16/07/2026
I headed into the WA outback alone this week, chasing something I thought I was looking for… yamadori.
Recently I learnt that one of the stories behind bonsai begins with an emperor who saw a beautiful tree growing in the wild and wanted that same beauty brought back to his palace. From that desire came the art of recreating nature in miniature.
As I wandered among the ancient granite domes of Cathedral Rocks and Kokerbin Rock, I found them everywhere. Twisted little survivors, clinging to cracks in stone, shaped by wind, fire, drought and time. Trees that had earned every bend in their trunk over decades—perhaps centuries.
Standing there, I couldn’t imagine removing them.
For a moment, I realised they didn’t belong to me. Their beauty wasn’t something to possess. It was something to witness.
Maybe that’s one of the lessons bonsai quietly teaches us. We don’t have to capture nature to appreciate it. Perhaps the deeper art is to recreate its spirit, while leaving the originals exactly where they belong.
We spend so much of life trying to hold onto beautiful moments, beautiful places, even beautiful people. Yet some things are most beautiful because they remain free.
I came home without a yamadori.
But I think I brought home something far more valuable—a different way of seeing.
Sometimes the greatest treasure isn’t the tree you collect…
It’s the one you leave behind
