Category: Cultural critique
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The Guidebook is live
If you want the most recent version of my long running guidebook to packrafting in Glacier and Bob Marshall you can have it now, here in fact, for five dollars. This is a beta release, and a rather primitive one. You pay and register your email, and I will email you a 32 page PDF…
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Echo Park
The water would have been right up there. It’s a thought that hovers 500 feet overhead and permeates what would otherwise be an overly lucent place, a pinch of silt dissolved in a pint of champagne. Echo Park was named by Major Powell, and might have been the first occasion for the 1869 river trip…
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The importance of bikes Outside
There was a time, within the last decade, when Outside Magazine was the bastion of quality in outdoor writing and journalism. They published a wide range of writers, on a wide range of subjects, notably giving Steven Rinella his start well before hunting was anything close to mainstream, and publishing Sebastian Junger well before “perfect…
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The packraft in 2017
Left to right: Double Duck, 2015 Yukon Yak, Doomiyak, Scout. When I last sat down to write a treatise on this subject, 4.5 years ago, there wasn’t really all that much to say. Alpacka Rafts where the only acceptable option for serious use, wilderness or otherwise, and everyone else was dancing around being a serious…
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The Blackfoot-Clearwater Question
The Blackfoot-Clearwater Stewardship Project, an organization founded to steer the future of public lands long the southwestern edge of the Bob Marshall Complex, has reached its goal. Senator Tester introduced the Blackfoot-Clearwater Stewardship Act the other week, and for fans of the area or folks just interested in what public lands advocacy and law might…
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Zion
Unlike so many places, it is well named, especially for the 21st century bourgeois dilletante “adventurer”. Namely, us. We did well last year to so thoroughly associate the backpack with fun. LB loves hiking, occasionally requests to get back in the pack, and for him the more exposure and wind, the better. Which made Angel’s…
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The Ultimate Hikers Gear Guide, 2nd edition
Disclaimer: Mr. Skurka gave me this copy at a book signing during the winter OR show. First, the rationale behind the obnoxious title must be dealt with. Skurka’s “ultimate hiker” is one who tailors every aspect of her trip to serve walking, while the “ultimate camper” would maximize camping. It’s an intelligible distinction, one which…
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Mike Rowe, party hack
In the course of 40 minutes I saw every hunting celebrity I can name: Remi Warren bumped into my elbow and spilled my beer, Steve Rinella is shorter than you think, Janis Putellis taller, Joe Rogan and Cam Hanes and Eric Chesser way shorter (which is saying something). This was all at SHOT, the First…
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How to get free gear
I’m finally on the other side of the coin. As one of the main folks at Seek Outside who sifts through and arbitrates requests for free stuff from the media and general public, I have in the last few weeks gotten to sit in the seat I used to be looking at from a distance,…
Bedrock & Paradox 
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