were the case.  Clearly there are formidable challenges not the least of which is climate change.  But there is always more going on than meets the eye.  We are a race awakening to an expanded view of who and what we are in relation to All That Is.  We know things can change overnight and it will not take a majority to cause that shift.  The problems we face cannot be solved with the same level of conscious (Einstein).  This is what awakening is about and many have already made the journey or already arrived.

More about the Way of Peace and my understanding of it down to road.  But in short it remains the Way of Love spoken of by spiritual masters through the ages.

Peace Rider 

 

 

   

On the Road from Tegucigalpa, Honduras 1/2/2011

Arrived here this AM tired after climbing over two mountain ranges..  This Sunday is literally a day of rest for me.  After finishing here try and climb out of the valley into the surrounding pine hills headed for Danli.  Won´t get there today though.

Beyond Danli will head into Nicaragua via Somoto and Estelli.  If road conditions permit down the east side of Lake Managua crossing into Costa Rica at outlet of Lake and San Juan River.  From there to San Jose, CR.  Hopefully, get to Boquete and my friend´s place by mid-Jan.  But one day at a time4

Had a Channel 10 TV crew catch me on the outskirts of San Pedro Sula a few days back.  Did some filming and an on the spot interview, my first.  In Belise a family just out of a 7th Day Church Service invited me to have dinner with them, it was noon time.  Wonderful!  Chickens, dog and cat underfoot in their simple home but a family rich in way that count most.

Camping out at night, try to find an out of the way and mind spot.  A place is always provided.  I´m cared for.  Manage to find small patch of nature everywhere, my favorite spots in trees by riverside.  I´m usually awake by 5:30 but don´t get up until 6:00 and just getting light.  Begin packing my things, dry the tent if I´m able, usually a heavy dew fall overnight.

Last night and this AM first rain in weeks, this at higher elevation between 4 & 5 thousand feet in pine forest.   On the road by 8:30 or so, start looking for a place to camp about 5:00 and usually in bed by 7:30 PM or so.  Usual dinner fare rice, pasta, onion, dried beans and some seasoning, bread if I have it and fruit dessert.  Cooking on an alcohol stove.  Alcohol from local pharmacy, use few drops of paint thinner to light.

Long nights but I need the rest.

It really has been a joy being on  the road again.  Lots of things going on.  Many vendors at road side selling fresh fruit, pineapples, mandaring oranges and bananas, apples from the States, and inexpensive.  One hot day milk from a cold coconut really hit the spot.  Another purchase was a small bottle of African bee honey.

Water I´m getting from gas stations or streams.  It´s been hot and sweaty work climbing hills and drinking buckets.  Disinfect all with iodine drops.

Got to hit road.

On the Road from Toledo Ohio 11/4/10

Peace Rider is in the saddle again for anyone still monitoring the blogosphere for some signs of activity on this sight.  Hi oh Silver and away!   My new steed is an old, refurbished Schwinn my neighbor gave me.

I joined a 350SolutionsRevoltions ride already in progress.    It was a good fit for a follow on to my first ride for the planet that ended in May.

Alec Neal, and Katherine Ball set out from Portland, OR in mid-August to film a documentary on local solutions to climate change.  They were joined in Montana by Malcomb Boothroyd from Whitehorse.  He actually began his ride from Skagway, Alaska  In Edina, MN, a burb of Minneaopolis,  they were joined by Paul Thompson, our sagwagon, driving a Toyota Prius.

In one of those coincidences not coincidences Malcomb is the son of Whitehorse friends I knew from flying days in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

I flew into Chicago from Fairbanks on 27 October.  Paul met me at the airport thankfully,  with none of those anxiety producing moments of arriving "cold turkey" in a new place.  

The group had the use of an apartment for the Chicago stay. Kathy had moved out for three days to give the group a place to stay.   Just one example of being cared for along the way by the generosity of friends and friends of friends.

We are in another such place this day near Toledo, Ohio the home of Becky and Dean Kasperzak, friends of Alec Neal.  Yesterday we put nearly 80 miles behind us so it was slow getting going this morning.  Next stop for interviews is Cleveland about 120 miles down the road, a shorter day in the offing today.

I have some inkling of where the expression "Holy Toledo" may have come from.  Passing a landfill south of Detroit a roadside nail flattened my tire.   Glueless patches failed thereafter and it took several attempts and an hour or so of fussing and glue down patch before the tube to held air.   The delay put us into Toledo just at dark.

I should add that Malcomb is 18, Alec is 27 and Katherine 26.  Paul and I are men of some vintage with me in the more elevated vintage category.   At the outset I was wondering whether I could just keep up with these young folks.  Luckily Paul is carrying much of our weight so the bicycles are lightly loaded.  I also had two relatively low mileage days at the outset to gather strength after a four month layoff.

There must have been some residual conditioning from the earlier ride because I'm  hanging in there,  somewhat slower,  but at least the rest of the group is still in sight at the end of the day.  And after all, as Katherine said to me, they're not going to leave me behind.

It's a good mix of young and old that works well together.  I am blessed to have these folks as traveling companions.

The plan is to reach DC on 15 November,  spend a few days walking the halls of Congress lobbying members.   Afterward, we'll leave by train for the southern coast and take a boat to Cancun or near vicinity.  The latter has yet to be arranged.  Several leads remain to be followed.

IF YOU CAN HELP WITH A BOAT CONNECTION ACROSS THE GULF TO PROGRESO, ON THE NORTH COAST OF THE YUCATAN PENN. LET ME KNOW.

Through contacts Katherine had developed, I have been able to volunteer with Klimaform, the climate talk organizers.  Katherine and Alec are also volunteers as well as delegates to the conference.   Food is provide and we will camp together in an eco-village.  It should be interesting.

Malcomb is part of the Canadian youth delegation to the talks.  Paul is also a delegate.  I was too late to apply to attend the conference talks but I am happy to be a freelancer to go where I'm needed.

The talks run from late November thru 11 Dec.

After the talks not sure where the Universe would have me go.  This is, after all, a faith walk.  But have-wheels-will-travel.  I plan to take my old Schwinn with me and will see, perhaps Cuba.

I will continue to add to the blog as computer access allows.

See 350Solutionsrevolutions web site for more information and a Face book page for updates on the ride progress.

Don - Peace Rider

End the Madness

I wrote the following article which appeared as a Community Perspective on the Opinion page of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Sunday, August 29, 2010. My title was "End the Madness." The text is unchanged from the original with the exception of one and universal, capitalized for emphasis. Editorial improvements were made to the author's punctuation.

Not all of the text appearing in the printed article was appropriately credited. That is corrected here.

*From "Target Atmospheric C02: Where Should Humanity Aim?" by James Hansen, Makido Sato et al. in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.

"Spontaneous Evolution," by Lipton and Bhaerman


Changing our mental climate

We must alter our ways now.

I recently returned from a seven-month winter bike ride from Fairbanks to Washington, DC. I rode, impelled by the urgency of reigning in C02 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, motivated by the way of peace which is the way of Love. See www.ridefortheplanet.blogspot.com. To get involved see www.350.org.

In Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 97 percent of the climate researchers published in the field say man-made climate change is real.*

I spoke with those who still believe climate change is part of a natural cycle and not human caused. It lets you off the hook for doing anything about it if that's your belief. There are those, of course, who just don't know or are misinformed. But it's also convenient if your motives are money-driven and you choose to ignore all the costs to the common good from continuing our addiction to burning fossil fuels. It's the "what's-in-it-for me?" mind set that places human needs above all other considerations that must change.

Climate has changed in the past but has occurred over the course of centuries allowing living systems to adapt. The changes we are experiencing now are occurring over a relatively few decades-- too short a period of time for plants, animals and humanity to readily adapt.

Riding south through Canada, I was struck by the sight of so many dead trees. I had seen this earlier on the Kenai Peninsula but had no idea it was happening over vast areas of the Yukon, into Alberta to southern British Columbia. Later, I saw a lot more in Colorado. The winters are no longer cold enough to kill the spruce and pine bark beetle infestations causing widespread dying of trees.

Trees are the lungs of the planet, producing oxygen we need to breathe and absorb carbon dioxide. The oceans absorb some C02 but are becoming more acidic, stressing coral reefs and shell fish fisheries with consequences for long term productivity. Acidification in some Alaskan waters is already cause for concern.

Climate science is complex, but our understanding and ability to model it is better than any time in history. Perceived deficiencies in data are not a rationale for doing nothing. The present global mean of 385 ppm C02 is already in the danger zone.* Positive feedback may set in motion dramatic climate changes that cannot be controlled if humans push the climate system far into disequilibrium.* The possibility of near term return of atmospheric composition beneath the tipping level for catastrophic effects is practically eliminated with continued growth of green house gas emission for just another decade.*

Everything is connected and separation is an illusion in our quantum mechanical Universe.^ We are part of a greater field called the Source, Universe, All-That-Is, God.^ No structure or thing exists apart from it.^ Another way of putting it is we are all One. What we give to another, whether ourselves or other living things returns to the self individually or collectively because of our interconnectedness.

A "four-alarm-fire" is raging on the planet and we are sleep-walking through it. Quantum mechanics acknowledges that the observer creates the reality.^ We have created a kind of hell on Earth through our misperceptions. Perpetuating the war way and continuing our polluting, plundering and poisoning way of life on the planet is a prescription for extinction.

The good news is people are waking up. I met some of them and was greatly encouraged. A new consciousness is arising. We must change our perceptions if we are to meet the many challenges facing us. If we are to survive as a species on this planet, it will be through strategies and ways of being that foster cooperation and sharing for the greater good, not perpetuating competitive strategies that benefit a relative few at the expense of the many-- whether human or the environment.

If your heart's desire is to end the "madness," make it your intention to do so by acting on your highest thought aligned with Universal values of love, compassion, honesty, integrity, courage and kindness. All thought is creative, actually arranging the particles of matter called reality through our conscious and unconscious beliefs.^ As improbable as it may seem, it's through the power of our intention and acts of kindness multiplied a million fold and more that will end the "madness" and create a new Earth. It is time.


Don Ross, aka Peace Rider is a long time Fairbanks resident and Bush air service pilot.