The annual World Bog Snorkeling Championships in Wales draws more competitors than the Bike Bog Snorkeling Championships. But, in either of these bog snorkeling contests you must submerge your body into filthy, dank-smelling trenches dug out of the Waen Rhydd peat bog near Llanwrtyd Wells in mid-Wales. This style of snorkeling definitely qualifies as an extreme adventure travel experience.
Tuesday, 24 May 2011
Adventure Races - Race Around the World On a Global Scavenger Hunt
Have you watched the Amazing Race television show and wondered if -- or were sure you could -- compete? If so, the Great Escape is looking for globetrotters and adventurous travelers to join its annual Global Scavenger Hunt, a true adventure race. The 2011 three-week long experience, April 15- May 7, has wrapped up, and you can get a sense of the race from comments on the Web site. The race began in Los Angeles and ended in New York - but participants had to travel the long way around the globe.
Applications are now being taken for the 2012 race.
Applications are now being taken for the 2012 race.
What Will You Do?
During this "Great Escape" 25 teams of two will travel around the world, but won't know which 10 countries on four continents they are going to visit. The activities will include a mix of cultural-oriented scavenges, such as finding a Buddha's tooth in Sri Lanka, and challenges such as entering a camel race in India or taking a photo of a wild orangutan. The goal is to test each team's ability to deal with the difficulties of extended travel and personal dynamics within the team. On the Web site, you can see photos and comments from travelers as they met their challenges in 10 countries on their way around the world during the 2009 race.Who's It For?
The race is for curious and savvy travelers eager for new, often difficult and at times strange mind- and body-testing experiences. As one former contest, Randy of Newport Beach, says, "A cross between Abercrombie & Kent and Lonely Planet." Another contestant, Jason of Toronto, explains, "This even is geared toward people who are really interested in the culture, the people and the places...They attract the traveler, not the tourist."What's It Going to Cost?
It's expensive, but this travel-a-thon is designed to raise money for several internationally-focused humanitarian organizations. Accepted participants pay or raise the entry fee of $9,900 per person. Some teams raise a lot more and earmark their funds for specific charities. Because some of the funds go to non-profits, some of the entry fees may be tax-deductible. The goal is to raise a million dollars for charities such as CARE, Doctors Without Borders and UNICEF.Contact Information
If you think this adventure race might be the experience for you visit Global Scavenger Hunt to learn more or call 310-281-7809. Potential travelers will be interviewed for suitability and asked to help in fund-raising events to help reach the million-dollar goal. Single travelers can apply.More Adventure Travel Races
To learn about other exciting adventure travel races for the ultra competitive and for those who simply want to turn their next trip into a more moderate version of a reality TV-style adventure raceSunday, 22 May 2011
Secret Of Vulcan Fury
Deceased 1999
It is still beyond all logic (Vulcan logic that is) why Interplay cancelled this game. Star Trek: 25th Anniversary and The Judgment Rites were arguably the best games based on the popular series and both of them were modest hits.
For this third chapter, the designers made a job beyond comparison with the incredibly realistic characters modeled after the real actors whom also provided their voices (also present in the first chapters). The graphics were the best ever seen in an adventure game up to that date and there was even more with a truly epic story directed by John-Meredith Lucas from the original series. It was also written by one of the original scriptwriters, D.C. Fontana: when a Romulan ambassador is found murdered on board the Enterprise on his way to Vulcan in a diplomatic mission of reunification, the Enterprise crew must set things right as this mission is endangered. Apparent connections to an ancient Vulcan weapon called “Vulcan Fury” makes the mystery even more compelling. The game was divided in six chapters each one starring a different member of the crew: Captain Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Sulu, Chekov and Scotty.
There was no doubt that this was going to be a great game. And then, when it was almost finished, Interplay inexplicably canceled it. It’s not very clear why; maybe it was due to the huge success of their action games line based on the Star Trek universe. Be that as it may, they still have a whole legion of fans dying in agony.
What Could Have Been (unfinished adventures)...
We adventurers are the underdogs of the gaming community. Too many times we have seen our favorite titles delayed, released in a poor and buggy state or even canceled, which is the focus of this article. Due to today’s gaming trends, developers have almost unlimited resources at hand and it’s more profitable to make a cheap action game filled with eye candy knowing beforehand that it will be a bestseller or, at the very least, have relative market success. To put it another way: creative minds need not apply and, of course, creativity isn’t cheap. Designing adventure games is no easy task. But that’s another story.
The games we're going to discuss were cancelled for many different reasons but they all have something in common: someone decided that the project was no longer feasible. Obviously, there have been a lot of excellent games that never saw daylight, but these are the ones that were the most anticipated. Even worse, they held promise that they were going to be great and innovative.
Try to not shed a tear.
Louis Trichart, Thoyandou a cultural adventure in a land of myths and legends
On the border between South Africa and Zimbabwe (Beitbridge), just south of the Limpopo one can find the picturesque town of Louis Trichart in the mountainous area of the Soutpansberg. On a recent trip back from Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe we visited this area as well as the Njelele valley (close to Toyandou town) in the neighbouring Venda. This geographical area is blessed with a rich historical background full of legends and myths and is one of a few remaining unspoilt areas of South Africa. Today, the history is still evident in the names of the two major towns in the area namely Louis Trichard that was named after a Voortrekker leader and Thoyandou after a historical chief of the VhaVenda nation.
On our arrival in Louis Trichard, we were welcomed by Marius Gilfillan from Carousel Lodge who accompanied us into the SAFCOR forestry area from where the famous Hanglip (previously called Hangklip) could be viewed. We visited the Hanglip Picnic site and Motane forest where all the trees are marked for the visitors information. Several hiking trails winds its way through this indigenous forest while Marius also runs several horse trails through this specific area. This whole area is very good for birdwatching and several interesting bird species can be spotted including the shy Narina Trogon (Apaloderma narina), the Purple Crested Lourie (Tauraco porphyreaolophus), the Knysna Lourie (Tauraco corythaix) and the Crested Guineafowl (Guttera pucherani). Although the Narina Trogan is a brightly coloured bird and is usually very difficult to spot because of its habit of sitting with its green back (disguised by the green surroundings) towards the observer. This bird has a combination of a crimson lower breast and belly and bright emerald green upper-breast and back. The Purple Crested Lourie differs from the Knysna lourie by having an obvious, very long and pointed crest and a slightly darker back. The Knysna lourie has an all-green head with a white eyering and white tips to the crest. It is also differs from the Livingstones and Shallow's Lourie which has different length and shaped crests. The Crested Guineafowl is a ground bird and is one of my favourite birds. It has a grey body, flecked with white, a marked blue and red head with characteristically black head plumes. Another distinguishing factor is its bright red eye.
After we left the beautiful Motana Forests, Marius took us to show us Mpephu's village. It was here that we started to experience the deep mysticism of this area which was carried forward into our next day's excursions with Johan Kloppers (Eagle Adventures). It is therefore important to discuss the historical background to the area before we can discuss Mpephu's village in more detail.
Legends, myths and religions play an important role in a society, it is a way of adapting human behaviour to the demands of an ecosystem or pressure of demography. It can also be used by the ruling class to maintain their class in terms of other people in the society. Myths are living social events, intelligible only in the context of real humans in real places involved in some or other social interaction. The VhaVenda nation has a rich history of myths and legends, some still influences their daily life even today. These myths and legends have developed with the VhaVenda nation, and have been adapted over the centuries with their changing social and physical environment.
Dabanyika was the first VhaVenda chief to have settled in this area, now known as the Njelele valley more than eight centuries ago. It seems that they have migrated from the region surrounding the big lakes of Central Africa making a home in what is now known as the Dzata 1 and Dzata 2 ruins. They obviously thought that they had found their "promised land" and Dzata literally means "a good place". The story goes that Dabanyika went of with his dog into a cave in the surrounding Soutpansberg where he was caught in a rock cave-in. His trustworthy dog was still outside the cave and apparently went to fetch his son and heir Toyandou at their village. When Toyandou reached where his father was trapped, he was still alive. It was impossible for Toyandou to rescue his father and they had a discussion through the rocks. Dabanyika made Toyandou promise that he would unify the different clans in the area and build a great nation. Toyandou did this and was one of the greatest vhaVenda leaders of all times. Toyandou literally means "head of the elephant" and this is an important indication in the Venda tradition of his strength as a leader. Elephants have always been used in African mythology as a symbol of strength, leadership and greatness. Even today this symbolism is continued where important people are greeted with "nda ndou" which literally can be translated as "good day elephant". It is further interesting to note that no future VhaVenda leader was ever called Thoyandou. The next chief in the VhaVenda nation was a Mpephu - a name still carried forward today.
The current Mpephu sacred village is situated in an area close to Hanglip and which Marius went to show us. We, as Westerners, or non-Venda people cannot enter this sacred village which are looked after by vhaVenda woman. This is the burial place of the vhaVenda chiefs and all the previous Mpephu's and this is where another very interesting myth comes into play. The vhaVenda's are historically known to re-bury their chiefs. Somewhere in history one of the vhaVenda chiefs swallowed a small white rock. This is interlinked with another Venda sacred place namely Lake Fundudzi, which will be discussed in more detail later. Apparently a white crocodile used to live in this Lake, and crocodiles are known for their strength and also for swallowing rocks to assist them with the digestion of their food. One of the vhaVenda chiefs obviously translated the white crocodile (possibly an albino crocodile that did exist) and the general habit of crocodiles swallowing small rocks into the swallowing of a small white rock by the VhaVenda chiefs - possibly to give them the same strength as a crocodile combined with the mysticism related to the white crocodile in the Fundudzi Lake. The re-burial of the Chiefs is linked to this custom, where a deceased chief is put on a wooden stack/elevation, until the body has totally decomposed. The white rock swallowed by the first chief then falls out of the body and is then swallowed by the new chief which in turn would give him strength and special features. That is also the reason why only women are allowed in this sacred village, because according to vhaVenda tradition they cannot become chiefs and therefore guard the body and the small white rock in order to ensure that the rightful chief swallows it and not another arbitrary male.
We ended our first day's visit on a nearby farm, where we had a discussion with an old Venda man, who is apparently between 96 and a 105 years old. A wealth of knowledge was shared by this man who has experienced many changes in this region. Our day was ended by a friendly barbeque (braai) organised by Marius and other townsfolk involved in tourism at Carousel Lodge. This reinforced our impression of the hospitality of the people in this region.
We spend the next day in the Njelele valley (between Toyandou and Makhado) following the trail of the great legends of the vhaVenda with Johan Kloppers of Eagle Adventures. Johan's company is named after Billy Eagle, a Canadian Indian that came with the Royal Canadian Infantry during the Anglo Boer War in the 1900 and decided to stay in the area after the war was over. He was apparently appointed as a police constable and tracker at the nearby Elim police station. One day while he was in the Soutpansberg on horseback, he was attacked by a lion which pulled him of his horse. He then proceeded to kill the lion with his bare hands, a feat which hasn't ever been repeated. Billy Eagle later succumbed to the infections in his wound with the absence of any antibiotics during that time but went on to become a legend in the area.
Our first visit in the morning was to an area Johan calls the Lost Valley' with its strange terraces built by the VhaVenda over centuries and where some reoccupation has taken place through the years. The hills in the area are covered by age-old rock terraces stretching for miles and miles and are indicative of the origins of the vhaVenda nation. The Khoi and San who used to stay in this area, as well as other original indigenous southern African nations never used the terrace method. Other nations in Central Africa used to use this method and it was obviously brought down with the vhaVenda nation when they migrated from the great lakes of Central Africa. It is also within this context that we can talk about the so-called lost tribe of Israel - the Balemba. The Lemba nation has refined eastern features and current research is done to see if there is any link between them and Israel. The Lemba was culturally very strong and still today only Venda men can marry a Lemba woman and not vice versa. A Venda man can wed a Lemba women only after a certain ceremony has been completed. A fire is made on top of an anthill (big enough to fit a man underneath) and the Venda man has to then climb through this hot anthill. In this Lost Valley' we also saw some original African dogs - the so-called Nguni dogs as well as original African Nguni cattle. Both these species have adapted to the African environment successfully, and are hardy to African diseases.
Dzata 2 Ruins was our second stop. These ruins originated from the Thoyandou era, and were build with hard blue rocks, which apparently are not found in the area. Speculation exists that these rocks were carried on the heads of slaves coming all the way from Central and North Africa. Dzata 2 was reconstructed by archeologists and although some of the original walls are still standing some significant changes has been made to this site. Dzata 1, currently investigated by scientists hasn't been changed and is still in its original state.
We then went on to look at the sacred "Lake Fundudzi" situated in the Thathe Vondo forest, the home of the mythical python and white crocodile. The python is the god of fertility in the vhaVhenda tradition and the legend tells us that a VhaVhenda man had a broken heart because of the loss of a great love. In his sorrow he walked into Lake Fundudzi at which time he turned into a python. Young virgin Venda maidens still perform the famous Domba-python dance in this area to honour this god of fertility. We can further speculate about the white crocodile (as described previously) which the vhaVenda's belief lives in this Lake. This crocodile might have really existed because this Lake is still today inhabited by large crocodiles, and an albino crocodile might have once lived in the lake where young, virgin Venda maidens were once offered to them. Lake Fundudzi is surrounded by mountains and special permission has to be obtained to visit this sacred Lake. No-one washes or swims in this lake.
Also in the Thathe Vondo forest is the so-called "Sacred Forest". The Thathe Vondo forest has giant hardwoods (jakkelsbessie, yellowwood), a wide variety of ferns, creepers and a wealth of plants and trees which makes the forest nearly impenetrable on foot. The Sacred Forest is a mystical place, where no ordinary VhaVhenda people may walk and as a visitor one may not walk off the dirt track going through the forest - hikers are not allowed. In the Sacred Forest two mythical creatures keep guard namely the white lion (the spirit of Nethathe an important chief) and the thunder and lighting bird called Ndadzi which according to myths flies on the wings of thunder. One can speculate further about this bird and its origin, and the origin of the vhaVhenda people. Can we make a comparison between this bird and similar mythical birdlike figures in North Africa (Egypt)? Ndadzi's eyes flash lighting, from in its beak it bears rain and when it drops an egg at a foot of a tree this tree will be destroyed by fire. As previously stated, myths, religion and believes have their origin in how a specific society experiences their environment at a specific time. Myths always have their origin in an experienced reality. Some important chiefs from the Thathe clans have apparently been reburied (according to believe) in a cave in this forest, protected by the white lion and Ndadzi. One can also find the giant edible mushrooms, Nkoa in these woods, with a diameter of approximately 300 cm on top.
Our day was ended by looking down onto the Vando Dam and its surrounding valley with many unanswered questions and many myths to still explore on a next visit including that of the waterfall spirits, the ivory traders, the copper people, the sacred Albasini treasures, the golden rhino, the rain queen, the holy baboons of Lwamondo, the blue beads of Egypt and the ancient ruins of Mukumbani.
Louis Trichart and the surrounding areas provide a wealth of activities ranging from hiking, horse riding, birding trips, 4 X 4 trails and culture adventure tours visiting all the mythical places mentioned in this article.
For more information on Louis Trichard, accommodation and other activities
For more information on culture adventure tours and 4 X 4 trails contact Johan Klopper (Eagle Adventures) at +2715 516 4222 or write to him at PO Box 996, Louis Trichard, 0920, Northern Province, South Africa.
On our arrival in Louis Trichard, we were welcomed by Marius Gilfillan from Carousel Lodge who accompanied us into the SAFCOR forestry area from where the famous Hanglip (previously called Hangklip) could be viewed. We visited the Hanglip Picnic site and Motane forest where all the trees are marked for the visitors information. Several hiking trails winds its way through this indigenous forest while Marius also runs several horse trails through this specific area. This whole area is very good for birdwatching and several interesting bird species can be spotted including the shy Narina Trogon (Apaloderma narina), the Purple Crested Lourie (Tauraco porphyreaolophus), the Knysna Lourie (Tauraco corythaix) and the Crested Guineafowl (Guttera pucherani). Although the Narina Trogan is a brightly coloured bird and is usually very difficult to spot because of its habit of sitting with its green back (disguised by the green surroundings) towards the observer. This bird has a combination of a crimson lower breast and belly and bright emerald green upper-breast and back. The Purple Crested Lourie differs from the Knysna lourie by having an obvious, very long and pointed crest and a slightly darker back. The Knysna lourie has an all-green head with a white eyering and white tips to the crest. It is also differs from the Livingstones and Shallow's Lourie which has different length and shaped crests. The Crested Guineafowl is a ground bird and is one of my favourite birds. It has a grey body, flecked with white, a marked blue and red head with characteristically black head plumes. Another distinguishing factor is its bright red eye.After we left the beautiful Motana Forests, Marius took us to show us Mpephu's village. It was here that we started to experience the deep mysticism of this area which was carried forward into our next day's excursions with Johan Kloppers (Eagle Adventures). It is therefore important to discuss the historical background to the area before we can discuss Mpephu's village in more detail.
Legends, myths and religions play an important role in a society, it is a way of adapting human behaviour to the demands of an ecosystem or pressure of demography. It can also be used by the ruling class to maintain their class in terms of other people in the society. Myths are living social events, intelligible only in the context of real humans in real places involved in some or other social interaction. The VhaVenda nation has a rich history of myths and legends, some still influences their daily life even today. These myths and legends have developed with the VhaVenda nation, and have been adapted over the centuries with their changing social and physical environment.
Dabanyika was the first VhaVenda chief to have settled in this area, now known as the Njelele valley more than eight centuries ago. It seems that they have migrated from the region surrounding the big lakes of Central Africa making a home in what is now known as the Dzata 1 and Dzata 2 ruins. They obviously thought that they had found their "promised land" and Dzata literally means "a good place". The story goes that Dabanyika went of with his dog into a cave in the surrounding Soutpansberg where he was caught in a rock cave-in. His trustworthy dog was still outside the cave and apparently went to fetch his son and heir Toyandou at their village. When Toyandou reached where his father was trapped, he was still alive. It was impossible for Toyandou to rescue his father and they had a discussion through the rocks. Dabanyika made Toyandou promise that he would unify the different clans in the area and build a great nation. Toyandou did this and was one of the greatest vhaVenda leaders of all times. Toyandou literally means "head of the elephant" and this is an important indication in the Venda tradition of his strength as a leader. Elephants have always been used in African mythology as a symbol of strength, leadership and greatness. Even today this symbolism is continued where important people are greeted with "nda ndou" which literally can be translated as "good day elephant". It is further interesting to note that no future VhaVenda leader was ever called Thoyandou. The next chief in the VhaVenda nation was a Mpephu - a name still carried forward today.
The current Mpephu sacred village is situated in an area close to Hanglip and which Marius went to show us. We, as Westerners, or non-Venda people cannot enter this sacred village which are looked after by vhaVenda woman. This is the burial place of the vhaVenda chiefs and all the previous Mpephu's and this is where another very interesting myth comes into play. The vhaVenda's are historically known to re-bury their chiefs. Somewhere in history one of the vhaVenda chiefs swallowed a small white rock. This is interlinked with another Venda sacred place namely Lake Fundudzi, which will be discussed in more detail later. Apparently a white crocodile used to live in this Lake, and crocodiles are known for their strength and also for swallowing rocks to assist them with the digestion of their food. One of the vhaVenda chiefs obviously translated the white crocodile (possibly an albino crocodile that did exist) and the general habit of crocodiles swallowing small rocks into the swallowing of a small white rock by the VhaVenda chiefs - possibly to give them the same strength as a crocodile combined with the mysticism related to the white crocodile in the Fundudzi Lake. The re-burial of the Chiefs is linked to this custom, where a deceased chief is put on a wooden stack/elevation, until the body has totally decomposed. The white rock swallowed by the first chief then falls out of the body and is then swallowed by the new chief which in turn would give him strength and special features. That is also the reason why only women are allowed in this sacred village, because according to vhaVenda tradition they cannot become chiefs and therefore guard the body and the small white rock in order to ensure that the rightful chief swallows it and not another arbitrary male. We ended our first day's visit on a nearby farm, where we had a discussion with an old Venda man, who is apparently between 96 and a 105 years old. A wealth of knowledge was shared by this man who has experienced many changes in this region. Our day was ended by a friendly barbeque (braai) organised by Marius and other townsfolk involved in tourism at Carousel Lodge. This reinforced our impression of the hospitality of the people in this region.We spend the next day in the Njelele valley (between Toyandou and Makhado) following the trail of the great legends of the vhaVenda with Johan Kloppers of Eagle Adventures. Johan's company is named after Billy Eagle, a Canadian Indian that came with the Royal Canadian Infantry during the Anglo Boer War in the 1900 and decided to stay in the area after the war was over. He was apparently appointed as a police constable and tracker at the nearby Elim police station. One day while he was in the Soutpansberg on horseback, he was attacked by a lion which pulled him of his horse. He then proceeded to kill the lion with his bare hands, a feat which hasn't ever been repeated. Billy Eagle later succumbed to the infections in his wound with the absence of any antibiotics during that time but went on to become a legend in the area.
Our first visit in the morning was to an area Johan calls the Lost Valley' with its strange terraces built by the VhaVenda over centuries and where some reoccupation has taken place through the years. The hills in the area are covered by age-old rock terraces stretching for miles and miles and are indicative of the origins of the vhaVenda nation. The Khoi and San who used to stay in this area, as well as other original indigenous southern African nations never used the terrace method. Other nations in Central Africa used to use this method and it was obviously brought down with the vhaVenda nation when they migrated from the great lakes of Central Africa. It is also within this context that we can talk about the so-called lost tribe of Israel - the Balemba. The Lemba nation has refined eastern features and current research is done to see if there is any link between them and Israel. The Lemba was culturally very strong and still today only Venda men can marry a Lemba woman and not vice versa. A Venda man can wed a Lemba women only after a certain ceremony has been completed. A fire is made on top of an anthill (big enough to fit a man underneath) and the Venda man has to then climb through this hot anthill. In this Lost Valley' we also saw some original African dogs - the so-called Nguni dogs as well as original African Nguni cattle. Both these species have adapted to the African environment successfully, and are hardy to African diseases. Dzata 2 Ruins was our second stop. These ruins originated from the Thoyandou era, and were build with hard blue rocks, which apparently are not found in the area. Speculation exists that these rocks were carried on the heads of slaves coming all the way from Central and North Africa. Dzata 2 was reconstructed by archeologists and although some of the original walls are still standing some significant changes has been made to this site. Dzata 1, currently investigated by scientists hasn't been changed and is still in its original state. We then went on to look at the sacred "Lake Fundudzi" situated in the Thathe Vondo forest, the home of the mythical python and white crocodile. The python is the god of fertility in the vhaVhenda tradition and the legend tells us that a VhaVhenda man had a broken heart because of the loss of a great love. In his sorrow he walked into Lake Fundudzi at which time he turned into a python. Young virgin Venda maidens still perform the famous Domba-python dance in this area to honour this god of fertility. We can further speculate about the white crocodile (as described previously) which the vhaVenda's belief lives in this Lake. This crocodile might have really existed because this Lake is still today inhabited by large crocodiles, and an albino crocodile might have once lived in the lake where young, virgin Venda maidens were once offered to them. Lake Fundudzi is surrounded by mountains and special permission has to be obtained to visit this sacred Lake. No-one washes or swims in this lake. Also in the Thathe Vondo forest is the so-called "Sacred Forest". The Thathe Vondo forest has giant hardwoods (jakkelsbessie, yellowwood), a wide variety of ferns, creepers and a wealth of plants and trees which makes the forest nearly impenetrable on foot. The Sacred Forest is a mystical place, where no ordinary VhaVhenda people may walk and as a visitor one may not walk off the dirt track going through the forest - hikers are not allowed. In the Sacred Forest two mythical creatures keep guard namely the white lion (the spirit of Nethathe an important chief) and the thunder and lighting bird called Ndadzi which according to myths flies on the wings of thunder. One can speculate further about this bird and its origin, and the origin of the vhaVhenda people. Can we make a comparison between this bird and similar mythical birdlike figures in North Africa (Egypt)? Ndadzi's eyes flash lighting, from in its beak it bears rain and when it drops an egg at a foot of a tree this tree will be destroyed by fire. As previously stated, myths, religion and believes have their origin in how a specific society experiences their environment at a specific time. Myths always have their origin in an experienced reality. Some important chiefs from the Thathe clans have apparently been reburied (according to believe) in a cave in this forest, protected by the white lion and Ndadzi. One can also find the giant edible mushrooms, Nkoa in these woods, with a diameter of approximately 300 cm on top. Our day was ended by looking down onto the Vando Dam and its surrounding valley with many unanswered questions and many myths to still explore on a next visit including that of the waterfall spirits, the ivory traders, the copper people, the sacred Albasini treasures, the golden rhino, the rain queen, the holy baboons of Lwamondo, the blue beads of Egypt and the ancient ruins of Mukumbani.Louis Trichart and the surrounding areas provide a wealth of activities ranging from hiking, horse riding, birding trips, 4 X 4 trails and culture adventure tours visiting all the mythical places mentioned in this article.
For more information on Louis Trichard, accommodation and other activities
For more information on culture adventure tours and 4 X 4 trails contact Johan Klopper (Eagle Adventures) at +2715 516 4222 or write to him at PO Box 996, Louis Trichard, 0920, Northern Province, South Africa.
Columbia III Settler’s History Tour
Led by Jeanette Taylor and crew of the Columbia III
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Our trip began from Port McNeill where 9 guests, historian Jeanette Taylor, and crew Ross, Fern, Miray & Farlyn Campbell cast off for Sointula and Alert Bay, our first overnight moorage.
Day 2 began with rain, Native history, and a tour of the U’mista Cultural Center in Alert Bay,
then on through the Broughton Archipelago to Billy Proctor’s Museum in Echo Bay.
Day 3 included more rain, Native pictographs on isolated rock walls, more great food, and a visit with Lorna (nee Hansen) Chesluk, 3rd generation Hansen and Postmistress at the Port Neville Post office. Her grandfather opened the first Post Office in 1895. It moved into the new store in 1924, and into its own building in 1960. The 'OPEN' sign greets boaters at the wharf.
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From Port Neville to Diamond Bay on Sonora Island, with more pictographs, exploring trails and forgotten old fishing & logging equipment, and a sunset!
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Octopus Islands, Surge Narrows, Desolation Sound, Prideaux Haven. We contributed our pictographs to the funky Octopus Islands Museum, took our usual 3 daily trips in the zodiac to hike and explore, including Surge Narrows with its Post Office and School. The school runs 4 longer days per week, to ease daily boat transportation of students from numerous isolated homes. The Post office is open Mon/Wed/Fri., and on Thursdays the Postmistress becomes the school’s art teacher.
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Cortes & Quadra Islands. An 1892 gravestone (didn’t fit on yesterday’s page) which took a half hour search from a locator ribbon and a stream, the sun! Views of Mount Denman on the mainland north of Powell River, more zodiac, and Whaletown with my vote for the prettiest Post Office in BC.
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The trip ended with a visit to the oldest house on Quadra Island; an apple press fresh juice demonstration; a trip to the workers camp and scene of the 1958 Ripple Rock explosion in Seymour Narrows, the largest non-nuclear detonation on earth and first CBC nationally televised program; and sadly to the marina in Campbell River for good-byes.
Canada Post refers to these as 'Air Stage Offices - An Air Stage Office is a Post Office to or from which all mail must be airlifted for more than six (6) months of every year as a viable surface transportation alternative is not available. These offices are generally confined to remote or isolated communities.
A guide to create the ideal adventure game
What is an ideal adventure game? The answer to this question has eluded adventure game designers, developers, and players. Many so-called adventure games of today have blurred the line that, in the past, has so clearly defined the adventure genre of yesteryear. Recently, I have taken an interest in the issue, mostly to see if it is possible to reestablish this missing line. The goal of this article is to outline the elements that I think are required to create the ideal adventure game. Although this topic is obviously very subjective, I hope to share with you something that I think you can at least accept as good guidelines for designing adventure games.
There seem to be fewer adventure games being produced lately, even from the traditional adventure producing companies such as LucasArts and Sierra On-Line. Furthermore, many of the games being called adventure today are very different from the games to which the term has traditionally been applied. While we can accept a boarder definition of adventure, such generalization simply makes the term useless for future discussion. A useful definition must establish relatively sharp boundaries. Otherwise, the scope of gameplay becomes too large to even consider talking about what an ideal adventure game should be.
Any definition should be based on the games that have originally defined the medium. These include titles such as Adventure, Zork and other Infocom games, as well as King's Quest and other early 1980s adventures from Sierra On-Line. The definition should also be exclusive, in order to distinguish adventures from other currently accepted genres like First Person Shooters (FPS), Role-Playing Games (RPG), Real-Time Strategy (RTS), and puzzle games. We should not fear a definition that excludes games such as Quest for Glory, Alone in the Dark, and System Shock. Whether or not we decide that they qualify as adventure, they still remain great games.
Character development is a tempting characteristic to use to divide these two genres. Unfortunately, it falls a bit short. It is not unreasonable for an adventure protagonist to acquire new abilities, such as lock picking or increased dexterity, during the quest. The difference is not in whether character development is used, but in the reasons behind using it. In adventure, the development is needed to solve a particular problem. In role-playing, the development is needed to improve the character's chances to solve nonspecific problems that may arise randomly from the virtual world.
In essence, the fundamental distinction between role-playing and adventure games is the stochastic nature of the former s as opposed to the deterministic nature of the latter. It is the random presentation of obstacles that makes Role-Playing Games character statistics so important. Adventure games seldom play with a significant rolling of the die. In other words, an adventure game plays out the same every time you run through it if you take the same actions. Role-Playing Games rely heavily on rolling the die for determining combat and other event outcomes, whereby the player must court Lady Luck and develop stronger character statistics to improve the odds of survival.
Linearity is caused by a relationship between challenges. The solution of a challenge typically gives you a reward, such as access to new parts of the game world, objects, abilities, and information. These connections create a gameplay graph where the challenges are the nodes. Technically, in graph theory, this gameplay construct is a directed acyclic graph, and it functions similar to a Petrie network.
Few (if any) games are completely linear or completely nonlinear. Many have a linear introductory series of challenges, and most have a linear finale. In between, there are some common shapes in the constructs. Adventures are frequently split into chapters, each to be completed in a linear sequence. This segmentation gives the author control over the plot, but at the same time allows the player to have nonlinear freedom within each segment. It is also common to see the game split into independent branches, whereby the player can complete the branches in any order. A branch is, in effect, a mini-adventure within the larger one.
The game world should work consistently according to some physical principles. For example, if you have to cut a string, the knife and scissors should both work, and any other strings that can be cut should also be able to be cut by these objects. This does not mean that the virtual world has to follow our rules. Cartoon worlds like Toonstruck and dream worlds like Sanitarium can be bizarre, but they should be understandable by the player.
In an adventure, death is not the only way to die. The player may reach a state where it is impossible to win the game, yet still be alive—a dead-end. The function of death and auto-recovery is to avoid requiring that the player to replay large segments of the game; in the death case, this means not having to replay from the most recent of the player's saved games. For similar reasons, the game should not allow the player to unwittingly remain in a dead-end for a long time. The action (or lack of action) that leads to a dead-end should be treated as if an action leading to death. It should be reasonably expected to be a questionable act, so the player knows to save in advance, and it is even better if there is auto-recovery. Once a player does wander into a dead-end, the game should soon make it clear that the player has done so.
The graphic and sound design should clearly indicate what is important to the player. The player should never wonder what those few smudgy pixels are supposed to be, nor should the player wonder what that character has just mumbled (subtitling should always be an option). Any object that the player needs should be clearly presented and not be a needle lost in a haystack of other objects. That is not to say that there should be no red herrings, only that they should not drown out the necessary objects. Similarly, an important character should not be a face lost in a crowd.
The game should have a good save facility. Players should be able to save where they want to save, not only where the game's programmers would like them to save. It should also save the game as it is played. Some games have been known to make assumptions, which turn out to be false if the player does things different from the designer's intent. There should be no fixed limit on the number of saved games, either; leave that to the player's file system.
The interface should be easy to use, intuitive, and economical of input. Common actions should require a minimum of clicks or keystrokes.
A problem with many recent games is that the interface has gotten so economical that the player no longer has to think of the solution, it just happens. The problem is that designers have streamlined the mouse interface so that the player has no choice as to how to interact with objects and characters. Some games, such as Callahan's Crosstime Saloon, have tried to get around this by offering a large menu of actions for every interaction, contextual with the objects and characters involved. This works well by expanding the search space beyond what is feasible by exhaustive search, but still has the problem that the player is frequently presented with the solution, rather than having to construct it. Other games, such as Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail!, get around this by allowing the player to specify the interaction by typing in a word, in addition to a menu of obvious interactions such as topics for dialogues. This approach maintains much of the flexibility of design of the old text parser, yet also retains the ease of use of the mouse interface.
Defining the adventure game
Before we can consider what makes an ideal adventure, we must first lay down some ground rules as to just what constitutes an adventure.There seem to be fewer adventure games being produced lately, even from the traditional adventure producing companies such as LucasArts and Sierra On-Line. Furthermore, many of the games being called adventure today are very different from the games to which the term has traditionally been applied. While we can accept a boarder definition of adventure, such generalization simply makes the term useless for future discussion. A useful definition must establish relatively sharp boundaries. Otherwise, the scope of gameplay becomes too large to even consider talking about what an ideal adventure game should be.
Any definition should be based on the games that have originally defined the medium. These include titles such as Adventure, Zork and other Infocom games, as well as King's Quest and other early 1980s adventures from Sierra On-Line. The definition should also be exclusive, in order to distinguish adventures from other currently accepted genres like First Person Shooters (FPS), Role-Playing Games (RPG), Real-Time Strategy (RTS), and puzzle games. We should not fear a definition that excludes games such as Quest for Glory, Alone in the Dark, and System Shock. Whether or not we decide that they qualify as adventure, they still remain great games.
Storyline
Story is an important aspect of an adventure. This prerequisite allows us to exclude purely puzzle based gams, such as Sokoban, Sherlock, or the daily crossword. However, story must not be the sole defining characteristic. Books and movies are not adventure games, since they have no game aspect and no problem solving. Neither is any game that includes only primitive story elements, such as Wolfenstein, X-COM, and Alpha Centauri that have some elements of story but are clearly not adventure games.Problem solving
Maybe an adventure is simply problem solving in the context of a story. This is a good first approximation, but we can quickly see boundary problems. First Person Shooters require problem solving, although the problems there are often solved by blowing someone to smithereens. Similarly, there are many run and dodge games where the problems are solved by nimble jumping or ducking at the right time and place. These types of games can also include varying amount of story. Clearly, a meaningful definition of adventure must exclude Doom and Mario. We must therefore restrict our problem solving to the intellectual realm. The solutions to problems in an adventure game should be difficult to conceive but not difficult to execute. This gives us a reasonably narrow border between adventure and the various action genres.Deterministic or stochastic
This still leaves us needing a line between adventure and role-playing. Games in these two genres share many characteristics, although they usually lean in different directions on the emphasis thereof. Adventures usually stress on story and puzzle content. In contrast, Role-Playing Games emphasize interaction with a larger and more randomly behaving virtual world. These differences in emphasis are not definitional, however, since a game clearly in either genre can be designed with either or both of these elements.Character development is a tempting characteristic to use to divide these two genres. Unfortunately, it falls a bit short. It is not unreasonable for an adventure protagonist to acquire new abilities, such as lock picking or increased dexterity, during the quest. The difference is not in whether character development is used, but in the reasons behind using it. In adventure, the development is needed to solve a particular problem. In role-playing, the development is needed to improve the character's chances to solve nonspecific problems that may arise randomly from the virtual world.
In essence, the fundamental distinction between role-playing and adventure games is the stochastic nature of the former s as opposed to the deterministic nature of the latter. It is the random presentation of obstacles that makes Role-Playing Games character statistics so important. Adventure games seldom play with a significant rolling of the die. In other words, an adventure game plays out the same every time you run through it if you take the same actions. Role-Playing Games rely heavily on rolling the die for determining combat and other event outcomes, whereby the player must court Lady Luck and develop stronger character statistics to improve the odds of survival.
Definition
With these insights, we now have a workable definition of an adventure—an adventure is the "deterministic, intellectual problem solving in the context of a story".Properties of an adventure game
Story/Plot
There are different aspects of the story. The back story, or background story, is the history of the game world prior to the player gaining control. This includes the history of the player's character, the protagonist. It may be revealed early by accompanying documentation or introductory segments of the game, or it may be fleshed out during the course of play by interacting with non-player characters, reading notes, and so on. In contrast, the other aspect of story is one created by the protagonist during play. This journal of play is referred as the plot.Gameplay
People often talk of gameplay, but what they mean by it varies. Here it means the semantic actions performed by the protagonist. This is distinct from the syntax used to express those actions. Whether you type "pour pitcher into bowl" or click the pitcher icon on the bowl, the effect is the same. The difference is one of result versus one of method.Challenge
The player must overcome many obstacles to complete a game. Examples of these obstacles include inventory based problems, dialogue trees, machine twiddling, sliders, timed sequences, and others. More appropriately, these obstacles should be called challenges, and the collective aggregate of these obstacles is known the challenge. The term puzzles should, instead, be reserved for self-contained obstacles like sliders and Rubik's cubes.Linearity
People frequently talk about linearity, but confusion exists regarding its definition. In one sense, linearity refers to the geographic path the player takes through the game. In this case, a game is said to be nonlinear if the player is free to roam widely about the game world. This may not be a very interesting quality. Exploring might be fun, but wandering back and forth gets old, fast. The other sense of linearity refers to the sequence of gameplay, that is, the order in which the challenges can be solved. If there is only one order in which the challenges can be overcome, then the game is completely linear. If all of the game's challenges can be overcome at any time, then the game is said to be nonlinear.Linearity is caused by a relationship between challenges. The solution of a challenge typically gives you a reward, such as access to new parts of the game world, objects, abilities, and information. These connections create a gameplay graph where the challenges are the nodes. Technically, in graph theory, this gameplay construct is a directed acyclic graph, and it functions similar to a Petrie network.
Few (if any) games are completely linear or completely nonlinear. Many have a linear introductory series of challenges, and most have a linear finale. In between, there are some common shapes in the constructs. Adventures are frequently split into chapters, each to be completed in a linear sequence. This segmentation gives the author control over the plot, but at the same time allows the player to have nonlinear freedom within each segment. It is also common to see the game split into independent branches, whereby the player can complete the branches in any order. A branch is, in effect, a mini-adventure within the larger one.
Relevancy
Relevancy describes the relationship between the challenges and the game. Specifically, it describes the believability of the challenges as part of the game world and as part of the story. As an example of irrelevance, how many real world doors have you seen that are opened by a slider puzzle? However, relevancy is not always clear cut. Very odd things may just make sense when done by Wile E. Coyote.Constraint
Constraint can either be in time or geography. Many adventures include time constraints in theirs challenges. These constraints may vary in duration. In the broadest form, the player may have several minutes or hours to complete a set of challenges, such as fiddling about in the laboratory with the mad scientist is off for lunch. In a narrower form, the player may have several seconds or minutes to solve a particular challenge, such as defusing a bomb. With even tighter constraints, a challenge may require some action within a window of only a few seconds, such as throwing a grenade after pulling the pin. At the extreme end of the real-time continuum is the arcade challenge, which is an actual physical challenge to the player. Geographic constraints are commonly used by the designer to impose some linearity in an adventure. Typically, at the beginning of a game, the player has access to only a restricted part of the game world. Completion of challenges during gameplay may then allow the player to access a greater part of the world previously not accessible.The ideal adventure game
Game world
The ideal adventure starts with a well defined world. It should be a place with history and personality, not just a coffee table to lay the puzzles onto. It should be populated with characters that live there, that clearly have a reason to be there other than to help or hinder the protagonist. The history of this world should not stop with the commencement of play. There should be a strong plot to propel the player through the game. The player should help paint the picture, not just uncover it.Linearity
Many people talk of linearity as though it is an inherently bad thing in an adventure. This view is too simplistic. Linearity gives the author more control over the plot, usually allowing for a stronger one. It has the danger of giving the player the feeling of being dragged through the game, a passenger rather than a driver. In contrast, non-linearity gives the player the feeling of being in control of the plot, and a greater sense of immersion in the game. However, it can also leave the player lost, not knowing what to do. The linearity of an adventure is thus a tradeoff, and good adventures can be made anywhere along the linearity spectrum. A game that combines both aspects is probably the best approach using, for example, a series of chapters, each of which is fairly nonlinear. Some chapters can be placed in parallel with others, in the form of branches that are playable in whichever order the player likes.Relevancy
The individual challenges should be relevant. They should be natural parts of the game world and natural parts of the story. For example, there should be no door locks by Rubik or power systems by Escher. If we are to have puzzles (which can be fun), they should be integrated into the game world by appropriate dressing. For example, Myst, unlike so many of its copycats, does a good job of dressing up puzzles as natural parts in the locale. However, there should be a broader ranges of challenges than just puzzles.The game world should work consistently according to some physical principles. For example, if you have to cut a string, the knife and scissors should both work, and any other strings that can be cut should also be able to be cut by these objects. This does not mean that the virtual world has to follow our rules. Cartoon worlds like Toonstruck and dream worlds like Sanitarium can be bizarre, but they should be understandable by the player.
Reasonable challenges
The solutions to the various challenges should be reasonable. While it is fine to create a difficult game to stump the player, the player should be at least able to understand the solutions in hindsight. The player should feel that he should have been able to find the solution, that he has had all the necessary information to deduce the correct action or at least to try the correct experiment. For example, if throwing an ice cube at a unicorn turns the animal into a pair of pliers, then there should be some prior indication that throwing cubes at magical creatures turns them into tools. If the game is not reasonable, if it is silly, then it devolves into the logical equivalent of a big maze—the player must exhaustively try every possible action until progress is made. This is trivial, but tedious and boring.Real-time challenges
Challenges can have real-time components, but they should be used only to frame an intellectual problem. They should be a test of the player's wits, not of reflexes. Once the player knows how to overcome the challenge, it should only require a few mouse clicks or keystrokes to effect, and with a wide time window. Stated again, it should be a test of conception, not of execution. Furthermore, failure of a real-time challenge should not require the player to restore and replay an unassociated segment of the game, that is, the broader game state should remain unchanged. If there is any dexterity or perceptivity required, the game should adapt to the player, easing the challenge until it ceases to exist. The player should also be able to set the difficulty level directly.Death
Death can be an annoying part of an adventure, but its absence can be equally jolting. If I pull the pin on a grenade and sit on it, I expect more than a little constipation. A great adventure can be designed without mortal danger, and in the game the player can be reasonably restricted from death. The point in this state, however, is the suspense of a dangerous situation. Still, death should never catch the player unawares. Any fatal action that the player takes should be reasonably deducible as a fatal action beforehand, giving the player a chance to save the game. Even better, the game should do this itself, and automatically restore the player to a point just before the fatal action.In an adventure, death is not the only way to die. The player may reach a state where it is impossible to win the game, yet still be alive—a dead-end. The function of death and auto-recovery is to avoid requiring that the player to replay large segments of the game; in the death case, this means not having to replay from the most recent of the player's saved games. For similar reasons, the game should not allow the player to unwittingly remain in a dead-end for a long time. The action (or lack of action) that leads to a dead-end should be treated as if an action leading to death. It should be reasonably expected to be a questionable act, so the player knows to save in advance, and it is even better if there is auto-recovery. Once a player does wander into a dead-end, the game should soon make it clear that the player has done so.
Difficulty
There is no ideal difficulty level for an adventure. Some games should be geared towards novices, and some towards grizzled spelunkers. Within a game, however, the challenges should get more difficult the farther into the game you get. A hard challenge at the beginning can cause a player to just give up. By the end of the game, the player has enough interest in the story and enough investment of time into the game to try a little harder rather than give up in frustration. Even if the player does get completely stumped, at least a larger portion of the game has been enjoyed.User interface
So far I have only discussed the semantics of game design, but an ideal adventure should also have a good user interface. You might think of high resolution graphics, directional sound, 3D engines (which acquires a new definition every few years), and so on. These technologies, however, are just means to an end, and any specification eventually becomes obsolete. The goal is to present the world clearly to the player, to establish the atmosphere, and to make it easy for the player to play the game. The artists and designers must work within the technology of the day to achieve this; if they are successful, the level of that technology is irrelevant.The graphic and sound design should clearly indicate what is important to the player. The player should never wonder what those few smudgy pixels are supposed to be, nor should the player wonder what that character has just mumbled (subtitling should always be an option). Any object that the player needs should be clearly presented and not be a needle lost in a haystack of other objects. That is not to say that there should be no red herrings, only that they should not drown out the necessary objects. Similarly, an important character should not be a face lost in a crowd.
The game should have a good save facility. Players should be able to save where they want to save, not only where the game's programmers would like them to save. It should also save the game as it is played. Some games have been known to make assumptions, which turn out to be false if the player does things different from the designer's intent. There should be no fixed limit on the number of saved games, either; leave that to the player's file system.
The interface should be easy to use, intuitive, and economical of input. Common actions should require a minimum of clicks or keystrokes.
A problem with many recent games is that the interface has gotten so economical that the player no longer has to think of the solution, it just happens. The problem is that designers have streamlined the mouse interface so that the player has no choice as to how to interact with objects and characters. Some games, such as Callahan's Crosstime Saloon, have tried to get around this by offering a large menu of actions for every interaction, contextual with the objects and characters involved. This works well by expanding the search space beyond what is feasible by exhaustive search, but still has the problem that the player is frequently presented with the solution, rather than having to construct it. Other games, such as Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail!, get around this by allowing the player to specify the interaction by typing in a word, in addition to a menu of obvious interactions such as topics for dialogues. This approach maintains much of the flexibility of design of the old text parser, yet also retains the ease of use of the mouse interface.
Final thoughts
Obviously, there is more to an ideal adventure game than the above. For starters, there should be no bugs. The challenges should be clever. You should be proud to have solved them, and you should want to kick yourself for having had such a hard time once you have seen the solution. The story should be interesting and engrossing. Humorous games should be funny, and horror games should be scary. Unfortunately and fortunately, there are no guidelines for creativity.
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