Category: photos

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best hikes in Arizona

With 50,754 Photos and almost 800 hikes, HikeArizona.com is an incredible resource. It’s run by Joe Bartels.

Contributor Al_hikesAZ posted in 2005 a list of The 20 Most Popular hikes in Arizona:

Flatiron
West Fork of Oak Creek
Peralta Trail
Humphreys Summit Trail
Brown’s Peak
Havasu Canyon
Fossil Springs Trail
Camelback Summit via Echo
Horton Creek Trail
Piestewa Peak Summit Trail
Bright Angel
Barnhardt Trail
Rogers Canyon
West Clear Creek Trail
Hunter Trail
Kaibab – South Rim
Boynton Canyon
Bell Trail
Inner Basin Trail
Tonto Narrows

This isn’t necessarily the 20 best hikes in AZ, just the 20 Most Popular hikes.

He also recommends:

Bright Angel Trail
South Kaibab Trail

Thunder River/Deer Creek (photos)
Nankoweap Trail (photos)
Ribbon Falls (photos) just west of the North Kaibab Trail
Superstition Ridgeline

Al_hikesAZ also recommends 2 other sites for AZ Hikes:

  • Arizona Hikers
  • Todd’s Desert Hiking Guide

    • I am now planning on hiking Arizona in 2008! (There is a lot of research to be done.)

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    Early morning at Carney springs – Superstition Wilderness – larger original

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    Arizona Black Rattlesnake – larger original

    See all of Al_hikesAZ photos sets on Flickr. They are excellent.

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    Photo Contest Winners – National Wildlife Magazine

    In case you missed seeing these photos linked via Two-Heel Drive, here’s another shout out.

    THE SUBMISSIONS to the 37th annual photo contest were remarkable, not only for sheer volume—nearly 16,000 images—but for geographic breadth. Our winning photographers hail from Texas, California, New York and Tennessee, among other states, but also from India, Poland and the United Kingdom.

    One of the winning pics by Carol Goldstein

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    Reflection Lake in Alaska’s Denali National Park

    Photo Contest Winners – National Wildlife Magazine

    I finally got to Denali this past summer, but — as usual — the highest peak in North America was clouded over during my visit. So I must return.

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    National Geographic Photography Winners

    When I saw the Adventure Blog had submitted photos to National Geographic, I thought … why not me too?

    I’ll make a New Year’s Resolution to submit my best photos to contests in 2008.

    If only I could come up with something like this contest winner:

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    About 10 years ago I saw a monkey in India admiring himself with a stolen hand mirror. But had no camera at the time.

    National Geographic has announced the winners of this year’s photography contest and has begun displaying the winners and honorable mentions online. …

    As you would expect, there are some stunning images here, each of which will be published in the January issue of National Geographic. Sadly, none of my entries made the cut, and after seeing some of these shots I can see why. Of course, with 148,203 photos entered, I can’t imagine trying to whittle it down to these few. It must have been an incredibly tough job. …

    The Adventure Blog: National Geographic Announce Photography Winners

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    Ryan Jordan – Wilderness Trekking School

    I wish I could have atteneded Backpacking Light’s Wilderness Trekking III Course.

    From super hiker Ryan Jordan’s blog:

    … food, water, avalanche gear, group gear, snowshoes, and all clothing worn and items carried. Our pack weights to start actually averaged in the 12-14ish pound range.

    If I had to sing praise for the most merit-worthy benefits of this course, it was the cross pollination of experience, the joy of camaraderie in the face of wilderness stress, and the satisfaction of having achieved something meaningful as part of a group. …

    Ryan Jordan’s Backcountry: Wilderness Trekking School Featured in Billings Gazette

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    see all the wonderful photos – Wilderness Trekking III Course

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    fantastics photos by Istvan Hernadi

    A really diverse and engaging series of outdoor photos by Istvan Hernadi, editor for www.trailpeak.com of the Yukon, NWT and Nunavut area

    A couple of samples:

    Mt Shishapangma camp, Tibet
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    Advance base camp at 19,500ft near the ice pinnacles – late in the day storm clouds.

    Storms over Juneau icecap
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    View from Atlin lake BC

    see all photos in this set – most interesting – Explore top 500 – flickr

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    96 interesting Grand Canyon photos

    Here’s a set of the 96 most “interesting” pics on flickr tagged “Grand Canyon”. Flickr has over 2 billion photos, many of them very interesting.

    Best way to see them is to click on View as Slideshow after the link.

    Grand Canyon – All GC Sets Combined by Interestingness

    Here’s one of my favourites:

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    original – Al_HikesAZ

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    Everest Rocks slideshow

    Click through to The Adventure Blog to see a video slideshow of the world’s highest rock concert (altitude-wise).

    The musical score is by participating musicians.

    Jake Norton has recently returned from Nepal, where he took part in the Everest Rocks Trek in which 40 musicians turned into wandering minstrels, playing their music all the way up the Khumbu Valley before performing a concert at Everest Base Camp. It was, in fact, the highest concert ever, and was conducted to raise awareness of the Love Hope Strength Foundation. The concert was a success it would seem, as Jake reports that nearly $500,000 was raised for the Bhaktapur Cancer Hospital in Kathmandu. The funds will go a long way to making it a world class cancer treatment center.

    Jake has also sorted through the 5200 photos he took on the trip to put together a great video that helps capture the spirit of the entire event. ..

    The Adventure Blog

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    climbing Naeba Mountain, Japan

    One of my favourite blogs is Batish.net. I read every post.

    The photos are particularly well done. Almost Japanese in their elegant simplicity, though the author is an expat.

    A good example:

    The hike up was one of the most challenging trails I have come across in Japan in terms of terrain – a seven-hundred meter gain in less than 1.5 km. While it was short enough that, even after a leisurely morning, we reached the summit just in time for sunset, much of it was almost vertical …. It was satisfying to me to see that everyone made it despite admissions that this was the most difficult trek they had ever done. …

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    bastish.net: Hiking Tour of Japan’s Naeba Mountain

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    Afghan hiking … with machine gun

    When I said I want to hike Afghanistan, I didn’t mean I wanted to join the MILITARY to get a free trip there.

    Stars and Stripes posted a photo series on “Afghan hiking”.

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    Troops of Company A, 2nd Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade got an eyeful of scenery walking down a mountain in Afghanistan’s Kunar province. Many of the men ran out of the water along the way and began cramping up.

    Photo gallery: Afghan terrain tests soldiers’ hiking skills

    The original article was reprinted in American Hiking Society, posted by Jeffrey Hunter:

    Yesterday I came across an online article in Stars & Stripes, a paper published for the US Military. The article talked about how hiking can be a regular part of the routine for a member of the US Army’s 173rd Airborne Brigade. Of course, hiking in Afghanistan is nothing like hiking in the US. These soldiers not only have to negotiate steep terrain carrying as much as 100 pound! They also run the risk of encountering enemy fire along the way. My hat is off to these brave young men! …

    American Hiking Society – Hiking in Afghanistan: A Soldier’s Perspective

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    Ian McAllister – wildlife photographer

    At the Banff Mountain Book Festival we were treated to one of the most amazing slideshows I’ve ever seen.

    Ian McAllister gave an overview of his life story vis-a-vis bears and wolves.

    He’s very angry about big game trophy hunting. (And Ian’s a hunter who kills deer to feed his family.) There’s no reason to tag bear or wolf.

    Ghosts of the Rain Forest

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    Ian McAllister is a nature photographer, writer, and conservationist who has dedicated his life to exploring the remote wilds of the British Columbia coast. Born in Vancouver, his exploration and adventures in the province’s rugged West Coast began at a young age, and inspired in him a passion for conservation which led him to become one of Canada’s leading advocates for rainforest protection.

    With a keen interest in wildlife behaviour, ecology, and sailing, McAllister has spent much of the last 20 years travelling along the north coastline of British Columbia, observing the behaviour of coastal wolves and grizzly bears. For the last 17 years, McAllister has lived in the heart of the Great Bear Rainforest, one of the last places on earth where wolves live relatively undisturbed by humans. In his latest book, The Last Wild Wolves, he documents the behaviour of two packs, one in the extreme outer coastal islands and another farther inland.

    McAllister’s first book, The Great Bear Rainforest (1997), was instrumental in helping Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, Ian and Karen McAllister’s Raincoast Preservation Society, and other environmental groups to successfully lobby British Columbia’s provincial government to impose a moratorium on grizzly bear hunting and to designate a large portion of the province’s mainland coast as parkland in 2001.

    McAllister is a founding member of the Raincoast Conservation Society, and his images have appeared in numerous publications including International Wildlife, BBC Wildlife, Audubon, Sierra, and Beautiful British Columbia. Also a filmmaker, his footage has been used by National Geographic TV, Discovery Channel, and the BBC.

    Mountain Festivals at The Banff Centre

    His two books:

    The Great Bear Rainforest: Canada’s Forgotten Coast

    The Last Wild Wolves: Ghosts of the Rain Forest