1 00:00:04,440 --> 00:00:06,600 You're listening to the Reversing Climate Change podcast 2 00:00:06,600 --> 00:00:09,080 by the team at NORI, the Carbon Removal Marketplace. 3 00:00:09,560 --> 00:00:11,720 This is a show about the innovators and entrepreneurs 4 00:00:11,720 --> 00:00:13,520 developing solutions to climate change. 5 00:00:14,720 --> 00:00:17,360 Hello and welcome to the Reversing Climate Change podcast 6 00:00:17,360 --> 00:00:18,720 with Nori. I'm Ross Kenyon. 7 00:00:18,720 --> 00:00:20,720 I'm one of the Co founders of the Nori Carbon Removal 8 00:00:20,720 --> 00:00:23,160 Marketplace. Today I have with me Rinker. 9 00:00:23,160 --> 00:00:26,320 Buck Rinker is a journalist, adventurer, and the author of 10 00:00:26,320 --> 00:00:29,080 several books including The Oregon Trail, A New American 11 00:00:29,080 --> 00:00:32,600 Journey, and Life on the Mississippi, an epic American 12 00:00:32,600 --> 00:00:34,840 adventure that we will be discussing today. 13 00:00:35,160 --> 00:00:37,800 Thanks for being here, Rinker. Great to be here. 14 00:00:39,440 --> 00:00:41,040 Rinker, why do you do the things that you do? 15 00:00:41,320 --> 00:00:44,080 You performed what I understand to be the first passage of the 16 00:00:44,080 --> 00:00:47,360 Oregon Trail in about 100 years, and you built and captained in a 17 00:00:47,360 --> 00:00:49,480 flat boat down the Mississippi River system. 18 00:00:49,920 --> 00:00:54,240 These are eccentric hobbies. Why do you do such things? 19 00:00:55,120 --> 00:01:02,280 Well, I I only learned after my Oregon Trail book came out that 20 00:01:02,280 --> 00:01:03,720 they actually have a term for this. 21 00:01:03,720 --> 00:01:06,400 It's called participatory history. 22 00:01:07,240 --> 00:01:10,280 And that that has very little appeal to me. 23 00:01:11,000 --> 00:01:16,320 I just, I just was I'm just responding to the existence of 24 00:01:16,320 --> 00:01:20,120 life that come up. I wanted to do a book about the 25 00:01:20,120 --> 00:01:27,040 Oregon Trail, and I read doing, and I do intensive research and 26 00:01:27,440 --> 00:01:30,040 I tend to write books where here's what's happening to me 27 00:01:30,040 --> 00:01:33,360 today along the Oregon Trail, and here's what happened 150 28 00:01:33,360 --> 00:01:35,880 years ago when the trail was in use, creating America. 29 00:01:36,800 --> 00:01:42,120 So I do a lot of research and I was reading my research one day 30 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:48,160 and what came up. But the Oregon Trail has not 31 00:01:48,200 --> 00:01:53,600 been crossed in an authentic way by cover wagon and mules since 32 00:01:53,600 --> 00:01:57,400 1909. So I said, wow, it's 100 years, 33 00:01:57,400 --> 00:01:59,520 more than 100 years since anybody went across. 34 00:02:00,200 --> 00:02:04,160 And I grew up on a farm with work horses and wagons. 35 00:02:04,400 --> 00:02:06,040 We even had a covered wagon as a kid. 36 00:02:06,040 --> 00:02:08,759 We were one of those eccentric families that collected old 37 00:02:08,759 --> 00:02:11,120 wagons and the. Story's about your dad. 38 00:02:11,120 --> 00:02:13,440 He's he's quite a character and sent you on a number of 39 00:02:13,440 --> 00:02:16,440 adventures too. Yeah, he, he he was quite a 40 00:02:16,440 --> 00:02:18,720 character. So I said to myself, well what 41 00:02:18,720 --> 00:02:21,560 the hell, You know, I'm, I'm interested in the Oregon Trail. 42 00:02:21,560 --> 00:02:22,880 Why don't I take the Oregon Trail? 43 00:02:22,880 --> 00:02:24,720 That'll lead me to interesting places. 44 00:02:25,280 --> 00:02:29,040 And it led to, it sounds like I'm being boastful, but it led 45 00:02:29,040 --> 00:02:32,640 to a successful book. And then the I decided to go 46 00:02:32,640 --> 00:02:36,880 down to the Mississippi, too, because in a flat boat, because 47 00:02:36,880 --> 00:02:40,640 during my trip across the Oregon Trail, it took us four months 48 00:02:41,480 --> 00:02:43,280 and you know, it was an authentic trip. 49 00:02:43,280 --> 00:02:47,120 We didn't have pickup trucks following us with catered meals 50 00:02:47,120 --> 00:02:49,080 and all that kind of re enact your bowl. 51 00:02:50,080 --> 00:02:54,840 And I learned that the crossing of the rivers was very, very 52 00:02:54,840 --> 00:03:00,360 important. And there was diary entries that 53 00:03:00,360 --> 00:03:02,440 I found in small towns in Oregon. 54 00:03:02,440 --> 00:03:06,560 Stuff about carpenters who helped people convert their 55 00:03:06,560 --> 00:03:09,880 wagons to flat boats to to go down the rest of the Columbia 56 00:03:09,880 --> 00:03:13,240 River because the wagons were all beat up after a 2000 mile 57 00:03:13,240 --> 00:03:17,160 journey. And they said The Pioneers 58 00:03:17,720 --> 00:03:21,440 proved almost all of The Pioneers, who were largely from 59 00:03:21,440 --> 00:03:27,520 the Midwest, proved exceptionally adroit at building 60 00:03:27,520 --> 00:03:32,320 boats and taking boats because of their experience during the 61 00:03:32,320 --> 00:03:36,800 great flat boat era. And I said wow, I'm AI read a 62 00:03:36,800 --> 00:03:39,280 lot of history and I'd never heard of the great flat boat 63 00:03:39,280 --> 00:03:41,400 era. So I got involved in that and it 64 00:03:41,400 --> 00:03:45,200 turns out the flat boat era, which was trafficked between 65 00:03:46,920 --> 00:03:50,080 Pittsburgh and New Orleans right after the American Revolution, 66 00:03:50,080 --> 00:03:51,960 between the American Revolution and the Civil War. 67 00:03:52,400 --> 00:03:54,280 It turns out that they were the first pioneers. 68 00:03:54,280 --> 00:03:57,560 And that really created the America that we know today. 69 00:03:57,560 --> 00:04:01,600 And that the flatboat period when thousands of people every 70 00:04:01,600 --> 00:04:04,400 year were going, building their own flat boats and going down 71 00:04:04,400 --> 00:04:06,680 the Ohio 1000 miles to Cairo, IL. 72 00:04:06,680 --> 00:04:11,160 And then from there 1000 miles down the Mississippi to New 73 00:04:11,160 --> 00:04:15,560 Orleans with a lot of stops in between. 74 00:04:16,240 --> 00:04:18,040 It turns out that was the real frontier. 75 00:04:18,040 --> 00:04:21,680 That was the first frontier. America was a riverine country. 76 00:04:21,839 --> 00:04:26,000 We're a river country and the frontier was a river, two 77 00:04:26,000 --> 00:04:31,000 rivers, Ohio and the Mississippi and all their tributaries. 78 00:04:31,720 --> 00:04:37,160 And that just fascinated me. So it just occurred to me, as it 79 00:04:37,280 --> 00:04:41,320 often occurs to me, things like this, well, why don't I build a 80 00:04:41,320 --> 00:04:44,280 flat boat and just take it to New Orleans, you know, and this 81 00:04:44,280 --> 00:04:48,000 all got started, which I I, I think you mentioned, Ross, that 82 00:04:48,000 --> 00:04:52,080 maybe you had read the book. But this all got started as a 83 00:04:52,080 --> 00:04:53,760 youngster. And I think it just became 84 00:04:53,760 --> 00:04:57,840 ingrained in me, my brother and I, when we were teenagers. 85 00:04:57,840 --> 00:05:02,760 I was 15, my brother was 17. We rebuilt a Piper Cub, an old 86 00:05:02,760 --> 00:05:07,240 Piper Cub, a $300.00 Piper Cub in our barn in New Jersey. 87 00:05:07,240 --> 00:05:10,280 And then once we had it done, we said, well, what are we going to 88 00:05:10,280 --> 00:05:13,320 do with it? And the farthest we could go 89 00:05:13,320 --> 00:05:16,200 without having to take it apart again and send it by ship or 90 00:05:16,200 --> 00:05:19,560 something, was California. So we, we became the youngest 91 00:05:19,560 --> 00:05:22,920 aviators, so-called to fly coast to coast. 92 00:05:22,920 --> 00:05:25,080 And that's described in my book Flight of Passage. 93 00:05:25,080 --> 00:05:28,200 And the point is, I'm just trying to answer your question, 94 00:05:28,200 --> 00:05:31,720 how do you get to be this eccentric writer and stuff? 95 00:05:31,720 --> 00:05:35,280 And to me, it's not eccentric, it's just it's just what you do, 96 00:05:35,400 --> 00:05:39,760 you know? It is what you do. 97 00:05:39,760 --> 00:05:43,240 It isn't common though it reminds me of the Laurence 98 00:05:43,240 --> 00:05:45,240 Olivier quip about method acting. 99 00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:48,320 I think he asked Dustin Hoffman. Have you tried acting? 100 00:05:48,360 --> 00:05:50,320 You don't actually have to become the character. 101 00:05:50,560 --> 00:05:53,160 You don't actually have to do this, but you sort of have a 102 00:05:53,160 --> 00:05:56,760 gonzo journalism method acting. You're committed to telling this 103 00:05:56,760 --> 00:06:00,000 in in the most authentic way possible, which is seems like 104 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:03,360 it's took you take you four months living out of a mule 105 00:06:03,360 --> 00:06:07,520 drawn cart crossing mountains. Parts of it strike me as being 106 00:06:07,680 --> 00:06:10,680 quite perilous. Parts of it, I mean most of it 107 00:06:10,680 --> 00:06:17,360 seems very uncomfortable and it also it doesn't strictly require 108 00:06:18,520 --> 00:06:21,480 it isn't necessary, but it's a beautiful thing. 109 00:06:21,960 --> 00:06:24,640 Why do it that way though, rather than desk research? 110 00:06:24,640 --> 00:06:27,560 I know you supplement your your expeditions with lots and lots 111 00:06:27,560 --> 00:06:30,760 of research in a similar way. Like like reading Paul Throu is 112 00:06:30,760 --> 00:06:33,000 often like this for me too. Like the guy reads a lot about 113 00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:35,240 what he's doing and also goes there himself. 114 00:06:35,240 --> 00:06:37,360 You don't actually have to do that to write a good, good 115 00:06:37,360 --> 00:06:38,040 history. Why? 116 00:06:38,040 --> 00:06:43,080 Why do it that way? Well, because all kinds of 117 00:06:43,080 --> 00:06:45,600 things occur to you when you get to the actual scene. 118 00:06:46,760 --> 00:06:49,880 As a journalist, I learned over the years, and it could even be 119 00:06:49,880 --> 00:06:52,600 just a toe touch, but it was very hard to write about a place 120 00:06:52,600 --> 00:06:58,960 or a major event unless you went there, unless you saw, you know, 121 00:06:58,960 --> 00:07:03,720 the boat where the captain was seized by pirates or whatever. 122 00:07:05,360 --> 00:07:10,320 And so for authenticity to occur to me and for me to feel I'm 123 00:07:10,320 --> 00:07:13,320 writing a truthful count, it really helps to go there. 124 00:07:13,480 --> 00:07:17,000 There's also just huge insights that you get by by being on the 125 00:07:17,000 --> 00:07:21,000 scene as opposed to just reading about it in books. 126 00:07:21,000 --> 00:07:27,600 So that the Platte River, which is very, very important in the 127 00:07:27,600 --> 00:07:29,880 Oregon Trail crossing, The Pioneers followed the rivers. 128 00:07:29,880 --> 00:07:31,680 They followed the major rivers across the West. 129 00:07:32,320 --> 00:07:36,560 It's what's called a braided flow river, which most of the 130 00:07:36,560 --> 00:07:41,440 rivers in India are like that. It's a big, wide, shallow, muddy 131 00:07:41,440 --> 00:07:46,320 thing that in heavy rains breaks into what's called the braided 132 00:07:46,320 --> 00:07:49,080 flow. Which means that when in heavy 133 00:07:49,080 --> 00:07:52,880 rains, storms and the Platte River Valley is famous for its 134 00:07:52,880 --> 00:07:56,360 very violent thunderstorms, it breaks into all these tiny 135 00:07:56,360 --> 00:08:03,600 little rivulets which make the the the river extremely wide and 136 00:08:03,600 --> 00:08:06,320 extremely various. And why was this important? 137 00:08:06,320 --> 00:08:08,560 Well, the biggest killer on the Oregon Trail was cholera 138 00:08:08,560 --> 00:08:11,080 epidemics and there was no germ theory. 139 00:08:11,080 --> 00:08:14,200 In those days. People thought that disease was 140 00:08:14,200 --> 00:08:16,600 caused by a kind of malaise in the air. 141 00:08:17,040 --> 00:08:22,040 And what happened was a covered wagon would come in, they would 142 00:08:22,080 --> 00:08:25,160 defecate all over the place where they where they camped 143 00:08:25,160 --> 00:08:28,360 that night. Then the river would flood a 144 00:08:28,360 --> 00:08:33,120 little bit overnight into the braided flow and flow 145 00:08:33,120 --> 00:08:40,799 downstream, and the covered wagon that was behind you coming 146 00:08:40,799 --> 00:08:46,720 up to get to the same spot the next day or two was ingesting. 147 00:08:46,720 --> 00:08:52,680 Water that had fecal matter had dangerous waste matter, which is 148 00:08:52,760 --> 00:08:58,280 is what causes cholera, the mixing of waste and drinking 149 00:08:58,280 --> 00:09:00,640 water and so how. But how was I going to 150 00:09:00,640 --> 00:09:02,120 understand that? How was I going to see that? 151 00:09:02,120 --> 00:09:10,000 And it really became amazing because by seeing the sandy soil 152 00:09:10,000 --> 00:09:14,760 along the Platte River, by understanding how the trail 153 00:09:14,760 --> 00:09:18,240 literally went right along the river and the trail is still 154 00:09:18,240 --> 00:09:20,440 there. And that's space today 155 00:09:20,920 --> 00:09:23,480 unchanged. And you're just riding right 156 00:09:23,480 --> 00:09:25,640 along the river and then in the middle of the night you we might 157 00:09:25,640 --> 00:09:28,560 have. It was one night when I didn't 158 00:09:28,560 --> 00:09:31,040 park far enough away from the river and sure enough we had 159 00:09:31,040 --> 00:09:34,200 huge flooding. We got trapped actually near 160 00:09:34,200 --> 00:09:38,480 Bridgewater, Nebraska. We got trapped for two or three 161 00:09:38,480 --> 00:09:41,200 days because the river overflowed the trail and there 162 00:09:41,200 --> 00:09:44,800 was no way for us to get through and and and it overflowed on the 163 00:09:44,800 --> 00:09:46,040 local roads too. So. 164 00:09:46,400 --> 00:09:49,280 So you're actually, you asked me what's the advantage? 165 00:09:49,600 --> 00:09:55,200 You're actually participating in the same kind of ecological 166 00:09:56,120 --> 00:10:00,080 topographical events that you're writing about. 167 00:10:00,080 --> 00:10:03,960 And and you'll notice when you read my books, you feel like 168 00:10:03,960 --> 00:10:06,160 you're along for the trip. Well, that's because I took the 169 00:10:06,160 --> 00:10:08,120 trip. If I didn't take the trip, 170 00:10:08,760 --> 00:10:12,280 there's nothing to take you along except, you know, a 171 00:10:12,280 --> 00:10:15,560 footnote from Professor Alonzo or something. 172 00:10:17,040 --> 00:10:19,640 Yeah, I've read other books, like one of the books I read 173 00:10:19,720 --> 00:10:22,400 supplementally for this podcast is Women's Diaries of the 174 00:10:22,400 --> 00:10:24,400 Westward Journey. Have you have you read that? 175 00:10:24,960 --> 00:10:29,120 Yes, I I quote several. The fascinating thing about the 176 00:10:29,160 --> 00:10:34,040 Oregon Trail experience was is that and is that the the women 177 00:10:34,040 --> 00:10:37,720 diarists were the best and without women diarists we would 178 00:10:37,720 --> 00:10:40,320 have been done. Most of the typical marriage in 179 00:10:40,320 --> 00:10:44,440 those days was an illiterate male who worked all day and 180 00:10:44,440 --> 00:10:50,040 heard a cattle and did whatever and a well read wife who might 181 00:10:50,040 --> 00:10:51,440 have been a school teacher at some point. 182 00:10:51,600 --> 00:10:57,120 So the women diarists were the best and best writers, the best 183 00:10:57,120 --> 00:11:00,680 recorders. And our sister Whitman, who was 184 00:11:00,720 --> 00:11:07,400 a a missionary wife, was the first to cross, the first woman 185 00:11:07,400 --> 00:11:11,400 to cross the trail and get through South Pass and she 186 00:11:11,400 --> 00:11:17,400 galloped up and over S Pass on a side saddle and side saddles are 187 00:11:17,400 --> 00:11:20,440 really impossible to ride, very difficult. 188 00:11:20,440 --> 00:11:22,480 They made women ride them because there was a belief that 189 00:11:22,480 --> 00:11:25,480 was more delicate and gentle and better for the dress for her to 190 00:11:25,480 --> 00:11:29,880 sit sideways. And this image, this beautiful 191 00:11:29,880 --> 00:11:33,720 image of Narcissa Whitman and her friend galloping up over S 192 00:11:33,720 --> 00:11:38,640 Pass on side saddles, you know, and she was a great recorder of 193 00:11:38,640 --> 00:11:41,640 the trail. And because she sent letters and 194 00:11:41,640 --> 00:11:44,200 Diaries home, which were published in the local 195 00:11:44,200 --> 00:11:47,440 newspapers, what happened in those days was a letter was in 196 00:11:47,440 --> 00:11:51,400 the mid 19th century, a letter was almost public property. 197 00:11:51,640 --> 00:11:54,640 It got passed all through the family and shared and whatnot. 198 00:11:55,080 --> 00:11:59,240 And it was Narcissa Whitman's letters home that were published 199 00:11:59,720 --> 00:12:03,600 in the New York State papers that really opened up the Oregon 200 00:12:03,600 --> 00:12:05,960 Trail. Because the big fear, the big 201 00:12:05,960 --> 00:12:09,920 bugaboo that the American public had was that it was not a place 202 00:12:09,920 --> 00:12:12,600 fit for women. It was not a place fit for women 203 00:12:12,600 --> 00:12:15,160 and children. And then she gets to the rivers 204 00:12:15,160 --> 00:12:20,160 and and one fear was the savage Indians, You know, the depiction 205 00:12:20,160 --> 00:12:23,560 we had of them those days. Well then she gets to the river, 206 00:12:23,560 --> 00:12:30,600 and the Indians come across in a bow boat or in a canoe. 207 00:12:32,280 --> 00:12:37,600 In one place she saw pioneers being crossed the rivers on the 208 00:12:37,600 --> 00:12:42,000 children were crossed the rivers on the backs of Sioux Braves. 209 00:12:42,240 --> 00:12:47,280 They were great swimmers and so the the the the tribes tended to 210 00:12:47,280 --> 00:12:49,760 meet the covered wagons when they had to cross the rivers 211 00:12:50,840 --> 00:12:53,200 because they were great boatmen. And they also knew they could 212 00:12:53,200 --> 00:12:57,600 make a little money or get some trinkets or whatever by helping 213 00:12:57,600 --> 00:13:01,440 The Pioneers across. But it was those letters 214 00:13:01,920 --> 00:13:07,920 published in the early 1840s from Narcissa, Whitman that 215 00:13:07,920 --> 00:13:10,800 opened up the trail because everyone realized, well, we can 216 00:13:10,800 --> 00:13:13,120 travel with our families and you don't. 217 00:13:13,120 --> 00:13:15,520 You don't. I mean, you don't really learn 218 00:13:15,520 --> 00:13:19,960 all of that until you get on the trail and see it. 219 00:13:19,960 --> 00:13:24,600 And you know that riding up over S Pass myself is unique 220 00:13:24,600 --> 00:13:30,960 experiences, Continental Divide. And there's a monument there to 221 00:13:31,400 --> 00:13:33,880 Narcissus and Whitman when she came through, and I think it was 222 00:13:34,080 --> 00:13:39,640 1842 or 1843, you just feel it intensely. 223 00:13:39,640 --> 00:13:41,480 You're you're there, you're seeing it. 224 00:13:41,520 --> 00:13:45,600 And that inevitably creeps into your writing and makes it a 225 00:13:45,600 --> 00:13:48,440 better book. I think so too. 226 00:13:48,440 --> 00:13:51,360 As much as I like the book Women's Diaries of the Westward 227 00:13:51,360 --> 00:13:53,520 Journey, and there's so much that's fascinating about it, 228 00:13:53,680 --> 00:13:57,120 mostly the thing that sticks with me is that they'll not 229 00:13:57,120 --> 00:14:00,120 discuss their pregnancy at all. And then say a baby arrived 230 00:14:00,120 --> 00:14:02,520 today. Like, really you? 231 00:14:02,520 --> 00:14:04,920 You've been doing this horribly uncomfortable, dangerous journey 232 00:14:04,920 --> 00:14:07,360 and then also you're pregnant or became pregnant on this trip. 233 00:14:07,840 --> 00:14:11,400 It's it. Was considered it was considered 234 00:14:11,400 --> 00:14:19,920 indecent to discuss a pregnancy you know and just so so so yes 235 00:14:19,920 --> 00:14:23,200 so so we have good health today. Things are good. 236 00:14:24,440 --> 00:14:27,560 Our second baby arrived on Tuesday you know blah blah blah, 237 00:14:28,320 --> 00:14:31,920 you know and nowadays we make such a big deal of it. 238 00:14:31,920 --> 00:14:34,760 You know we have reveal parties and all this stupid stuff. 239 00:14:35,200 --> 00:14:38,560 The the other things that were fascinating about taking the 240 00:14:38,560 --> 00:14:42,080 trip itself is you pick up things in local Diaries and 241 00:14:42,560 --> 00:14:46,040 local histories and history rooms and stuff that that aren't 242 00:14:46,040 --> 00:14:51,160 in the in the major history books and that leads you to go 243 00:14:51,160 --> 00:14:53,800 to other sources for research. One of the things about the 244 00:14:53,800 --> 00:14:57,760 trail is that it was a very religious event. the IT was 245 00:14:57,760 --> 00:15:01,720 something called the Panic of 1837, which lasted for 15 years. 246 00:15:02,480 --> 00:15:04,720 It was extraordinary. It was much worse than the Great 247 00:15:04,720 --> 00:15:09,200 Depression or anything else. There were half the banks in 248 00:15:09,200 --> 00:15:13,920 America failed between 1837 and the early 1840s when the trail 249 00:15:13,920 --> 00:15:16,200 began. And what would happen for mutual 250 00:15:16,200 --> 00:15:21,520 security, adventure, faith, whatever, Whole churches would 251 00:15:21,520 --> 00:15:25,240 leave together. And people were more organized 252 00:15:25,240 --> 00:15:29,120 according to their churches than they were even to their towns. 253 00:15:29,600 --> 00:15:32,840 And so, and there was still a lot of religious. 254 00:15:33,120 --> 00:15:35,680 It was a time of a lot of religious ferment. 255 00:15:36,120 --> 00:15:39,200 The Second Great Awakening it was called and a lot of 256 00:15:39,480 --> 00:15:42,800 differences between religions. So you have these hilarious 257 00:15:42,800 --> 00:15:45,600 things and you know, I would get to the same place and look 258 00:15:45,600 --> 00:15:47,640 around and see what they were describing. 259 00:15:47,640 --> 00:15:54,120 It was like, you know, arrived Plum Island today, found a very 260 00:15:54,120 --> 00:16:00,480 favorable campsite along the Platen, alas discovered that a 261 00:16:00,480 --> 00:16:04,920 group of Presbyterians were camped nearby. 262 00:16:05,640 --> 00:16:07,200 And these were Baptists, of course. 263 00:16:08,080 --> 00:16:13,240 Packed all our stuff back up, proceeded 2 miles down the river 264 00:16:13,520 --> 00:16:17,520 to have our own place to camp. You know, that literally 265 00:16:17,520 --> 00:16:20,280 happened that that that, that that was, that was how America 266 00:16:20,280 --> 00:16:22,200 was then. Can you imagine, you know, like 267 00:16:22,200 --> 00:16:27,160 if you got to Motel eight, you know, and I don't know, it's 268 00:16:27,160 --> 00:16:32,000 full of looks, like it's full of a bunch of Methodists. 269 00:16:32,000 --> 00:16:35,480 We can't stay here tonight, you know, But that's so. 270 00:16:35,520 --> 00:16:40,080 So you learn the detail, the textual, the tactile detail that 271 00:16:40,080 --> 00:16:44,280 makes a book really good. You learn it by going along on 272 00:16:44,280 --> 00:16:47,080 the trail. And also I got to see how 273 00:16:47,080 --> 00:16:49,080 dangerous it was. I mean, when we, when we went 274 00:16:49,080 --> 00:16:52,640 down the Rocky Mountains on the border between Wyoming and 275 00:16:52,640 --> 00:16:56,640 Idaho, that's the last, the western face of the Rockies, you 276 00:16:56,640 --> 00:17:03,000 descend this very steep trail that descends to the Bear River 277 00:17:03,000 --> 00:17:06,960 in Idaho. And it was perilous. 278 00:17:06,960 --> 00:17:09,760 I mean you know we we could easily have died there because 279 00:17:09,760 --> 00:17:15,599 the we had to go along this narrow path on a Cliff on the 280 00:17:15,599 --> 00:17:17,960 left side of our wagon was a 300 foot drop. 281 00:17:18,680 --> 00:17:24,599 And you know I said Nick, you know this is you know, I said 282 00:17:25,040 --> 00:17:27,599 don't worry if we go or I could probably get off the wagon but 283 00:17:27,599 --> 00:17:30,440 he wasn't going to be able to because he was on the the steep 284 00:17:30,440 --> 00:17:32,360 side. And I said don't worry, I'll 285 00:17:32,360 --> 00:17:34,680 come back for you. He said Don't worry about that. 286 00:17:34,680 --> 00:17:38,200 Just come back for my dog. So God that. 287 00:17:38,200 --> 00:17:41,240 Section of the book is truly I got nervous just hearing you 288 00:17:41,240 --> 00:17:43,760 describe it just now. I can't imagine people having to 289 00:17:43,760 --> 00:17:47,440 do that in large groups with perhaps less less ability to be 290 00:17:47,440 --> 00:17:49,360 rescued if anything happened. Although it sounds like if 291 00:17:49,360 --> 00:17:51,280 anything bad happened there, you'd probably be out of luck 292 00:17:51,280 --> 00:17:52,720 anyway. So maybe it's not actually that 293 00:17:52,720 --> 00:17:57,080 different from back then, yeah. But but you, you're on the 294 00:17:57,160 --> 00:17:59,800 actual trail. You're not standing at a a 295 00:17:59,840 --> 00:18:02,680 highway marker 5 miles from the trail or something. 296 00:18:02,680 --> 00:18:05,000 You're on the actual trail and you're seeing the dangers. 297 00:18:05,000 --> 00:18:07,800 Another thing. And at a certain point, I have 298 00:18:07,800 --> 00:18:10,840 some interesting insights on what all this means for global 299 00:18:10,840 --> 00:18:13,480 warming. But at another point we got to a 300 00:18:13,480 --> 00:18:18,760 place called Willow. Willow Springs, about 30 mile in 301 00:18:18,760 --> 00:18:22,680 the middle of Wyoming. Remote remote area hasn't 302 00:18:22,680 --> 00:18:26,600 changed at all since The Pioneers were crossing in the 303 00:18:26,600 --> 00:18:30,200 1840s and 1850s and it just happened to have been heavy 304 00:18:30,200 --> 00:18:34,120 storms along the Sweetwater and Willow Springs was flooded. 305 00:18:34,120 --> 00:18:36,240 We couldn't get through. We literally couldn't get 306 00:18:36,240 --> 00:18:38,720 through. But fortunately I had done 307 00:18:38,720 --> 00:18:40,680 enough reading to know that there was something called the 308 00:18:40,680 --> 00:18:44,120 Seminole Cut off. The Oregon Trail wasn't really 309 00:18:44,120 --> 00:18:47,840 one trail, it was a series of cut offs and new trails made 310 00:18:47,840 --> 00:18:50,080 according to what changed each year. 311 00:18:50,960 --> 00:18:57,440 And so we had to head sort of due South until we got to the 312 00:18:57,440 --> 00:19:00,320 Seminole cut off and then I took the Seminole cut off back to the 313 00:19:00,320 --> 00:19:02,880 regular trail. But fortunately I'd done enough 314 00:19:02,880 --> 00:19:08,640 reading and knew about it. We got incredibly lost in a in a 315 00:19:08,640 --> 00:19:17,120 place called Spike Peak, Wyoming, where the the trail at 316 00:19:17,120 --> 00:19:19,960 that point after you leave the Platte you join. 317 00:19:21,120 --> 00:19:24,280 It's a large tributary that goes to Wyoming called the Sweetwater 318 00:19:24,280 --> 00:19:27,320 River, which is one of the most undisturbed and beautiful rivers 319 00:19:28,040 --> 00:19:31,640 in the country. But there had been flooding. 320 00:19:31,640 --> 00:19:34,240 It was a high water year when we crossed, so there was flooding 321 00:19:34,720 --> 00:19:37,880 ahead of us and the trail was flooded out. 322 00:19:38,400 --> 00:19:45,280 So we had to just take off cross country and in this very, very 323 00:19:45,280 --> 00:19:49,600 high remote desert. And it it it took a while, but I 324 00:19:49,600 --> 00:19:54,320 I managed to get us back on the trail by figuring out that there 325 00:19:54,320 --> 00:19:59,680 had been a cattle drive coming through and literally following 326 00:19:59,680 --> 00:20:02,720 the footprints of the cattle drive back to a paved Rd. 327 00:20:02,720 --> 00:20:05,520 'cause I was pretty sure they were taking the cattle to trucks 328 00:20:05,520 --> 00:20:12,400 on the highway, to a paved road. And that led us to a ranch ahead 329 00:20:12,520 --> 00:20:16,640 and back to the Oregon Trail. So it's so. 330 00:20:17,080 --> 00:20:19,560 But that was something that happened to The Pioneers a lot. 331 00:20:19,560 --> 00:20:24,120 The trail was wiped out. By flooding, heavy rains, 332 00:20:24,120 --> 00:20:27,680 whatever. And and you had to improvise. 333 00:20:27,680 --> 00:20:34,680 You had to you had to be fearless and and and clever and 334 00:20:34,840 --> 00:20:41,560 and read you know read the signs of nature to to get through 335 00:20:41,560 --> 00:20:45,680 where you wanted to go. And yet. 336 00:20:45,800 --> 00:20:49,600 Both books make a point of describing your work as not 337 00:20:49,760 --> 00:20:51,800 reenactment. And in fact both books have 338 00:20:51,800 --> 00:20:54,160 sections where you have conflicts with people who are 339 00:20:54,160 --> 00:20:59,240 more reenactment minded than you yourself are and you're going 340 00:20:59,240 --> 00:21:01,280 through change environment. So we're going to get to this 341 00:21:01,320 --> 00:21:04,600 environmental history of both of these Oregon Trail system and 342 00:21:04,600 --> 00:21:06,160 also the Mississippi River system. 343 00:21:08,360 --> 00:21:11,480 But if you had gone at it in a reenactment kind of way, looking 344 00:21:11,480 --> 00:21:14,280 for the old way it might have been, it both would have been 345 00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:16,680 less informative. And also your work is supposed 346 00:21:16,680 --> 00:21:19,720 to chronicle these changing environments and how these 347 00:21:19,720 --> 00:21:22,520 things are memorialized and experienced now as well. 348 00:21:22,520 --> 00:21:24,760 And so if you had done it in purely that old school fashion, 349 00:21:24,760 --> 00:21:26,560 you probably would have missed a lot of that, I think. 350 00:21:27,400 --> 00:21:28,040 Yeah. Well, we. 351 00:21:28,040 --> 00:21:29,880 I mean, we did it in a totally authentic way. 352 00:21:29,920 --> 00:21:31,200 You know, we went on a covered wagon. 353 00:21:31,200 --> 00:21:34,360 We went on a flat boat. I didn't have any other you know 354 00:21:34,360 --> 00:21:40,880 modern things along, you know and but no I don't go for 355 00:21:40,880 --> 00:21:44,040 reenactment because reenactment is totally phony. 356 00:21:44,160 --> 00:21:47,320 It's it's it's based on a premise that you can actually 357 00:21:47,320 --> 00:21:52,720 physically recreate by uniform wearing or the red clothes this 358 00:21:52,720 --> 00:21:55,560 kind of thing. The conditions and the mental 359 00:21:55,560 --> 00:21:58,240 attitudes and actually relive that history. 360 00:21:58,800 --> 00:22:01,280 Well you can of course the world has changed and and what 361 00:22:01,280 --> 00:22:09,320 reenactresses they tend to focus on very very obsessively focus 362 00:22:09,320 --> 00:22:13,640 on little details of uniforms and and and so forth like that 363 00:22:16,000 --> 00:22:21,200 in in the belief that that will give them some kind of insight. 364 00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:25,240 Well, it gives you no insight. You really, the Civil War was a 365 00:22:25,240 --> 00:22:27,880 horrible tragedy. There's nothing to, there's 366 00:22:27,880 --> 00:22:29,720 nothing to celebrate it as a re enactor. 367 00:22:29,720 --> 00:22:33,720 And what they celebrate is, is death and dying. 368 00:22:33,760 --> 00:22:36,200 You know, there's guys that blow, the guys who get shot by 369 00:22:36,200 --> 00:22:38,960 mini ball and whatnot and that's their specialty. 370 00:22:40,320 --> 00:22:43,560 The other problem with reenacting is it tends to be 371 00:22:44,160 --> 00:22:48,720 historically recreated or an attempt to recreate history in a 372 00:22:48,720 --> 00:22:53,040 way that promulgates myth and propaganda. 373 00:22:53,520 --> 00:22:56,960 So like the Mormons, for instance, every year the Mormons 374 00:22:56,960 --> 00:23:01,360 take these huge, long COVID wagon drives and they're they're 375 00:23:01,360 --> 00:23:06,680 phony because they're they're they're they're catered meals 376 00:23:06,680 --> 00:23:09,480 and you know, they pull up a tractor trailer in for showers 377 00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:11,200 at night and and all that kind of stuff. 378 00:23:11,960 --> 00:23:16,720 Because the the Mormons, they trace their Heggera across the 379 00:23:16,720 --> 00:23:19,360 Mormon Trail, which was really just the Oregon Trail. 380 00:23:20,320 --> 00:23:27,520 They trace that exodus to Utah as the creation of their 381 00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:31,400 religion and distinct culture, and so they're trying to move 382 00:23:31,480 --> 00:23:32,360 the Moses. Right. 383 00:23:32,360 --> 00:23:34,480 It's supposed to be an exodus from Nauvoo. 384 00:23:35,640 --> 00:23:37,680 Yeah, Yeah, it was. It was an exodus. 385 00:23:37,720 --> 00:23:42,400 And the hilarious thing is at various points along the 386 00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:47,680 Sweetwater they have which is kind of the Holy Land of the old 387 00:23:47,680 --> 00:23:52,160 Mormon Trail, they have these summer camps, you know, and all 388 00:23:52,160 --> 00:23:55,680 the Mormon kids have to come up from Salt Lake and all those 389 00:23:55,680 --> 00:23:59,160 different places where Mormons are and camp out there for the 390 00:23:59,160 --> 00:24:01,000 summer and they push hand carts around. 391 00:24:01,640 --> 00:24:03,840 They have to wear period dress. You know it's really hot out 392 00:24:03,840 --> 00:24:05,000 there and they have to wear these long. 393 00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:07,520 The women have to wear these long dresses and the men's men 394 00:24:07,520 --> 00:24:13,480 wear these Western get up you know and the and they celebrate 395 00:24:13,480 --> 00:24:17,400 their religion and when. And a lot of it is just comical 396 00:24:17,400 --> 00:24:19,560 and really, really silly. And I wrote about that. 397 00:24:20,320 --> 00:24:25,440 And the interesting thing was, and and I knew a lot of more, I 398 00:24:25,560 --> 00:24:27,480 worried that a lot of Mormons wouldn't like it. 399 00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:29,720 But you know, that's what you see a lot. 400 00:24:29,720 --> 00:24:35,000 The Mormons actually control about 150 miles of the trail in 401 00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,680 the most spectacular place in the South Pass section. 402 00:24:39,600 --> 00:24:46,240 OK, well, so at Devil's Gate, this beautiful stretch of the 403 00:24:46,240 --> 00:24:48,520 Sweetwater River, there's this huge Mormon camp. 404 00:24:48,520 --> 00:24:51,240 And I described coming over the peaks and looking down, and 405 00:24:51,240 --> 00:24:54,720 there's this immense camp of kids. 406 00:24:54,720 --> 00:24:57,880 And the Mormons use it to celebrate their their religion, 407 00:24:58,240 --> 00:25:00,880 to promote their religion. They have a museum there, and 408 00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:03,080 they're, you know, how great Mormonism is and everything. 409 00:25:03,800 --> 00:25:06,880 And I was sure that a lot of them would be offended by what I 410 00:25:06,880 --> 00:25:08,960 wrote. I didn't write it that way 411 00:25:08,960 --> 00:25:11,920 deliberately, but how could you miss that when you're crossing 412 00:25:11,920 --> 00:25:16,200 the trail? And so when after the book came 413 00:25:16,200 --> 00:25:19,920 out, I got all these emails and letters from Mormon kids and 414 00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:24,000 they said as far as celebrating our religious history, you know, 415 00:25:24,760 --> 00:25:27,680 the only thing we learned at Mormon camp, the forced Mormon 416 00:25:27,680 --> 00:25:31,600 camp every summer, the devil's gate, is how to have sex with 417 00:25:31,600 --> 00:25:39,200 our Mormon boyfriends, you know, So, you know, re enacting, I 418 00:25:39,200 --> 00:25:41,800 mean, it brought them there. And I guess it's a valuable 419 00:25:41,800 --> 00:25:45,360 thing to the church leaders and everything, but for the rank and 420 00:25:45,360 --> 00:25:49,920 file of the faithful, it's it's just an act. 421 00:25:49,920 --> 00:25:53,640 It's just something that you put on in in the same way we have a 422 00:25:53,640 --> 00:25:57,920 nativity scene at Christmas, you know, But the handcart? 423 00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:03,320 Track is mythologized, at least partially because wasn't it an 424 00:26:03,320 --> 00:26:06,040 error of judgement at Brigham Young's to to send them out at 425 00:26:06,040 --> 00:26:09,480 an unseasonable time that was badly provisioned and it became 426 00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:13,000 like heroic in a way, but it was kind of bad Leadership in my 427 00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:14,760 understanding is what actually happened I. 428 00:26:15,120 --> 00:26:20,160 I I described that it was the I think it was the 1846 or the 429 00:26:20,160 --> 00:26:26,880 1847 handcart experience and hundreds died at Martin's Cove 430 00:26:28,040 --> 00:26:30,600 until they were finally said because they they were like the 431 00:26:30,600 --> 00:26:34,440 Donner party crossing the Sierras. 432 00:26:35,080 --> 00:26:37,160 They left late. They made a lot of mistakes. 433 00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:40,080 They weren't provisioned properly, and it was, it was a a 434 00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:46,240 classic instance of a disaster for religion, something that 435 00:26:46,480 --> 00:26:49,640 shouldn't have happened and it should be celebrated as a 436 00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:52,120 failure of leadership that killed a lot of people. 437 00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:57,320 But of course, the Mormons have turned that into a kind of 438 00:26:57,320 --> 00:27:00,640 resurrection story. And, you know, and there's all 439 00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:03,760 kinds of myths and funny beliefs. 440 00:27:04,040 --> 00:27:08,480 There's one mass grave just beyond where they were trapped 441 00:27:08,480 --> 00:27:13,520 by the Snows that is now sort of a kind of a Mormon temple in the 442 00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:17,760 middle of the desert. So and and again, you see, I 443 00:27:17,760 --> 00:27:19,960 wouldn't have known about this and I wouldn't have realized to 444 00:27:19,960 --> 00:27:24,240 write about it as dramatically as I did unless I was along the 445 00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:26,840 trail, you know, actually seeing it. 446 00:27:28,480 --> 00:27:31,200 What did you notice along? The trail about how things have 447 00:27:31,200 --> 00:27:34,800 changed environmentally. One example I have in my head, 448 00:27:34,800 --> 00:27:36,840 and maybe you agree with this and maybe not, or maybe it's 449 00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:39,560 relevant or maybe not. But reading Stephen Ambrose's 450 00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:43,160 undaunted courage about how many animals the Lewis and Clark 451 00:27:43,160 --> 00:27:45,480 expedition could shoot from their boats with, they didn't 452 00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:47,840 even have to go anywhere. Like we killed 60 elkers today 453 00:27:48,360 --> 00:27:49,800 and they didn't. They didn't even seem to leave 454 00:27:49,800 --> 00:27:52,480 the river to do so. That is obviously no longer the 455 00:27:52,480 --> 00:27:54,840 case. The Buffalo are gone now, but 456 00:27:54,840 --> 00:27:57,280 surely there's many other things that you noticed that some 457 00:27:57,280 --> 00:28:00,680 things are good environmentally, like the Platte River system is 458 00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:03,440 no longer producing huge amounts of cholera that are killing many 459 00:28:03,440 --> 00:28:05,280 people. That is no longer a thing. 460 00:28:05,640 --> 00:28:08,000 We know how to address that. But there's also many, many 461 00:28:08,000 --> 00:28:10,200 things that maybe you've seen and along the Mississippi River 462 00:28:10,200 --> 00:28:13,640 as well that are signs of industry in decline, of 463 00:28:13,640 --> 00:28:16,000 pollution and potentially of clean up too. 464 00:28:16,320 --> 00:28:20,200 What trends have you seen? It's it's both good and bad. 465 00:28:20,200 --> 00:28:22,120 All right. So the Monongahela River, which 466 00:28:22,120 --> 00:28:25,840 is one of the tributaries of the Ohio that flows in from West 467 00:28:25,840 --> 00:28:28,960 Virginia is very clean and everything nowadays. 468 00:28:30,280 --> 00:28:33,720 The so-called Monongahela Valley, the Mon Valley was where 469 00:28:33,720 --> 00:28:41,040 all the US Steel works, steel plants were massive forges, coke 470 00:28:41,040 --> 00:28:47,560 plants, et cetera. In 1973, when the Clean Water 471 00:28:47,560 --> 00:28:54,440 Act was passed, there were only three edible species left in the 472 00:28:54,440 --> 00:28:59,080 Monongahela River. The clean up since then has 473 00:28:59,120 --> 00:29:01,880 largely been precipitated by the fact that the steel mills 474 00:29:01,880 --> 00:29:06,720 closed, which is a tragedy. But you can now catch 150 475 00:29:06,720 --> 00:29:11,200 species of edible fish in the Mononga Hill. 476 00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:14,600 So it's a great success story and it's much, much cleaner. 477 00:29:14,600 --> 00:29:20,280 Now on the other hand, as you get further down on the Ohio and 478 00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:26,000 on the Mississippi, especially the the companies, the big big 479 00:29:26,000 --> 00:29:31,360 corporate entities that run transportation and carry all the 480 00:29:31,360 --> 00:29:34,000 goods down there, and still about a third of our economy 481 00:29:34,320 --> 00:29:37,440 exit to the world economy through the Mississippi River. 482 00:29:38,560 --> 00:29:46,240 But the industries that dominate that transportation are filthy 483 00:29:46,440 --> 00:29:52,000 polluters, lazy, abominably LED. You know, everyone likes to 484 00:29:52,000 --> 00:29:56,000 worship. What's his name? 485 00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:59,280 The Sage of Omaha, Warren. Buffett, Warren. 486 00:29:59,280 --> 00:30:03,160 Buffett now he owns the Northern Pacific. 487 00:30:03,160 --> 00:30:08,880 Northern Pacific rail lines are the filthiest places in the 488 00:30:08,880 --> 00:30:11,240 world. They they take all the old 489 00:30:11,240 --> 00:30:17,040 creosote ties down. The wooden ties underneath the 490 00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:23,840 rails replace them and then create a huge pile of creosote, 491 00:30:23,840 --> 00:30:27,600 literally almost an acre of creosote ties just thrown on the 492 00:30:27,600 --> 00:30:30,160 side of the railroad tracks, which by the way runs right 493 00:30:30,160 --> 00:30:35,880 along the Ohio and and in the West, the Platte River and so 494 00:30:35,880 --> 00:30:38,560 forth. And it's rotting creosote. 495 00:30:38,560 --> 00:30:40,600 It's it's it's one of the most toxic. 496 00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:44,080 The creosote is a treatment that they put on the ties so they 497 00:30:44,080 --> 00:30:47,160 don't rot. It's a petroleum based thing. 498 00:30:47,160 --> 00:30:50,840 Black ugly stuff. They leave acres and acres of 499 00:30:50,840 --> 00:30:54,760 these along the railroad tracks. When you're coming down the 500 00:30:54,760 --> 00:31:00,240 Mississippi and the Ohio, the barge companies, you know these 501 00:31:00,240 --> 00:31:03,480 big tugs are going by and they're pushing 30 or 40 barges 502 00:31:03,480 --> 00:31:08,280 at once. If an old barge gets rusty or 503 00:31:08,320 --> 00:31:11,040 gets damaged or whatever, they just push it over the side of 504 00:31:11,040 --> 00:31:14,400 the river, let it rot out and sink right there. 505 00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:21,400 All the companies, all the tugbo companies, big source of 506 00:31:21,400 --> 00:31:25,040 fortunes in in in the Midwest that have big tugboat 507 00:31:25,040 --> 00:31:29,240 operations. If a transmission blows, they 508 00:31:29,240 --> 00:31:32,760 throw it overboard. If an engine blows, they throw 509 00:31:32,760 --> 00:31:36,760 it overboard. And it's so severe that in 510 00:31:36,760 --> 00:31:39,000 certain spots and they're they're marked on the maps. 511 00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:40,480 The maps are pretty carefully marked. 512 00:31:41,080 --> 00:31:46,640 You know you're coming to a port or repair Center for the Ingram 513 00:31:46,640 --> 00:31:51,840 Barge Company or whoever it is. And as you get closer, what 514 00:31:51,840 --> 00:31:56,520 happens is your compass starts going wild, starts going around 515 00:31:56,520 --> 00:31:58,720 in circles. There's so much metal down 516 00:31:58,720 --> 00:32:01,440 there, there's so much iron down there at the bottom of the river 517 00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:06,360 that that they've thrown out that it affects it. 518 00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:08,840 It's called deviation, but it it affects the accuracy of the 519 00:32:08,840 --> 00:32:10,600 compass and starts going around in circles. 520 00:32:11,000 --> 00:32:14,680 So you could tell by how the compass is behaving, whether you 521 00:32:14,680 --> 00:32:20,600 were passing a junkyard, an impromptu junkyard along the 522 00:32:20,600 --> 00:32:25,360 river. So those are those are two 523 00:32:25,360 --> 00:32:33,120 examples, OK? The fish came back and the 524 00:32:33,120 --> 00:32:40,520 pollution, the hard physical pollution of industry is 525 00:32:40,520 --> 00:32:44,000 everywhere that you see and it's it's the the beautiful rivers 526 00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:46,760 and this beautiful lyrical trip to go down them. 527 00:32:46,760 --> 00:32:50,840 But the irresponsibility of our corporate leaders is just 528 00:32:51,880 --> 00:32:54,400 staggering. And you also. 529 00:32:54,400 --> 00:32:57,640 Detail on the Oregon Trail and you can see this in I don't know 530 00:32:57,640 --> 00:33:01,120 if you watched the Taylor Sheridan 1883 series. 531 00:33:01,120 --> 00:33:03,280 Did you see that by chance? Yes. 532 00:33:03,280 --> 00:33:04,760 Yes, yeah, they're and they're scenes. 533 00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:06,760 Of people. They're just leaving behind huge 534 00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:09,360 amounts of valuable items at various river crossings. 535 00:33:09,360 --> 00:33:11,960 There's just no room to bring all the stuff that they want to 536 00:33:11,960 --> 00:33:13,240 bring. And apparently there's just 537 00:33:13,240 --> 00:33:15,320 debris fields. You can just follow trash all 538 00:33:15,320 --> 00:33:18,040 the way across the Oregon Trail essentially in. 539 00:33:18,400 --> 00:33:25,200 In fact, after the middle 18, after late 1840s when the trail 540 00:33:25,200 --> 00:33:30,560 traffic picked up, especially in the 18481849 gold rush period, 541 00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:36,560 you navigate it to California or Oregon via the debris field. 542 00:33:37,360 --> 00:33:40,720 And I I quote it, I quote this in my book, my Oregon Trail 543 00:33:40,720 --> 00:33:43,440 book, and it's hilarious. I mean, you're crossing the 544 00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:48,080 desert and they're in the middle of the desert is a huge ship's 545 00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:50,280 anchor. Why did someone decide to bring 546 00:33:50,280 --> 00:33:53,160 a ship's anchor, you know, or a bathtub? 547 00:33:53,720 --> 00:33:56,240 And there was a guy named Langworthy who was very 548 00:33:56,240 --> 00:34:01,720 interesting, who was a diarist. And he said he concluded from 549 00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,880 very early on in the trip that he wasn't going to keep all his 550 00:34:04,880 --> 00:34:06,800 baggage and all his clothes and everything. 551 00:34:07,640 --> 00:34:11,080 Because when he needed a new suit, when his old suit, you 552 00:34:11,080 --> 00:34:13,880 know, he probably wore it for a week or two and it got kind of 553 00:34:14,199 --> 00:34:16,920 filthy and smelly. When he needed a new one, he 554 00:34:16,920 --> 00:34:19,440 just went through the the debris piles that he found along the 555 00:34:19,440 --> 00:34:25,639 trail and founded a clean suit, you know, and he, it wasn't, he 556 00:34:25,639 --> 00:34:27,880 wasn't joking that that that's really what happened. 557 00:34:27,880 --> 00:34:35,719 So yes, there America as a serial polluter had its origins 558 00:34:35,719 --> 00:34:39,320 very early. So, but you know, the thing 559 00:34:39,320 --> 00:34:42,239 about climate change that's fascinating to me that struck me 560 00:34:42,440 --> 00:34:46,719 as I was crossing the trail, and it struck me again, given some 561 00:34:46,719 --> 00:34:50,840 of the aberrant weather that I found along the Mississippi when 562 00:34:50,840 --> 00:35:00,240 I was going with flat boat, was that one day we were traveling 563 00:35:00,240 --> 00:35:03,000 along in Nebraska along the Oregon Trail fairly early in the 564 00:35:03,000 --> 00:35:05,040 trip. And the Platte River Valley in 565 00:35:05,040 --> 00:35:10,760 Nebraska is the first treeless expanse of Prairie after the 566 00:35:10,760 --> 00:35:12,760 Rockies. There's nothing to stop the 567 00:35:12,760 --> 00:35:17,520 storms coming through and the Platte rivers storms down 568 00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:22,480 through Kearney, NE and all the way E to Omaha, through Grand 569 00:35:22,480 --> 00:35:26,960 Isle and places like that are some of the most violent in the 570 00:35:26,960 --> 00:35:28,760 country, probably probably the world. 571 00:35:29,520 --> 00:35:32,400 And there's stories of a whole wagon trains, every wagon was 572 00:35:32,400 --> 00:35:36,160 blown over, stuff like that. We camped several nights during 573 00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:42,400 really violent thunderstorms and and the wagon would literally 574 00:35:42,400 --> 00:35:46,960 shake and rock back and forth from the explosions of the 575 00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:49,200 lightning hitting the soil and also the wind. 576 00:35:49,840 --> 00:35:53,000 But the thing that struck me this moment of insight I had 577 00:35:53,600 --> 00:35:58,840 was, wow, there are actually, there are actually prototypes 578 00:36:00,240 --> 00:36:03,280 for the impact of climate warming. 579 00:36:04,680 --> 00:36:06,800 You know, we've lived through this before. 580 00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:11,320 And so sitting in my covered wagon at night, and there was a 581 00:36:11,360 --> 00:36:14,080 really violent thunderstorm, which was something that no one 582 00:36:14,080 --> 00:36:18,600 had prepared me for and something that I just didn't 583 00:36:18,600 --> 00:36:20,280 know that I was going to quite confront. 584 00:36:21,040 --> 00:36:23,160 But it led to really good parts of the book. 585 00:36:23,160 --> 00:36:26,080 Not only what was happening to us, but what was the experience 586 00:36:26,680 --> 00:36:32,120 of The Pioneers we've lived through. 587 00:36:32,840 --> 00:36:41,280 Not climate change exactly, but the physical and meteorological 588 00:36:41,320 --> 00:36:45,520 impacts of climate change. For instance, we crossed during 589 00:36:45,520 --> 00:36:50,240 a high water year and there were crossings where we expected to 590 00:36:50,240 --> 00:36:55,040 get across the river. We couldn't do it that day in 591 00:36:55,040 --> 00:36:57,920 that spot because there was so much flooding. 592 00:36:58,480 --> 00:37:01,520 So we had to go up another 50 miles and and figure out a way 593 00:37:01,520 --> 00:37:06,840 to get across. We we would be riding along the 594 00:37:06,840 --> 00:37:11,520 trail and get this really violent thunderstorm and we had 595 00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:16,320 to sort of sort of pitch the mule along in a in a very quick 596 00:37:16,320 --> 00:37:20,480 way up to high ground so the wagon wouldn't get flooded. 597 00:37:20,480 --> 00:37:25,160 Underneath we had wind storms. I described wind, wind, 598 00:37:25,600 --> 00:37:32,520 windstorm just near those kind of approaching Scotts Bluff, 599 00:37:32,600 --> 00:37:37,240 Nebraska. And the sandstorm was so violent 600 00:37:38,000 --> 00:37:40,880 that we couldn't, I couldn't see the road any longer, I couldn't 601 00:37:40,880 --> 00:37:43,640 see the road we were following. And the only way I could 602 00:37:43,640 --> 00:37:47,320 navigate holding the mules is I was holding the lines like this. 603 00:37:48,320 --> 00:37:51,400 I look straight down, absolutely straight down. 604 00:37:52,240 --> 00:37:55,520 For some reason, in a really violent sandstorm, you can sort 605 00:37:55,520 --> 00:38:02,520 of see straight down and I could see the dim outline of the grass 606 00:38:02,520 --> 00:38:08,720 shoulder of the road. And I just I just kept the mules 607 00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:12,720 just kept the wheels right on that grass shoulder right on the 608 00:38:12,720 --> 00:38:16,040 edge of that grass shoulder and I knew I was still on the road 609 00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:21,320 would you would never you know there was another fascinating 610 00:38:21,320 --> 00:38:22,800 thing that happened. We crossed something called the 611 00:38:22,800 --> 00:38:28,160 Little Colorado Desert in Wyoming, which is sort of South 612 00:38:28,160 --> 00:38:30,720 of Casper. And you're you're kind of 613 00:38:30,720 --> 00:38:33,360 crossing the open desert towards, and this is real desert 614 00:38:34,520 --> 00:38:40,280 towards the Green River and it's called the Little Colorado 615 00:38:40,280 --> 00:38:43,560 Desert. And we crossed it in one day and 616 00:38:43,600 --> 00:38:49,480 there's wet very large wild horse herds in there and all 617 00:38:49,480 --> 00:38:51,840 these rivers are marked on the map, but they're dry gulchers 618 00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:57,840 that they're only there's only water in there, you know a day 619 00:38:57,840 --> 00:39:01,040 or two a year after a rain. But one of the things you learn 620 00:39:01,040 --> 00:39:07,760 about water is that the river is just the visible indication on 621 00:39:07,760 --> 00:39:10,680 the surface of water that's underneath. 622 00:39:11,160 --> 00:39:13,440 OK. So there's a lot of huge amounts 623 00:39:13,440 --> 00:39:16,480 of water underneath. So what happens is I just 624 00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:22,280 started noticing all these Prairie Falcons, these peregrine 625 00:39:22,280 --> 00:39:26,880 Falcons, these, you know, apex predators of the desert circling 626 00:39:26,880 --> 00:39:32,640 around in a certain area. And then we get up close and I 627 00:39:32,640 --> 00:39:34,760 noticed well there's a lot of Prairie dogs around here 628 00:39:35,840 --> 00:39:37,440 etcetera. And what was happening was the 629 00:39:37,440 --> 00:39:40,680 Prairie dogs, who of course Burrow into the ground, 630 00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:46,640 establish a colony near the dry river Gulches because there is 631 00:39:46,640 --> 00:39:50,320 water underneath there. And they they can, they have at 632 00:39:50,320 --> 00:39:57,080 least a source of water that they can dig to the and and also 633 00:39:57,520 --> 00:40:00,480 there's enough water certain times a year that there's 634 00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:05,280 vegetation around for the Prairie dogs to eat well. 635 00:40:05,960 --> 00:40:16,200 The the the the Prairie Hawks, Prairie Falcons feed off their 636 00:40:16,200 --> 00:40:19,120 their their big source of feed is baby Prairie dogs. 637 00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:22,720 And so from a distance I'd I'd be trying to figure out on the 638 00:40:22,720 --> 00:40:25,840 map how am I going to get across and figure out where I am. 639 00:40:25,840 --> 00:40:28,560 And no because it's it's an area where there really isn't a trail 640 00:40:28,560 --> 00:40:31,400 you just have to head off cross country by compensating. 641 00:40:32,600 --> 00:40:35,040 But and then it would be useful to know well all right there is 642 00:40:35,080 --> 00:40:40,800 a dry Gulch up ahead and like in in one afternoon I was able to 643 00:40:40,800 --> 00:40:47,200 learn OK where those Prairie Hawks are circling that's the 644 00:40:47,200 --> 00:40:53,520 dry Gulch and it's about two miles away and it's a little bit 645 00:40:53,520 --> 00:40:54,920 off. So we're going to steer in that 646 00:40:54,920 --> 00:40:57,880 direction just to make sure we hit that and we have a cross 647 00:40:57,880 --> 00:41:04,040 point and I get there and where the where the Hawks were was 648 00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:08,240 exactly where the dry Gulch was and was exactly where a Prairie 649 00:41:08,240 --> 00:41:12,160 dog colony and I I figured that myself. 650 00:41:12,160 --> 00:41:14,320 I didn't. Later on I confirmed this by 651 00:41:14,720 --> 00:41:19,120 reading in biology books and stuff about wildlife and and 652 00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:24,360 where they kind of get there. You could tell from the tracks 653 00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:31,880 of the wild horse herds where water was where there were 654 00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:35,880 rivers and stuff because they would they they had to stay stay 655 00:41:35,880 --> 00:41:39,040 close to the rivers. And we we camped at a couple of 656 00:41:39,040 --> 00:41:43,480 these spots in Willow Creek and stuff South of Casper along the 657 00:41:43,480 --> 00:41:45,280 very, very remote stretch of the trail. 658 00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:48,800 And so I learned that you're you're you're navigating 659 00:41:50,360 --> 00:41:53,360 according to where the water is and you can you can teach 660 00:41:53,360 --> 00:41:56,600 yourself to navigate when you don't really have any other 661 00:41:56,600 --> 00:42:03,040 visual references to help you. And I guess the the the insight 662 00:42:03,040 --> 00:42:06,240 I had was that we've been through this before. 663 00:42:07,120 --> 00:42:13,040 You know the pioneer experience, the homesteading experience was 664 00:42:13,800 --> 00:42:18,560 really in a very literal way, a search for water. 665 00:42:18,560 --> 00:42:21,680 You had to stay along the rivers for for water and for 666 00:42:21,680 --> 00:42:24,080 vegetation, for firewood, stuff like that. 667 00:42:24,880 --> 00:42:28,720 And then as The Pioneers crossed, and I read about this 668 00:42:28,720 --> 00:42:31,640 in the book, they realized that a lot of pioneers were gonna 669 00:42:31,640 --> 00:42:38,360 return to stretches of Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, where they saw 670 00:42:38,360 --> 00:42:40,640 a lot these beautiful fields of wildflowers. 671 00:42:40,640 --> 00:42:43,400 You you drive through these wildflowers, they're amazing, 672 00:42:43,400 --> 00:42:47,040 the scent and everything. Because The Pioneers who were 673 00:42:47,040 --> 00:42:52,520 experienced farmers knew that if there was a effusion, an 674 00:42:52,520 --> 00:42:57,080 explosion of wildflowers in a certain area, it would only be 675 00:42:57,080 --> 00:42:59,920 there. They would only be there because 676 00:42:59,920 --> 00:43:01,800 there had been water, there had been a heavy rain. 677 00:43:02,080 --> 00:43:04,360 And it's it's sort of like in the Australian Outback, you 678 00:43:04,360 --> 00:43:07,760 know, every four years you get this explosion of beautiful 679 00:43:07,760 --> 00:43:11,240 flowers when they occasionally get a rain, the seeds never 680 00:43:11,240 --> 00:43:13,240 leave. The ability to grow, those 681 00:43:13,240 --> 00:43:15,840 plants never leave. So The Pioneers knew they could 682 00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:18,920 come back here. And how did they make it work 683 00:43:18,920 --> 00:43:24,800 for farming? They dug wells into the Ogallala 684 00:43:25,200 --> 00:43:30,920 Aquifer and put in irrigation ditches, which now 100 and 5200 685 00:43:30,920 --> 00:43:38,120 years later we're we're drying up the aquifer, you know, But I 686 00:43:38,160 --> 00:43:40,880 guess just surviving the incredible storms that we 687 00:43:40,880 --> 00:43:46,760 survived, understanding that I could always navigate, no matter 688 00:43:46,760 --> 00:43:51,760 how hostile the environment, understanding there was a unique 689 00:43:51,760 --> 00:43:53,920 weather situation that I described in my Mississippi 690 00:43:53,920 --> 00:43:55,800 book. Traveling down the Mississippi. 691 00:43:57,160 --> 00:44:01,080 There was a very unique weather set up that came that year, 692 00:44:01,080 --> 00:44:03,560 although it's becoming more and more common. 693 00:44:04,240 --> 00:44:08,800 There was a dip in the jet stream above us and was holding 694 00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:15,200 the storms about 50 miles off from the course of the river. 695 00:44:16,520 --> 00:44:21,200 But there were these pop up storms that would be generated 696 00:44:21,200 --> 00:44:24,240 by all the storms that were 50 miles away and we're driving 697 00:44:24,240 --> 00:44:27,560 along the river and also in this huge thunderstorm totally 698 00:44:27,560 --> 00:44:31,040 unpredicted nothing that was in the weather reports the night 699 00:44:31,040 --> 00:44:34,480 before whatever. And and then the big problem and 700 00:44:34,520 --> 00:44:38,240 and during those kind of storms you're going down the river on a 701 00:44:38,240 --> 00:44:42,120 boat, on a flat boat. It's more dangerous to try and 702 00:44:42,880 --> 00:44:45,520 land the boat on shore than it is to stay in the middle of the 703 00:44:45,520 --> 00:44:49,080 river. And so but I I didn't want to 704 00:44:49,080 --> 00:44:51,400 run into something and there were curves and everything along 705 00:44:51,400 --> 00:44:55,280 the river. So I just assumed the compass 706 00:44:55,280 --> 00:45:00,520 course, pointed the boat into the wind as much as I could and 707 00:45:01,480 --> 00:45:06,120 followed exactly what I saw just before the storm hit that 708 00:45:06,120 --> 00:45:08,840 compass course. And it was amazing how well we 709 00:45:08,840 --> 00:45:12,120 survived those so-called pop up storms and they were very 710 00:45:12,120 --> 00:45:17,120 violent and after a while I just became you know another storm 711 00:45:17,560 --> 00:45:20,880 stood. So it it, it just seemed to me 712 00:45:20,880 --> 00:45:29,360 that there is in kind of the kind of the DNA of Americans 713 00:45:29,960 --> 00:45:35,440 coping mechanisms that we learned during conditions which 714 00:45:35,440 --> 00:45:39,800 weren't necessarily caused by climate change, but they. 715 00:45:39,800 --> 00:45:43,920 Were caused but. They were impacts as severe as 716 00:45:43,920 --> 00:45:47,840 the climate change we're starting. 717 00:45:47,840 --> 00:45:50,320 To experience today. And that it's in our DNA. 718 00:45:50,320 --> 00:45:52,560 We we did that. There are coping make 719 00:45:52,560 --> 00:45:56,760 mechanisms, presumably, although it's easy to be a pessimist, 720 00:45:57,720 --> 00:46:00,680 presumably we really are going to bring on alternative energy 721 00:46:00,680 --> 00:46:04,400 and stop pumping all this carbon into the air, etcetera, and 722 00:46:04,400 --> 00:46:05,880 it'll take 50 years or something. 723 00:46:07,960 --> 00:46:08,520 Are you? Are you? 724 00:46:08,720 --> 00:46:14,640 Quasi adopting the Frederick Turner thesis to climate change 725 00:46:14,640 --> 00:46:17,040 here our I guess, has adopted us. 726 00:46:17,080 --> 00:46:19,960 To a culture. Of adaptation, Yeah. 727 00:46:19,960 --> 00:46:23,920 So you. So the so the Turner thesis was 728 00:46:23,920 --> 00:46:28,680 that everything in America is just a replay of the front of 729 00:46:28,680 --> 00:46:34,960 your ears. Yeah, I I I haven't. 730 00:46:35,400 --> 00:46:36,720 Exactly. Thought it through. 731 00:46:36,720 --> 00:46:40,080 But you're going along. You're crossing the plains in a 732 00:46:40,080 --> 00:46:43,800 covered wagon and you know the nearest town might be 30 or 40 733 00:46:43,800 --> 00:46:46,800 miles away. You're on your own. 734 00:46:47,120 --> 00:46:51,000 It's it's it's just your own ingenuity and resourcefulness is 735 00:46:51,880 --> 00:46:56,880 keeping you alive and. Suddenly, a real bad storm 736 00:46:56,880 --> 00:46:58,840 comes. Up and similar experience on the 737 00:46:59,080 --> 00:47:04,640 Mississippi River. And what struck me was, well, 738 00:47:04,640 --> 00:47:07,960 you know, everybody's panicked about climate change and we're 739 00:47:07,960 --> 00:47:09,640 going to go through all this hell. 740 00:47:09,640 --> 00:47:11,920 We're going to have coastal flooding, you know, because of 741 00:47:11,920 --> 00:47:14,120 the rise of the water levels and so forth. 742 00:47:15,120 --> 00:47:18,480 And it's going to be uncomfortable and maybe even 743 00:47:18,480 --> 00:47:23,640 tragic. And then I just yeah. 744 00:47:23,640 --> 00:47:24,960 But I mean, I just got caught in the most. 745 00:47:24,960 --> 00:47:28,320 Violent thunderstorm of my life. I had to move to high ground. 746 00:47:28,320 --> 00:47:34,120 I had to drive 3 mules and two wagons, you know, you know, half 747 00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:39,920 mile away up to higher ground. So we didn't get flooded and I 748 00:47:39,920 --> 00:47:46,840 coped and The Pioneers coped. Now it was a much less complex 749 00:47:46,840 --> 00:47:54,160 world then, I suppose, but for some reason it just it gave me 750 00:47:54,160 --> 00:47:56,720 hope. And it also gave me a notion 751 00:47:56,720 --> 00:48:02,720 that that there were prototypes for this experience and we can 752 00:48:02,720 --> 00:48:08,040 rely on those prototypes. I have mixed feelings on it. 753 00:48:08,520 --> 00:48:13,760 On the one hand, I like that humans are less exposed to 754 00:48:13,960 --> 00:48:17,080 extreme climate events than ever before in history, just in terms 755 00:48:17,080 --> 00:48:19,760 of development and and our material safety. 756 00:48:20,480 --> 00:48:22,680 On the other hand, I really like about your books because your 757 00:48:22,680 --> 00:48:25,520 journeys force you to notice things and to be an active 758 00:48:25,520 --> 00:48:27,920 participant in your environment, more than just caring about the 759 00:48:27,920 --> 00:48:30,120 weather for, oh, it's going to rain today, I should change my 760 00:48:30,120 --> 00:48:32,240 jacket. Like, it actually influences the 761 00:48:32,240 --> 00:48:34,880 course of major decisions in both books of what actually 762 00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:37,000 going to happen and how to remain safe and to be aware of 763 00:48:37,000 --> 00:48:39,720 your surroundings like that. I think that noticing is 764 00:48:39,720 --> 00:48:42,680 actually a really important thing beyond just a practical 765 00:48:42,680 --> 00:48:45,240 adaptation. I think spiritually it's a good 766 00:48:45,240 --> 00:48:48,200 thing to be plugged into how the world around you is actually 767 00:48:48,200 --> 00:48:51,200 still very wild and how you actually need to pay attention 768 00:48:51,200 --> 00:48:52,200 to it. It's not something you can just 769 00:48:52,200 --> 00:48:53,800 take for granted for stability sake. 770 00:48:54,080 --> 00:48:56,920 That's in some ways an illusion. And also, even if it were not an 771 00:48:56,920 --> 00:48:59,800 illusion, I think there are good spiritual reasons for wanting to 772 00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:01,440 pay attention to it or needing to pay attention to it. 773 00:49:01,440 --> 00:49:04,360 I think that it would be good for us not to forget that, Yes, 774 00:49:04,360 --> 00:49:08,280 and it would be. What what taking those trips 775 00:49:08,440 --> 00:49:11,600 reminded me of, and what the books are really about, is 776 00:49:13,080 --> 00:49:14,640 start. Noticing things. 777 00:49:15,040 --> 00:49:18,280 Noticing things? I mean, you know, is the grass 778 00:49:18,280 --> 00:49:22,480 long here or is it short? Are the wildflowers here? 779 00:49:22,480 --> 00:49:26,320 Is it? Has the emerald ash borer gotten 780 00:49:26,320 --> 00:49:29,040 to this part of the country or not? 781 00:49:29,720 --> 00:49:32,760 And by notice and and and you you have to do that when you're 782 00:49:32,760 --> 00:49:34,760 on a covered wagon trip or flatboat trip down to 783 00:49:34,760 --> 00:49:38,280 Mississippi because that's the physical environment you're in. 784 00:49:38,280 --> 00:49:40,920 You're not in a big tall skyscraper somewhere protected 785 00:49:41,360 --> 00:49:44,400 and sort of isolated away from nature. 786 00:49:45,240 --> 00:49:48,520 You're not in an air conditioned car etcetera and so. 787 00:49:51,840 --> 00:49:53,400 You have to notice. Those things. 788 00:49:53,400 --> 00:49:54,720 Because that's your environment now. 789 00:49:54,720 --> 00:49:58,640 You know, Covered Wagon, you're pretty much exposed to the whole 790 00:49:58,680 --> 00:50:01,320 environment. Another thing that people need 791 00:50:01,320 --> 00:50:03,880 to appreciate and I think you get from my books, and I have a 792 00:50:03,880 --> 00:50:06,880 big long screed about this in my Mississippi River book. 793 00:50:06,880 --> 00:50:08,280 There are several screeds though so. 794 00:50:08,760 --> 00:50:10,800 Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. 795 00:50:12,600 --> 00:50:16,520 Is. We depend on what we consider 796 00:50:16,520 --> 00:50:19,560 normal. Life is extraordinary luxury. 797 00:50:20,120 --> 00:50:23,800 And we and we we don't need it. OK, Everyone said you'll never 798 00:50:23,800 --> 00:50:27,400 make it down to Mississippi. You're gonna die because the sun 799 00:50:27,400 --> 00:50:29,320 is too scorching. This, that and the other thing, 800 00:50:30,240 --> 00:50:33,120 well, it's both when you get out on the when you get out on the 801 00:50:33,120 --> 00:50:36,520 water, there's always a breeze out there you're moving along, 802 00:50:37,200 --> 00:50:42,240 etcetera, etcetera. And at night it was it was 803 00:50:42,240 --> 00:50:45,840 always possible to find kind of a breezy area or some kind of 804 00:50:45,840 --> 00:50:49,720 place where you could survive the mosquitoes and the heat and 805 00:50:49,720 --> 00:50:58,240 all that stuff. You know if if you know nature 806 00:50:58,240 --> 00:51:00,360 calls and you have to take a crap in the woods, you do it. 807 00:51:00,480 --> 00:51:05,800 You know this fetish that we have of you know, you know, 808 00:51:07,440 --> 00:51:15,080 sanitary, you know luxuriant conditions is is not necessary. 809 00:51:15,080 --> 00:51:20,520 We're taking the the resources we have, which are finite and 810 00:51:20,520 --> 00:51:22,840 applying them to all kinds of things. 811 00:51:24,760 --> 00:51:28,160 I mean I just just was reading about these stupid data centers 812 00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,360 you know, which they need to keep all these video games going 813 00:51:31,360 --> 00:51:33,960 and everything. Well, it's ridiculous. 814 00:51:34,040 --> 00:51:37,440 I mean they're they're polluting rural areas of the country. 815 00:51:37,440 --> 00:51:40,760 They're they're located along rivers because they need the 816 00:51:40,760 --> 00:51:44,760 water for the coolness, etcetera. 817 00:51:44,840 --> 00:51:48,560 And for what? For some kids staring at a video 818 00:51:48,560 --> 00:51:50,680 game on a cell phone. I I don't get it. 819 00:51:50,720 --> 00:51:52,840 You know, that kid should be rebuilding a Piper Cub. 820 00:51:52,920 --> 00:51:55,560 In his barn, he should be rebuilding a Piper Cub or? 821 00:51:56,000 --> 00:51:58,520 You know, I I live in Amish country and I go out every day 822 00:51:58,520 --> 00:52:02,920 after I finish. Writing and I cut firewood. 823 00:52:02,960 --> 00:52:08,000 Stuff like that, yeah, there's just we. 824 00:52:08,000 --> 00:52:11,480 What happens when you take a trip like this is you realize 825 00:52:12,080 --> 00:52:15,560 that there are deeper pleasures and deeper enjoyments, deeper 826 00:52:15,560 --> 00:52:22,440 luxuries in life that don't include all the sort of physical 827 00:52:22,440 --> 00:52:27,520 pampering that we seemed that we surround ourselves with and and 828 00:52:27,920 --> 00:52:33,360 you know, but the the biggest thing is just being aware. 829 00:52:33,720 --> 00:52:37,520 See what's happening around you. That's that's what these trips 830 00:52:37,520 --> 00:52:40,680 taught me. Sure, there are many parts where 831 00:52:40,680 --> 00:52:43,000 you. Maybe not considered quitting, 832 00:52:43,000 --> 00:52:45,520 but fantasized about being somewhere more comfortable. 833 00:52:45,520 --> 00:52:48,600 But I'm sure, now that it's fully behind you, the memories 834 00:52:48,600 --> 00:52:51,520 of those trips, even if you hadn't written books that were 835 00:52:51,520 --> 00:52:53,840 part of your career, might still make it worth it. 836 00:52:53,840 --> 00:52:56,240 Because how many how many people get to do something like this? 837 00:52:56,400 --> 00:52:58,120 I'm sure parts of it were extremely difficult, and you 838 00:52:58,120 --> 00:53:01,200 document many of them, but I'm sure you're glad that you did 839 00:53:01,200 --> 00:53:04,000 them right. Yes, and and one thing. 840 00:53:04,000 --> 00:53:07,120 Is, Is. You shouldn't. 841 00:53:07,120 --> 00:53:12,280 Over plan it and you. Shouldn't, you know, sit around 842 00:53:12,280 --> 00:53:14,560 and come up with lists and everything. 843 00:53:15,360 --> 00:53:18,120 Basically, if you read my books, you see I just, I just left. 844 00:53:18,280 --> 00:53:20,480 You know, there's like, there's Deus Ex Machina. 845 00:53:20,640 --> 00:53:22,600 Just helping you out all over the place. 846 00:53:22,600 --> 00:53:25,840 Seemingly just things fall into place and the world. 847 00:53:26,600 --> 00:53:30,200 Is more receptive and gracious out there than you expect. 848 00:53:30,440 --> 00:53:32,840 Now of course, the the way I'm traveling, everybody wants to 849 00:53:32,840 --> 00:53:35,560 help you and you get quite a fan base going. 850 00:53:35,560 --> 00:53:41,480 But to ask yourself, oh, how am I ever going to make this? 851 00:53:41,480 --> 00:53:44,320 I mean, you know, take it away. A covered wagon across the Rocky 852 00:53:44,320 --> 00:53:48,760 Mountains is. A bitch, you know it's. 853 00:53:48,760 --> 00:53:54,320 Difficult and but each day is just, oh, we just got to get 854 00:53:54,320 --> 00:53:57,160 over that place, to this place and the next place. 855 00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:02,760 You just have to have a a sense of abandoned. 856 00:54:02,760 --> 00:54:06,200 And I'm no longer living in a culture where I have to have a 857 00:54:06,200 --> 00:54:11,480 permit for everything you know. One of the trips. 858 00:54:11,480 --> 00:54:17,520 That I did as I rode my my bike from Phoenix to Los Angeles a 859 00:54:17,520 --> 00:54:19,920 long time ago and it was a 10 day trip. 860 00:54:19,920 --> 00:54:23,720 I did, you know self supported by myself and the part that I 861 00:54:23,720 --> 00:54:25,880 most did you come across. Did you come across death? 862 00:54:25,880 --> 00:54:27,960 Valley on that route, I did. I didn't. 863 00:54:28,040 --> 00:54:29,280 I didn't go to death. Valley route? 864 00:54:29,640 --> 00:54:31,760 No, but I I wasn't super far from it either. 865 00:54:32,160 --> 00:54:35,840 I ended up going like the 29 palms north of Joshua Tree way. 866 00:54:35,880 --> 00:54:40,240 But I love that I just had to make my miles and not get hit by 867 00:54:40,240 --> 00:54:42,520 a car. And that's where my mind was. 868 00:54:42,520 --> 00:54:45,520 I wasn't thinking about I could also be reading a book or 869 00:54:45,520 --> 00:54:48,680 writing something or seeking another job or I. 870 00:54:49,160 --> 00:54:52,240 My all I did was not die and keep going. 871 00:54:52,240 --> 00:54:54,560 And I felt like we don't have a lot of places where we're not 872 00:54:54,560 --> 00:54:56,840 being distracted in that way. I think that's really a powerful 873 00:54:56,840 --> 00:54:59,680 good thing for for me, at least. You know what you have to do is 874 00:54:59,680 --> 00:55:02,600 not die and keep. Going and conquer whatever 875 00:55:02,600 --> 00:55:05,640 problems you had, like, you know you plant for water here, it 876 00:55:05,640 --> 00:55:06,800 wasn't there. What are you going to do 877 00:55:07,040 --> 00:55:08,600 exactly? Yeah, all you have to do. 878 00:55:08,600 --> 00:55:11,400 Is. Solve contingencies, not die. 879 00:55:11,400 --> 00:55:15,880 And keep going for 10 days, OK? And next thing you know you're 880 00:55:15,880 --> 00:55:20,880 in LA you know? So yeah, I just think we live 881 00:55:20,880 --> 00:55:28,080 lives to insulated by luxury and what these trips taught me and 882 00:55:29,640 --> 00:55:31,160 I'm. I'm I'm going to go on another. 883 00:55:31,160 --> 00:55:33,320 One I'm building building a wagon now. 884 00:55:35,280 --> 00:55:36,960 I was going to ask you, I'm. Like, surely you've got. 885 00:55:36,960 --> 00:55:38,360 Something up your sleeve? How could you not? 886 00:55:38,360 --> 00:55:40,120 Well, I got something else up my sleeve that I'm. 887 00:55:40,120 --> 00:55:41,320 Doing now I'm writing. I'm. 888 00:55:41,360 --> 00:55:45,160 I'm writing a new book about all my experiences over the years 889 00:55:45,400 --> 00:55:47,480 with a very similar group of people which is the Amish and 890 00:55:47,480 --> 00:55:49,640 the Mennonites and they still live that very simple way. 891 00:55:50,120 --> 00:55:54,280 But no, I'm building. In the old days you'd call it a 892 00:55:54,280 --> 00:55:57,160 gypsy wagon, but my kids tell me that we can't use the word gypsy 893 00:55:57,160 --> 00:56:00,160 anymore. So I'm calling it an Irish 894 00:56:00,160 --> 00:56:04,520 traveler's wagon. But it's it's sort of. 895 00:56:04,520 --> 00:56:07,400 A domestic wagon it'd be. Pulled by three mules and it'll. 896 00:56:09,960 --> 00:56:12,120 It's got a bed in it. And a wood stove. 897 00:56:12,360 --> 00:56:15,240 I'll have a little insulation in there and I can probably live 898 00:56:15,240 --> 00:56:17,160 almost year round in most parts of the country. 899 00:56:18,200 --> 00:56:20,960 And I'm it's being built by the Amish for me in Tennessee. 900 00:56:21,680 --> 00:56:24,760 And I'm going to take it. I want to. 901 00:56:24,760 --> 00:56:27,920 I've never seen the whooping crane and sandhill crane 902 00:56:28,080 --> 00:56:31,680 migration along the Platte River at Grand Isle Nebraska. 903 00:56:31,680 --> 00:56:35,360 I want to see that I have friends in Red Lodge Mt. 904 00:56:35,360 --> 00:56:36,000 I love. I love. 905 00:56:36,160 --> 00:56:40,920 I love that area of Montana. So I'll get up there so that you 906 00:56:40,920 --> 00:56:48,760 know like Middle Tennessee to. The Abzarka Mountains in. 907 00:56:49,040 --> 00:56:53,600 Montana over a period of a couple years, maybe three years. 908 00:56:54,120 --> 00:56:57,360 I'm just going to do it just, you know, I don't even have any 909 00:56:57,360 --> 00:57:00,480 idea for a book about it. Just just go. 910 00:57:00,480 --> 00:57:03,040 And see what happens. And see how I survive. 911 00:57:03,040 --> 00:57:08,520 And you know I've got the team of mules assembled and I'm all 912 00:57:08,520 --> 00:57:13,320 I'm all set for that and and I guess what the earlier trips 913 00:57:13,320 --> 00:57:17,240 have taught me is you know, don't worry just go you know you 914 00:57:17,240 --> 00:57:21,720 just got to go you know and and your protections and everything 915 00:57:21,720 --> 00:57:26,600 you need. Defines itself as you go along. 916 00:57:26,680 --> 00:57:31,880 And I I think, I think that's what we're going to see with 917 00:57:31,920 --> 00:57:36,080 climate change. You know, it's, I don't think 918 00:57:36,080 --> 00:57:40,800 it's a smart thing anymore for people to buy beach houses. 919 00:57:41,040 --> 00:57:43,160 And I don't think ecologically it's a good thing. 920 00:57:43,560 --> 00:57:49,680 And the government is finally taking away one of the 921 00:57:49,680 --> 00:57:51,440 incentives, which is cheap insurance. 922 00:57:51,440 --> 00:57:58,120 We had government, government subsidized insurance coverage. 923 00:57:59,000 --> 00:58:01,840 Well, that's slowly going away and it should go away. 924 00:58:01,840 --> 00:58:03,560 We shouldn't. But we shouldn't be building 925 00:58:04,200 --> 00:58:06,320 along our coast. We shouldn't, you know. 926 00:58:06,320 --> 00:58:10,760 And in California, they build, you know, on sand, so the cliffs 927 00:58:10,760 --> 00:58:12,400 overlooking the water. Well, it looks beautiful. 928 00:58:12,400 --> 00:58:15,520 I guess it's nice to wake up in the morning and see Pacific 929 00:58:15,520 --> 00:58:18,880 Ocean. But why are we doing that? 930 00:58:18,880 --> 00:58:22,320 It doesn't make sense and it causes a lot of damage. 931 00:58:22,760 --> 00:58:27,360 So I think what's gonna happen is people are gonna learn to 932 00:58:27,360 --> 00:58:31,400 cope with things like rising sea levels. 933 00:58:34,240 --> 00:58:35,880 I don't know. How we're gonna cope with? 934 00:58:36,200 --> 00:58:39,520 The fact that we're depleting the aquifers underneath the 935 00:58:39,520 --> 00:58:44,800 earth, mainly for agriculture at alarming rates. 936 00:58:47,320 --> 00:58:54,640 But I have hope that I guess from taking these trips I I have 937 00:58:54,640 --> 00:58:58,600 hope that you can encounter almost any circumstances, learn 938 00:58:58,600 --> 00:59:03,320 from it and get past it. So you know I. 939 00:59:03,320 --> 00:59:04,600 Guess that's where my head is at, I think. 940 00:59:05,560 --> 00:59:09,360 That's a good place to be. As we're coming close to the 941 00:59:09,400 --> 00:59:12,000 end, I want to ask you one more big question that hopefully 942 00:59:12,000 --> 00:59:15,080 won't, won't open up too enormous of an answer. 943 00:59:15,080 --> 00:59:19,280 But I think you had a a really both books put you in a position 944 00:59:19,280 --> 00:59:24,040 to understand and experience the United States in a very unique 945 00:59:24,120 --> 00:59:26,320 way. I think you do a good job of not 946 00:59:26,320 --> 00:59:31,960 being, you know, observant of its faults but also celebratory 947 00:59:31,960 --> 00:59:33,960 of it. I think you walk a a very 948 00:59:33,960 --> 00:59:36,600 correct the kind of line because there's a version of this that 949 00:59:36,600 --> 00:59:40,400 is propagandizing or so critical that we're just rotten to the 950 00:59:40,400 --> 00:59:42,200 core and there's no redemption possible. 951 00:59:43,320 --> 00:59:44,600 Are you hopeful about? The. 952 00:59:44,720 --> 00:59:46,880 Trajectory of the I'm not even talking about the election. 953 00:59:46,880 --> 00:59:49,960 I I mean that we're as a country are we? 954 00:59:50,880 --> 00:59:54,520 Are we living up to or in the in the hopes of living up to what 955 00:59:54,520 --> 00:59:57,520 we see that set out as our goals or our values or not really, 956 00:59:58,600 --> 01:00:01,000 well, one of the. Things that you notice very 957 01:00:01,000 --> 01:00:04,640 heavily when you take a trip, OK, across the Oregon Trail, 958 01:00:04,640 --> 01:00:08,920 which kind of cuts through open, beautiful country away from 959 01:00:08,920 --> 01:00:12,000 civilization. And the places where it crosses 960 01:00:12,000 --> 01:00:17,400 civilization tend to be nice towns or whatever. 961 01:00:17,480 --> 01:00:20,520 Or the Mississippi River, which is kind of like railroad tracks, 962 01:00:20,520 --> 01:00:21,720 you know, they're away from everything. 963 01:00:21,720 --> 01:00:26,680 You get a different perspective, but one of the sensation that 964 01:00:26,680 --> 01:00:30,320 overwhelms you a lot is. You know, all of this stuff 965 01:00:30,320 --> 01:00:33,040 that's happening in Los Angeles, New York City and Washington, 966 01:00:33,640 --> 01:00:38,960 You know, all these debates over migration and and global warming 967 01:00:38,960 --> 01:00:44,080 and taxation and this, that it doesn't affect you when you're 968 01:00:44,080 --> 01:00:45,880 way out here. It's not a part of life. 969 01:00:45,880 --> 01:00:49,760 Way out here, people are still running their farms, running 970 01:00:49,760 --> 01:00:54,480 their ranches. So you can get lulled into a a 971 01:00:54,480 --> 01:01:00,200 totally local based on nature mentality of just what you're 972 01:01:00,200 --> 01:01:04,240 seeing that day. And in the end you realize the 973 01:01:04,240 --> 01:01:08,080 politics are they don't really matter that much. 974 01:01:08,080 --> 01:01:11,080 The politics. You know, what is the real 975 01:01:11,080 --> 01:01:14,920 difference between Democratic policy and Republican policy on 976 01:01:14,920 --> 01:01:16,280 this? That or the other thing. 977 01:01:17,000 --> 01:01:22,960 So. My perspective to answer. 978 01:01:22,960 --> 01:01:26,400 Your question is distorted. I've removed myself from all 979 01:01:26,400 --> 01:01:31,720 that and realize that all the political battles raging in 980 01:01:31,720 --> 01:01:35,640 Washington and New York, LA, whatever, they're not 981 01:01:35,640 --> 01:01:42,800 necessarily a part of the life you lead deep in the natural fly 982 01:01:42,800 --> 01:01:46,760 over country. So it's easy to be helpful. 983 01:01:47,120 --> 01:01:55,160 It's easy to be helpful and. Yes, I I I am. 984 01:01:55,160 --> 01:01:57,240 Hopeful though, but it is appalling. 985 01:01:57,440 --> 01:02:01,160 It can be appalling when you get out there and realize. 986 01:02:04,080 --> 01:02:05,800 How little education there is. How? 987 01:02:05,800 --> 01:02:11,320 Little appreciation of how complex the cosmos is that 988 01:02:11,320 --> 01:02:19,120 people reflect on. So I'm hopeful, but I'm also 989 01:02:19,120 --> 01:02:20,680 spoiled. I've placed myself in 990 01:02:20,680 --> 01:02:23,880 environments where you can sort of ignore that all those 991 01:02:23,880 --> 01:02:26,400 problems are there. It's very. 992 01:02:26,400 --> 01:02:27,800 Romantic. It's very satisfying. 993 01:02:28,080 --> 01:02:30,280 Just sailing down a river in a simple wooden boat. 994 01:02:30,280 --> 01:02:36,040 Or plodding across the desert with mules, you know. 995 01:02:36,120 --> 01:02:39,400 Or plodding through beautiful farm country with mules you've 996 01:02:39,400 --> 01:02:43,360 kind of abstracted yourself from, although modern. 997 01:02:43,360 --> 01:02:49,280 Worries in a lot of ways. Where do you want someone? 998 01:02:49,360 --> 01:02:52,480 Listening to Track your stuff down, is it going to 999 01:02:52,480 --> 01:02:55,000 flatboatpatients.com? Is that where you'd want people 1000 01:02:55,000 --> 01:02:57,280 to go? They can. 1001 01:02:57,280 --> 01:03:05,680 Go to flatboatpatients.com, but I'm not that heavy big a a web 1002 01:03:05,680 --> 01:03:07,440 participant. No. 1003 01:03:07,440 --> 01:03:10,640 Go to Barnes and Noble or preferably your local 1004 01:03:10,640 --> 01:03:13,000 independent bookstore and just find the books. 1005 01:03:13,000 --> 01:03:16,760 The books are the the the books are what make the trip 1006 01:03:16,760 --> 01:03:18,920 significant. If I had taken a trip across the 1007 01:03:18,920 --> 01:03:23,640 Oregon Trail first in 100 years, that was authentic and just done 1008 01:03:23,640 --> 01:03:26,960 it it it wouldn't. It wouldn't exist any more than 1009 01:03:26,960 --> 01:03:31,520 a tree falling in a forest that no one hears exists. 1010 01:03:32,000 --> 01:03:36,520 But it's the book that dignifies. 1011 01:03:36,520 --> 01:03:39,880 The experience and. Makes it available to a wider 1012 01:03:39,880 --> 01:03:41,720 audience. No, I would say go find the 1013 01:03:41,720 --> 01:03:42,720 books. That's, that's the most 1014 01:03:42,720 --> 01:03:44,320 important thing. And I'm not saying that just to 1015 01:03:44,440 --> 01:03:48,440 sell books. I'm I'm saying is that there's a 1016 01:03:48,720 --> 01:03:54,080 great amount of integrity to the book experience and it's it's. 1017 01:03:57,400 --> 01:04:00,600 It it is the expression. Of one soul and one experience 1018 01:04:00,600 --> 01:04:03,720 that that that's very important. I'll tell you a story one one 1019 01:04:03,720 --> 01:04:06,760 thing, but people have to learn to be tangible and be immediate. 1020 01:04:07,320 --> 01:04:12,760 So my son, in his late 20s, was travelling in a very remote part 1021 01:04:12,760 --> 01:04:16,560 of Arizona because he participated in a group that 1022 01:04:16,560 --> 01:04:22,120 helps a group of Pueblo Indian, Pueblo and Hopi Indians out 1023 01:04:22,120 --> 01:04:24,760 there. And so he's. 1024 01:04:24,760 --> 01:04:27,240 Travelling along and they get. Out of cell phone range or 1025 01:04:27,240 --> 01:04:33,120 whatever, and the GPS is no longer accurate. 1026 01:04:33,120 --> 01:04:36,400 You know, GPS is saying. Travelling on road, you know? 1027 01:04:37,640 --> 01:04:41,120 So he pulls out of his backpack a map and says, oh, we're OK, We 1028 01:04:41,200 --> 01:04:44,640 we want to go along here. And then when we get to sort of 1029 01:04:44,640 --> 01:04:47,720 this intersection where we can see the river, we want to bear 1030 01:04:47,720 --> 01:04:51,360 NE a little bit. And the other Gen. 1031 01:04:51,360 --> 01:04:54,920 X type people who were along with him go like, boy, you're a 1032 01:04:54,920 --> 01:05:02,160 weirdo, you know, you, you know, I mean, who uses a map anymore? 1033 01:05:02,160 --> 01:05:03,880 Who? And I've talked to a few kids 1034 01:05:03,880 --> 01:05:08,400 about this and I I, you actually meet kids who go Oh yeah, I 1035 01:05:08,400 --> 01:05:10,760 wouldn't. I mean what is a map? 1036 01:05:10,960 --> 01:05:14,720 I I couldn't read a map and of course it seems so simple to me. 1037 01:05:15,760 --> 01:05:21,080 But my son, I guess largely through being exposed to me and 1038 01:05:21,080 --> 01:05:26,560 the kind of events I would expose him to, knew how to take 1039 01:05:26,560 --> 01:05:31,800 a map and tangibly connect it to the surroundings that are going 1040 01:05:31,800 --> 01:05:37,240 by you in the car. And what a lot of this 1041 01:05:37,240 --> 01:05:40,440 automation and digitalization and everything, you know, the 1042 01:05:40,440 --> 01:05:45,600 GPS says, turn right on this, such and such a road and in 500 1043 01:05:45,600 --> 01:05:48,880 feet, you know. And and you're just looking at 1044 01:05:48,880 --> 01:05:50,760 that screen. Your your relationship is to the 1045 01:05:50,760 --> 01:05:52,960 screen now. It's not to the actual natural 1046 01:05:52,960 --> 01:05:56,480 surroundings you have. So the best thing people can do 1047 01:05:57,320 --> 01:06:02,480 is, as I said before, get in touch, you know, observe what's 1048 01:06:02,480 --> 01:06:04,720 out there, you know. And fortunately, we're still 1049 01:06:04,720 --> 01:06:06,600 surrounded by nature, and there's a lot to observe. 1050 01:06:08,160 --> 01:06:10,960 I think it's good advice. I love your books. 1051 01:06:11,080 --> 01:06:14,520 I would even revisit them, which is not true for many books that 1052 01:06:14,520 --> 01:06:16,520 I read. There are also audiobook 1053 01:06:16,520 --> 01:06:18,680 versions that are quite good too, if you prefer that. 1054 01:06:19,200 --> 01:06:20,520 Well, they can listen to the audio, yeah. 1055 01:06:21,160 --> 01:06:23,800 Yeah, Thanks for being here. Winker I know you took a little 1056 01:06:23,800 --> 01:06:27,520 bit of a flyer doing a show like this, but I'm glad that we were 1057 01:06:27,520 --> 01:06:30,120 able to chat. No, it was it. 1058 01:06:30,240 --> 01:06:35,000 It it is great to chat and good luck with it and I don't know, 1059 01:06:35,000 --> 01:06:36,520 I'll do another book someday. We'll do it again. 1060 01:06:37,120 --> 01:06:42,160 That'd be great. Thank you so much for listening. 1061 01:06:42,240 --> 01:06:43,560 If you. Could please subscribe and give 1062 01:06:43,560 --> 01:06:46,320 us a great rating and review on Apple podcast or a rating on 1063 01:06:46,320 --> 01:06:48,280 Spotify? That'd be much appreciated. 1064 01:06:48,600 --> 01:06:50,480 It helps us get our content out to more people. 1065 01:06:50,760 --> 01:06:53,320 You can sign up for our newsletter at nori.com, follow 1066 01:06:53,320 --> 01:06:55,520 us on social media, and we will catch you next time.