How to have an adventure in the 21st Century

Wells Jones is a modern-day adventurer, writer, kayaker and producer. He recently joined us on our podcast to talk to us about his passion for travelling. Below is an extract from one of his answers. 

Well, and I think I think we have to define what an adventure is. A very accomplished mountaineer, well he defined it with five elements that are necessary to have an adventure. And I'll tell you what they are.

1.       High Endeavour

2.       Uncertain outcomes

3.       Total commitment

4.       Tolerance for adversity

5.       Great companionship

And when I heard that, I have thought about adventure and I thought that's, that's brilliant. That's wonderful, but it's relative. You can be a mom, dad, an individual that has a baby in a carriage. You're in the house. You put the baby in the carriage. A child and you pack up with food. You know you're going to go to the park. You have to cross the street. There's danger. There could be adversities. It's uncertain outcomes, but you know the weather looks good, but it might start raining. Meaning, but you still have this desire to go and to have this adventure.

I found also that I had to have purpose. To have purpose to the adventure. Because it took away a level of ego about it. Oftentimes, you’d hear the phrase peak bagging. It's like, well, how many times did you do that mountain? Well, how many times did you do that one, and how much elevation gain to get, you know, do you have pictures? If that's not my drive, that's not what gets me up the mountain. If it is a mountain or through a production.

You know you have to be curious. You have to have levels of adaptability. You have to trust you have to have a conscientiousness. You have to have a situational awareness around you. And so for me, adventure has been a constant. I mean, the first one was probably when I was born abroad. The whole sense of adventure started there and it just continued with with my life. And I felt like I have been tapped on the shoulder to do very adventurous things or I treated them that way.

And greeted them even when there was adversity. And so today, with the way the world is evolving, we'll have to treat it as a level of an adventure, A level of fate. A card hand that we're given and that we accept and we're going to see it through because there's going to be rocky days.

Churchill quote

And, this Churchill quote:

To each there comes in their lifetime a special moment when they are figuratively tapped on the shoulder and offered the chance to do a very special thing. Unique to them and fitted to their talent. What a tragedy. If that moment finds them unprepared or unqualified for that which could have been their finest hour.

And that sent my imagination running. And I said I have no idea where I'm gonna go, but I know I want to travel, see the world and engage and have a family.

Read his book and listen to his interview

The podcast can be found here and the video below, while his book, A Line in the Sand, is on Amazon.

If you are interested in our books, find them by following this literary link.