Frankly,  I enjoy cross country skiing (XC) more than snowshoeing.  It takes a little more skill, but getting through the countryside is much faster and requires significantly less energy per mile than snowshoes.  I began enjoying cross country skiing as a kid when my grandparents gave me a set of wooden skis with bamboo poles.  My […]

Snowshoeing is a great winter activity for families or anyone that wants to extend the hiking season through the winter.  It takes very little skill to use modern snowshoes.  They are designed to fit your feet and not interfere with your normal walking gait.  Further,  the cost of getting into snowshoeing is much lower than getting […]

Your best bet with an avalanche is to not be there when it happens.  If you are too adventurous to avoid the possibility, there are some pieces of equipment that can save your life if you get caught.  Typically these include: a transceiver (beacon) so that rescuers can find you under the snow a probe […]

The other day, I came across a custom made hiking staff from www.custommade.com.  This particular staff incorporates a survival kit into it. Survival on a Pole The people at Custom Made took a normal trekking pole, added a wooden handle, wrapped the handle in 20 feet of paracord, attached a carabiner with another 7 feet of paracord, attached a […]

Award Winning Design . . . Polarmond of  St Gallen, Switzerland, was recently announced as a  Gold Winner at the Outdoor 2015 European trade show.  The jury said: “The All-in-One Sleeping System by Polarmond embraces research and development from the last 20 years” and added that it is “innovative and extremely functional.” The system is reported to have […]

By “recreational foraging” I don’t mean looking around for recreational activities, but rather foraging for food on public lands as a recreational pursuit.  A lot of people wonder what’s the point of walking in the woods to see the scenery, it just seems a waste of time to them.  They need another sort of motivation. […]

Mardie Townsend, Claire Henderson-Wilson, Elyse Warner and Lauren Weiss, School of Health and Social Development, Deakin University, recently prepared Healthy Parks Healthy People: the State of the Evidence 2015 for Parks Victoria (Australia).  The 103 page document reviews the post-2008 scientific literature in relation to the health benefits of parks and natural spaces.  The attempt is […]

The Pennsylvania Land Trust Association (PLTA) says: “Unstructured, frequent childhood play in informal outdoor settings powerfully boosts the cognitive, creative, physical, social and emotional development of children. It also engenders deep conservation values; more so than any other factor.”  Continuing research is supporting this statement. In an effort to explain the idea further and to […]

You can’t always be out and about exploring during your adventures.  Sometimes it’s imperative that you sit on the ground, put your back against a tree and open a great book. Well, Patrick McManus’ books aren’t great in the sense of being an essential foundation in the literature of Western culture, but they are hilarious and, […]

Basis of The Isaac Walton League As the author of The Compleat Angler, Izaak Walton’s (1594-1683) name is synonymous with fishing.  He thus became the perfect namesake for The Isaac Walton League, an association originally formed to preserve fishing opportunities for future generations. The group was founded in Chicago in 1922 and by 1924 had […]