Dorian Amos - The Good Life: Up the Yukon Without a Paddle

THE GOOD LIFE

UP THE YUKON WITHOUT A PADDLE

Dorian Amos

Edited by Caroline Sylge

Published by Eye Books

Published by

Eye Books

29 Barrow Street

Much Wenlock

Shropshire

TF13 6EN

www.eye-books.com

First published in Great Britain 2004

Revised edition January 2009

First Eye Classics edition 2014

Copyright Dorian Amos

Front cover image copyright Johnny Caribou

All rights reserved. Apart from brief extracts for the purpose of review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwisewithout permission of the publisher.

Dorian Amos has asserted his right under the Copyright,Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as author of this work.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Printed by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon CR0 4YY

ISBN: 978-1-903070-82-6

To big and little Jack

A fond thank you must go to Matt Lovelock whose help, friendship and dedication smoothed the waves for our immigration across the sea, for which I will be forever grateful! To Pam and Glen whose generosity, friendship and support also made a would-be harrowing time seem remarkably comfortable. Id also like to thank Brent for his endless patience, help and his total acceptance of a dyslexic English cartoonist trying to survive a winter in his neck of the woods.

A big thank you to Carol Mac for her guidance and help. I would also like to thank my parents for somehow, somewhere instilling in me this reckless, full steam ahead approach I have to life, it makes everything so much more interesting. Most of all, Id like to thank Bridget for her unquestioning support and love. She makes everything so worthwhile.

Like moths drawn to the firelight from out of the shadows, Dorian and Bridget found themselves sitting around my campfire in Southern England attending a Woodlore Wilderness Bushcraft Course. Already the seed of an adventure had taken root inside of them, but at that time I had no idea of this. As with all of the others attending the course, they were introduced to the fundamental practicalities of outdoor living. I, as the instructor, emphasised the value of knowledge over equipment, the importance of perfecting the basic skills and encouraged the class to strive to walk in pace with the rhythms of the wild, rather than trying to over write natures symphony with our chaotic tempo. If I had known then what Dorian and Bridget had in mind, I would certainly have advised further tuition in bushcraft, pointed them at expert canoe coaches and a host of other instructors that would have eased their journey. When I received word of their venture I was cheered, but also concerned. Any true tutor wishes nothing more than for their alumni to go out and benefit from their tuition, but naturally, by dint of the experience necessary to instruct, the teacher perhaps appreciates more keenly the risk of such an undertaking.

Dorian and Bridgets adventures have both horrified me and made me laugh, truly ignorance is bliss. It is gratifying to read of their confidence to start a fire in bad weather, and the warmth it provided to their morale which rises from these pages as though it glows in my hands. But above all else it is their utter determination to break with convention and strike out in search of their dream that warms me the most.

In over twenty years teaching bushcraft, I have met many who have come to the campfire late in life and regret not having discovered their interest in their youth, and I have taught this many times to those who have their youth, but not the courage to follow their dreams. It is only a rare handful who dream well and live bravely, they know better than most that, Only dead salmon swim with the current.

Ray Mears
England 2004

I was living in Polperro, one of Cornwalls prettiest little fishing villages and friendliest communities. It took me thirty minutes to walk 10 yards in the morning to the post office, because everybody wanted to say good morning or talk about fish or the weather. I had my own little business drawing cartoons and selling them in my shop, Amosart. I worked when I wanted, did what I wanted, said what I felt and spent what I liked. There was no struggling to get up in the morning, no commuting in traffic jams or crowded trains, no stress of an over zealous boss breathing down my neck, and definitely no sexual harassment. Life wasnt ordinary or boring. Life was pretty good.

It had taken me five years to build up my business and create the happy, easy life I had. My wife Bridget had just finished 4 years of university to qualify as a psychiatric nurse. She was now working in a job she loved and we would have an extra 12,000 a year coming in. I was 32, Bridge was 29, and for the first time in our lives money would not be a real problem.

Somehow though, I had started to develop an ache for a little more adventure.

Ignoring the ache, and keeping it to myself, I knuckled down to draw more cartoons. Every morning Id percolate a pot of coffee, turn up the stereo and draw until about 3:00pm every day, when my thoughts would begin to wander the world seeking adventure. Soon, I was wandering the world at noon, then 11:00am, until after several months I was fighting crocodiles on the Nile as soon as I sat at the drawing board. My enthusiasm for my work and my business was gone, lost somewhere on the plains of Africa.

After 4 months of battling with my dreams I decided one night to talk to Bridge. I watched her as she unwrapped the chips from their soggy paper. She was telling me about her day; jabbing backsides with syringes, and pushing the panic button because someone had decided they were an aardvark and had started to dig up the carpet with their nose. I wasnt really listening, just watching her gesticulating with the vinegar bottle. Then I heard her sigh, Im sick of this shit, and I sat up with heart pounding. Are you? I said, We can make a change you know. Bridge looked at me in a way she had only started to do after qualifying as a psychiatric nurse. I took the plunge and told her about my now overwhelming urge for adventure.

When Id finished and slumped back into my chair, she said, If you think about something too much, you just talk yourself out of it and never do it. Were only here once. Lets go get some action! Can you pass the salt please? And that was it, the decision that would dramatically change our lives.

Bridget returned home the following evening with carrier bags full of travel guides, and over the next few days we studied atlases and skimmed through endless books. There was a whole life of adventure to live right there in those pages, but we had no idea where to go all I knew is that I didnt want to go to the Nile, because during my day-dreaming a crocodile had rather rudely chewed off my feet.