The Balancing Act Called Life

To make some sort of life in this world all of us need to specialize in something. It used to be a University Degree, but now it can take the form of a Trade or specialized skill to become a professional in your field. Doing this can set you up in life.

However, we can be sucked into this and loose so many aspects of life. Recently I have been so caught up in running my gym, sorting out budgets, finances and Planning for the future. I have also been training really hard and making sure my rest and recover is on point. I would love to visit international Sanctioned CrossFit events and chasing something like that takes a lot of time. Yesterday though I got pretty shaken up.

I send my sincere condolences and heartfelt sympathies to the family of the man who was shot and killed yesterday in Witbank. I didn't know any of you and don't pretend to, but just know that your story has shocked our town.

In order to save time, when I dropped my girlfriend off at work yesterday, I decided to take my running shoes with and go for a run when I got there. I had running intervals on the menu and it took me about an hour and 15 minutes to complete. Unbeknown to me. A block from where I was running a man was she and killed in his own house at 8:30 or there about in the morning.

I didn't know until later that day when everybody at the gym was telling me. It shocked me.

I started to think about the man, his family, his life his goals, and of that I know very little so the only logical similarities I could draw was with my own life.

Would I be content to walk out of this world now?

I must have stopped typing for at least 10 minutes thinking about that question and still I try to convince myself yes, but deep in my heart I still say, No.

The stress of your field of profession could have pulled you in so far that you have forgotten about the small things around you. The things that used to give you a sense of adventure and joy. I can feel it. And let me tell you, I am living my dream, I am in a job I am completely passionate about!

So how does this happen? if you figure it out, please tell me. But, I think, it starts in the future...the worry of it leads us so far into things we have control over. Much of our life is hard work yes, and it pays off, but much of it is half chance. Losing a contract, stock market crashes, government instability, death, so much can change over night, so much that can leave us at the will of outside circumstances. So we take out insurances and policies to hedge against it, spending money and energy on the unforeseen future. If you know me, you know I stress about the future, i am the first to try save and plan and as I get older i do it more.

But what if, we could take the foot off the gas once in a while. Take a weekend away. Plan a trip, do something you love, do something special with somebody you love? Will that destroy your whole world? On the contrary I think it may recover a sense of ourselves that we haven't seen in ages.

Today Im not giving you advise...I am rather giving myself advise, and if you would like to write some advise to your older self that you will be thankful for, well do that!
But here goes: To Myself:

Never forget that life can change instantly whether you think you are in control or not. Don't forget to use the 24 hours in your day to smile. Don't forget to look inside yourself for guidance, you know yourself the best, stop caring to much about other opinions of how you should run your life. Love yourself, look after yourself and then trust that the guidance you set yourself will lead to a thing of beauty! Take time out to review where you are going and if you are on the path you want to be. Find something in life you love and enjoy and never forget it, you owe yourself small pleasures because in these pleasure you can serve the world in your job even better than you already are, because you will be happier, you will know more and you will understand more.

I f you had x (years, days, months) to live, what would you change now...it may not even be an external change, it may be a way of thinking.

Peace.

A short trip to another country

Yes travel is about posting the picture in the airport. The coffee, the flight tickets, hast tag "traveling" if you haven't done this surely you are not living?


Well perhaps I used to think this, but a lot has changed for me in the last couple of years. These days small trips and excisions have brought me such joy and I believe it can "enlighten" excuse the pun, you will understand later, those who want to do more and see more on a daily basis in South Africa without exorbitant budgets.

I felt like I was in China

I had the opportunity to visit the Nan Hua Temple in Bronkhorstspruit recently and the experience blew my mind. Firstly it is very easy to find. Head off the N4 highway towards the massive temple you can see in the distance, continue straight until you see a sign prompting you to turn right.
You drive straight to the Temple. On your left on the approach is the visitors centre, I would suggest going there first although we did it the other way around.

The visitors centre has an awesome little coffee shop, Museum, Curio Shop and meditation room. When we were there, there was a group doing a retreat and it was really interesting to see them meditating and doing a lot of writing.

Once you have visited the office and main reception I am sure you will be impressed with the architecture and fine detail on all the buildings, but just wait for the main temples.

Be advised you cannot take any pictures inside their place of worship and always remove your shoes when entering the shrines.

The main temple is absolutely stunning, if you would like to see the Sunday ceremonies you will have to be there at 10am. If not however the Temple is open most days (except Mondays) until about 4pm.

I was impressed with the main shrine which had three gigantic statues of Budha in different forms. On that particular day the monks were celebrating the Birth Month of The Budha so there were beautiful displays everywhere. The kindness, patience and willingness to talk to us, explain the history and show us around is something that I found very cool.

Regardless of race or religion this is a cool little spot to get away to and almost "See another country" and way of living right on your doorstep. I enjoyed the peace especially, the break from technology, noise and a fast life.

I know the temple organize all sorts of retreats and activities, feel free to visit their page to get all the information.  Click Here

Kilimanjaro Day 1: Let the expedition begin

I know I had always wanted to do an adventure expedition with my dad, and many times he had spoken about doing some small things back in South Africa. We both came up with the idea to combine the most epic adventure to do in Africa, and do it together! Mount Kilimanjaro.

Flying over Mt Kilimanjaro and Mt Meru just before landing for a connecting flight to Kilimanjaro International Airport

The trip planning started up relatively easily!  I connected with my old friends from Kenya who owned and adventure company. They really made the process such a pleasure by explaining all the ins and outs as well as all the major budgeting we would need to do. I booked the trip, we secured the flights picked up some of the gear essentials we would need from Cape Union Mart and Kway and only then did we start doing a little more research on the mountain.

I started to read a book about a man who had summited Uhuru Peak on Kilimanjaro several times by the name of Henry Stedman. He gave a comprehensive guide to the mountain in his book: Kilimanjaro: The trekking guide to Africa's highest mountain. The book gave me some really cool insights into the planned adventure and also, quite frankly, scared the crap out of me.
I had heard about altitude sickness before but thought it was something only for those elite climbers who tackled Everest and Dinali and massive peaks like that, but it seemed that Kilimanjaro had its fair share of challenges.

During the planning there was a terrible loss for all South Africans when Gugu Zulu died on the mountain from complications from flu and altitude sickness. This sent shivers down my spine as well as my moms apparently who became quite un nerved about what my dad and I were planning to undertake. We dug into some serious research and found out that only 44 percent of all who attempted to climb the mountain ever summited and that 4 deaths happened on average a year.

Things were getting quite serious.

We slogged through all the planning, chose our route which we decided would be the Northern Rongai 6 Day route that passed the Mawenzi peak and started to do short hikes to prepare our bodies for the trip. The day after my final CrossFit Open Workout, we flew to Tanzania!

My Dad ready for Tanzania!

The Kibo Slopes driver picked us up and transported us to what felt like forever into Kenya, up some hills and to an altitude of 1700m Above Sea Level where we would spend the night acclimatizing before we would start the hike the next day. The border posts proved quite tricky as my dad and I had both forgotten our yellow fever vaccination card at home. We had thought up all sorts of scenarios to explain our dilemma only to find out we didn't get asked for the cards once!

The Kibo Cottages where incredibly beautiful and tucked away from modern civilization, it was a special time for my dad and I to share a great meal and a local Tusker beer and catch up on many months of conversation. Both having busy lives, we would come to appreciate these moments more and more as the trip marched forward.

Packed and ready to spend the first night in the hills on the slopes of Africa's highest mountain

The next day we would start on day one of an epic club up and epic mountain.... (Check the blog for day 2)

Cairo to Cape Town explained in 7 mins

Myself speaking at FEAT Joburg a year ago on the Cairo to Cape Town Guinness World Record and the beauty of Africa!

An epic Adventure by bike

From the arid dry land of the Karoo to the Beautiful lush Cape Fold mountains, there plenty of the country I have seen by bicycle. Sometimes the difficulties of the road are ushered away by the beautiful sights of slow traveling.

Myself and Brent's son, Rowan, the night before leaving. It was an emotional evening, especially for Brent's family who had never seen him off on a trip like this, into the unknown. 

Plenty of luggage to fit onto the bike.

When I asked a friend to join me on an adventure of a lifetime, I didn't imagine it would be quite so hard. Now I wouldn't call myself the most experienced adventurer but I do feel my experience in the field of long distance cycle touring is up there with some of the crazies of this world. My friend, Brent den Bakker, had never cycled more than 45km in his life and now I was asking him to hammer out big distances day after day. We sat down one evening over a glass of wine, which may have given us that extra bit of confidence, and plotted a route through the flatlands of Mpumalanga, the meandering roads of the Free State and up and down the undulating hills of Kwa Zulu Natal. Nothing ventured nothing gained I suppose. The route would total about 650kms from Witbank to Balito. There was however a crucial question that needed to be drawn up firstly, and secondly, answered. Why where we going to do this? 

Brent 30kms out of Witbank, Day 1, having a break

Both Brent and I are actively involved in Hockey in our province . Brent is a qualified umpire and I am a qualified Coach, we repressnt the Osaka hockey brand and have grown to love the game. We decided that it would be a perfect opportunity  to link the two events. Hockey and adventure. We planned to take our traveling hockey side, The Traveling Pinks, a primary school hockey team who played all over to raise money for Cancer, on a tour down to Balito. We would cycle down while the girls and the families would trek down by car a week later. Simple? Far from it. 

A beautiful sunrise on day 3, Brent's knee was feeling better, our prayers seemed to have been answered, God is faithful

The first day offered a glimpse of difficulties I had seen in past trips. We rode hard, through a headwind, and managed to do 145kms to the little town of Standerton. We had earned our stripes and checked into the beautiful Olive Lodge who had offered to put up with our needs for the evening. It was a pleasant surprise when we rolled into town to find, my Girlfriend and Brents wife, along with his family, following us in their van. They spent the afternoon with us and bought us dinner. This was a luxury, I knew would disappear on day two. 

Day 3 and going strong, we were on a "high" all day.

Traditionaly for me day 2 was tough. Legs are tender and stiff and the mind has taking a beating to. None the less we got up bright and early and pushed on. Within the first 20km's we experienced Mpumalanga in all its anger. The morning skies rewinded to a midnight state and the black clouds rolled in, thunder clapped violenty and not even the bright lightening could light the black we were cycling into. A headwind pounded us as hail and rain crashed into our faces. Being hardly visible to motorists passing us by we headed for the dirt running along side the road. It proved to be safer but it was terribly muddy and slippery. As the clouds cleared some two hours later, we had only hammered out 20kms. The pace was painfully slow but not as painful as Brents right knee was becoming. From hardly doing any cycling to doing over 200kms in two days, his body was crying out for rest and I didn't know what to do. I could tell he was in some serious pain and i hadn't been in a predicament like this, if we didn't speed up we would be sleeping on the side of the road in another thunderstorm that night. Something We really needed to avoid. We managed to limp into Vrede and find a small doctors surgery who administered a scary looking injection to my team mate. We discovered later it was a mix of various pain killer and ant inflamatories, she nicknamed the injection, the "Free-state three some." It seemed to numb the pain. We got to our accommodation just before the heavens once again opened up. 

There was a bit of an akward silence in the room as Brent and I both contemplated the difficulties of continuing with his injury. Our faith wouldn't allow surrender, we got up the next day.

The sand storm on day 3 was crazy! 46km.h winds

Day three, and everything came together nicely. We averaged about 23km/h on the road to Harrismith and even fought through a serious 40km/h wind dust storm just outside the town. We looked like trojans, returning from a victorious battle when we finally got into La La Nathi guest lodge just of the road we were traveling in. This place was incredible, 4 star luxury for two adventurers in some desperate need of love and attention. We had an early meal at the resturant and retired nice and early. 

Day four, or most of the morning rather, was spent climbing out of Harrismith. The hills took a toll on Brents knee who agreed that the pain killer could be waring off. We had a breakfast on the side of the road before getting back on track and putting some more km's asunder the belt. We flew down Van Reenens pass at about 80km/h before the road flattened out once again letting us do another 20kms or so. It was then that the tides turned. Fatugue set in, and another 40km/h wind came out of no where and attempted in pushing us back to where we had cycled from. We were desperate to get through the last 60kms but the conditions were against us. Again the fear of sleeping out in the bush became real. I had never been that desperate and tired in my life. We stopped under a little bridge and said some desperate prayers together. The speed had dropped to well under 10km/h now even on the steep downhills. We struggled through another 10kms before finding a little shell garage where we stopped for some food and hopefully a lift into town. We were about 15kms off our target and it was getting dark. An owner of a bakkie, Mike, offered us a lift and we took it gladly. He drove us to the guest house and helped us load our bikes out and heave them to our rooms. We collapsed after showering,  two minute noodles and corn and only rose again the next morning. 

Our run in with a Police Officer on the last day, many people back home criticized our decision to go on the highway, we regretted it and paid the price. No need for people to have verbally bashed us the way they did publicly.

On day 5 we would end our journey, The plan was to cycle as far as we could before our support team back home picked us up and took us into Balito. Day 2 had cost us our originnal target but our R20 000 for Cancer could still be reached. While we rode on, the girls prepared for their first match against KZN Coastals u/13 the next day. We got picked up in Mooi River after another full day of climbing hills. We were shattered.

A good nights rest in a comfy bed and a good meal was all welcome but completely foreign to us, whose minds were still on the road. Brent and I spoke at length about the journey and how it would shape our future. The answers weren't clear but I had suffered and bled with a great man...I was proud of him.

The next day we got to see the full side, all kitted up in pink and ready to play. Penzance primary school were spectacular hosts, they invited their whole school, some 500 odd children to come and watch our first clash for Cancer on the 3 schools Astro Turn in Durban. The Coastals side edged out a narrow 1- 0 victory in the end which was disspointing but in the end of the day, the fight against Cancer won. The province also offered a generous donation to our cause, we were getting close to our target. 

Brent missed his boy! Shopping for groceries after 5 days on the bike. We made it!

The next game, two days later, we arrived at Riverside Astro to take on the local club. They were a strong side, but the pinks were coming together nicely. We managed to draw with the side and should definitely have won the game. Back home people were donating money after seeing what these soldiers in pink were doing for the cause.

The last game was scheduled for the next day at St Marys Kloof where we would take on Madsen Hockey Academy. The side was coached by legendary SA player, Kelly Madsen and this defiantly excited the girls. Kellly gave the girls an hour clinic before the game and perhaps this was the deciding factor in the game after the girls 

managed a 1-0 victory. 

The Pinks after their first game against coastal, Cancer awareness the winner!

And so came the end of an absolutely incredible two weeks of adventure, charity and love. What an incredible cause we fought for both on the bike and the hockey field. Our target is sitting about R5000 short but we believe that before the end of the week we will reach our goal. 

The girls playing that raised all the money for Cancer, so special.