Yep, you heard me right. If you read the blog regularly, you know that my friend Jenn was looking for some gear to take to Nicaragua. Well, here’s the reason why! Jenn has created this awesome vacation experience through her extensive travel and research in Nicaragua and her wealth of kayaking experience. She has teamed up with Point Reyes Outdoors, and a local (Nicaraguan) guide Eddy to make it all happen. Get on down there!
YouTube kick, that is. I just got this from the NRDC, regarding wolves.
Before you watch the video, a quick story about wolves. Gear Queen and I learned this from a ranger named Joe, who is stationed at Union Pass, near Pinedale WY. Joe shares the Union Pass area with a lone cowboy who runs cattle up and down through there. Occasionally, they collaborate on the griz and the wolves who come by and take out a head or two from time to time (or eat a head or two, but that’s a different story.)
Turns out, the wolves are smart, and the bears not so much. Take out one wolf, and the entire pack will get the message and move off. Take down a bear, and one will step up to replace it. Smart as they are, looks like they need a little help! Though, I do realize it’s a complex issue.
Ya know, I have been seeing this around a lot, and I’ve decided it’s an idea worth some props. The idea here is that you log onto this Laneo site, take a poll, and then Laneo sells this research to industry (or I imagine, whoever would like to know the answers). They take that money, and turn around and use it to help the environment. Pretty snazzy! Try it!
It’s that time of year folks - we are officially closing in on Fall, and, if my predictions hold true, I believe it will be an early winter. If you’ve been out and about this summer, you’ve been bombarded by photons. Yes! Sun exposure is a good thing, since it feels good, and it boosts your serum vitamin D levels (fights cancer). But it’s a bad thing, too, since your DNA sometimes gets a little behind in their repair functions after so many photonic bombardments (causes cancer).
If you’ve got some moles or other kinds of skin spots, best have a good look at them or better yet, get them checked out. The last time I had an end-of-summer growth, it turned out to be an “age barnicle”, so you never know what suprises your skin has in store for you. Check this out:
Remember, good information is the best gear around. Have fun!
I’ve been out guiding, teaching and romping in (in my limited opinion) the finest venues in the American West. It has been a blur of rapids, passes, sandstone, granite, streams, screaming sun, sunrises, sunsets, acres of dehydration-induced delerius laughter, a few chills even - and more pressed coffee than I’d care to admit. In so many pure and charged moments: fears, fearful moments, victories, and times of feeling choppy, then fluid again. Trying, sometimes in the clumsiest way, to connect with people and loved ones in between car rides, airplanes, airports and reams of sleep lost.
You know it’s time to come home, and stay home, when you wonder if your beyond-Blistex-chapped lips will ever heal. When cheese loses it’s appeal completely, and salami becomes a chore rather than a salty thrill. When de (or re) hydrated anything radios your body from afar to say “I will not nourish you - neener neener!” When you go to zip up your sleeping bag and it hangs up for the 1 billionth time, and you could care less - sleeping with the bag half open is just fine. When you wake up, no matter where you are, and instinctively (often frantically) look for signs of daylight, signs of boats or food missing, or bears, students or clients milling around in the dark.
When you realize all at once, that the scenery is just a backdrop, a playground for the most important thing of all - the people who are there with you - and also a reminder of those who are not. When there are friends and family you just flat out miss, and there is no longer any way to finesse it. When you glorify your own life - your home, your people, your job, your future plans - as you hike out for the last time, instead of dread them. When you are somehow at the same time pleasantly and annoyingly, maybe achingly, deficient -nutritionally, emotionally, energetically? …but you cannot quite place it. I don’t get to feeling this way very often, so I also cherish this (and, of course, wish this on others.)
It’s good to be home! Time to replenish, and to kick iGearList into high gear!
