Adventure
ArchiveNews from the Field, December 1996 Chemistry: The Not-Quite-As-Big Bang Shredding’s volitile new form of avalanche control By Hal Clifford When Doug Abromeit, director of the Forest Service’s National Avalanche Center, recently spied two teenage snowboarders in Utah’s Little Cottonwood Canyon,…
Outside magazine, May 1995 Policing the Flyways of Disease From the peculiar vantage point of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the world beyond America’s borders swarms with pathogenic threats. With more than 2.5 million foreign animals arriving in the United States every year–any one of which…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Big Weather The Ice Storm The picturesque has become terror, whole forests collapsing at once. Lessness rules. By Barry Hannah The Gale Forty-knot winds. Fifty-foot seas. And a ship that suddenly…
 Outside magazine, May 1994 A Death in Navajo Country Leroy Jackson loved this land and fought to protect it. Last fall his body was found on a lonely New Mexico road. Was he murdered? Or had he somehow lost his way?…
Outside magazine, June 1996 Paddling: Nicklaus, Jordan..Who? Greg Barton, America’s most celebrated unknown athlete By Martin Dugard Devoted paddlers talk about greg barton’s kayak stroke with the same reverence that country-clubbers reserve for Jack Nicklaus’s golf swing. No unseemly kerplunk marks the…
Gone Summering, July 1998 The Sky Is Not the Limit Look, up there, it’s the Dakotas’ main attraction! By Louise Erdrich And Don’t Forget the Terra Firma The 244,000-acre Badlands National Park is probably…
Outside magazine, October 1997 The Ironmen They invited us to their masochists’ ball. Amazingly, we accepted. By John Tayman ‘We were the first that ever burst / into that silent sea,” quoth Coleridge. Nothing…
Outside magazine, October 1997 Phil Knight His big sell: Everyone’s an athlete By Donald Katz A billionaire nearly six times over, and every cent of it born of entrepreneurial obsession and the abiding allure…
The Downhill Report, December 1996 A Little Humility Never Hurt Learning to snowboard can be a bumpy ride. Get over it, will you? By Mike Harrelson Ask most folks to describe their first day on a snowboard, and what they’re sure…
Outside magazine, December 1997 Philanthropy: Do-Gooders Rule! In this age of mounting apathy, an unlikely subculture steps up to the plate By Paul Kvinta And the Moral Is, Never Underestimate the Home-River Advantage…
Outside magazine, June 1995 Paleontology: Don’t Touch the Femurs By Chris Dray “Finally, I can get back to work.” That’s about all Peter Larson had to say after a jury last March acquitted him of the major charges in a rare case involving dinosaurs…
Outside magazine, March 1996 Goodness, Gracious By Todd Balf and Paul Kvinta (with Brian Alexander and Steve Law) After last December’s inferno at the Malden Mills plant in Methuen, Massachusetts, shock waves could be felt both locally and throughout the outdoor-recreation business. The blaze…
Outside magazine, June 1996 Food and Drink Cycling Haute Cuisine By Bob Howells As many a resting athlete knows, there’s something about a malt beverage–and we’re not talking milkshakes–that soothes sore muscles and cools a hyperthermic body core. So next time…
Outside magazine, August 1995 Environment: A Moment on the Goofs Rome is burning. So why are greens throwing water at a book? By Keith Schneider (with Margaret Kriz) Gregg Easterbrook looked happy enough, but for somebody who once wrote an article entitled…
Outside magazine, October 1999 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 Mallory did, with tragic…
Outside magazine, January 1996 Heave To, Felix! Thar Blow th’ Faeroes! For good nautical fun, nothing beats the blizzardy, icebergy waters of the North Sea. Which makes it just the place for two friends willing to go anywhere in the name of unjustifiable adventure.
The recovery he helped bring upon the Hudson has been far more personal for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. than the process of simply cleansing a river. It has washed him of his sins, returning his birthright charm and political pedigree to full shiny view — and leaving onlookers wondering what's next.
Two men, a continent, and the mother of all polar duels
For years, virtually no one could beat Lynn Hill to the top of a climbing wall. Then along came Isabelle Patissier, and beyond a shadow of a doubt things are changing.
Cycling Special, March 1997 That Old Black Top Magic If you’re racing, touring, or just toning up, a few road-ready tricks can help you do it better By Andrew Rice Your Tutor: Fred Rodriguez, 23,…
Outside magazine, March 1998 Up. Down. Up. Down. Up. Down. Up. Down. And Then, By Golly, Up Again. Why fuss with this “Climb Every Mountain” crap when you can simply climb one mountain, every day, 2,000-plus days straight, almost six years, rain and…
Outside magazine, May 1996 Earth to Jenny: Come in, Jenny “Not to be rude,” said third-place finisher Anne Marie Lauck after she and the rest of a strong field were trounced by a mysterious number 61 at the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Columbia, South…
Outside magazine, June 1999 Birch Bark in Excelsis! Looking for someplace a little out of touch with the times? Hang a left at the Adirondacks. My Delta, Myself | A…
Outside magazine, August 1995 The Marvelous, Manic Drive of Juli Furtado What fuels the world’s most dominant mountain-bike racer? Doom and gloom and a steady flow of French roast. By Sara Corbett “Oh my god,” Juli Furtado…
Outside magazine, August 1996 The Book On: Beach Volleyball Can McPeak and Reno bury the hatchet for gold’s sake? By Mark Jannot Until April, the olympic debut of women’s beach volleyball seemed fairly easy to handicap: A few top international teams,…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Big Weather: The Ice Storm Trees crash through your windows like dead uncles, whole forests go into an exploding collapse. You’ve got your comeuppance. By Barry Hannah Here in Oxford, Mississippi, most of the leaves are fallen and…
Outside magazine, November 1995 Matches Made in the Heavens No matter what your alpine aptitude, a guide to finding that resort of your dreams By Ron C. Judd Fellow skiers, it’s time to take stock. Park yourself in a chair, rub that…
Out Front, October 1997 Attention: the Editors Have Left the Building Celebrating two decades of accuracy, prescience, and gentility. Or something like that. By Adam Horowitz If only we could attribute it to a newborn keeping us up all night.
 Outside magazine, August 1998 The First Law of Gravity Namely, that that which rises must eventually fall. A law that even the king of the Alaskan bush pilots probably can’t ignore forever. By Daniel Coyle Early morning at Ultima…
Deep beneath Moscow a crew of urban spelunkers frolics, hunting Stalin's secret hideaway, Ivan the Terrible's torture chamber, bootleg nuclear weapons, and a little fame and fortune
Outside magazine, September 1999 SPORT Out of This World Can a daring French rider called “the Alien” keep pace with downhill mountain biking’s wild, wild ride? “This is what I like,” says French downhill mountain-bike racing phenom Nicolas Vouilloz,…
Outside magazine, September 1999 POLITICS The New Wilderness Land Grab Armed with serious money, a young cadre of green activists is about to put naked nature back on the national agenda By Elizabeth Arnold…
Horse Sense I Wanna Be a Cowboy The Hysterical Parent The horse will buck or run off Wranglers look for horses to put in their lines that are “bomb-proof” (their description, not ours) because they don’t underestimate their clients’…
Outside magazine, October 1994 Books: Cactus Ed’s Apotheosis By Miles Harvey Earth Apples: The Poetry of Edward Abbey, edited by David Petersen (St. Martin’s Press, $14.95); Confessions of a Barbarian: Selections from the Journals of Edward Abbey, edited by David Petersen (Little, Brown and…
Outside magazine, November 1996 Election Preview ’96 He’s Back And He’s Tanned, Rested, and Ready Forget Colin, Pat, and Jesse. The big-time endorsement every politician covets this year is that of television commercial icon Iron Eyes Cody, beloved symbol of…
Outside magazine, February 1996 No Comprendo! Yo Soy un Gringo Estupido! For the linguistically impaired, a south-of-the-border survival guide By Randy Wayne White Recently, I attended a two-week Spanish course at Conversa, an intensive language school located a few miles outside San…
Outside magazine, March 1999 Books: The Real Deal By James Zug ELECTRONICS | BUYING RIGHT | THE OTHER STUFF | BOOKS…
Outside Magazine, November 1994 Cycling: The Curse Strikes Again By Todd Balf (with Jim Hage) Before the start of the season, Motorola star Lance Armstrong reasoned that the world champion’s curse, a malady coined by the European tabloids after a succession of recent winners…
Outside magazine, July 1994 You Know How I Don’t Like Pesticides Sure, it’s a kinder crop. But is organic food really better for your body? By Ken McAlpine There are people who can resist strawberries. In fact, they bristle at eating strawberries–plain, or on…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Men’s Sprints: Odds That Michael Johnson will win both the 200 and 400…….1-1 Donovan Baileywill win gold in the 100………10-1 Carl Lewiswill medal in the 100……….15-1…
 Outside magazine, Family Vacation Guide Unsung Heroes Ten top-ranking parks you might not have heard of — but then, no one else has either TODDLERS…
Dispatches, May 1997 Treasure Hunting: Thank You, Fidel, May I Have Another Gold Ingot By Miro Cernetig “There could be billions in gold down there,” says Glenn Costello, practically chuckling as he thumbs through slides of sparkling silver coins and other booty…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Mountain Biking: Odds That… Alison Sydor will capture the gold medal……3-2 Tinker Juarez will medal……..3-1 Thomas Frischknecht will break something…….8-1…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Field Notes: The Last Wilderness Few places are left like British Columbia’s rainforest. But for how long? By Doug Peacock Early July on the central coast of British Columbia was cold and wet. Clouds hovered over indistinct shorelines.
Outside magazine, October 1994 Sailing: Incoming! By Todd Balf (with Greg Child and Dan Dickison) Last July, 24 hours after a surprise opening-day drubbing by millionaire skipper and fellow trash-talker Bill Koch, Dennis Conner did what he does best: He got even. When officials at the…
Outside magazine, November 1995 My Gelding, Myself How passion crosses the line into not-quite-respectable obsession: The complicated joys of horse ownership By Jane Smiley THE WORK Last weekend, when I went away for a two-night horse trials with my elderly…
Features: Election Preview ’96, November 1996 The Nature of the Beast In defense of the dandelion-pickin’, tree-lovin’ side of that environmental bogeyman, Bob Dole By Brad Wetzler Little-known fact: Bob Dole was once a demon on roller skates –the steel-wheeled, strap-on,…
 Outside magazine, November 1997 The Victim’s Wake When the body of a local man surfaced in the Grenadines, the wave of accusations that followed not only swept up the wealthy American couple suspected of his murder — it also exposed anew the uneasy symbiosis…
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…
 Outside magazine, April 1998 You Gotta Have Friends. Which is Damned Unfortunate. Tackling the Appalachian Trail on a whim would require a few essentials. I realized, foremost among them a boon companion. What I got was Katz. By Bill Bryson…
In the evolution of the species known as hockey players, those indoor patches of brine-cooled, milky-white, Zambonied ice have spawned some very good athletes. But the truly great ones arise from the dense, black freeze of the neighborhood skating pond, where weekend duffers and future stars happily collide.
Outside magazine, May 1998 A Lovely Sort of Lower Purpose In praise of doing nothing. To wit: No racing, no exceeding, no catch-and-releasing. Just time-tested fooling around. By Ian Frazier As kids, my friends and I spent a lot…
Outside magazine, May 1999 Expeditions Sledgepuller, P.I. Toting 300 pounds and a love of the arcane, a Canadian explorer attempts to unravel an Arctic mystery When Hans Kr’ger set out to explore a desolate stretch…
Outside magazine, June 1994 Mountain Biking: 150-kph Dreaming By Todd Balf (with Martin Dugard and Eric Hagerman) Funny things happen when you try to ride a mountain bike at 150 kph. Ask the new downhill speed record holder, Frenchman Christian Taillefer, who on…
Outside magazine, August 1996 Books: Time and Tide Caught Inside: A Surfer’s Year on the California Coast, by Daniel Duane (North Point Press/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $21). Thoreau did it from the door of his cabin; Darwin, from the deck of the H.M.S. Beagle;…
Vacation Special, August 1997 F L Y – F I S H I N G T H E R O G U E Time Off the Grid In blissful isolation along the Rogue River, where it’s easier to find…
Outside magazine, October 1995 Books: Vengeance and Cactus By Miles Harvey Painted Desert, by Frederick Barthelme (Viking, $22.95). This vibrant novel has fascinating parallels with nature essayist Bill McKibben’s acclaimed 1992 nonfiction work, The Age of Missing Information. In that book, McKibben…
Destinations, November 1998 Ace is the Place A prime-season meander down South Carolina’s Ashepoo, Combahee, and Edisto Rivers By Parke Puterbaugh If your mental image of coastal South Carolina consists mainly of Myrtle Beach’s six-lane…
Out Front, Fall 1998 Anthropology O.J., B.C. New and disheartening evidence that domestic abuse is prehistory By Cristina Opdahl It wasn’t So Fred Flintstone flirted with waitresses in Rockapulco. And frittered away too much time at the lodge.
Outside magazine, January 1996 The Outside Prognosticator: If It’s Tuesday, This Must Be Parapenting “There is apprehension,” says Susie Smyle, a trip packager with Boulder, Colorado-based All Adventure Vacations, of the booming phenomenon known as multisport sampler tours. These outdoor smorgasbords let clients try everything–rafting, hiking,…
Outside magazine, January 1996 The Outside Prognosticator: Babes in Crampons “I’d stack my son’s psychological and physical strengths against 90 percent of the mountaineers that I meet,” brags Michael Stewart, proud father of 13-year-old Joshua, who is five summits away from his dream of being the…
Dispatches, February 1998 ADVENTURE Hey, Where’s the Joystick on This Thing? As the race to soar around the globe heats up, Dick Rutan prepares for liftoff By Hampton Sides The Borax Desert around Mojave, California, is the hallowed ground…
Outside magazine, September 1994 Trail Running: Ankles Away By Todd Balf (with Martin Dugard and John Alderman) Prior to last June, nobody from outside Interior Alaska had won the Annihilator 10k, in the town of Nenana. And with good reason: It’s remote, steep, bug-plagued, and proudly…
Outside magazine, June 1994 Books: Lunar Landscapes By Miles Harvey Clearcut: The Tragedy of Industrial Forestry, edited by Bill Devall (Sierra Club Books/ Earth Island Press, $50). For years, the timber industry has been skilled at concealing the horrific effects of clear-cut…
Outside magazine, July 1996 The Lightning Stalker Strikes Again As an amp-anxious world cowers, David Stillings goes to work By Randy Wayne White Because we’re standing in an open field near Orlando, Florida, because thunderheads are boiling toward us, because the…
Outside magazine, September 1994 Mining: Big Gulp Some call it fun. Some call it a huge, rubbly mess. News from the prospecting frontier. By Jonathan Weisman Glistening in a wetsuit and diving gear, 56-year-old Chuck Tabbert splashes to the surface in a section of…
Travel Guide, Winter 1995-1996 The Outside Yenta Says… 1. If you consistently selected (a), you are a HOPELESS AMPHIBIAN. Your body requires moisture at all times. Bring your scuba gear, surfboard, sailboard, or sea kayak to Bonaire–Plummeting coral walls just 100 feet from…
Outside magazine, September 2000 Page: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 Anatomy of…
Outside magazine, October 1995 St. Lucia By Trish Reynales Sure, St. Lucia’s twin peaks make for great postcards. “Pitons soar a half-mile into the sky. Mist dripping from the vines. Parrots mocking me from the palms. Mud up to my knees.
Outside Magazine, February 1995 Politics: Ask Not What They’ll Do for Your Countryside Face-to-face with the environment’s newest movers and shakers in Washington By Ned Martel (with John Galvin) Pumped with Gingrich fever, Congress promises to take up environmental issues with newfound…
Outside magazine, April 1996 Books: Dead Men Don’t Wear Drab Mystery writer Nevada Barr’s stiff-brimmed recipe for murder By John Galvin It’s after midnight on rural Mississippi’s Natchez Trace Parkway, and Ranger Nevada Barr is cruising solo on the scenic road’s loneliest…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Ride With Pride: Mountain Bike Skills: Let the Missile Guide You Missy Giove’s hard-won lessons in fat-tire control By Kiki Yablon “The best way to monitor your speed is by gauging the amount of control, or lack thereof,”…
Outside magazine, March 1995 Sport Climbing: Tres Bon, Robyn By Todd Balf (with Jim Kelly, Martin Dugard, and Alison Osius) Robyn Erbesfield has no peer in sport climbing. Period. At the World Cup finale last December in Birmingham, England, she out-jousted France’s Natalie Richer…
Dispatches, April 1999 Sport Spiked Almost Off the Map By Tim Zimmermann Let’s begin with a flashback. Atlanta, Georgia. July 1996. Beach volleyball is making its Olympic debut while serving as party central for a…
Outside magazine, September 1995 Personal Security: And for That Commute to Headquarters… By Jon Gluck Anyone with the corn-fed twang of Bob Seger’s “Like a Rock” lodged in his brain knows that a sport-utility vehicle can handle anything the backcountry can throw at it.
Outside magazine, September 1995 Buying Right: Bodacious Rooftop Boxes By John Lehrer Adding a cargo box to your roof rack is like building a new room on your car. All of the things that crowd your backseat when the trunk overfloweth–backpacks, ski boots, cooking…
Outside magazine, October 2000 21st-Century Blues TOO OFTEN, the media only skim over politicians’ positions, neglecting substance for candidate babble. So I enjoyed “Campaign 2000” (August), Outside‘s package on the environmental records of this year’s candidates. The environment is…
January 1996 Features: The Outside Prognosticator Every time period has its ups and downs, but 1996 will be something else. Are we thrilled to our toes about the Atlanta Olympics? Yes, but we’re cringing about Izzy, the Games’ purple-hided mascot, who will lead a schlock…