On the Ascent of Mount Ventoux

This piece really resonated with me. I especially liked the reference it made to the 'Inferno', in which one must go down to go up. I've seen other people on that sort of journey. Where they, like Petrarch, had to take a long, winding, easy path (down into sin and vice) before they were able to lift themselves up, so to speak, to the top of the mountain. Almost as if they needed to hit the bottom to get some sense knocked into them. They, like Petrarch, after continuing on that path for some time, realized they were not going the way they had intended, and tried again and again to correct their course. I also, as one who has experienced the transcendent self-contemplation induced by mountains and nature's beauty, thought it was interesting that not only did Petrarch have to go down to go up, but that he had to go up literally in order to go up spiritually. He went down into himself to go up, while at the same time going up to go up. That's not confusing at all, is it?