Resources

Traveling in shoes, not leather boots, and lightweight synthetics, not army fatigues, plus years of specialized training have sped up finishing times for the Western States 100. The course record is held by Jim Walmsley, who finished the race in fourteen hours, nine minutes, and twenty-eight seconds in 2019. Auburn, California’s own Ann Trason won the women’s race fourteen times between 1989 and 2003. More at wser.org

We assume that you’re now ready to quit everything to become a river guide. First, decide where you want to guide. Next, get certified in CPR and earn your Wilderness First Responder cert. Then enroll in a guide school, where you learn hydrology, packing techniques, and even conversational skills. The folks at O.A.R.S. (Outdoor Adventure River Specialists) have a list of schools to check out at oars.com. Fritz Horst guides for Rocky Mountain River Tours in Stanley, Idaho. rafttrips.com

Managing editor Jeff Moag always has one oar in the water, a phrase we just made up, and was the editor of Canoe and Kayak magazine from 2006 to 2016.

Photos: Andrew Burr, lokelanilynn.com, @andrew_burr

Want to get away from the sounds of humanity? A handful of public lands make acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton’s list of the quietest places in North America: Kelso Dunes in California’s Mojave Desert; Impassable Canyon, Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, Idaho; Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest, Joyce Kilmer-Slickrock Wilderness, North Carolina; Grasslands National Park, Saskatchewan, Canada; Haleakala National Park, Maui, Hawaii; and the Hoh Rain Forest, Olympic National Park, Washington. Hempton is cofounder of Quiet Parks International, quietparks.org

This story was excerpted from Seeing Silence: The Beauty of the World’s Most Quiet Places by Colorado writer and photographer Pete McBride, published by Rizzoli in 2021. His last book, Grand Canyon: Between River and Rim, won a National Outdoor Book Award. petemcbride.com; @pedromcbride

More of Chip Thomas’ work can be seen at jetsonorama.net, where he also writes essays.

Craig Childs is a frequent contributor to Adventure Journal. He lives and writes in Western Colorado, though his true home is the smooth sandstone floor of a hidden desert canyon. You can read more of his desert musings at houseofrain.com.

“A wild place can be a difficult place, uncomfortable for humans. And we should seek to keep it that way, not try to make it safer, more comfortable, more like the civilization we leave behind.” So wrote Laura and Guy Waterman in their book, Wilderness Ethics, a sentiment that informs the work of the Waterman Fund, which has given more than $230,000 for mountain stewardship efforts, watermanfund.org. Learn more about Laura Waterman and her books at laurawaterman.com.

AJ senior editor and book reviewer Emily White writes from the Olympic Peninsula, Washington.

Move over, Minnesota: Wisconsin has more than fifteen thousand lakes, and only one of them has Camp Wandawega. The camp, recently added to the National Register of Historic Places, can accommodate groups as small as five and as large as sixty for overnights, with up to one hundred fifty for day use. Accommodations include a bunkhouse, cabins, and platform tents. wandawega.com, airbnb.com/p/wandawega

Former Surfer magazine editor Matt Warshaw’s book, Photo/Stoner: The Rise, Fall, and Mysterious Disappearance of Surfing’s Greatest Photographer is the go-to source for Stoner stories and is a beautiful collection of his best work. Stoner’s archive is preserved in only two known places: the black hole that is the now-defunct Surfer’s shuttered offices and the Surfing Heritage and Cultural Center, in San Clemente, California. shacc.org

From the top of Marin County’s forested Mount Tamalpais, 2,571 feet high, it’s roughly thirty miles of riding north to Point Reyes National Seashore. What’s your fancy? Gravel riding? Check. Heart in your throat singletrack descents? Plenty of that. Smooth blacktop winding through redwoods? You betcha. Do it in the spring, when writer Albert Flynn DeSilver did, and you’re greeted with acres of purple lupines and bright orange sweeps of California poppies. Farm stands, espresso houses, and hidden beer gardens abound. Apps like Trailforks have the route planning goods; the nearby town of Fairfax boasts four bike shops in a town of just seven thousand people and is home to the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame.

DeSilver is a poet, memoirist, and mindfulness teacher who lives and rides in Northern California. albertflynndesilver.com

Roman Dial has been traversing Alaska since the 1970s, first by thumb, then foot, then foot and raft. Eventually, he got a bike, too, and pioneered bikerafting so he could alternately ride and float deep into the backcountry, covering immense amounts of ground. “My first trip to Alaska was in 1974, and you just heard stories about him,” author Jon Krakauer once said of Dial. “He made people rethink what you could do, how far you could travel.” If you also want to rethink how far you could travel, check out the 2021 book from Dial’s fellow Alaskan packrafter and frequent expedition partner Luc Mehl, The Packraft Handbook: An Instructional Guide for the Curious, with illustrations by Sarah Glaser. Dial teaches biology and mathematics at Alaska Pacific University. He writes at packrafting.blogspot.com

Photos: Dan Ransom, danransom.com, @danransomphoto; Austin Siadak, austinsiadak.com, @austin_siadak

Megan McDuffie and Michael van Vliet live and cook in Bend, Oregon. Their project, Fresh Off the Grid, is not just a great source of camp meals, it’s also a member of One Percent for the Planet and the Conservation Alliance. freshoffthegrid.com, @freshoffthegrid

Photographer Stuart Palley spent five years shooting photos for his 2018 book Terra Flamma: Wildfires at Night, but just before the book was originally due to be published, in late 2017, the massive Thomas Fire in Southern California began roaring through thousands of acres of Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, putting the book about wildfires on hold because of…a wildfire. It was a taste of what’s to come. In 2020, California experienced the largest wildfire season in modern history with over four percent of the state’s total area having burned.

Palley is working on a new book, Into the Inferno, a memoir of his time embedded with fire crews and befriending wildfire experts, expected to be released in late 2021. See more of his work at stuartpalley.com, @stuartpalley