Adventure
First light from the summit
You feel the fluid building up, and you feel a kind of rattling in your lungs,” says Glenn Randall of a night spent in a snowbound tent in the Sawatch range, high-altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE) slowly drowning him. He’d had the condition before, at 16,000 feet in ...
Schooled in snow
Colorado.The state is known as “Ski Country USA.” It’s a place of rugged peaks, high mountains and snowy winters. So, if you’re a skier looking for a place to get educated, it’s no surprise that going to an institute of higher education in the Centennial state might ...
An odyssey remembered
"My friends, welcome to Lesbos — now you are going to Moria.”
The blue bus with iron grates on its windows sits perched on a...
Mountain of a man: Fred Beckey discusses his new book
What impresses Fred Beckey, the 89-year-old mountaineer with more first ascents than he can, or at least has bothered to, count, is Madonna’s halftime show...
Dancer in the wild
High up on the southern side of Bear Peak at the southwestern edge of Boulder, the rock feature known as The Maiden hooks from the ground toward the western horizon. The rock monolith, dusted in lime lichen, catches the setting sun, holding on to the light after ...
Climbing in Colombia: High and dry
Climbers are always looking for lines that push possibilities and take their abilities to a next realm. They push the limits of their mental and physical endurance while toeing the fine line between mastery of the unknown and reckless risk...
Riding for a lifeline
You do not look like a person who has just biked over 100 kilometers,” Jan “Jano” Rohac of Greenways Travel Club told me, very matter-of-factly, in his thick Slovakian accent as I entered the Grand Hotel Matej in Banská tiavnica, Slovakia, after sunset. Helmet still...
In the East Rampart Roadless Area, solitude rules
Across the road from the dirt bikes and ATVs in Rainbow Falls, Colo., is a different world. It’s a world hiker Tom Mowle discovered two years ago, looking for trails close to his Gleneagle, Colo., home. “As you can see, we’re the only people here. You can hike ...
Traveling with more than good intentions
On a visit back to his native country, on a trek in the Annapurna region of Nepal, Portland State University professor Bishupal Limbu remembers being uncomfortable because of his shoes. They were nice, they were meant for the occasion and the Australians he was ...
It’s a bear
You`ve hiked Mount Sanitas and Chautauqua Park, but have you given Bear Peak in South Boulder your best shot? A lengthy, strenuous climb, Bear Peak is not for the endurance-deficient beginners of Mount Sanitas Valley or Chautauqua trails. At 8,461 feet, the mountain ...
Can you have the Wild West and your blueberry mojitos, too?
Erin and I are off itinerary. It’s after 1:30 p.m. when we look up at the clock in the WabiSabi thrift store in downtown Moab and realize we’ve missed our lunch reservation by an hour. After scoring a second-hand Arc’teryx jacket for $10, we arrive back at the Sorrel...
Warriors in the wilderness
If the shocks in his prosthetic arm would reload faster, Marc Dervaes could spend all his evenings doing one-armed pushups. After losing his right arm just above the elbow in combat, Dervaes had a replacement prosthetic built with a set of shocks like those on a ...
