Author: Rick Mc

Career gymnastics coach who loves the outdoors, and the internet.
Posted on

mountaineering clothing on Nanga Parbat

Patagonia sponsored Steve House and Vince Anderson climbed Nanga Parbat in six days in “pure alpine style. It was a new direct route on the Rupal Face, a wall with the largest relief of any wall in the world (14,000 feet)”.

For this they won the Oscar of Mountain Climbing — the Piolet d’Or (French for The Golden Ice Axe).

Patagonia posted some great photos, video and a detailed shopping list of Steve’s clothing. (All Patagonia, of course.)

Nice use of the internet! I like this company.

ss_Nanga_Parbat_house_03.jpg

UPDATE: For a terrific article about the controversial Steve House, check The Devil Wears Patagonia – Outside magazine

Posted on

Geared Up – gear, gadgets & expeditions

UPDATE: Besthike.com got a post on the the Geared Up blog.

This is the perhaps the best laid out multi-contributor hiking blog on the web. Excellent design. I love the prominent tag cloud navigation.

There is a ton of great content. I have subscribed to their RSS feed and will certainly be linking more in future.

Geared Up Blog – home page

geared-up.jpg

Posted on

language translation – now on this site

Just added a small widget (bottom of right hand side navigation) which can translate this page into 8 different languages.

Translations between European languages are surprisingly good. But to and from Asian characters is more hilarious than helpful.

Babel Fish is a web-based application developed by AltaVista (now Yahoo!) which machine translates text or web pages from one of several languages into another.

It takes its name from the Babel fish, a fictional animal used for instantaneous language translation in Douglas Adams’ novel The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. …

Babel Fish (website) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Posted on

planning for the Continental Divide Trail

m_cdt_overview.gif
Continental Divide Trail map – GORP

Southbound Or Northbound?

The choice between nobo and sobo may depend on snow conditions in a given year, and some experts feel sobo gives the best chance of completing a linear thru-hike. It’s important to know that there will be snow in Montana in May so sobo hikers should check with area rangers and land managers to see how deep the snowpack is before choosing this option. …

Backpacker

Now is the time to organize for 2007.

Posted on

hiking bloggers “meetup”, Shasta California

BuddhaShasta-c.IMG_0434.jpgThanks to Tom Magnan’s excellent Two-Heel Drive blog, I am now booked to attend the first ever “Outdoor Blogger Ho Down Oct. 6-8, 2006“.

Strange name. But what could be more natural than those who blog about hiking getting together in the wilderness to scramble a peak and exchange notes?

I expect to learn a lot.

We are tentatively scheduled to rendezvous at Horse Camp in the Mt. Shasta Wilderness about 6hrs out of San Francisco.

This is what blogging is all about. Using the internet to enrich the lives of online communities — in this case hikers.

See a larger version of the photo of Mt. Shasta by Vicki Brenner on Blooming Rose Press.

Posted on

Arctic1000 expedition, Alaska – update

Mission completed.

Ryan Jordan (Publisher of Backpacking Light Magazine), Roman Dial and Jason Geck made the longest known unsupported traverse of America’s most remote, roadless, uninhabited wilderness, 1000km (600mi).

The goal was to carry food for 20 days. And not forage, hunt, nor fish.

Details on the Arctic 1000 Expedition.

arctic1000.jpg

Posted on

Santa Cruz Trek, Peru

Noel Wigdor is a 21-year-old Canadian doing South America right.

On his travel blog he posted a trip report of a rainy, problematic adventure on the Santa Cruz Trek out of Huaraz, Peru:

Trekking the Andes – Santa Cruz

This is by far the most popular serious hike in the region and is indeed, as Noel tells, one of the best hikes in the world.

noel.jpg
Noel at the top of the pass — Punta Union 4760m (15,617ft).

If you are packing for a trip to the Andes check out besthike.com Santa Cruz for details. It’s 50km (31+ miles) plus sidetrips, 4 days recommended. Best months are May to September. Altitude is a factor.