But a katabasis is never a wasted journey: it always offers a dose of the phenomenal. According to the news article that caught my eye, this one was no exception. The maps revealed that the Southern Indian Ocean seafloor was spectacularly, eerily beautiful. It was a symphony of extremes, a playlist of geology’s greatest hits. It was as if we had di

But we’ve known the power of the wild, the all-consuming demands of rain and snow and wind, the callousness of mountains and rivers. We’ve been cared for by strangers. We’ve felt part of something much

Seawater isn’t only water but a living community.

beyond the reward of securing the health of our biosphere for generations to come, we may just rediscover a kind of deep communal satisfaction that most of us in the modern world had forgotten was even possible. A felt sense of connection, belonging and togetherness that so invigorates the human condition that we’re left smiling at days end, eager