ExWeb’s Adventure Links of the Week

Here at ExWeb, when we’re not outdoors, we get our adventure fix by exploring social media and the wider interweb. Sometimes we’re a little too plugged in, and browsing interesting stories turn from minutes into hours. To nourish your own adventure fix, here are some of the best adventure links we’ve discovered this week.

Free and High: A Future of Cutting-Edge Alpinism: This essay by leading climber Tom Livingstone is one of 18 published in the latest edition of Alpinist, which is focused on the future of alpinism. Alpinist is publishing eight of these essays online, including this one. For a complete overview of the wide-ranging essay topics and personalities, check here.

Rules of Ascent: For mountaineers, it’s not enough to get to the top. It must be done a certain way, and with style. But why is harder better? Paul Sagar, a lecturer in political theory, tries to make sense of the games climbers play from a social and political perspective.

Nature Is Medicine. But What’s the Right Dose? A new app called NatureQuant harnesses the latest research to track and rate your time outside. Next up: determining how much you need. It sounds like a cybernetic abomination to me. Must we track and quantify everything?

Lenin Peak 7,134m — The World’s Easiest Seven Thousander? Lenin Peak, which sits on the border of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, is widely cited as the world’s easiest 7,000m summit. While in a strictly technical sense that might be correct, it’s still a serious mountain.

King of The Chubbs

Photo: NPS Photo/N. Boak

 

There Is a Fat Bear Cub Contest Going on in Alaska and We Don’t Know What Else You Could Possibly Want: Fat Bear Junior (the name of the contest) will pit four chubby cubs and yearlings against each other in a fight to be the fattest.

Bare on Night Mountain: British photographer and writer David Lintern tells the story of being out of his depth during a trek of the Haute Route Pyrenees. This high, 900km coast-to-coast trail straddles the waistline between France and Spain.

Understanding and Managing the High-Altitude Environment: Dr. Stephen Taylor, a lecturer in Natural Area Tourism, explores the challenges of both living and moving at high altitudes. A very well-researched and in-depth piece.

The Pioneer Climber Who Led in Tennis Shoes: Glen Dawson, who passed away in 2016 at 103 years old, was born to a life of mountains. At age 15, he went climbing with family friend and Sierra pioneer Norman Clyde. Then at 16, he climbed the Matterhorn with his father.