081
081
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/335247017″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=true&show_comments=false&show_user=false&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”300″ height=”300″ iframe=”true” /]“Picture walking through a parking lot with a ski mask rolled up on your head and a pistol in your pocket. You’re getting closer to the bank, your heart’s beating faster, adrenaline’s starting to rush through your head, and you can’t believe you’re about to do what you’re about to do,” says Roland Thompson. “When you’re climbing a route you’ve never done before, it’s a grade or two above what you’re comfortable with, you’re a few feet above that bolt and you’ve got a dynamic move coming up–that adrenaline is definitely the same intensity, it’s just cleaner.”
After serving 10-years in state and federal prisons, Roland discovered that he could satisfy his adrenaline craving and use his ability to stay calm in high-intensity situations by rock-climbing and snowboarding–instead of robbing banks. The outdoors also gave him what he had really been looking for all along: a sense of acceptance and community.
Roland is currently writing a book and doing public speaking events. Learn more at Iam081.com
Music: That Hill It Has Already Gone Away by adcBicycle • If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Conviction by Little Glass Men • Open Your Eyes! (To The World) by MC Cullah • Somnolence by Kai Engel • Belly of the Whale by Jason Tyler Burton • Realness by Kai Engel • Shame by My Monthly Date • Passages by Kai Engel • The Pouring Rain by MC Cullah • Save My Soul by MC Cullah • Today’s Reflection by Roland Thompson
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
Endangered Spaces — Katahdin Woods and Waters
Katahdin Woods and Waters
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/332029157?secret_token=s-isw1u” params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=true&show_comments=false&show_user=false&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”300″ height=”300″ iframe=”true” /]”The reason that I was able to do it is because I was incredibly naive,” says Lucas St. Clair. “I had no idea how much work it was gonna be when I started. Not a clue.”
The thing Lucas did: work to establish Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument in the North Woods of Maine.
We started the “Endangered Spaces” series for two reasons. First, we want to take a deeper look at a handful of important, active land battles. Second, and every bit as important, we want to follow the stories of a handful of people who, in their own, quirky ways, have stepped up to protect the threatened spaces they hold dear.
For Lucas, the endangered space wasn’t the land he was working to protect, but the communities that surround it.
The comment period for the 27 national monuments on Zinke’s list ends July 10th. Outdoor Alliance makes it easy to speak out for the places that are important to you.
To plan your trip to Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument, visit Friends of Katahdin Woods and Waters.
Music: If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Walking Barefoot on Grass by Kai Engel • That Hill It Has Already Gone Away by adcBicycle • Procreation by Little Glass Men • Mountain Sun by Jason Shaw • The Fallen by MC Cullah • Moontime by The IMG • A Language of its Own by Publish the Quest • Firediary5 by Ken Christianson • Live at Bazillus by Aidan Baker • lost love letters by Fog Lake • Primary Colors by Ken Christianson
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
The Shorts — Exit Strategy
Exit Strategy
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The summer after her first year of graduate school, Emma enrolled in an Alaska Pacific University Expedition Mountaineering course. She told her family she signed up because it meant she’d earn graduate credits to traipse around the Harding Icefield. But she also hoped the trip would bring some clarity on the bigger questions, like whether or not grad school had been a mistake and what she was still doing in Alaska.
No lightning bolts of clarity struck during her trip, but looking back a year later, she could see that, perhaps, her month in the Alaska mountains had given her the inspiration she needed after all.
You can find more of Emma’s writing at myalaskanodyssey.com or listen to her first Short, “I Poo: A Love Story”
Music: Save My Soul by MC Cullah • All of the Time by adcBicycle • Spray Paint it Gold by Little Glass Men • Sloppy Lazy Blues by MC Cullah • Passages by Kai Engel • Lost Forever by Little Glass Men • Rain Down and Fall Away by adcBicycle • circuit rider by Fog Lake
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
Pedal Strokes and Perspective
Pedal Strokes and Perspective
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“As a brown woman, I stand out,” says Mary Ann Thomas. “People came up to me just because they were curious, just because they were like, ‘There aren’t a lot of strangers here, we’re just interested in who you are as a person–as a whole person.’”
Mary Ann is the daughter of Indian immigrants, she’s queer and she had always lived in the liberal bubble of big cities on the East Coast. When she embarked on a six-month, 6,600-mile bike tour across the country, she worried most about the prejudice she might encounter as she pedaled through middle America. She was surprised to discover that the stereotypes she had to confront in a profound way were her own.
Check out the blog from Mary Ann’s trip, or find more of her writing here.
Music: Intro by Jacob Bain • If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Last Days by Cleod9 • Lost Forever by Little Glass Men • Conviction by Little Glass Men • Brothers by Cleod9 • Simplify by Little Glass Men • Tightrope Walker by Jason Tyler Burton
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive and with permission from the artists.
Picaflor
Picaflor
[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/324190553?secret_token=s-X1IfN” params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=true&show_comments=false&show_user=false&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”300″ height=”300″ iframe=”true” /]When a bad breakup sent him into a spiraling into a deep depression, Tom Ireson fixated on an unconventional way to get his head straight:
“I really needed something to focus my mind on to pull me out of that,” Tom says, “and about the biggest thing I could think of was to try and do a new route on a big wall.”
Not just any big wall, a big wall on the other side of the world in the remote and wild valley of Cochamo, Chile. When he latched on to the idea, Tom had never been to Cochamo and never climbed a big wall, much less established a new route on one.
Today, we’ve got one for you about how, if you find yourself at the bottom of an impossibly deep hole, sometimes it takes an equally impossible goal to pull yourself out of it.
If you want to hear more from Tom, check out his 2014 Short, ‘Go For It‘.
Music: Somnolence by Kai Engel • If Walls Could Talk by Jacob Bain & Nis Kotto • Snowmen by Kai Engel • hope! by The F*cked Up Beat • Rain Down and Fall Away by adcBicycle • Modulation of the Spirit by Little Glass Men • Nogales by Cleod9 • Sunset by Kai Engel • Kelp Grooves by Little Glass Men • Firediary5 by Ken Christianson • Moontime by The IMG • Ground Up by Cleod9 • Brothers by Cleod9 • Sonic Roads by Cleod9
Tracks provided by Free Music Archive or with permission from the artists themselves.
