Outdoor recreation businesses say state water plan must do more to protect rivers.
Recreation
Posted inSeptember 15, 2014: Books & Essays
A new century with carnivores
Learning to see predators as companions, not competition.
Posted inSeptember 1, 2014: Lost in the Woods
When is lightning likely?
The National Weather Service’s new lightning potential index.
Posted inArticles
Want a trophy buck? Ditch the camo and get a guide
Study looks at successful types of big game hunters
Posted inAugust 18, 2014: Alaska's Uncertain Food Future
Long live backpacking
Christopher Ketcham’s essay is one long misunderstanding of the trends in outdoor recreation (“The death of backpacking?” HCN, 7/21/14). Backpacking is not dead, and it’s not dying. It’s different, yes, thanks to a revolution in lighter and more versatile gear, as well as an ethos of carrying less gear. And while weeklong treks are less […]
Posted inGoat
Recreational deaths soar this summer
Grand Canyon and Colorado rivers have record year for deaths.
Posted inAugust 4, 2014: Idaho's Sewer System
Old friends
I’m 35 and also cannot find backpacking companions my age (HCN, 7/21/14). Most friends my age are more interested in camping at the brewery or a music festival. All my backpacking buddies are pushing 60. Still, I can’t help but enjoy the thought that traffic on the trails is getting better and not worse. Bradley […]
Posted inAugust 4, 2014: Idaho's Sewer System
Summer swimming in a Washington lake
When I was a kid, I swam all summer in backyard pools and at the city park, lessons in the morning, wildness all afternoon. My bare feet grew calluses, my hair turned brittle green, my shoulders got broad, my Lycra suits disintegrated. And then I left home. I’ve lived in this mountain town for a […]
Posted inAugust 4, 2014: Idaho's Sewer System
Early eulogies
Methinks Christopher Ketcham is a bit premature with his eulogy, “The death of backpacking?” (HCN, 7/21/14). Backpacking is not so much a sport as an activity whose ebb and flow in popularity reflects that of the natural world he enters on his sojourns. Nothing in that world stays the same. It gets hot, it gets […]
Posted inAugust 4, 2014: Idaho's Sewer System
Future defenders
Maybe instead it’s the death of parenting (HCN, 7/21/14). Take your children backpacking. Start ’em early and start small. It can be done. Get creative. Make it happen. Leave the devices at home. It does not need to be expensive. No doubt it’s cheaper than 129 other things Americans do on vacation. Lord knows wildlands […]
Posted inAugust 4, 2014: Idaho's Sewer System
Lay of the land
How to Read the American West: A Field GuideWilliam Wyckoff384 pages, paperback: $44.95.University of Washington Press, 2014. Too hefty to be carried in a hip pocket or even a daypack, William Wyckoff’s How To Read The American West is a field guide unlike any other, with a focus on patterns, variations and the distribution of […]
Posted inGoat
Was the fatal thunderstorm in California a climate phenomenon?
The weather of Venice Beach, California, where I live, is for the most part stable, and almost always predictable. No sudden squalls appear out of the southwest to chase skateboarders off their concrete ramps; never do we hear the civil-defense sirens warning of an approaching tornado. Living here, swimming and surfing at the beach a […]
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
The virtues of old-school car camping
Backwoods adventure isn’t the only way to develop an affinity for the outdoors.
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Gear companies go local
A new crop of manufacturers try to succeed without selling out.
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
The death of backpacking?
Younger people don’t seem interested in this outdoors tradition.
Posted inGoat
On the Wilderness Act’s 50th, a backpack into the Weminuche
Author ponders Wilderness Act on its 50th birthday.
Posted inJuly 21, 2014: On the Wild Edge
Motorheads gone wild
An off-roading conservationist navigates some gnarly landscape on the road to more protection for the Utah desert.
Posted inArticles
The privatization of public campground management
All the info you need to decide whether you love or hate that the Forest Service uses concessionaires.
Posted inArticles
Concessionaire Campgrounds: An Explainer
The Privatization of public campgrounds | Create Infographics