Intro

I don’t want to think or write about climate change, and I know you don’t want to read about it in Adventure Journal. Adventure, outdoor recreation, and AJ are supposed to be escapes from the buzzkills of daily life, or so you’ve told me. One day, I received an email from a ranger in Texas, who shared she often cried on her long drives to work because of grief over the changes in her park; Adventure Journal, she wrote, made her feel better and gave her hope. In that moment, I vowed that if we were going to cover hard issues, we would only publish stories offering solutions and possibilities.

But adventure—those delightful, challenging, sometimes perilous interactions we chase in the mountains, canyons, and waterways—doesn’t take place in a world separate from the material concerns of weather, heat, and fires. Adventure as play offers an escape, but it is a temporary one, and mostly in our heads. In the summer of 2024,