Sidetracked #24

Seeking Adventure in the Details

Our planet is vast, our oceans savage, our mountains still wild and beautiful. But while those of us who seek to challenge ourselves often look to the larger extremes of scale, sometimes the true beauty is to be found in the details. In the very small.

‘Chasing Armenia’ by Evan Christenson tells the story of a huge bikepacking journey across Europe made possible by tiny moments of kindness. In ‘Xunaan-Ha’, Ana Overgaard describes the caves of the Yucatán where traces left by previous civilisations teach us about our planet’s future. Angie Payne learns to appreciate nature through a macro lens in ‘Tiny Worlds’, swapping big adventures for the wonder to be found on her doorstep. And in ‘Tough Choices’, Ryan Sandes must break a seemingly impossible endurance challenge down into individual moments, taking it one step at a time.

Perhaps only by learning to appreciate the fine details can we get the perspective to understand the bigger picture. In this volume of Sidetracked, we celebrate both extremes of scale.