Valley Dusk

My teary-eyed gratitude to popular mural artist Goodloe Byron for his original painting of my recently dearly departed Jack Russell Terrier, Tiki. Its whimsical energy brings me a smile at his memory. 🐾

Portrait of a Primate

Image by @idee-montijo. Tanzania, Africa.

My image collections are full of primate facial expressions, and this expression of what I perceive as calm and curiosity is among my favorites.

What do you see in this expression?

Feel free to visit featured collections at Idee Explores and field videos on my new "Idee Montijo" YouTube channel! 🐒

My Float Space

Am I #shark bait here?? Coolness settles into my wetsuit as I snap photos of our #survey team's boat activities. I can't help taking a moment to appreciate that my office today is the crisp clear and ultra-salty water of Italy's Tyrrhenian Sea.

Join the adventure - find me on IG @idee_explores!

ENDURANCE FOUND - Shackleton's Famous Ship Discovered

Idee Montijo Exploration and Photography. Blogging about visits to fields afar.

Announced today, March 9th 2022, intrepid expedition team Endurance22 in the Weddell Sea, carrying The Explorers Club flag, uncovered the resting place of Ernest Shackleton's ship Endurance. Find out why this discovery's’ timing has such a poetic twist! 

Photo by @idee_explores | Sunset in the #adirondacks casts a warm #tone over a vibrant tapestry of autumn colors. With a nod to @thebeachboys, all the leaves aren't yet brown. 🍁🍂 . . I #optoutside with @the_explorers_club @natgeointhefield @canonusa @terrasolutions @ausableriver . #sunset #leafpeeping #autumnvibes #mountains #lightchaser #natgeoyourshot #reflection #hope #🍁 #somewheremagazine #skyporn #sunray (at Planet Earth) https://www.instagram.com/p/CVi65L5v1cm/?utm_medium=tumblr

Have you ever felt lost in the darkness, like you’re stumbling over rocks and sinking to unknown depths? In our darkest moments we need a light to show us the way. It doesn’t matter if the light is provided by someone else or if one finds their own light and rescues themself from the darkness. 

Image by @idee_explores (IG)

"Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy—the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan." With these words, Franklin D Roosevelt opened a speech undertaken by few Presidents, and launched America into World War II.

About the image: I produced this one-of-a-kind art piece using an AI-based image generator that shows the attack on America naval assets. You'll soon find more of these dream-like images on my NFT and website.

Photo by Idee_Explores 

Such a path could only be traveled by one... sensitive to the landmarks of a trackless wilderness. -Thomas Merton The wild Adirondacks in autumn, a riot of warm colors blanket the mountain ledges above this icy-cold lake, which from our stone-perch vantage point, seemed endless.

If beautiful mountains inspire you, I invite you to visit my website's Adirondack Mountains & Collections Portfolio!

What’s the Difference Between Adventure and Exploration?

An increasingly controversial question: In today’s world of travel-blogging and adventure sports, how can we define true exploration?

It’s a frigid winter’s eve at Norway’s Finse 1222 Lodge, high above the tree line overlooking Hardangerjøkulen glacier. The rustic lodge is accessible only by train or dogsled, and in its library huddled before a blazing fireplace, a group of road-worn explorers discuss past and future expedition challenges while sampling spirits they’ve collected from around the globe.

Centuries ahead of Shackleton and Amundsen, early explorers began taking to land and sea. The late Sen. John Glenn once said at an Explorers Club Annual Dinner, “Explorers push dragons from the map.” — they uncover and discover the mysteries of our oceans, space, earth, and humankind. Though today’s satellite imagery of Earth is void of dragons, we still have a lot to explore. So, let’s first understand, “What’s exploration?”

Cenote survey during a 2015 expedition in Mexico’s Yucatan State. Image by Idee Montijo © 2021

The late Jim Fowler, wildlife champion and explorer extraordinaire of Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom fame, once described exploration as the pursuit of information that advances the greater body of knowledge on mankind, space, oceans, and the Earth. How explorers undertake that pursuit varies from expedition to expedition, but the common thread is a hope of ‘discovery’ or the real possibility of making a contribution to our greater body of knowledge.

Bob Ballard, ocean explorer and National Geographic Explorer-At-Large, provided the world with a first glimpse of the legendary ocean liner Titanic since its unexpected demise in 1912. But in an NPR interview, Ballard describes what he considers his most important contribution to science, stating, “ …The hydrothermal vents, for example, I would think was my greatest discovery. We knew where Titanic was, but we never knew about these new life forms, and we didn’t know they were there.” It’s all about the data.

While adventure can be one element of many expeditions, it differs from exploration in that explorationinvolves a pursuit of data that increases our larger body of knowledge while adventureis a personal experience that can provide individual growth.

It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves — in finding themselves. ~ André Gide, winner Nobel Prize in Literature, 1947

An important aspect of the human experience, adventure helps people become more confident in their personal capabilities, to broaden their own knowledge of the world, and advance personal skills. Psychology’s Self-Determination Theory (SDT) is a theory that explains human motivation and personality with respect to inherent growth trends and natural psychological needs. Researchers in the 1980s proposed that we have three basic and universal psychological needs that promote intrinsic motivation: autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Adventure addresses all three of these needs. For example, autonomy can be gained through accomplishing new tasks like navigation where one has a freedom to choose their course, competence is earned through successful interaction with one’s environment through activities like building a shelter, and relatedness is the desire to belong to a group of others with similar experiences.

Whether pushing dragons from the map like those explorers gathered on a Norwegian mountaintop or seeking personal growth and development by blogging about one’s whitewater rafting trip, we benefit when driven by curiosity to engage with the world around us in exploration and adventure.

Get inspired with expedition portfolios at IdeeExplores.com and on Instagram (at)idee_explores.

Photo by @idee_explores | “Let my armies be the rocks, and the trees, and the birds in the sky.” . This quote is attributed to Charlemagne in an Indiana Jones movie, but a journalist at ThoughtCo checked and couldn’t find any confirmation of the attribution. Still, the quote perfectly fits Harrison Ford's film as well as it fits this shot of majestic Indianhead Mountain - a beautiful landmark rising above autumn foliage and a chilly Adirondack valley lake. 🍁🍂