Adventure
ArchiveOutside magazine, October 1994 Endurance: Get With it, Guys By Todd Balf (with Greg Child and Dan Dickison) Last July, Ann Trason won her sixth straight Western States 100 women’s title, beat all but one of the men, and bettered her own course record by 37…
Outside magazine, October 1995 Mountain Biking: Eyes for Mammoth By Todd Balf (with John Alderman) Mountain-bike professionals are no strangers to tough conditions, but July’s World Cup stop on California’s Mammoth Mountain was in another realm: The course was buried in ten feet of…
Features: Election Preview ’96, November 1996 The Boy Scouts Find A Compass In the shrink-wrapped politics of the environment, it’s not how far you go, but in what direction By The Editors “Clinton knows that if he wins in ’92, he’ll…
Outside Magazine, 1999 Annual Travel Guide Doing the Wild Thing Eight bush camps and jungle lodges where the floor show is fierce Temple Tiger Jungle Lodge, Nepal Milk and musk: That’s what a Royal Bengal tiger smells like. So said…
T H E H O L I D A Y G I F T G U I D E Shop for THE JOCK Shop for THE WANDERER Shop for…
Dispatches, April 1998 RETAIL One Giant Leap for Suckerkind How to buy lunar real estate, and other “bargains” on the World Wide Web By Katie Arnold As though there weren’t already enough distractions on the Internet, virtual malls are…
News from the Field, February 1997 Tinseltown: Alas, Mr. Speilberg has declined to direct By Adam Horowitz OK, here’s the plot: A dream team of Hollywood titans–one an avowed environmentalist–announces plans to build a 1,000-acre studio atop some of L.A.’s last wetlands. Unbowed…
 Outside magazine, May 1998 The Jungle Took Her Twenty-seven years ago a young Canadian woman went to Borneo seeking a sort of paradise, a place where she could study the mysterious red ape, gather science, garner respect…
Outside magazine, May 1999 Epitaph for a Crusader Terry Freitas lived for a cause, a place, a people, but he died for no good reason at all. When Terence Freitas returned to the United States on…
 Outside magazine, June 1994 The Hydroponic Dreams of Laird Hamilton He was born in a bathysphere, baptized in surfboard resin, raised in the rainforest in Hawaii. Who else is ready to ride the biggest wave on earth? By Bucky McMahon…
Outside magazine, July 1995 Windfishing: Call Me…Dude By John Galvin Though catching air off the lip of big waves is Jeff Olson’s first love, he’s also been known to tell a pretty good fish story. “When this one hit, he pulled my board backward,”…
Vacation Special, August 1997 R A F T I N G T H E G A U L E Y The Hillbilly Autobahn The best swimming in Mexico: Ocean? By Stephanie Gregory…
Outside magazine, October 1995 A Spin Around the Gab Galaxy By Sara Corbett “America loves a female athlete with a big personality,” says Kathy Dasilva, a producer of MTV Sports. “Someone who’s a force field unto herself, who’s all-around big.” Of course, the…
Dispatches, November 1998 Breakthroughs So Can I file a Patent on My Wife’s Panty Hose? And other modest proposals from the cutting edge of science By Denis Faye Once, there was a world without velcro, devoid of Gore-Tex, and…
Women Outside, Fall 1998 Toys Sharp Objects The best ways to slice, carve, chop, whittle, and otherwise be a cutup By Michael Kessler GEAR | TRAVEL | FITNESS |…
Dispatches, April 1998 ENVIRONMENT When We Say Roadless, We (Kinda) Mean It The Clinton administration’s latest bold move could spell the end of subsidized logging … or not By Alan Freedman It’s the timber industry’s oldest maxim: If you…
Outside magazine, January 1996 Ma Sparker By Bill Donahue The story seemed almost biblical: 60-year-old Charmian Glassman so loved her prodigal, forest-fire-fighting son, Jason Robertson, that she ventured into the dry, manzanita-specked hills near her Mount Shasta home and reportedly set the forest ablaze,…
Outside magazine, February 1998 Out There: OK Gorillas, No Belching During the Pledge of Allegiance Bringing a little jungle indoors, to a fresh generation of primatologists By Tim Cahill LISTEN UP! Tim Cahill speaks on Outside Radio…
Outside magazine, April 1996 The Town That the A-Bomb Built By Lawrence Burke Last summer’s 50th anniversary observances of the trinity blast, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki understandably focused on the world-historical transformation brought about by the atomic bomb. Considerably less was said about the here…
Outside magazine, April 1996 The Case for Speed By Todd Balf and Paul Kvinta Will mountaineering’s next era be all about linking the premier routes of yesteryear in nonstop climb-a-thons? Marc Twight thinks so. Best known for his ice-climbing prowess and tortured poetry (see…
Outside magazine, August 1999 Thicker Than Blood It takes some good old boys to show you the primo secret woods By Larry Brown Two years before my father died, when I was 14, my…
Travel Guide, Winter 1995-1996 Rack It Up Who says you can’t take it with you? By John Lehrer What to look for in a car rack? Ease of use (for example, can you open the ski/ snowboard holder with frozen fingers?), durability…
Outside magazine, December 1995 Introducing the Particle-Accelerating Bohunk Next Door By Todd Balf and Paul Kvinta Uh, meet Brian Scottoline. Stanford biochemist. HIV researcher. Sweaty pinup boy in the 1996 Studmuffins of Science calendar, on sale now in most university bookstores. Really. “I’m…
News from the Field, January 1997 Marketing: Salty, Salty, He’s Our Man… Some free advice for the organizers of the 2002 Winter Games By Bruce Mccall The Utah Winter Olympic Games are still five years away, but to sell those millions…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Ride With Pride: Well, It Won’t Fix Itself: Part 1 How to straighten a bum rim By Scott Sutherland As disheartening as it looks, a wheel that’s been banged into a shape that’s slightly suggestive of a taco…
Outside magazine, January 1996 The Outside Prognosticator: Wooood-y! Wooood-y! We’re drinking bottled water, We’ll soon be drinking bottled air… In 1991 he caught our ear by warbling these earnest lyrics. In 1996, as Outside names Woody Harrelson the Embarrassing Enviro Celeb of His…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Swimming: In our ongoing search for masochists… By Todd Balf (with Jim Kelly, Martin Dugard, and Alison Osius) Call Guy Delage a dreamer, but on December 16 the 42-year-old Frenchman left the Cape Verde Islands in a heroic bid to…
Outside magazine, April 1997 Another Herbal Wrap, O Immortal One? Should fortune, fame, and flabby acolytes be your heart’s desire, the first American sumo champion suggests thinking really, really big By Brad Wetzler When he…
Outside magazine, July 1996 Paddling: Mission Uncomfortable Mark Robbin’s lonely quest for the other side of the continent By Bill Donahue The setting is bleak–a Motel 6 in the middle of nowhere–and Mark Robbins is weary. “This isn’t fun,” he laments, sprawled…
Outside magazine, October 1996 Sport: From Wurst to First Propelled by Eastern Bloc training methods and a zest for junk food, a trio of Germans looks to sweep the Ironman By Lolly Merrell It’s midnight in Worms, Germany, and European Ironman champion…
Outside magazine, May 1995 Little Rascal A harmless pleasure cruise this was not By Randy Wayne White When my friend G.M. asked me to crew from Colombia to Panama and through the canal aboard his 35-foot Morgan sloop, I grudgingly consented–though I…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Movies: Legends of the Fall By Michael Paterniti As a minor literary movement unto himself, writer Jim Harrison has invented a cult of brazen heroes who live for the roar of fanged animals in wild places. To date, film versions…
Outside magazine, May 1995 Ballooning: The Legend of Steve the Adventurer By Todd Balf On the surrealness scale, it was off the charts: a 50-year-old Chicago securities dealer in the gondola of a hot-air balloon that he’d flown only once before, readying for takeoff…
Outside magazine, June 1996 Politics: Do Unto Endangered Species… With the environment up for grabs, God send in a green army By Bill Donahue And on the eighth day, after he had created Gingrich, Dole, and other democratically elected foes of the…
Dispatches, July 1997 S P O R T Where No One Has Gone Before? Mehgan Heaney-Grier’s precocious quest to become the world’s deepest free diver By Paul Kvinta The most peaceful part of Mehgan Heaney-Grier’s life begins at 40…
Dyn-O-Mite!, October 1997 The Illustrated History of Hat Head By Andrew Tilin and Mike Grudowski Who could have guessed, way back at that family reunion when your cousin Larry snuffled down one Schlitz too many and ended up with a Styrofoam cooler…
Outside Magazine, October 1998 Inspriation Enlighten My Load Sometimes you find yourself in the most predictable places By Pico Iyer I am sitting on a high hill above the dusty passageways of Ganden Monastery in Tibet. The sky…
News from the Field, December 1996 Sport: Why Is This Kid Grinning? Because 15-year-old Chris Sharma is the future of American sport climbing By Todd Balf “I think most people are past the age thing,” says Chris Sharma, 15, after another…
Outside magazine, December 1997 Enterprise: Eureka? Above the din of doubters, a prospector swears a filthy Canadian river will make him filthy rich By Trevor Curwin ‘Oh, it’s down there, all right. that gold is definitely there, as we speak,”…
Outside magazine, June 1996 Wildlife: Marty Stouffer’s Apocryphal America After a raft of allegations, his peers ask: Has the popular PBS filmmaker gone too far? By John Tayman When 50 filmmakers settled into missoula, Montana, last March for the 19th annual International…
Outside magazine, March 1996 Communications: Talk Alien to Me An Everyman’s plan to mingle with the stars By Paul Kvinta “If that call comes and you don’t answer, you’ll regret it,” trumpets astronomer Paul Shuch, in a wobbly impression of Humphrey Bogart…
Outside magazine, May 1995 Night Calls It was the last of its kind. When the red-crested heron vanished deep in Africa’s outback, a girl and her father traced the lonely rise and fall of their lives by its fading song. By Lisa…
Dispatches, June 1997 Jurisprudence: Hey, Get Your Ropes Off My Cathedral! A Wyoming judge is left to answer a thorny question: To whom does Devils Tower belong? By Bill Donahue For The Record…
Outside magazine, July 1999 BUSINESS Wall-to-Walls Climbing gyms go high-tech, top-dollar, and mainstream I’ll Stick with the Miso Soup It sounds like a Zen riddle: When is a sumo wrestler too fat? Recently, sumotori who…
Outside magazine, September 1996 Books: A Lyrical Turn to the Epic By Miles Harvey Accordion Crimes, by E. Annie Proulx (Scribner, $25). From Homer’s Odyssey to Dante’s Divine Comedy, perhaps the purest genre of literature is the travel…
October 1999 F E A T U R E S Adventure at the End of the Century The sight of George Leigh Mallory’s well-preserved body on Everest confirms that adventure, like life, is not always pretty. It means risking all on a mountain—as…
Outside magazine, April 2000 Snows of Yesteryear Mckay Jenkins’s article about the avalanche tragedy that struck Mount Cleveland 30 years ago (“And None Came Back,” February) was spare, elegant, and riveting—so much so that I told my…
Cycling Special, March 1997 Surviving the Mean Streets You can’t outrun all the obstacles you encounter in the city. You have to outsmart them. By Alan Coté Your Tutor: Mike Downey, 29, commutes three miles six days…
Outside magazine, May 1996 Acoustic Camping The summer’s best outdoor music festivals By Peter Nelson Kerrville Folk Festival May 23-June 16 at 50-plus-acre Quiet Valley Ranch, nine miles south of Kerrville, Texas. Tunes: Scheduled headliners this year include…
Outside magazine, May 1996 You Got the Beat? “I got my first heart-rate monitor last year,” Kelly McCown says. “It was revolutionary.” She may have come late to the party, but the reason seemingly every elite athlete is bleating about using a monitor is that it’s…
Outside magazine, June 1998 Letters: The Lagging Response Bill Bryson’s story about his woeful friend Katz and their Appalachian Trail misadventures (“You Gotta Have Friends. Which Is Damned Unfortunate,” April) reminded me of a hike in New Hampshire’s White Mountains. My partner constantly trailed…
Outside magazine, July 1994 Environment: Rainbow Worriers The Forest Service tries, again, to corral a happy hippie jamboree By Ned Martel A sprawling campsite. Lentils simmer in iron cauldrons. Bota-squeezing women twirl in batik skirts. A sunburned longhair yowls that a U.S. Forest Service…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Decathlon: Odds That… Dan O’Brien will win the gold medal……..1-5 He will top the mythic 9,000-point barrier…..5-1 He will once again bonk in the pole vault……50-1…
Dispatches, March 1998 SPORT Lights, Action, Cameras? On the eve of defending his unlikely title, world champion Rob Evans insists that ice surfing’s a surefire hit. Now if only the cable honchos would listen. Oh, would that he’d ridden to…
Outside magazine, November 1995 Postnuptial Agreements Four resorts where you and your new-to-the-sport partner can find downhill harmony By Ron C. Judd You share private moments, swap toothbrushes, even exchange vows. Big deal. Agree on the perfect ski vacation, and people will…
 Outside magazine, June 1996 Balloonatics They’re swashbuckling billionaires and absent-minded dreamers, all chasing one of the last great adventures: 25,000 miles around the globe by jet stream and Icarian wing. No stopping, no sploshing. By Daniel…
The trail to some sort of personal peace seemed to wend high into the Himalayas. But where it led was back to an old friend.
So, you have to ask, when it comes to the great outdoors, is anything OK anymore?
Outside Magazine, September 1999 OFF-ROADING Going Down? Brian Head’s 6,000-foot vertical red-rock relief should do the trick You can be forgiven for snubbing Brian Head during ski season. For while tiny Brian Head Resort does amass…
Outside magazine, September 1999 CONTENDERS The Wild Bunch, Cont. Why stop at 12? There’s plenty more where those came from. POLITICS | VIRGIN LAND: A HISTORY | FRONT…
Bulletins Grandparenting: Geriat-Tricks By Bob Howells Call it cross-generational bonding, old-fashioned mentoring, or just doing neat stuff with the grandkids–more and more outfits are bringing disparate generations together on outdoor jaunts. Not surprisingly, Elderhostel lurks behind many of them, such as Let’s…
Outside magazine, October 1995 You’re Looking a Little Ozoned-out When it comes to the air you breathe, what you can’t see will hurt you By Mark Jannot I have a friend who’s always complaining about the tribulations of running in his own…
Outside magazine, November 1995 Music: Wastin’ Away Again Down in Vacaville By Mike Steere And the award for the most shameless and unprecedentedly obscene use of the environment for marketing purposes goes to…White Devil Records of Seattle. Along with its recently released CD of…
Outside magazine, February 1996 She Who Laughs Last… By Todd Balf and Paul Kvinta (with Debra Shore) Two days before the short-course triathlon world championships in Cancún, Mexico, last November, newly crowned Ironman champion Karen Smyers was neither training nor relaxing nor touring Mayan…
Outside magazine, March 1999 And the Placebo Costs Less, Too The results ù such as they are ù have come in on the latest wonder herb By Michael Kessler Before bustling off to the…
Outside Magazine, November 1994 Ultra: No, Thank You By Todd Balf (with Jim Hage) Perhaps Kawika Spaulding of Hawaii would have been in the running for the Huntington Beach-to-New York City Trans America Footrace had he chosen to stay away from whiskey at rest…
Family Vacations, Summer 1996 Bringing Up Grandpa We pushed the family-vacation envelope last summer when we took a multigenerational clan rafting on Idaho’s North Fork of the Salmon. There were 21 of us in all, ranging from my six-year-old son to my 75-year-old father. My…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Women’s Sprints Here comes Gwen Torrence, America’s fastest loose cannon By Mark Jannot Gwen Torrence promises to be among the most hyped athletes of the Atlanta Games: a hometown girl who returns to accolades and–a good bet–Olympic gold…
Outside magazine, July 1994 Triathlon: Beware of Dave By Todd Balf (with Derek Rielly) As the season kicked off last April with the St. Croix International Triathlon, the buzz on the street was about the imminent return of Dave Scott, the six-time Hawaii Ironman champion turned…
Dispatches, May 1997 Sport: A Man, A Plan, and a Hell of a Tan With a patient approach and all the tools, José Loiola stands poised to become the new King of the Beach By Johnny Dodd “Right now,…
Outside magazine, August 1996 The Book On: Mountainbiking Will Tinker Juarez triumph–or psych himself out trying? By Alan Cote and Eric Hagerman Until last year, the word on Tinker Juarez was that were he ever to recognize just how strong…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Good-Bye 1996, Hello 2004 As the sun descends on Atlanta, an anxious world turns its eyes to…Puerto Rico? By Stephanie Gregory While Boston elbows into position in the race for the 2008 Summer Olympics, the dash for the…
 Outside magazine, October 1994 Welcome to Gun Camp In the sport of shooting, proficiency means not only winning, but getting good at killing. Welcome to Gun Camp, where the question is, Do I want to do this? and the answer is, a little sadly, You…
Outside magazine, October 1995 Cycling: A Race to Remember, Sadly By Todd Balf (with John Alderman) Miguel Indurain’s unprecedented fifth straight victory in the the Tour de France last July was indeed impressive, but the race probably won’t be remembered for Big…
 Outside magazine, November 1996 Peruvian Gothic Don Benigno Aazco carved his way 36 years deep into the green heart of the Andean forest, founded 14 settlements, abandoned his wife and many children, married his daughter, slew his son-in-law, fought drug peddlers, tamed…
Outside magazine, November 1997 Chin Up — There’s Always Next Year The latest on a not-so-successful expeditionary season By Andrew Tilin Since explorers typically utter “uncle” about as often as Jackie Chan, one has to wonder what dark cosmic forces…
Dispatches, December 1998 Sport Hey Bob, Can You Tie Me Off to That Pika? Climbing’s uphill battle against a proposed ban on fixed anchors By John Galvin Idaho’s Sawtooth Wilderness is a region of such overwhelming natural grace that…
Dispatches, April 1998 SPORT These Guys May Be on EPO, Does Anyone Care? Despite the promise of an effective new drug test, the USOC drags its heels By Paul Keegan At 53, Allen Murray swims five times a week,…