May 9, 2024

Fall Mecca: 10 Tips for Climbing Indian Creek like a Local

　　By Luke Mehall 　　Fall means one thing to the desert climber: Indian Creek season. Located about an hour southwest of Moab, Utah, the Creek is the center for the Colorado Plateau desert climbing scene. Every year, it gets a little more popular, but the good news is there are plenty of cracks for everyone. If a climbing road trip is...

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May 9, 2024

Climbing in Ruth Gorge Alaska: 5 Things to Know Before You Go

　　This past June, climbers Harry Hamlin and Avery Parinello spent a couple weeks in the Ruth Gorge in Denali National Park. The Gorge is a mammoth glacial gorge cut into the lowlands below Denali by the Ruth Glacier. This enormous zone contains prodigious peaks that tempt rock climbers and ice climbers alike due to their immense size and spectacular exposure....

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May 9, 2024

Denali Gear List: 5 Items that Made Life Better—Plus 5 Things I Learned

　　By Savannah Cummins 　　This spring I spent nearly a month on the flanks of Denali, supporting my friend Katie Bono as she successfully set the women’s ascent speed record at 21h 6m. As my first time on a big mountain, it was an unforgettable experience despite all the suffering involved. From carrying 130lbs of gear at once, to rain, snow,...

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May 9, 2024

Colorado’s Longs Peak: A Reward Worth The Suffering

　　 　　The boulder field, photo by Whitney Oliver Originally published on Aug. 18th, 2014 　　Story by Hilary Oliver 　　When it comes to hiking, there are mountains—and then there are the mountains that haunt your fantasies. The legendary peaks that don’t come so easily. The ones with iconic shape, or stunning cliff faces. Longs Peak in Colorado’s Front Range is one...

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May 9, 2024

Fostering a Stewardship Culture: Purcell Mountain Bike Traverse

　　By Lorraine Blancher 　　Photos by Ryan Creary 　　As passionate outdoor aficionados, we all love to experience the natural beauty of our planet. As humans, we know our decisions can have an impact. How we balance our adventurous desires with our responsibility to protect the precious places we love is paramount to ensuring they will be here for generations to come....

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May 9, 2024

Drifting to Connect: Paddling Canada’s Bloodvein River

　　Story and Images by Dustin Silvey 　　Outside my tent I hear the fire crackling. I open my eyes, shocked to realize the sun is shining. I roll my body to the side, slowly sitting up, and pull myself out of my sleeping bag. That’s when it hits me, the cold. I quickly put on some extra layers and head out...

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May 9, 2024

Cycling the Peru Divide in the Andes – with GPX Files

　　By Steve Marks, aka the “Malbec Pilgrim” 　　A few May snowflakes appeared out of nowhere, drifting down and brushing off my jacket as I paused to enjoy the immense vista. It had been a tough cycle to the summit, and was just one of the many times my altitude almost touched 5000 m (16,400 ft). The blackened rocky and mountainous...

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May 9, 2024

Exploratory Mountaineering – The Tien Shan Mountains

　　16 Days and 8 First Ascents in Chinas Tien Shan Mountains The Tien Shan range in China is ideal for exploratory mountaineering expeditions. There are hundreds of valleys, each with handfuls of unclimbed peaks and each mountain with plenty of route options. A lot of the routes can be simple mountaineering, but you can choose a line more demanding and...

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May 9, 2024

Exploring the Wilderness Areas of Scotland

　　When considering the wild areas of the UK, my mind quickly pans straight to Scotland which houses some of the remotest places in the country, vast planes of uninhabited wilderness and towering mountains. Each region of Scotland has its own unique feel, from the valleys of Glencoe and the planes of Glen Shiel to the wild sandstone landscapes of Torridon....

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May 9, 2024

Cycling Around the World: Lessons from Living a Nomad Life

　　Oscar Wilde said, If you want to be a grocer, or a general, or a politician, or a judge, you will invariably become it; that is your punishment. 　　Long before living a nomad life, I had wanted to be a software engineer. But when I became one, it felt like a punishment. It is not to say that a Ph.D....

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May 9, 2024

Climbing in the Khumbu

　　Words by Sammy Podhurst 　　Photos by Sammy Podhurst and Anna Pfaff 　　Climbing in the Himalaya is interesting. There are many layers to the equation here. The acclimatization period requires patience. The lack of resources requires a lot of forethought and pre-planning. There is little infrastructure as far as rescue and medical goes. But at the same time, all of that...

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May 9, 2024

Chasing the Northern Lights: How to see the Aurora Borealis

　　Words and photography by Joe Yelverton 　　Night falling, calf muscles burning, a heavy pack pulling on my shoulders. All good reasons to sit down and enjoy the twilight from our rarified perch in the Chugach Mountains. To the west, a crimson glow on Cook Inlet, and beyond this massive body of water, the Southern Alaska Range painted in alpenglow. Stunning...

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May 9, 2024

Trip Report: Climbing in Pakistan’s Karakoram Range

　　Travel Chaos Our Pakistan expedition started out with high stress levels, to say the least. Our bags were painstakingly packed—gear organized, packed, organized again, double-checked, and repacked. As we celebrated our last night in the US with some friends in Denver, Colorado before catching our morning flight, Allen received a terrible email—our flight was canceled! 　　When we had started planning...

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May 9, 2024

Camp Recipes: A simple dish from the French Pyrenees

　　Story and Recipe by Kieran Creevy 　　Images by Cat Vinton 　　 　　Iron studded wood doors, gnarled and black with age, rise before drawbridge chains: We’re in the tiny fortified village of Villefranche De Conflent, our home for the next few days. Wandering down the narrow streets toward our apartment, we begin to see more elements of ironwork. Shops, bars and...

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May 9, 2024

Bringing Climbing to an Island Once Abandoned

　　Words by MSR athlete Nina Caprez, photos by Jimmy Martinello 　　I dream a lot. Almost every morning I wake up and remember, for a moment, dreams from the night before. Some say it’s a way for the subconscious to process. Maybe I don’t have enough down time to do it any differently. 　　I had dreams my first days in Makatea,...

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May 9, 2024

Bikepacking Washington: A Multisport Adventure to Climb Mt. Rainier

　　By Josh Perez Most of us work a 9-5 and eagerly await the weekend to squeeze in as much adventure as possible. Or we wake up at extreme hours and pull all-nighters when we absolutely must get into the mountains during the week. 　　Occasionally we’re blessed with a holiday weekend, which seems like gold for us weekend warriors. With July...

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May 9, 2024

Flying with a Camping Stove

　　Flying with a camping stove can be trickier than you might think. Don’t waste time, fuel or lose your stove. Follow these steps and check up with TSA to make sure you’re flying right with your backcountry stove! 　　 　　TSA Rules You are allowed to bring a stove in a carry-on or checked baggage, but ONLY if you take the...

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May 9, 2024

Bikepacking Oregon’s High Country Lakes

　　By: David Woronets 　　 　　Photo by: David Woronets The ideal time to visit Oregon’s Cascade Lakes region is just after the mosquitoes abate and before the snow returns. And one of the best ways to do it is by mountain bike. This fall, my friend Josh and I decided to connect a couple of iconic high-mile mountain bike trails that would...

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May 9, 2024

Bikepacking Through Death Valley: A Loose How

　　Something about bikepacking Death Valley drew us in—maybe it was the iconic sand dunes, the deep canyons, salty-dry basins, or moving rocks, but more likely it was just the empty space and lack of cell service. After a year of chaos, we all wanted a break. What better way to get out the angst than to hammer pedals for a...

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May 9, 2024

A Bikepacking & Fly Fishing Journey on Oregon’s Remote Singletrack

　　Words and photos by George Terrizzi 　　The sun baked the back of my neck and simultaneously my face as we slowly mashed the pedals through what can only be described as miles of playground sand in the mid-day sun. I clinched my eyes shut from the stinging sensation of sweat that was pouring down my brow mixing with the sunscreen...

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