Category: Packrafting
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Green grass for the future
The grass is always greener, right? In northwest Montana, it’s now dark by 5pm, mid-elevations are starting to fill in with snow, and roads are closing. For me, the antithesis is four months ago, when temps were kind, there was more daylight for hiking than my feet could take, the country was as open as…
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There is something about the desert
Examining my photos brings contempt. Clear dawn air shining through snow-dusted larches has been this past week filtered through a shadow of indifference. I keep looking back, in books, old things I wrote long ago, most of all in memory. I want to find it. Whatever it is. Abbey was right. There is something about…
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Clarity
I’ve been waiting for this trip for a long time. It’s a perfect plan: hunt your way upriver from the Meadow Creek trailhead, shoot something, and float it back out. At the low levels of autumn Salmon Forks down is floatable, and aside from a few shallow riffles and two rapids, everything is runnable in…
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30s and raining: some suggestions
30s and raining is the toughest weather to manage sustainably. What follows are some ideas for how to do so, in vague order of importance. -Don’t put your rain jacket on until you have to. “Have to” can be defined as the point where you’ll be getting wet enough from exterior sources that maintaining core…
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Autumnal shoe roundup
The time of shallow snow, snain, and hourly freeze/thaw cycles is upon us. Check your shoes. Caveat for all of this is that the shoes gotta fit ya. Check the links to older posts for more extensive discussion. The Boulder X Mid continued to impress through our rather short summer snow climbing season. They’re the…
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The same pack all over again
It occurs to me that since I started doing this four years ago, most of my packs have been the same. After all, most everyone needs a solid big pack. Each iteration represents more learning on how to best meet the same demands. The pack bag weighs 25 ounces as shown above, the modified Gossamer…
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The rainy season
After a summer (the whole year thus far, really) of very nice weather it’s finally raining regularly. The heat has been killed off, and the mountains are shrouded in clouds like they’re supposed to be. Life is good. Photos by M. A quest to packraft around upper Grinnell Lake was mostly foiled by rain, as…
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2014 is Open
I made a decision: the Bob Open next year will go from the Marias Pass rest area to the Monture Creek TH. The course area is restricted to public land in the contiguous Bob complex. As ever, no linear travel on paved roads is permitted. Everything else human-powered is fair game. Mass start date is…
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Media Feliz
The guys who invented the packrafting video are back, with an excellent series on basic river skills. Check them out.
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Mr. Bakwin owes me five dollars
You heard me; Peter Bakwin owes me five dollars. Mr. Bakwin invented, or at the very least introduced into common usage, the term fastest known time many years ago. His website, which began as a list consisting almost entirely of his own running times, languished in relative obscurity until not too many years ago, when…
Bedrock & Paradox 
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