After finally escaping a life of oppression and poverty in small-town Maine, in late August of 2005 I showed up in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada with little direction and less cash, but very glad of the change of scenery. Little did I know then that those circumstances would follow me every time I came to a new destination. Weed, or Cannabis Sativa, was my primary goal and spaced ambition. I knew the quality of British Columbia (BC) bud by reputation, even a continent away. Within my first hours of stepping off the plane I managed to obtain some herb from the streets of Vancouver with relative ease combine with a degree of thrill of completed quest of acquiring an illicit (yet plentiful) substance in a foreign town of strangers.

So I began walking the streets of Vancouver in a pleasant mild euphoria. Coming from backwoods Maine, it was the first city I really explored on foot, on my own, and I put in at least 20 miles a day. But I couldn?t keep that pace up, as my financial stamina from my trip fund was lagging. As I was stoned, time and money slipped away, and my focus and resolve were diminishing. It was time to go to nature for guidance.

I ferried off to beautiful Vancouver Island, not knowing quite what to look for, how to find it, or what to do with it. My compass needle of self was spinning near aimlessly. The perturbing factor was my shrinking savings that would soon leave me destitute. Luckily, one night amidst my wanderings, a couple from east Canada mistook me for a drug dealer (an occurrence which was far from rare, thanks to my long hair) and our chance meeting led to a coalescence of energy to score some weed together and in this combined effort we met a dude who said he was selling ?hippy? drugs. I asked if he had shrooms? and at his affirmation I was later told by Crystal, ?You should have seen the ear to ear grin that spread across your face when he said he had shrooms!?

So now the pieces were coming together. All the elements were in place for a solitary vision quest in the wilderness. I meant to take a cosmic journey within to find direction on my newfound life in travel.

I hiked some miles on trails through the woods. On my path I crossed a trestle that spanned quite a chasm; with each step I confronted a wave of vertigo as the gap between railroad ties revealed a drop of a hundred feet of doom.

But these fears I faced. Though they were substantial, they paled in comparison with what I was about to do. After climbing a mountain, I prepared myself as well as I could to take a heroic dose of psilocybin with a shamanic mixture of my own devising of other sacred herbs, attuned to my own personal ritual, and preperation for sacred flight.

Do you know what these mountains and valleys are for?

I said a few prayers of intent before ingesting the sacred plants. Basically that I wanted to survive this journey of epic and immense proportions I was undertaking, this Hero?s Quest, and I wanted to return with some great truths, knowledge I could use on my travels and direction; where I should go next.

I waited in a meditation stance; open, relaxed, receptive. I saw the sun go down behind distant mountains.

As time passed, I got the first inkling of what can be called the cosmic giggle. As it grew darker I weighed my options. I could play it safe and stay within the comfort zone of base camp. But I knew that small envelope of time and space where real magic was could only be found in exploration and adventure. I decided to take a walk in the wilderness as darkness grew.

At first I rationalized my choice. I wasn?t going too far away, I could still see, I wasn?t tripping yet, I would certainly remember that rock and that tree over there as a landmark? Then the first wave of consciousness expansion hit me: this is how fairy tales start, it was intoned, by foolish people getting lost in the woods at night while playing with magic. That funny little thought was then followed by a tidal wave.

Nature became alive, I mean, nature is always alive, but unless you have your third eye open you never quite how personable, talkative and animated a piece of land can be. Standing up, with eyes wide open (all three) and my feet upon the ground I had broken on through to the other side; more real than real. I will not attempt to describe all that I saw and felt here: first of all, it?s the kind of thing you only tell around a campfire, secondly, telling it is really a moot point; you have to see and touch and experience it for yourself to even begin to comprehend.

As I walked, different scenarios with different entities and scenarios appeared and unfolded. Psilocybin can be very serious and profound, but it can be remarkably silly? usually you get heavy doses of both with lots of fluorescent colors streaming all the way. Trees came alive and offered bits of wisdom (i.e. don?t sit down until you have completed your quest), multidimensional Imps perched on rocks offering directions back to camp with their multiple arms sprouting out and pointing many different ways. Surly French innkeepers with limited vacancy after hours (don?t ask), oh, and a flavor of Hindu/Buddhist: Maya?s daughters emerging from a bed of roots offering a lie down (sorry ladies, I?m on a quest, maybe next time). I was at a nexus point showing many paths and outcomes. I could go on here with a philosophical/spiritual discourse, but I?ll leave that to you for now, and get to the ?peak? of the trip.

Making it back to camp was no longer an option. Hours passed, who knows how many, I was entranced. I couldn?t see my hand in front of my face, only these beams of colored light and energy that made up where I thought my hand should be or was. Ever see an Alex Grey painting? Yeah, kind of like that. In this state I tried to wander around a bit more but the will o? wisps of nature had another trick/lesson to play. What may have been a tangle of branches or a cluster of roots in this world; it didn?t matter. To me I recognized it for what it was then. I had stumbled into the Labyrinth.

Again, what tales were spun around me as I twisted and turned in this maze I?ll not share here. What?s important is how I got out. A blend of solving a riddle, and a state of fortitude: a method of clear head and sound judgment in the colorful chaos of torrential existential maelstroms which I had garnered over years of research, inner exploration, and discipline, is what got me through the realm of branch mazes. But I was not out yet.

As I pushed the last obstacle of a bough up and ducked under, I breathed a sigh of relief conveying the ?whew, I?m glad that?s over!? sound which quickly turned into a shocked gasp as my foot expected to touch upon non-labyrinth ground but found nothing but free air. I quickly assessed my peril. There I was, on a ledge of a cliff no more that a foot and a half wide. Perched on this ledge my open-eyed color swirling vision cleared up enough to show me there was a sheer drop of some thirty feet to sharp craggy rocks below that grinned at me with evil intent. (The description here is metaphor, the plight of distance and gravity is real) Above me was a steep rock wall of unknowable height. In front of me is where the sidewalk ended, behind me, the maze. My cranium thumped with a psychedelic truth: There is no turning back. (Practically speaking, it was nothing short of a miracle that I didn?t stumble and meet my demise my first time through: I wasn?t going for a second round.

So there I was. Clinging to the cliff face, certain doom below me, uncertain fate and quite a trial above me. One of those moments struck me: all fears, doubts and terrors of past shocked through me, and nearly left me witless falling. I touched the abyss. I had fallen to the lowest of the low states of being, pining and bemoaning my circumstance. Then I remembered: Once touched, you can break through the other side of the veil. I took a deep breath, and the metaphor became starkly obvious, and it showed me the way: Nowhere to go but up from here.

Not having much experience in the ways of rock climbing did not deter me as I was now imbued with an illuminated psychedelic truth. I clambered up that cliff face without a moment of second guessing, and after about the easiest fifteen feet I?ve traveled in any direction, I made it to a hauntingly beautiful grove on a plateau. Here, after many hours of journeying on my feet, I finally collapsed to the earth thanking it and everything else I could think of for my survival.

But I was not out of the woods yet. (ha!) I was lost in the wilderness, alone, in cold darkness. I found a large tree and sat cross-legged propped up against it. I was exhausted, but sleep was impossible. I would wait until daylight before venturing out again as to not get more lost than I was. I eased my mind into the best meditative mode I could manage, and shivered through the rest of the night.

Hours later, morning had broken (like the first morning), and what was the first thing I saw upon opening my two eyes?

A large raven that was perched on a branch in front of me. Raven looked at me, cawed, and flew behind me. As I got up to follow him, he perched again, almost as if he was waiting for me to catch up. He led me over a hill, and perched on a gnarly blasted tree. As I crested the rise, there it was. Base camp, as I left it a nightfall and a lifetime ago.

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