Sep
14
Hootin’ & Hollerin’
“I was certain I was paralyzed. My legs were totally limp, I was hanging upside down and the only thing stopping me from falling 160-feet headfirst into the talus below, was this rope that was wrapped around my foot,” remembers Craig Gorder. In November, 2016, Craig took a fall in Indian Creek that injured him badly, and dramatically altered the course of his life. “But I don’t really identify with the story of the accident. As intense as it was, it’s just this thing that happened. What does matter is: what happens after you get hurt? What happens after you lose your identity and your sense of self?” In this episode, we follow Craig through the first year of his recovery through a series of updates and reflections that document the day to day questions and decisions, setbacks and victories, mini-crises and mini-epiphanies that really make up the recovery process.
Note: In the credits, we asked you to consider donating to Craig’s GoFundMe. Craig contacted us after the episode came out to say that he’s currently caught up on his medical bills and to ask that that people not donate to his GoFundMe, but save their money for some more urgent cause. Thanks!
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • sleep! by The F*cked Up Beat • Live at Bazillus by Aidan Baker • Monsanto Fields II by The F*cked Up Beat • Manly Nunn Steps Out by Doctor Turtle • Your Ghost by Richard Smith • Save My Soul by MC Cullah • Long Way Down by Vienna Ditto • Whatever Comes My Way by Vienna Ditto • Prowl by Hopeless Jack • Moontime by The IMG • nostalgia! by The F*cked Up Beat • Conviction by Little Glass Men • Lau by Richard Smith
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
Aug
24
Ethan and G-Pop
“I have a pretty young grandfather, but he was starting to get old and knew he had one or two more big expeditions in him,” says Ethan Roebuck. “He wanted to put together a big trip, because he’s getting older, but also because I’m getting older, these are skills that he thinks are important, and he wants to make sure I have them too–a handing off of the baton, I suppose.”
So when Ethan’s grandfather proposed that they go on a two-month, five-hundred mile, tandem kayaking expedition along the Canadian coast the summer before Ethan’s senior year of high school, Ethan was onboard.
Producer Cordelia Zars brings you the story of a wild adventure, a passing of the torch, and the special bond that emerges and evades the constraints of words.
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • A Language of It’s Own by Publish the Quest • Kelp Grooves by Little Glass Men • The Waltz by Jason Tyler Burton • On the Road by Amy Stolzenbach • Ghost Dance by Ken Christianson • Firediary5 by Ken Christianson • Daemons by Kai Engel • The Next Ones to Come by Publish the Quest • The Architect by Cleod9
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
Aug
10
The Glacier Project
“Any time I ski a steep line, I’ve done it hundreds of times, and still every time for me there is that moment of fear on top, where I am like, ‘Do I really want to do this?’,” says Jason Hummel. “But, also, anytime you do anything scary, it really ties you down to the moment, the instant, to that second, and all that matters is the next turn.” That feeling of complete presence when you drop into a committing line for the first time has driven Jason’s life. It’s guided decisions about his career, about the structure of his life, and, for the past three decades, it has pulled him up all of the major peaks of the Pacific Northwest, and many of the more obscure, remote and committing mountains of the Cascades and Olympics. But, just as Jason had started to feel like he knew what his home mountains had to offer, he stumbled into this idea that made him reconsider how much he still had to explore.
Today, producer Matt Martin brings you, “The Glacier Project,” the story of Jason’s journey to ski all of the glaciers in Washington, and how placing a constraint on adventure can deepen the relationship with the places we consider most familiar.
Read more about Jason’s Glacier glacier project and check out his photographs at myadventurecrusade.com
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Manly Nunn Steps Out by Doctor Turtle • Oxygen Mask by Andy G. Cohen • Blowback Blues by Canyon Kids • Roswell by Fog Lake Tracks provided by Free Music Archive or with direct permission from the artists.
Jul
27
The Shorts — A Story of My Own
A Story of My Own
For most of his adult life, Cam Fenton has fought against climate change–and particularly to protect the Arctic.
“The funny thing was, for most of that time, I couldn’t tell you why,” says Cam. “Sure, I could recite, and often wrote, the talking points: to stop sea level rise, stand with small island nations and Indigenous peoples, keep fossil fuels in the ground and save the Arctic. But anytime I heard someone tell a deeply personal story, I felt embarrassed that I didn’t have a story of my own.”
So, this past summer Cam jumped at the chance to join a friend on a trip to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He hoped to return changed–with his own story, with revelations about climate change and with renewed purpose. And Cam did walk away from the Arctic with an adventure and a revelation–just a very different one than he expected.
You can find more of Cam’s writing at overstoker.com
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • I Dare You by Little Glass Men • She-Wolf In My Heart by Sergey Cheremisinov • Rewire Your Cables by Little Glass Men • Simplify by Little Glass Men • Loops to Aviemore by The Freeharmonic Orchestra • rattlesnake by Fog Lake
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive.
Jul
13
The Elephant in the Boat – Part II
The Elephant in the Boat – Part II
“The definition of kidnapping is moving someone from one point to another point against their will, and that’s exactly what had happened to us,” says Ben Stookesberry. “But, to me, the most noteworthy part of the day was that, for the first time in the entire trip, we were actually all working together as a team and we were all spending an entire day together.”
Ben and Chris Korbulic are the expedition kayakers. The two of them have what is perhaps the longest running, most successful partnership not just in kayaking, but in the world of outdoor adventure. They’ve been at this together for over a decade now.
And, yet, in April of 2017, the two boaters wound up on an expedition on which the interpersonal dynamics grew so strained that being held hostage by an armed rebel group in the remote Amazon didn’t necessarily seem like the worst thing that could have happened.
We’ve broken today’s episode into two parts. In Part I, we followed Ben and Chris down a stretch of Colombia’s remote Apaporis River. Today, for Part II, we’ll get into the history of this epic partnership, what went so wrong, and what happens moving forward.
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Beg Me to Stay by Hopeless Jack • Crow Jane by Hopeless Jack • Hidden Eyes by Hopeless Jack
Tracks used with permission from the artists.
