Still Looking for the Next Adventure

By Fabrice

The world once pulled me towards unfamiliar countries and dangerous work. These days, adventure can be much closer to home—but I still need something that takes me beyond the routine.

There are places in the forest near my home where you can sit down and hear almost nothing except the animals and the forest itself. They are not far away. Maybe 300 metres from the road.

That is enough.

I like going outside. I walk, swim, go into the forest, look for mushrooms, go fishing, see animals. Sometimes I simply sit. Going outside is already part of my normal life.

Of course, I can stay at home. I can watch television, listen to music or spend time on my computer. I don’t need an adventure every day.

But after some time, if everything becomes too predictable, I get bored. Then I start looking for something else.

That has probably always been there.

A New Country.

When I was younger, going somewhere new meant something rather different.

Lebanon. Kuwait. Saudi Arabia. Other countries and completely different environments.

Every time I arrived somewhere I had never been before, it was exciting. There were things I knew and many things I did not know. Everything was different.

In Lebanon, I remember the landscape, the sea and Mount Lebanon. But there were also destroyed buildings, destroyed cars and the remains of war.

Other countries brought other pictures, other landscapes, other ways of living. Sometimes the differences were beautiful. Sometimes they were difficult to understand.

But I was curious.

When you enter a new country, you don’t yet know what you are going to see. For me, that was always interesting.

Janita asked me to think of one adventure I would happily do again.

I said, “Clearing a minefield.”

There was a short silence.

“I don’t think that’s an adventure,” she said.

For me, it was.

When I was in Kuwait, part of our work involved clearing areas where mines and ammunition had been left behind. There was danger, of course, but there was also a purpose. You searched, you found something, you dealt with it, and at the end of the working day—if everything had gone well—you had a good feeling.

It was useful for the people who lived there.

Janita and I clearly have slightly different definitions of the word adventure.

She prefers something like a national park.

I apparently prefer minefields.

The Challenge Changes.

Today, I do not need to travel to another country to find a challenge.

I already know what I want to do next: another 100-kilometre walk.

I am training again, and this time I want to do better. I have a time in my head. Perhaps around 24 hours.

Before a challenge, I don’t normally ask myself, “Why am I doing this again?”

I am excited because I chose it.

Nobody forces me.

During the 100 kilometres, of course, there comes another moment. Somewhere around 50 or 60 kilometres, the question becomes much more reasonable:

Why am I doing this?

Then you continue.

What attracts me is not proving something to other people. I don’t need that. I want to prove to myself that I can do it.

It is a competition, but mainly against yourself.

If I do the same challenge a second or third time, I want to improve. That gives me another reason to go back.

Boredom Is Dangerous.

Routine is not a bad thing. We all have routines.

But too much of the same thing becomes boring for me. When I know exactly what will happen every day, sooner or later I start searching for an escape from it—something different.

This is perhaps where my motorcycle problem begins.

I would like another motorcycle.

My wife says no.

Probably she has a point.

Janita suggested that this might be the beginning of a midlife crisis: first the motorcycle, then pierced ears, then black leather trousers and boots.

I am not convinced.

But I admit that getting older has not made the attraction of adventure disappear.

What has changed is the approach.

When I was 20, I might simply do something. Now I think more about the risk beforehand. I calculate. I prepare. I use the right equipment.

The attraction may be the same, but the preparation is better.

That seems a reasonable combination.

Not Finished Yet.

There is also another side to all this.

Adventure does not always mean danger.

Sometimes it means walking through the forest. Sometimes it is sitting somewhere quiet and listening to the animals. Sometimes it is swimming, travelling, discovering a new place or deciding to try another physical challenge.

The outward movement is still there, but it does not always have to take me far away.

Janita finally asked me to imagine that we meet again in ten years.

What would surprise her more: that I am still looking for another adventure, or that I have finally said, “Enough. I am staying at home”?

I hope I am still looking.

In ten years I will be 69.

That is far too early to stop.

Ask me again when I am 99. Then maybe I will think about it.

Until then, I prefer to remain optimistic.

The problems come by themselves.

I don’t need to go looking for those.