Whenever I find something I like, my brain pursues it to the maximum. I have never been the ultimate best at anything, but I have excelled well beyond average in everything I actively pursued.
I have enormous curiosity about everything. Why do things work the way they do? Coupled with great drive, I think I could excel at almost anything I try. Having Asperger’s is key to my success.
People with Asperger’s syndrome are well known for having special areas of interest. I suppose that is what I do when pursuing my passions.
However, with many of my past passions, I frequently eventually give them up and forget about them completely. For example, I have not played duplicate bridge since 1995, have virtually not golfed since 1999, and have now not taken a photograph since 2006. I have now not sea kayaked since 2017, but have plans for several trips when home in 2021. I hadn’t been diving since 2015, but repeated my Advanced Open Water when I was in Egypt in 2021. After diving in some of the best places in the world, it will take being in some exceptional places to restart.
They have been replaced with my website and travel. I hope to restart using an SLR camera when I finally retire from travel. Art was a reaction to being home for 1 1/2 years in the first part of Covid. I will probably not take it up again until I finish my active travel when I plan on spending my winters in Mexico.
HIKING, WALKING and LOVE OF NATURE
Hiking is the one activity I’ve done for most of my adult life and have never given up, as I have with most of my other passions (photography, bridge, golf).
As a family, I was never exposed to outdoor life by my parents. However, every day in the summers of my childhood, my brother and neighbourhood friends hiked across the prairie to a coulee with a creek lined with trees. We fished, swam, ate beans and sardines out of a can, and relished the time outdoors. My mother didn’t even know where we were. That area near Medicine Hat was eventually developed into a par-three golf course.
I read the then bible on hiking, Colin Fletchers, “The Complete Backpacker”. Upon graduation from university, I went to a local mountaineering store and purchased a complete set of backpacking gear – tent, sleeping bag, pad, stove, backpack, and enormous, heavy hiking boots.
My very first hike was with my brother and his friends from Medicine Hat to the Cypress Hills. The prairie looks dull but in fact, is alive with life. I left those big hiking boots at a ranch.
Waterton NP and Glacier NP, Montana. My wife’s family owned a large cabin in Waterton National Park. I spent some time there every summer for the next 17 years. On my very first hike, I carried our infant daughter on my back to Bertha Lake. Over those almost two decades, I explored every nook and cranny of Waterton, possibly the smallest national park in Canada, and ventured often into neighbouring Glacier National Park across the border in Montana. I climbed every mountain and walked every ridge in Waterton, often alone. With the blessing of the Waterton Natural History Association, I placed registers in plastic plumbing tubes on most mountains. I wrote a book on off-trail hiking in Waterton. It was never published as the park administration was not keen on people going everywhere. They wanted to keep parts of the park unvisited. If you go to the Hiking page of my website, I give rough summaries of my favourite hikes – a few are the classic hiking trails described in books written about Waterton. Most are off-trail adventures that few people do.
When my middle son was old enough, I sometimes dragged him along. At the time, he was probably the youngest person to summit Mt Cleveland, the highest mountain in Glacier, and one most accessible from the Canadian side of the International Peace Park. We went on a few backpacking adventures involving climbing every mountain along the way and even ventured once on an off-trail epic that took us to the remote spot where the continental divide formed by the Rocky Mountains meets the 49th parallel. I doubt few others have ever been there. On that trip, we camped at a lake where other backpackers were fishing. That is what he wanted to do. By the age of ten, I had already “burnt” him out, and he rarely hiked with me again. Instead, he fished and as a teenager, we bought him a good hunting rifle and he went with other fathers to shoot animals. I don’t like fishing or hunting.
Vancouver Island. After graduation when interning on Vancouver Island, I did the West Coast trail alone experiencing it before the boardwalk was placed over the bogs and ladders built to access the creeks. I finished the trail in 3 ½ days, twice as fast are most people take.
I backpacked to Della Falls, a trip that started with a long canoe trip. I also went on two epic backpacking trips in Olympic National Park in Washington State alone. I climbed Mt Rainier. I went on a climbing expedition in Mexico to climb Popicetalquestal and Orizaba, the highest mountain in Mexico.
Other than access to the high places, I avoided anything with trees. I always wanted the big view and loved one of the windiest places on earth.
West Kootenay. My first and only job was in the West Kootenay of south/central British Columbia. I met my two lifelong friends as patients and together we hiked whenever feasible. I joined the Kootenay Mountaineering Club and was exposed to all elements of mountain travel – rock climbing, rope management, and glacier travel. I went to 22 hiking camps seeing remote places not accessible except by helicopter throughout the Rockies and the Columbia Mountains. I started the register program by placing plastic plumbing tubes on summits.
I organized 13, four-day adventures over the Labour Day weekend with my best friends.
I also belonged to the Alpine Club of Canada and went on six of their tremendous adventures (Rockies Panorama Traverse, Wapta Icefield, climbing in Lake O’Hare, Mt Assiniboine, and climbing in the Bugaboos [Pigeon Spire, Brenta Spire, and Crescent Spire). See: http://www.ronperrier.net/hiking-3/
Southwest USA. I have gone on 37 trips to the desert southwest of the US. Because the perfect season to go there is in our shoulder seasons in the spring and fall, I went at least twice a year mostly to the Colorado Plateau, that area of SW Colorado, NW New Mexico, northern Arizona, and primarily southern Utah. 300 canyons empty into the Colorado River giving endless adventuring possibilities. I could still do another ten or so trips if I stopped repeating my favourites. I have walked on almost every trail in all six National Parks and been to possibly the most beautiful place in the world, Coyote Buttes, nine times. I’ve kayaked 180 miles of the Green River and explored Lake Powell by kayak five times.
Some trips ventured into California to see Yosemite, Death Valley, and many more places. The best adventure trip in the world is rafting the Grand Canyon (220 miles, 14 days, countless rapids, and great hiking every day). See: http://www.ronperrier.net/2012/10/06/desert-southwest-usa/
Some of my other memorable trips: Mt Rainier and Whitney (2 highest mountains in the lower 48), Mts Popocatepetl, Itzacihuatl and Orizaba (3 highest mountains in Mexico and the highest I’ve ever been), the W trek in Torres del Paine (Patagonia), all nine Great Walks in New Zealand, Santa Cruz trek and the Inca Trail in Peru, and 2,000 kilometres of the Camino de Santiago (Via Podensis, Camino Frances, Camino Portuguese).
In BC, I’ve done some great backpacking trips: Berg Lake in Mt Robson NP, Rock Wall trail in Kootenay National Park, West Coast Trail twice, Juan de Fuca Trail, and Cape Scott Trail.
Go to my website to see lists of my favourite backpacking and day trips: http://www.ronperrier.net/2012/10/06/favourite-hiking-trips/
I find walking and connecting to nature my spiritual adventure. It is a meditative experience.
Over five months I pursued one of my long-time dreams, to write a book on hiking and climbing in the West Kootenay. Produced on my website, it became an encyclopedic description of every hike ever done by the Kootenay Mountaineering Club and remains unfinished with no maps. This is another job I need to finish.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Joining a camera club is the best way to learn how to use a camera. I belonged to the West Kootenay Camera Club for over 20 years. I read every book I could on photography subscribed to several magazines and knew every technical element of using an SLR camera. I also have a very good eye for taking good pictures. I only shot Fuji Velvia slide film and rarely took a picture off a tripod. My forte was taking pictures using hyperfocal techniques and half-grad filters to control contrast. I competed regularly winning Best Picture twice and many honorable mentions at the annual Abbotsford Photo Arts seminar.
My original goal in retirement was to write a book on photographic technique but abandoned that idea.
I have now not taken a picture in over 15 years. It simply takes too much time and energy to take good photos and I can’t stand taking snapshots. I quit when digital came along. Almost every photo now is rigged in Photoshop and leaves as much to computer technique as actually learning how to use a camera.
Not taking pictures has made travel so much easier – no camera gear to lug around or get stolen, no discarding photos, no editing or emailing. I now see things for visual memory rather than through a rectangular frame. It is much more gratifying.
I doubt that 1% of most photographers could name the primary f-stops or understand contrast and how to control it. The composition consists of centring everything.
I have over $20,000 worth of the best lenses and tripods sitting in a box in my apartment. I believe I will start again when I finally retire from international travel.
BRIDGE
The Perrier family always played a lot of cards. It was our way of socializing in the evenings sitting around a table playing for small stakes (not poker). My father thought he was the best cribbage player in the world. I only enjoy hearts and bridge, both requiring counting cards and skill.
I think bridge is the most complicated game in the world (Go and chess players might disagree) as it involves three connected but different strategies – bidding, the play of the hand, and defence. I started playing bridge in the late ’70s. My bridge ability took off when I read 2/1 Game Force by Max Hardy and I finally understood bidding. With Hubert Hunchak, we played in 40 tournaments in our first year and each won our categories in the American Contract Bridge League in Canada. At the Kimberly Sectional, we won every event. My one major win was the Open Swiss at the Calgary Regional where I played with a woman from New York City.
With my wife, we travelled all over the northwest playing in sectionals (weekend tournaments), regionals (6-day tournaments), and the occasional nationals (10-day tournaments). I acquired over 1300 master points. I eventually lost interest in bridge and played golf where ever we travelled. I kibitzed more than played (what other game can you sit behind some of the best players in the world and watch them play). Our large bridge library was an issue in our divorce (I lost).
I still play online bridge (Bridge Base Online) with players from all over the world and enjoy the challenge immensely. Maybe I will start playing bridge again in my old age.
Now I enjoy playing Yaniv, a simple Israeli card game that is a lot of fun. See the rules of games commonly played on the road including Yaniv, Shithead, and Asshole on my Travel page.
GOLF
I played at the Connaught Golf Club in Medicine Hat as a teenager (we could walk there across Kin Coulee from home) and developed a swing and muscle memory. After I moved to Castlegar and joined the Castlegar Golf Club, golf became my driving passion. It didn’t take many years to acquire a low handicap – I generally played to a 4 handicap and occasionally got to a 2, but that was difficult to maintain. I read everything I could and learned to play out of books and magazines. I never took a lesson and still understand the swing well to be able to fix errors on the go. Castlegar was the best course to refine the technique as there are few flat lies.
Playing well requires a lot of practice – hitting on the range 3-4 times a week, chipping, and putting. I learned how to hit controlled draws and fades. I dislike using a cart and have always carried my clubs.
I played in the British Columbia Amateur many times and only missed the cut once (surprisingly on my home course). I even played in the Canadian Amateur once but was totally outclassed. I was the club champion at Castlegar once and played in the Boyd Cup team for Castlegar many times which Castlegar dominated for many years. I had four very low rounds: 66 (Christina Lake), two 67’s (Castlegar), and a 67 at Trail, and still have those scorecards.
I purchased a life membership at Castlegar in 1989, one of the better investments of my life.
I played courses all over western North America. In one year, I played 40 different courses, spending a lot of money along the way. It is not unusual to have played several courses seen on golf on TV.
At Castlegar, I was chairman of course operations for a few years. We were named the number one public golf course in Canada by Golf Digest. The course still has the look I introduced reflecting the many courses I played.
I played in many BC Physician golf tournaments winning low gross three times. The prizes were two trips to Las Vegas and one to Montreal.
However, I only enjoy playing competitively and playing with a few like-minded guys. Golf is generally a social game played from a cart where you can carry a lot of beer. I didn’t fit in. After a round with members, you had to purchase a jug – after that, one could not help but be impaired. I have never drunk much after my teenage years and didn’t enjoy that aspect of golf. I was viewed as being cheap.
I made more than a few social errors, often after following foursomes whooping it up throughout the round. I became a social outcast at my own club with a reputation no one would envy. It was easily the most devastating social place I could be. Many members refused to my face to play with me.
I was asked by a group of high school friends to join them for a week of play at Kokanee Springs. They were the jocks in high school and it was fun to be a much better player than all of them. They only asked me once.
For this reason, I eventually lost interest in practicing and playing. I quit in 1999 with the excuse that if I could not play well, I would rather not play at all. Since I have used my life membership only a few times a year whenever I return to West Kootenay in the summer. I rarely break 80 and get disheartened, but still love the game.
Maybe when I retire, I will play more. I bought a new set of irons in 2020. I still only carry my clubs. It is a good way to improve fitness to hike.
SEA KAYAKING
I took a kayak tour to the Queen Charlottes and then bought my first kayak in 1999, a Current Designs fiberglass boat that is still the one I use. Sea kayaking became my next passion. It is not an activity to be taken lightly as mistakes can be life-endangering. I bought my second kayak (a tangerine Kevlar Current Designs) for any female partner I had. I also bought a collapsible double Feather-Craft, the best boat of its type in the world.
I took a 7-day kayak assistant’s guide course with Rainforest, a company based out of Tofino. It changed everything and I learned lots of techniques, refined my rescues, and taught me all aspects of navigation. Vancouver Island easily had the greatest variety of sea kayaking anywhere in the world. I went on many long expeditions with others and a few alone to explore some of the best places.
One spring, an American friend came to Vancouver Island where I had moved in 2010 and we had two epic adventures. The first was a 280km trip exploring everywhere in the Broughton Archipelago.
We then went to the Queen Charlottes to kayak in Haida Gwaii National Park. Starting at Moresby Camp at the far north end, we paddled to Ninstints, possibly the most iconic indigenous site in the world and a WHS site. It was abandoned in about 1890 on the heels of smallpox that eventually killed about 90% of the Haida, easily the most advanced of all northwest Indian tribes. It has the greatest number of original standing totem poles in the world. It is enchanting. Along the way, we stopped at all the old main villages manned by Haida watchmen. There are many large islands on the east side of Haida Gwaii and we encircled all of them on the way down and on the return. It was a 390km adventure over 13 days with about 9½ of actual paddling. After a day off for weather, we were up one morning at 3 with the intent to go as far as we could. After 60kms and only one break out of our boats, it was a gratifying day.
Our last campsite was at Cumshawh, the last village site of the Haida on the south part of the islands, and the only large village not manned by watchmen. We didn’t realize where we were until I noticed the four rotting corner posts of a longhouse where I had set up my tent. Further exploring found all the evidence of a village with totems and more longhouses. It was magical.
The next trip that spring was with an experienced couple from Lasqueti Island. It was equally energetic starting at Port Hardy and kayaking around Cape Scott, the north tip of Vancouver Island and a dangerous place to be in a boat. August often brings highs with strong northwesterly winds. We were wind-bound with 20-25 knot winds for 5 days. We sat it out on a lovely beach, hiked, relaxed, and ate. When the wind finally abated to 15 knots, we were off early. With huge following swells, we hit dense fog by 8 am and had to use GPS to navigate creating a real adventure. We finally abandoned the trip and paddled up to take out prematurely.
I’ve had numerous other kayaking adventures around Vancouver Island, including paddling all the Gulf Islands, Broken Group five times (the best kayaking place in the world), and a major trip to the South Brooks (including Kyukot and the Bunsby’s) and took out at Little Esperanza Inlet near Zeballos.
I then started 2 years of energetic travel and haven’t kayaked since.
Beach cleanups. BC Marine Trails has conducted many beach cleanups. The most aggressive was with 7 other groups to use the last of the $1 million provided by Japan to deal with the 2011 tsunami. I went with a group to the north Brooks, one of the wildest places on the west coast. 80 tons of marine debris were finally collected using a helicopter and a barge called the Garbarge. I was part of that 3-man crew, the result of aggressively trying to get the volunteer job. It ended up being one of the best experiences of my life – helicoptering across Vancouver Island three times and then down the entire west coast.
I have kayaked in New Zealand and the Sea of Cortez in Baja Mexico but would avoid virtually any tourist activity with inexperienced people who barely have a forward stroke.
With my final retirement, my bucket list has many kayak expeditions planned especially in the Baja. See: http://www.ronperrier.net/kayaking/
POLITICAL JUNKIE
I have always had a great curiosity about how things work. Ever since I bought my first Kindle (I’m now on number 10, I’ve destroyed so many), I’ve had subscriptions to Time magazine and the monthly Atlantic, with easily the best writing on Earth. I have since added the Economist, the best current affairs magazine on Earth. If you read everything in the Economist, you are up-to-date with the world. It is a daunting task made easier by not trying to read everything.
I also have had 35-year subscriptions to National Geographic, Canadian Geographic, and Beautiful BC Magazine.
TRAVEL
In the late 70’s I went to Hawaii three times seeing all the islands and doing several great hiking trips – climbed Mona Loa, walked through Haleakala down to the coast, and backpacked to the Kalalau Valley on Kuai.
In 1980, I went on a climbing trip to Mexico, my first trip outside Canada and the US.
I went on a G Adventures trip to Patagonia shortly after my divorce. Possibly with some of the best landscapes in the world, this excited my desire to travel.
100 months before my 55th birthday, I started a savings plan to acquire enough money to fund retirement and never work again. I developed a very austere lifestyle renting single rooms, buying second-hand vehicles, and taking cheap trips to the desert SW of the US. I achieved that goal when I was 53, gave up my medical license, and started a life on the road.
My first trips were to single countries: Baja Mexico and mainland Mexico driving my Big Foot camper to Cancun, one winter in New Zealand and one winter driving to the Florida Keys seeing a lot of the USA.
One winter was spent in South America.
After seeing most of Central America, that spring, over 64 days I walked about 1,600 kilometres of the Camino de Santiago from Le Puy in southeastern France to Santiago, Spain. With a friend, we spent 3 weeks driving around Spain.
Since then, my biggest travel years were to Russia (the Trans-Siberian Railway), then Mongolia, North Korea, and China. Southeast Asia took another winter. I followed that with a trip along the Silk Road from Xiang China to the Middle East (22 countries). 5½ months was spent on an overland adventure from Morocco to Cape Town (23 countries).
My biggest travel took up all of 2018 and 2019. I bought a Volkswagen California (a deluxe camper van with a fridge, stove, and bed) and saw every country in Europe and several in the Middle East driving it as far east as Baku, Azerbaijan (about 50 countries). I slept in the van for over 700 nights never paying once for accommodation and ate about 95% of my own meals in it. This was easily my most intense travel and could only have done it alone. It was much more work than practicing medicine with 18-hour days. I kept my website up-to-date every day and then had to do all the research for the next day. I entered all my way points onto Google Maps and followed them. I only took one day off in all that time, while waiting for a storm to blow over to see an island off the west coast of Ireland.
On New Year’s Day, 2020, on my way to Amsterdam to sell the van, I was hit by a drunk driver outside Verona, Italy causing 27,000 € damage. After constant obstruction from my Belgian insurance company, the van was finally ready to drive on August 5, 2021, exactly when I was able to go there.
Covid interrupted most travel until July 2021. On March 15, just before all travel restrictions were placed, I entered the US with my Big Foot camper eventually seeing 33 US states and 7 provinces of Canada. That finished all the lower 48.
On July 14, 2021, I left home with the optimistic goal of finishing seeing all the island regions in Europe (Azores, Cape Verde, Madeira, Canaries, Mallorca, Jersey, Guernsey, and Minorca/Santorini. I included 23 new countries with decisions made almost day-to-day to avoid COVID issues. If I finished all my plans, I would have finished all countries in Asia, South America, North and West Africa, and the Caribbean.
That would have left only the Western Pacific/Australia and East Africa to finally arrive at 193, the ultimate goal of most big travellers. See:http://www.ronperrier.net/travelogue/
DIVING
I obtained my PADI open water in Utila, the Bay Islands of Honduras, then subsequently my advanced open water in the Andaman Islands of India. Since I’ve done more than 90 dives adding to the ability to explore all elements of our planet by muscle power. My last diving adventures were in the Komodo islands of Indonesia, Palau, and the Raja Ampats west of Papua, Indonesia, the last two on one-week live-aboard trips. Because of a 2 metre difference between the Pacific and seas off Indonesia, the Coral Triangle is subjected to tremendous currents that bring up cool water that supports an amazing underwater world. The best places to dive are predator-rich – lots of sharks, barracuda, tuna, and others – the little fish common elsewhere are hiding. Palau possibly has the best diving in the world with sites like the Blue Corner and German Channel full of sharks and giant manta rays. The Raja Ampat has amazing coral and giant, multicoloured sea fans.
I did not dive again for 6 years because of other travel and the lack of equally good places to explore in places I have been.
In November 2021, I repeated my Advanced Open Water with a PADI dive shop in Dahab Egypt. I had 7 dives and also got my NItrox certificate. It was a great refresher with some excellent instructors. The sea life though was a little disappointing.
My last three years of travel include the western Pacific with great diving and I hope to resume diving then. One of my dream trips would be the 19-day repositioning trip of the Jaya, the boat I was on in the Raja Ampat. See: http://www.ronperrier.net/diving/
MY WEBSITE.
In 2013, I decided to start my website, www.ronperrier.net, mostly to describe my travels. For about $12/month, it has given me a platform to write anything I want. It started with mainly a travelogue that is more like a diary than a typical travel blog. I describe my years of travel since 2006 in chronological order. It has no ads, is not monetized, has no personal photography, or is connected to Google search.
I gradually added a book list and cookbook so that I could have access to this information wherever I travelled. Other pages are Hiking, Sea Kayaking, and Diving, the three passions I have continued. I have written everything I have learned about travel on the Travel Page. The Ideas Page reflects anything I find interesting. There are at least 50 posts on America, one of the most aberrant countries in the world, more bizarre than ever during and since Trump’s presidency.
The last major addition was my first “book” Hiking and Climbing the West Kootenay. It gives an encyclopedic survey of everything ever done by the members of the Kootenay Mountaineering Club. I’ve added my adventures paddling all the lakes in the region and have posted on the many rail trails emanating from the West Kootenay.
I have also added this book High-Functioning Asperger’s Syndrome. I doubt if I will publish it as there is so much plagiarizing.
ART
Drawing was another activity that was on hold till retirement. I have never done any art before but during the 18 months at home with Covid, I bought all the gear and started drawing and colouring using pencil crayons. I loved it. See my post of what I drew, mostly copying MC Escher’s art.
I also want to do stained glass. I purchased a lovely window that had been in a restaurant. My apartment has three windows that have no particular view (duplexes in my complex) and I want to make windows for the other two. I like the large panels of Portuguese tiles and would love to recreate one for a wall in my bathroom. See http://www.ronperrier.net/2021/02/07/my-art/