When European explores began their overland journeys to the western parts of North America in the 16th and 17th century travel by water was a common practice.

Of course this limited the explorers and settlers that followed somewhat, to places the rivers went or the lakes were.  The philosophy was, follow the river, it will take you somewhere.

Making Maps

Using rivers and lakes allowed greater distances to be covered faster and supported the development of maps.  Of course the destinations were not planned, beyond going where the river went.

Eventually portages between bodies of water and ultimately land bound trails increased the scope of exploration and maps covered the entire continent.

The initial approach, basically follow the river into the unknown, fascinates me.   I am a firm believer in planning which starts from the premies of knowing where you are going (the destination).

The first European explorers and the settlers that followed them basically figured it out as they went along.  Looking back in history this proved to be a viable approach, that is it worked.

Careful Plan versus Sketchy Concept

The successful exploration of North America, albeit a high risk high reward situation, does demonstrate that working toward a conceptual goal ( with a multitude of unknowns) can lead to sucess.

This leads me to balance careful planning wth a less structured course.   That is just following the river into the unknown, going where it goes and figuring out how to overcome obstacles as they arise.

While this does not resonate with me at a basic level, intuitively it makes sense to balance planning with chaos for the best overall results.