The Joy Trip Project

In 2024 the U.S. Capitol Christmas Tree was harvested and delivered from the Tongass National Forest of Wrangell Alaska. For the tenth year in a row, I had the rare privilege to be the official photographer of The People's Tree. In cooperation with the U.S. Forest Service and the Society of American Foresters we brought an 80-foot Sitka Spruce to the west lawn of the U.S. Capitol Building on a journey of more than 4,000 miles. Taking pictures along the way, we also gathered audio and video to tell this amazing story. In this special edition of the Joy Trip Project Podcast in three acts, we bring you the sounds and voices of our travels on the trail of a gift from the lands of Tlingit People.

After 16 years of production, the Joy Trip Project has worked hard not to endorse political candidates. With a single exception in the last Wisconsin Senate race, I've intentionally kept my opinions to myself. As a professional journalist, it is my obligation not to reveal my personal bias regarding any political party or partisan issue. Instead, it is my job to report on the events of our world in as objective a manner as possible. Even in this incredibly divisive and polarizing campaign season, I have recounted few details on the respective candidacies of former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris. Although I'll vote for one candidate, based on my personal beliefs publicly, I've been silent on these matters. That's not going to change. As a news organization it is our duty to convey to our audience the facts of any story with neither bias nor prejudice so that one can draw their conclusions, and cast their vote based on the information we've gathered. Since we tend to focus on issues of environmental preservation, I believe that a summary of the two candidates' history of protecting the natural world can best serve the interests of our readers and listeners. Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have strikingly different records on the environment.

Hosted by James Edward Mills, this series delivers each day in the month of February a compelling audio story via podcast in about 60 seconds. Each narrative offers a brief glimpse into the life and times of Black men and women who have shaped our cultural identity. The series is called Unhidden Minute. I hope you'll join us.

Immediately following my return from Washington D.C. - I mean on the flight home – I was inundated with kind words of support and condolences for the demise of my Christmas Tree. Due to excessively high winds early in last week of November 2023, it is indeed true that the beautifully decorated holiday tree provided to the White House by the National Park Service sadly fell over. News reports in photographs showed the tree lying on its side. But as I graciously replied to each of these thoughtful notes, I found great comfort in the knowledge that the 63-foot Norway Spruce I had followed from the Monongahela National Forest of West Virginia to our nation's capital, The People's Tree, stood proudly on the west lawn of the U.S. Capitol Building.Immediately following my return from Washington D.C. - I mean on the flight home – I was inundated with kind words of support and condolences for the demise of my Christmas Tree. Due to excessively high winds early in last week of November 2023, it is indeed true that the beautifully decorated holiday tree provided to the White House by the National Park Service sadly fell over. News reports in photographs showed the tree lying on its side. But as I graciously replied to each of these thoughtful notes, I found great comfort in the knowledge that the 63-foot Norway Spruce I had followed from the Monongahela National Forest of West Virginia to our nation's capital, The People's Tree, stood proudly on the west lawn of the U.S. Capitol Building.

For those of us who really love bicycles, I think what we enjoy most is the sense of freedom we get from travel on the open road under our own power. This mechanical device allows us to engage both our minds and bodies to pedal long distances on just two wheels so that we can explore the landscape of the modern world. But through our journeys over lightly trafficked rural roads, as we roll past obscure old towns and villages, we can also reveal the compelling memories of the not-so-distant past. As a modern-day explorer, there's a man who rides a bike along gravel paths and asphalt highways across time and space and into the pages of history. Erick Cedeño: My name is Eric Cedeño. Some people know me as the Bicycle Nomad. JTP: For many years, Eric Cedeño has traveled thousands of miles by bicycle across North America. As a cyclist carrying his own gear from one town to the next, he reimagines the excitement and enthusiasm of human powered transportation toward the end of the 19th century. Back then, even the United States Army thought that the bicycle might change how human beings travel from place to place. Erick Cedeño: There was a big craze. People were going crazy about the bicycle, the technology, about the bicycle. And the army realized that they needed other methods of transportation to be successful. They only had the cavalry back then, and they knew that bicycles were cheaper than horses. Easier to maintain than a horse. They could go further than a horse could. And also, there were quite in battlefields. So they understood the power of the bikes and they wanted to adapt a bicycle corps. JTP: In 1896, U.S. Army Lieutenant James Moss came up with the idea to conduct an experiment to see if the bicycle could one day be used to replace the horse. In order to prove the concept, moss recruited a platoon of 20 soldiers. Erick Cedeño: Fort Missoula, Montana, is where that was formed. Lieutenant Moss approached the Army and says, I have the perfect man to do this experiment. And he did. Luckily for him, he had the Buffalo Soldiers out of the 25th Infantry out of Fort Missoula. Erick Cedeño The Bicycle Nomad photo by Josh Caffrey JTP: At the time, more than 30 years after the end of the Civil War, there were stationed there an all-Black unit of enlisted men known collectively as the Buffalo Soldiers. These men who fought the Plains Wars of westward expansion and sadly participated in the displacement of Native people, were given the opportunity for a peacetime mission into the American heartland. Led by Lieutenant Moss, a white officer. Over the next two years, from 1896 to 1897, the Buffalo Soldier Bicycle Corps would make three expeditions across the West. In 2022, Eric Cedeño retraced the route that they traveled from Fort Missoula, Montana, to Saint Louis, Missouri. The distance of more than 1900 miles. In the retelling of their story through physical reenactment, the Bicycle Nomad takes us on a journey back in time. In his travels following the path of the Buffalo Soldiers, Cedeño not only celebrates the accomplishments of black Americans from our past, but also inspires further exploration of our history that is too often overlooked. I'm James Edward Mills, and you're listening to The Joy Trip Project. Title photo by Josh Caffrey Erick Cedeño in Missouri photo by Josh Caffrey Erick Cedeño's passion for exploration began at a very early age. Erick Cedeño: Since I was a kid, I've always loved history. And I have a story where my mom took me to Mexico to see the pyramids of the Mayan and Aztec civilization. We went to Mexico just for that. She hired a tour guide that took us and told us the history. Now, I'm 12 years old. I have read some of that, those books. And to be walking the steps of ancient civilization just changed ...

The protection of public land requires the broad ranging vision and leadership of federal service professionals at the highest levels. As the 19th Director of the National Park Service Charles F. Sams III is guiding the management of a complexed agency that oversees the protection of 63 National Parks and more than 420 individual monuments, battlefields, lakeshores and grasslands. A member of the Confederate Tribes of the Umatilla Indians, Sams is the first Native American to serve as the administrator of the memorial sites that preserve our natural history and enduring national heritage. After a long career in the U.S. Navy in times of both war and peace as well as the creation of career opportunities for aspiring stewards of the natural environment, Sams now dedicates his commitment to public service by encouraging the next generation of National Park Rangers. By building a corps of passionate interpreters to effectively tell a more comprehensive story of our culture as a united people, he's a helping to pave a diverse and inclusive pathway of preservation well into the future.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row] "You're never going to meet a more passionate group of people who are dedicated to mission than the National Park Service Rangers and their staffs out there," Sams said. "And what they really need is a leader who will advocate for them to ensure they have the funding so they can can go about doing the preservation of flora and fauna and telling America stories." In recent months since the passage by Congress of the Great American Outdoors Act, also known as GAOA, there are new opportunities to affirm the priorities of natural resource and heritage protection through the National Park Service. By permanently providing financial resources for the Land And Water Conservation Fund, the federal government is poised to make profound investments in the people and places that define our identity as a nation. Now that he's coming to the end of his first year on the job, I had the chance speak to Sams and have him reflect upon his tenure so far as well as the role that the NPS can play in the shaping our way forward. I'm James Edward Mills. And you're listening to, The Joy Trip Project. National Park Service Director Charles Sams (Middle) stands with Mosaics In Science Interns at the U.S. Department of the Interior Building in Washington D.C. (photo by James Edward Mills) JTP Well, first of all, thank you very much for taking the time to to chat with me and to share a little bit about your experience in the management of public land. My first question is a very basic one. Tell me where you from and how you how you got to the position that you're in now. Sams So I'm from Oregon originally. I was born in Portland, Oregon, but raised on the Umatilla Indian Reservation in northeast Oregon, right along the Umatilla River, which was feeds into the big river, which is now known as the Columbia, that we know as the Necheewana. And I very fortunate to grow up in a very well-educated household. My parents had attended and graduated junior college, which was very rare to have two native parents who had actually not only attended, but graduated. And so education has always played an important part and also a freeing of oneself by having a good education. In addition to being surrounded by a number of elders, my grandfather and a number of tribal elders who raised me in a much more traditional and cultural sense of the Cayuse and Walla Walla people. JTP And from that experience, how did you get into public service? Sams Well, public service is expected in our family. We are supposed to give back more than we take, which is a simple principle. We also come from a group of people that believe that we have limited wants with unlimited resources, which is the exact opposite, which, you know, it's funny, since I have a business degree that tells me that I have unlimited...

When the folks at the Public Broadcasting Service went looking for a charismatic personality to host their latest documentary film series on the natural world, they reached out to a man with just the right skills to bring the outdoors into every home in America. Baratunde: My name is Baratunde Thurston. I am a multimedia storyteller operating at the intersection of race, technology, democracy and climate. Because I love this planet. The wild. There's nothing quite like the feeling of stepping outside. And breaking free from the modern world. I'm in northern Minnesota, on the edge of a lake that resembles an ocean. In places like this, it's easy to see nature as something so powerful, so vast. We could never leave a real mark on it. But our footsteps are almost everywhere these days. And while knowing that can weigh you down, it can also lift us up and inspire us to change. JTP: The show airs on PBS television stations nation-wide. And like its host, the program explores those points of connection where the outdoors and the human experience come together for fun, adventure and environmental conservation. Each episode introduces viewers to remarkable people and places from one end of this great nation to other. In advance of the premiere of this amazing new series I had the chance to talk to Baratunde Thurston and get an inside look into America Outdoors.   The PBS Series America Outdoors is coming to your favorite Public Television station. Check your local listings for dates and times near you. Baratunde Thurston is the author of the book “How to be Black” and he's the host the “How to Citizen” Podcast. You can learn more about him and all his amazing work at Baratunde.com Our Music comes courtesy of Artlist featuring the talents of The Cliff  The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to the support of the Schlecht Family Foundation and the National Geographic Society. You can follow along on this and other journeys through history at Joytripproject.com. If you enjoyed this episode, please drop me a note in the comments or better still write a review on one of our many stream platforms including iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify and Google Podcasts. I'd love to hear from you. You can also reach me via email with your constructive questions, comments and criticisms at info@joytripproject.com

On May12, 2022, history was made as the first team of Black American climbers successfully ascended to the summit of Mount Everest, the highest peak in the world. Known as the Full Circle Everest Expedition, this group of six men and one woman, all of African descent, made it safely to the top of the mountain and back to Everest Base Camp. The team included an array of climbers from across the United States and one native of Kenya. They ranged in age from 26 to 62. And they achieved this great accomplishment with the invaluable assistance of eight Nepali Sherpa guides. At a moment in time when even the most remote corners of our planet seem well within reach of human endeavor and ambition, this unique expedition is the latest milestone not only in the progress of high-altitude mountaineering, but the global advancement of racial diversity, equity and inclusion in the outdoor recreation industry. Almost 70 years since the first formally recognized ascent of Everest in 1953 by Sir Edmond Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, Black Americans have at last realized the metaphorical vision that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. defined in his many speeches that encouraged the aspiration to climb mountains. In was in August of 1963, the same year that the first American team led by Jim Whittaker reached the Everest summit, that King shared his dream at the March on Washington and declared that freedom for all people must be allow to “Ring From Every Mountainside” But throughout the Civil Movement of the 1960's and well into the 21st Century, it would take more than 50 years for the feat of a successful Everest ascent to be achieved by Black South African climber Sibusiso Vilane on May 26, 2003. Three years later, Sophia Danenberg of Seattle, Washington, became the first Black American climber to reach the summit of Everest in 2006. In the time since, of the many thousands of people who have made it to the top, only six have been Black. And more than 15 years after that first ascent by Vilane, it is only now that a team of Black Americans have been assembled, trained and financed with the support of commercial sponsors and nonprofit donors to finally ascend as a community to the most prestigious mountain top on the planet. With the Full Circle Everest Expedition, the number of Black climbers to ascend to the summit has now more than doubled! The story behind this ground-breaking accomplishment is the culmination of the many decades of effort on the part of diversity, equity and inclusion advocates who recognize the importance of creating recreational spaces and opportunities that are welcoming and accessible to all people. To truly understand how we got to this particular moment in our history I believe it's necessary to take a close look into the lives of those individuals who are intimately a part of it. Among the seven climbers on the Full Circle Everest Expedition team who reached the summit is Demond "Dom" Mullins. I just happen to reach him in Nepal over the WhatsApp messaging platform while he was trekking through the Khumbu Valley. In the village of Phortse, a few weeks before the rest of his teammates arrived to begin their journey, I caught him during his dinner. In this very candid conversation Mullins shares not only his life and career as a climber but also his work to earn a doctorate in the field of sociology through the study of war and military conflict. We also discussed his time spent as a soldier in the U.S. Army. At the age of 19, he was called to serve in Iraq immediately after the events near his hometown of New York City on September 11, 2001. I'm James  Edward Mills and you're listening to The Joy Trip Project. Demond "Dom" Mullins in Lulka, Nepal Through his aspirations to climb high mountains Demond Mullins has defined for himself a place in the world where he can express both pride and passion for his convictions. In the days that follow Dom and his fellow team members of the Full Circ...

A few weeks before his 80th birthday, I had the rare pleasure to speak by phone to the 15th director of the National Park Service Robert Stanton. From his home in Maryland, Mr. Stanton shared with me a personal history of his career as a leading figure in the preservation of public land as well as the enduring legacy of our heritage as a nation. Born in 1940, as Black American Stanton was subjected to the racially focused prohibitions of the Jim Crow era that denied him access to many of the national parks and monuments that he would grow up to manage. And though he and his family were restricted from the recreational spaces where white Americans were free to travel, Stanton was able from an early age to experience the wonders of nature.Stanton: I grew up in rural segregated Texas, and we came from very meager means, so we did not vacation. I was in the cotton fields or the hay fields during my young adulthood. But I was not a stranger, if you will, to the out of doors, you know, with bare feet running through the woods, fishing in the lakes, gravel pits, taking a little dip in our birthday suits and what have you and watching out for the copperheads and water moccasins. But so, no the out of doors were not a stranger to me.JTP: It was during his childhood that policies that had restricted Black Americans from visiting national parks were slowly beginning to lift. Under the administration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt around the end of the Second World War progressive shifts in the nation's attitude toward Black Americans became a bit more favorable, despite the objections of many state legislators and private citizens. Stanton: In terms of my exposure to the National Park Service and other land management agencies and putting it in sort of historical context, you recognize the courage on the part of Harold Ickes, Secretary of the Interior, and Roosevelt, when he issued his secretarial order in 1945, saying that there will not be any discrimination in the national parks. My understanding is that when he made the decision that the proprietors of restaurants and overnight accommodations surrounding the gateways to the parks, they raised holy hell. “You mean you're going to allow them colored folks to come in and eat and sleep where they want to in the park?”JTP: It could be said that first battle lines of modern Civil Rights Movement were drawn in our national parks. By order of Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes in 1945, these public recreation areas were among the first sites to be desegregated nation-wide. It was through the leadership and encouragement of social activists within the Roosevelt Administration and then under President Harry S. Truman that Ickes ordered that the National Parks be made open to everyone regardless of race or ethnicity.Stanton: But the thing I would bring to your attention, which was not widely advertised, is that he had the counsel of two prominent, forceful, unrelenting Black executives who were promoting the integration in full accessibility of not only to Park Service citizen programs, but throughout the breadth of the programs at Interior. The first one was Robert Weaver, who became the first African-American to serve as a Cabinet Secretary at HUD appointed by President Johnson. He was followed by William Trent Jr.. And it is William Trent Jr. who was really a strong advocate that here you have young men returning from World War II and they need to have some way in which they could just sort of relax themselves. Coming from the war, even though we were coming back to places they were not permitted to enter, such as cafes and restaurant, but still they should have an opportunity to enjoy some of the benefits of being an American citizen. JTP: Civil Rights leaders during the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt through the 1940s became known as the Black Cabinet or the Federal Council of Negro Affairs. The phrase was coined by Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune in 1936 and as group that incl...

Long before the National Park Service was established, the geological site commonly known as Mammoth Cave in the state of Kentucky was a popular tourist attraction. Open to the public for guided tours beginning in 1830's this massive labyrinth of underground caverns and tunnels was first explored by enslaved people whose legacy of stewardship spans more than 5 generations. A Black man named Stephen Bishop lead much of the earliest explorations of the cave system and named many of the most prominent features. An expert on the largest cave in the world that winds more than 406 miles beneath the Earth's surface, Bishop was said to have guided the most prominent scientists, political figures and writers of the mid-19th century including the poet Ralph Waldo Emerson. It was on a visit to Mammoth Cave guided by Bishop in 1857 that Emerson wrote the essay Illusions, inspired by a feature called the Star Camber. But when Mammoth Cave was established as the 26th National Park on July 1, 1941, local residents Black and white, were forced off the surrounding land to make room for the new federally managed recreation area. Under the provisions of Jim Crow era segregation, Black Americans were ineligible to become National Park rangers, despite their long history of service as cave guides. Grave of Stephen Bishop at Mammoth Cave National Park Born in Glasgow, Kentucky, in 1947, Jerry Bransford recalls being told as a young Black man to use the rear entrance of the Mammoth Cave Visitors Center. Though a direct descendant of Materson and Nick Bransford, who with Stephan Bishop had led tours and explorations of the cave, he was denied the same privileges as a white visitor. As a child Bransford only heard of his family's legacy from the stories told to him by his father. Removed from their role as interpreters of this historic site, little evidence remained of all that his ancestors had done to preserve it. After a 30- career in marketing as a photographer for the Dow Corning Corporation In Nashville, Bransford was recruited by the National Park Service to use his skills as a storyteller to share his family legacy of preservation. Today at the age of 74, after 17 seasons at Mammoth Cave, National Park Ranger Jerry Bransford continues the tradition as an interpretive guide. Bransford leads tours at Mammoth Cave National Park through much of the late spring and summer seasons. As a master storyteller he brings to life an incredible narrative of a proud legacy of environmental protection and the preservation of history that goes back more than 150 years. To learn more visit online at NPS.Gov/MACA. Thanks for joining us for the first episode of our 14th season on The Joy Trip Project! Our music comes courtesy of Artlist this time featuring the performer Falconer. This edition was made possible thanks to the partnership of the 2021 New York Times reporting project Black History Continued. Additional support for the Joy Trip Project is provided by Seirus Innovation, Outdoor Research, Patagonia, the University of Wisconsin Madison Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and the National Geographic Society.  [/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row] If you enjoyed this episode please drop me a note in the comments or better still write a review on one of our many stream platforms including iTunes, Sticher and Google Podcasts. I'd love to hear from you. You can also reach me via email with your constructive questions, comments and criticisms at info@joytripproject.com For now go be joyful. And until next time, take care!  

During the global Covid-19 Pandemic one of my favorite programs to watch on television was the Cinemax miniseries called “Warrior”. Set in San Francisco's Chinatown during the late 1870s, this amazing show, inspired by the writings of Bruce Lee, is an action packed period drama that depicts the realities of anti-Asian racial oppression along with the furious fists of Kung Fu fight scenes. One of the main characters in this exciting series is Father Jun, the leader of the City's most powerful gang or tong, played by the New York-based actor Perry Yung. His portrayal of this hard-edged and often violent leader is so captivating I began an instant fan. By an odd coincidence Yung and I just happen to have a mutual friend on Facebook. After getting acquainted online I also discovered that he is a passionate advocate for the resistance to the rise of hostility toward Asian people and the climate of hatred being perpetuated by white supremacists nationwide. As a master of the performing arts Yung uses his talents to personify prototypical roles of Asian men to give them Both depth and texture far beyond the cliched stereotypes so often presented by Hollywood. In his latest film “Boogie”, Yung plays the father of the title character, a young man who struggles with his identity as an Chinese-American basketball player with NBA aspirations at the intersection of the Black and Asian communities of the modern era. Yung and I spoke over Zoom not long before the mass murder of 6 Asian women in Atlanta. In addition to the parallels between the current state of anti-Asian sentiment of today and the violence and oppression of the past, Yung and I discussed his long career as both an actor and the maker of the traditional Japanese flute called the Shakuhachi. You can learn more about Perry Yung on his website at PerryYung.wordpress.com. In light current climate of racism and bigotry across America, I want to encourage everyone to seek out and experience cultures of every variety. Buy their art, learn their language, eat their food watch their media and demand of all those around you to stop the hate.   Music this week comes courtesy of Artlist featuring the work of Ian Post and the group Kodo. The opening was the theme music of the Cinemax series Warrior, by Reza Safinia and H. Scott Salinas.     The Joy Trip Project is possible thanks to support of Patagonia, Yeti, Seirus Innovations, Outdoor Research and a grant from the National Geographic Society.        Thanks for listening, but you know I want to hear from you. So please write a note in the comments or via email at info@joytripproject.com. If you enjoyed this conversation write a review on Apple Podcast, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. There you'll find past episodes going back more than a decade. Let me know what you think. For now, go be joyful. And Until next time. Take care!  

Even though we might be seeing the back end of the global Covid-19 Pandemic many of us are still stuck at home wading through endless meetings over Zoom and other teleconferencing platforms. With the hopes of creating a little community spirit and to encourage folks out there to step away from their screens and maybe crack open a book instead, I started a little group called the Joy Trip Reading Project. Each month we're taking a deep dive into stories of primarily Black authors whose work centers around nature and the identity many of us share in common as people who love the great outdoors. In February, for Black History Month, the title we read was Gloryland, by National Park Ranger Shelton Johnson. This novel is the story of a Black American sergeant in the United States Army at the turn of the last century. As a member of the Buffalo Soldiers, the principle character, Elijah Yancy, reveals to us the life and times of the men who were among the world's original protectors of public land at the National Parks of Yosemite and Sequoia. Not enough people know that in 1903 the first superintendent of Sequoia was a Black American U.S. Cavalry officer by the name of Captain Charles Young. Despite the national climate of Jim Crow segregation these men were among our first National Park Rangers During a time when race relation in this country were at their most abysmal, the Buffalo Soldiers fought to preserve the best idea America ever had. Unfortunately, because of some technical difficulties connecting with Ranger Johnson over Zoom I literally had to hold my cellphone up to my computer microphone to conduct this interview. Sorry in advance for the marginal sound quality, but under the circumstances, really can you do? I'm James Edward Mills and you're listening to the Joy Trip Project. [/vc_column_text] [/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner] Music courtesy of Artlist featuring the band Muted, Steve Poloni and Ty Simon.   [/vc_column][/vc_row] The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to support of Seirus Innovation and Outdoor Research. This recording of the Joy Trip Reading Project was created in partnership with University of Wisconsin Madison Nelson Institute For Environmental Studies. Here we acknowledge the ancestral homeland of the Ho-Chunk People on the sacred land known for time and memorial as DeJope. Wherever you are in North American please recognize the native people of the place you now call home. Thanks for listening, but as  always, I want to hear from you so please drop me in note in the comments with your questions, comments or criticisms or write to me via email at info@joytripproject.com. You can also find me on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. If you liked this episode please write me a review on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you download your favorite podcasts. For now, go be joyful and until next time. Take care.  

The Black Men Northwoods Retreat Hey everybody. Happy New Year! I know things seem to be getting off to a rocky start. How's that for an understatement. But I sincerely believe that by working together we can get past our differences and move forward toward a brighter future. We just need to come up with creative solutions to our many extremely complicated problems. For example, in the spring of 2020 I was asked by the National Forest Foundation to create a storytelling project.  They asked me to create a series of photographs and interviews about the Black community and its relationship with the outdoors. Cause you know…that's kind of my thing. But smack in the middle of the global Covid-19 Pandemic this already complicated project had the added challenges of travel restrictions, social distancing, and the potential of spreading the virus among a group of participants already at the highest risk of contracting this deadly disease. But rather than trying to come up with a solution all on my own, I reached out to a dude who knows more about these issues than anyone I know. [/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row] Aaron Perry: You know, probably the biggest challenge that I'm seeing is we're dealing with three epidemics, you got, you know, obviously covid-19, you have, you know, the health disparities and then you have racial tension. My friend Aaron Perry is the founder and executive director of the Rebalanced Life Wellness Center based right here in Madison Wisconsin. He works at helping to overcome the healthcare challenges that Black men face not only southern Wisconsin, but across the country. Aaron Perry: What I try to do is always be a part of the solution, period, point blank. I'm constantly looking at how can we be creative? How can we get our men to take part or participate in things that that's really kind of out of the box thinking. As it happens, the rise of the Coronavirus put into sharp relief many of the institutional disparities that place the Black community in jeopardy. High rates of unemployment, limited access to affordable healthcare, and the prospects of being subjected to racially motivated violence already make this population more susceptible to chronic illness, injury or even death. Black men and women are more likely as well to suffer from ailments such as obesity, high blood pressure, hypertension, heart disease and diabetes, conditions that can be reversed or remedied with physical exercise and better access to more nutritious foods. At a time when all the people of the world are being asked to stay indoors and prohibit their contact with others outside of their immediate families, the Pandemic has taken an even higher toll on those most vulnerable to infection. Ironically, however, the best place for this community to find healing and solace from the trauma of this crisis is in the outdoors. For the last few years, I've watched and even participated in a few of the outdoor events that Aaron has organized for Black men. Every week, in a bit of out of the box thinking, he offers a group running, walking or bicycling opportunity in the Madison area. A lot of his work focuses on getting Black men to eat right, exercise and get regular checkups at the doctor. And Aaron believes that being healthy also means getting outside in public and unapologetically being part of the wider world. Aaron Perry: But I started looking at these other activities because I've always said to the guys, I said, please remember, this is our community. This is our country, too, and everything under the sun we're entitled to as well. So, with Aaron's help we recruited a small group of Black men and their sons to experience the outdoors in a meaningful way. We wanted to take them hiking on public land in a natural setting. Everyone got a negative Covid-19 test and we created what I like call, an escape pod, a tight cohort of like-minded folks who can safely venture out together for a common experience.

Hey everybody it's January 2020 Happy New Year! In fact happy new decade for the 21st century. It's kind of cool to be living in the future, a time I tried to imagine as a kid growing up in the 80s. But here we are. It's amazing to see how far we've come. And still what a long way yet to go. If you've been following my work on this podcast or in a few magazine articles I've written over last few years you know that I put a lot of effort into the topic of diversity, equity and inclusion or DEI in the world outdoor recreation and environmental conservation. Throughout the last decade I've reported a lot about the progress that the outdoor industry has made in creating positive cultural and professional environments for people of color, the differently abled, those who identify as LGBTQ and other socially marginalized communities. But there is still so much that outdoor retailers, manufactures and non profit organizations can do to create spaces where everyone can not only be made to feel welcome, but encouraged to thrive, succeed and excel. I spent a bit of time throughout 2019 exploring how various institutions in the outdoor industry are rethinking the various pathways they can take to get a wide variety of different people outside. So I made stop in Atlanta Georgia to speak to a team of subject matter experts who are leading the way toward making the outdoors more diverse, equitable and inclusive.   Angelou Ezeilo is the founder and CEO of the Greening Youth Foundation. I think the challenge with a lot of these retailers are trying to figure out how to integrate, you know, the other right into what they're doing without it being so freakin awkward. So it shows that we have still a long way to go. For more than 10 years the Greening Youth Foundation has worked with Governmental Agencies like the National Park Service, U.S.D.A Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to place Black, Hispanic and Native American young people in paid professional internships. Working now with private companies like The North Face and Patagonia GYF is trying to expand the diversity of under represented segments of the population in the outdoor industry. In a very candid conversation with members of her staff at their offices in Atlanta, Ezeilo explains the many challenges we face in moving forward the work of DEI. As you can imagine it can be little awkward. It's important to understand that the work of DEI is not a philanthropic enterprise. Research shows that industries and workplaces that are racially and culturally diverse are much more innovative, socially relevant, creative and productive. Having a base of employees and managers that better reflect the emerging demographics of the communities they serve will assure an organizations long-term success and prosperity well into the future. The Greening Youth Foundation is based in Atlanta but they provide services and programs for clients nation wide. Angelou Ezeilo is the author of the new book Engage, Connect, Protect: Empowering Diverse Youth As Environmental Leaders, now available at Amazon. As we head into the new year and a new decade perhaps now we can all work to create diverse equity and inclusive environments where everyone is welcome. Music in this episode Ian Post, ATELLER and Mogli The Iceberg is provided by Artlist The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to the support of our partners at American Rivers, the National Forest Foundation and Patagonia.  In our best efforts to protect and preserve the natural environment we need fresh ideas to reimagine how we see ourselves as part of one big biological community. We believe that through creative storytelling we encourage everyone to #ReThinkOutside Find out how at ReThinkOutside.org.   Thanks for listening, but of course I want to hear from you. Your thoughts help make it possible for other folks find us online. So please drop us a note better  yet leave me a review on iTunes, Stitcher,

Early in November Columbia Sportswear matriarch and outdoor industry icon Gert Boyle passed away. She was 95. Having fled Nazi Germany with her family in advance of World War II Gert's father started the Portland, Oregon-based company that today is worth billions. Throughout her long career Gert cultivated an image as a fierce business woman, but that tough persona was belied by a delightful personality and a generous spirit. Way back in 2006 I had the great pleasure chatting Gert at the Outdoor Retailer Show in an interview for the podcast SNEWS Live. In this flash back edition we remember "One Tough Mother". Gert Boyle was one of the truly great original leaders of the Outdoor Industry and her enduring legacy of tenacity and courage will inspire us all for decades yet to come.   Our music in this episode comes courtesy of Artlist featuring original tracks by Polaris Rose and Ziv Moran. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to our partners American Rivers, The National Forest Foundation and Patagonia. Thanks for listening, but you know I want to hear from you. So please drop me a note with your questions comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com. For now go be joyful and until next time, take care!

Very early in my career, way back in the 90's I received the gift of a book, South of Haunted Dreams by Eddy Harris. As a young Black man venture out into a professional environment that was mostly white I took great comfort in this remarkable story of a person with a background similar to my own who was successfully leading a life of travel and adventure. In his book, Harris recounts his experiences of making his way through the Southern United States on motorcycle while enjoying occasional stops on trout streams to do a little fly-fishing. Though concerned that he might subjected to the mistreatment of racism Harris said his ability to navigate through places that are unfamiliar or even a bit frightening hinges upon his willingness to be vulnerable and receptive to the kindness of complete strangers. As writer myself I ask him, is that also a way to be an effective storyteller? "I never actually thought of it that way. But it's something that I do as a literary device. I'm a traveler. I've been a traveler since I was 16 years old. The way I travel is not organized. I have no plan when I go someplace. Whatever happens happens," Harris told me in an interview. "When I meet people and they invite me in for coffee or drinks or dinner, I almost never say no. I'm receptive to generosity, and I just put myself out there. I've discovered that that if you want people's stories, you make yourself available to them and they will in fact tell you're their stories." I believe that in many ways Harris's attitude toward travel and to how find one's place in the world directly influenced my own. Over the years that followed after reading that first book I went on read his other titles that include Mississippi Solo about his adventures paddling a canoe down the Mississippi River and Native Stranger that details a trip he made through the continent of Africa. But it was in article that he wrote for Outside Magazine 1997 on the disparities among people color as active participants in outdoor recreation that really got my attention. It was through the work of Eddy Harris that I first began to explore the divisions of diversity, equity and inclusion that I call “The Adventure Gap”. Now more than 20 years later I have a wonderful opportunity to learn from one of my favorite literary heroes. In 2018 I had the great pleasure of hosting a visit with Eddy Harris at the University of Wisconsin Madison. As adjunct faculty at the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies it was my honor to speak with him as a guest interviewer on the Edge Effects Podcast. After 30 years of reading the work of Eddy Harris as a fan I now count him among my friends. It's that same spirit of humility and vulnerability that makes him such an endearing person and very compelling writer. You can find more of his work online at Eddyharris.com.   Thanks again to my colleagues at the University of Wisconsin Department of History podcast Edge Effects. New music this week by Ilya Truhanov and Brick Fields courtesy of Artlist.   The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to the generous support of American Rivers, The National Forest Foundation and Patagonia.      

Wherever you are in the world I hope you had an amazing summer. I know I did. Over the last several months I've been on the road collecting stories for a broad new initiative to explore how people find their way into the outdoors. With grant funding from my partners at the nonprofits American Rivers and the National Forest Foundation along with Patagonia I made stops in the states of Georgia and Oregon to trace the routes of the great rivers that run through their biggest cities. From the Chattahoochee National Forest to Atlanta and the Willamette National Forest to Portland I went searching a direct connection between people in these urban centers and wilderness areas on Federally protected public land about 120 miles away. It didn't take long for me to realize that for many folks live in cities nature is closer than they think and with just a little bit of help they can find their own pathway to the outdoors. Along this journey I connected with an amazing organization based in the city of Portland called Hike It Baby. Created by my friend and colleague Shanti Hodges Hike It Baby connects families with children to wonderful outdoor experiences on short walks along easily accessible trails in cities across America and more than a few foreign countries. Like any great invention Shanti says the mother of her idea was necessity. "I just wanted to figure out a way to find people to get outside with. So I initially just built a website a Facebook group and a newsletter," she said in an interview.  "I went on looking for hiking groups in Portland with babies and I found nothing." Within a few weeks Shanti added about one hundred people to her newsletter list. She got texts every day wanting to know when she was hiking next. "I was leading four or five hikes a week and hundreds of people were texting me and calling me and Facebooking me. And then within a year we had a thousand and then people started writing me around the country," she said. "They started seeing pictures and asking how are you getting out with these groups of people to these amazing hikes? People started writing me and telling me they were lonely and they were looking for friends and could they start a group in their town. I'd pay to send them business cards. I'd have business cards made so they could hand them out so people could find the website, find the hikes and we built a little calendar and it just exploded!" Hike It Baby now has members numbering in the tens of thousands. And with hundreds of ambassadors around the world this remarkable organization brings families and children into the outdoors to become not only nature enthusiasts but also environmental stewards. There are Hike It Baby branches located in cities everywhere. If you can't find one near you, maybe you can start one. If you want to learn more about how you can get involved just visit them online at hikeitbaby.org.   New music this week by Michael Shynes and Paper Planes courtesy of Artlist.         The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to the generous support of American Rivers, The National Forest Foundation and Patagonia.

Just a few days before the 2019 Outdoor Retailer Snow Show in Denver I got my reporting assignments. Among the various topics I was tasked to report on was a human interest profile on a young man attending OR for the first time. Wyn Wiley is a professional photographer from Lincoln, Nebraska. He's also known as the drag queen Pattie Gonia. Photo courtesy Wyn Wiley I'll be honest I've  never interviewed a drag queen before and I have to say that I was a little nervous. I was more than a bit concerned about mixing up my male/female pronouns and appearing insensitive or even impolite. My goal in this interview was to create a safe space where Wiley could tell me all about his alter ego and share her story. Photo courtesy Wyn Wiley Coming on the scene only  a few months ago Pattie Gonia is an Internet sensation, with more than 117,000 followers on Instagram. In an industry that has more than its fair share of toxic masculinity this leggy dame in platform heels and trekking poles may just be the joyful expression of wilderness the business of outdoor retail  desperately needs. Photo courtesy Wyn Wiley In an interview last year Elyse Rylander, founder and executive director of Out There Adventures, an LGBTQ youth engagement organization, said something I will always remember. "There is nothing straight in nature." The outdoors is place where everyone is free to be themselves. Diversity is a sign of strength any natural environment. So get out there and find the best expression of who you really are. Look for Wiley's photographs and videos at instagram.com/pattiegonia. Photo by Louisa Albanese This edition of the podcast features music by the fabulous Katrina Stone provided by Artlist. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to the partnership of Specialty News also known as SNEWS, the outdoor industry online trade magazine. You'll find my text profile with pictures of Wyn Wiley as Pattie Gonia at SNEWSNET.com. Thanks for listening! But as always I want to hear from you so please drop me a note with your questions comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com. Or better yet subscribe to the feed on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever most fine podcast platforms can be found. There you can leave a message or a write review, but most of all don't forget to tell your friends. Now go be joyful. And until next time. Take care!

On Friday the Trump administration signed legislation to reopen the federal government. For many of us, an end to the longest government shutdown in U.S. history couldn't have come soon enough. The announcement arrived just in time for the 2019 Outdoor Retailer Snow Show that's starting this week in Denver Colorado. Tens of thousands of federal employees in service of environmental protection can now get back to doing their very important work. And those of us in the business of outdoor recreation can continue our efforts to make our public lands more accessible to a broader cross section of the American public. That kind of reminded me of a story I produced over the summer that explores an ongoing initiative to bring more people of color into the outdoor industry. So with OR coming up this week I thought we might take a look back at “the Pledge”.   The Pledge creator Teresa Baker (right) with active lifestyle ambassador Mirna Velario For people in business of adventure sports the Outdoor Retailer Show is a really big deal. There you'll find aisle after aisle of high-tech backpacks, tents, sleeping bags, hiking boots, GPS devices, tasty trail snacks and headlamps. To the outdoor professional it's pretty much kids…meet candy store! But if you take a look around you'll also see a lot rugged men with Nordic features, full beards and plaid shirts. These guys kind of embody what you imagine when you think “outdoorsman”.Through most of it existence, the outdoor industry has been…well…pretty white. Not many companies at OR that deal in outdoor gear have many employees who are Black, Latino, Asian or Native American. Only a few can claim a senior executive, owner or board member who is a person of color. But at the 2018 Summer Market Mario Stanley, a rock climbing instructor from Dallas, Texas said this year he noticed something different. Rock Climbing instructor Mario Stanley (left) Stanley>>Ah…the beautiful wave of brown walking around. I think that's probably the one thing I notice the most. And then I've also noticed that more people are engaging. JEM>>Not only were there more people of color at OR this year, Stanley, who's Black, said there is more conversation around issues of race and what the industry can do to improve its diversity. Stanley>>The dialect has changed and they are allowing us to talk or asking us what are we doing for the greater POC community as a whole. And I think the biggest thing that I noticed this year was people are actually asking, “What are we doing?” JEM>>Research conducted by the Outdoor Industry Association, a trade group, indicates that people of color or POCs participate in outdoor recreation at rates lower than their white counterparts. In order to grow the market as well as the number of people overall who will help to protect the natural environment there is a concerted effort to bring more black and brown folks into the outdoor industry. Teresa Baker, an advocate for environmental justice, was at OR to promote an initiative she calls The Pledge Baker>>The pledge is a commitment that we are asking the owners of outdoor brands and retailers to commit to the work of diversity, racial diversity in the outdoors. JEM>>Through the Pledge, kind of a contract, Baker wants company executives to not only hire more people of color, but to create marketing and outreach strategies that appeal to a broader cross section of the American public. She's not just interested in helping companies sell more products, but rather she hopes to encourage more people to care about the outdoors. Baker>>For me it really is about the environment and we need more people of color right now fighting for the environment. There are so many attacks on the land right now and the people that are missing from the conversation and the work are people of color. JEM>>As the current administration continues to roll back several of the environmental protections enacted over the last century,

For 34 days The United States Federal Government has been in a partial shutdown.  Pretty much since the beginning, the natural environment has been feeling the effects. Big Cities and small towns from coast to coast that serve as gateway communities near our national parks are on the frontlines of a political conflict that has put at risk the conscientious management of public land.  About 800,000 federal employees have been furloughed from their jobs or are required to work without pay. Among them are more than 27,000 National Park Service professionals.  Interpretive rangers, law enforcement officers and maintenance personnel have a long tradition of working in partnership with local environmental advocates in the communities they serve . Now with a dramatically reduced federal workforce, private businesses, nonprofit organizations and cambers of commerce across the country are  struggling to protect the natural resources that are so vital to their economic stability and way of life. In the hopes of better understanding exactly how the shutdown has impacted these gateway communities I made a few phone calls. I wanted talk to people on the ground who can speak directly to their experience of managing our National Parks with little to no government assistance. John Lauretig is one of six board member of Friends of Joshua Tree, a nonprofit organization that serves the interests of Joshua Tree National Park. “And I'm kind of the Hands-On director of some of the programs we support here in Joshua Tree in the national park, climber coffee, climber stewards program, and the HARP program, which is the hardware anchor replacement program,” Lauretig said in our conversation. “And most importantly I am a member of the JOSAR volunteer search and rescue team that friends of Joshua Tree supports and we augment the Park Service search and rescue team.  As someone with hands-on experience with day to day operations at Joshua Tree, Lauretig is the a good person to ask about how the Shutdown is affecting the Park. “Because of the shutdown we are no longer allowed to do any JOSAR training. So we haven't done any team training either with ourselves or with the park staff,” he said. “So all of that has stopped. Climber coffee has stopped because it was hosted by a park ranger and the climbers stewards when the campground was open were allowed to stay in the campground. But they weren't allowed to work they weren't allowed to do the volunteer jobs. And then when the shutdown happened one of the local climbing guides called and said. You know if the maintenance isn't done on this park we're going to need to clean bathrooms, take out trash like right away because you know this is during the holidays and this peak visitation. We have you know 200,000 visitors come to the park in the next 10 to 12 days. We knew right away that we had to get the power curve on this.”  Unmanned visitor centers, garbage cans overflowing, filthy restrooms …and that was a month ago. Under the government shut local gateway communities are picking up the slack at our national parks. While the president and members of Congress argue over the cost of a wall on the U.S. Southern boarder ordinary citizens across America are paying a very high price. In this episode of the Joy Trip Project we take a look at the trickle down impact of the federal government shutdown on gateway communities near our national parks. When this story was recorded the Government shutdown had been going on for 34 days, the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. Today, on Friday January 25th federal employees will miss their second paycheck. In addition to the impact on hundreds of thousands of hardworking government professionals and their families this shutdown is being felt across every sector of our economy in the lives of millions of people. Even the landscape of the natural environment is being effected.

Being an environmentalist doesn't necessarily limit your outdoor recreation pastimes to hiking, mountain biking, skiing or rock climbing. Those of us who indulge these so-called action sports should remember that we share the natural world with folks whose connection to the outdoors also includes activities like hunting and fishing. Personally I took up fly fishing a few years ago and pardon the pun I'm hooked. And on a trip to Wyoming in 2017 I met a young woman who has a passion for hunting. Jessi Johnson is an environmental activist who shared with me the story of a remarkable experience she had while hunting elk in the Wild. Along with one's passion for the outdoors must also come an understanding of the balance between life and death. As a bow hunter Jessi Johnson knows firsthand the responsibilities and obligations that go along with being a full participant in the natural world. Though she hunts for sport, the elk she kills for food bring her closer to the wilderness she aims to protect. In the edition of the Joy Trip Project we explore the  seeming contradictions of wildlife conservation through hunting.   This story details a vivid description an actual elk hunt. Though not overly graphic sensitive listeners should be advised… “We are all filled with a longing for the wild. There are few culturally sanctioned antidotes for this yearning. We were taught to feel shame for such a desire. We grew our hair long and used it to hide our feelings. But the shadow of Wild Woman still lurks behind us during our days and in our nights. No matter where we are, the shadow that trots behind us is definitely four-footed.” ― Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype Jessi Johnson is the co-founder of Artemis Sportswomen and the Public Lands Coordinator at the Wyoming Wildlife Federation. You can learn about environmental conservation through hunting and other outdoor activities at wyomingwildlifefederation.org Our theme music is provided by Jake Shimabukuro. Additional melodies by Ben Winwood and Oren Tsor were provided by Artlist. The Joy Trip Project is made possible by the support of the Next 100 Coalition a diverse group of environmental activists working toward equity and inclusion in the management of public land through the next century and beyond. Learn about its members and current initiatives at Next100Coalition.org. Thanks for listening! But as always I want to hear from you so please drop me a note with your questions comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com. Or better yet subscribe to the feed on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever most fine podcast platforms can be found. There you can leave a message or a write review, but most of all don't forget to tell your friends. Now go be joyful. And until next time. Take care!

From the opening frames, a recent movie by Canadian adventure film maker Heather Mosher lets viewers know exactly what they're in for. World class rock climber Kevin Jorgeson mugs at the camera and chuckles while his partner Jacob Cook holds up a bloody finger. This particular pitch on the Tom Egan Memorial Route in the Bugaboos of British Columbia was first climbed by Will Stanhope and Matt Segal back in 2015. Blood On The Crack is a pencil-thin fissure on a sheer vertical slab of granite. It's the perfect project for any aspiring rock climber or an adventure film maker. I first met Heather Mosher seven years ago when she was just a volunteer at the Banff Mountain Film Festival. A few weeks ago she sent me link to watch her latest film, a nine-minute short called Blood On The Crack. Let's just say I loved it. So got her on the phone to ask her a few questions about her life and career in film making. Adventure Film Maker Heather Mosher “Going to the Banff Mountain Film Festival in 2012 kind of there's a bit of a spark even though I didn't know it at the time,” Mosher told me in our interview. “I already knew I wanted to be a photographer. I started working in the photography industry in Vancouver and then as I moved out of that full time job the thing that sparked the filmmaking direction was going to Banff and being like ‘I want to make an adventure documentary.” So I've met up with local filmmakers and went, ‘Teach me about sound!' And they said, ‘Sure come on over to our studio and we'll show you our microphones. And they taught me basically how to edit. And that's what's taken me to where I am now.” Blood on the Crack (trailer) from Heather Mosher on Vimeo. Heather Mosher is a rising young creative in a new generation of adventure film makers. Taking her passion for storytelling and life in the outdoors she's producing compelling movies that are worth watching and definitely worth talking about. In this episode of the Joy Trip Project we discuss the process of making an adventure documentary and how this young producer got to work with one of the most sought after professional rock climbers in the world. Kevin Jorgeson and Jacob Cook photo by Kaare Iverson The film Blood On The Crack featuring Kevin Jorgeson and Jacob Cook is making its way around the world wide adventure film festival circuit so watch for it in programs and play lists in the coming months. You can learn more about Mosher on her web site at HeatherMosher.ca Our theme music is provided by Jake Shimabukuro. Additional sounds and melodies in this week's episode were inspired by selections from the film Blood On The Crack. Each was provided by Artlist. The Joy Trip Project is possible thanks to a partnership with Film Festival Flix. Check out the selection of action movies on the Vertical Life or Mountain & Adventure Channels at FilmFestivalFlix.com Thanks for listening! But as always I want to hear from you so please drop me a note with your questions, comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com. Or better yet subscribe to the feed on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher or wherever most fine podcast platforms can be found. There you can leave a message or write a review, but most of all don't forget to tell your friends. Now go be joyful. And until next time, take care!

Hey everybody! It's January first, 2019. Happy New Year! If you're anything like me you're excited to make this year better than the last and if you're listener to this podcast that means getting into the outdoors. But at the moment of this posting, the United States of America is in the second week of a partial government shutdown that's expected to last for at least a few weeks longer. In addition to the federal employees who will go throughout this period without a paycheck every national park and all of our national monuments will be closed. The reality of a nation without parks got me thinking about an interview I conducted more than a year ago. Jon Jarvis is the former director of the National Park Service. Appointed by president Barack Obama back in 2008, Jarvis served in that position through 2016. And now as a private citizen I asked him to tell me a little bit about his career and how he got started. Jarvis began as most of us do with a profound love of the outdoors. He went to the College of William and Mary where he earned a degree in biology. After graduation he took a long cross-country road trip and wound up in Washington D.C. where his older brother worked for the National Parks Conservation Association. There Jarvis worked a bunch of manual labor jobs as a mechanic and welder for a local bus company, but he was still looking for a steady gig, maybe in the outdoors. "And my brother said, “Did you ever think about working for the Park Service?” And I said no," Jarvis said in our interview. "I was also thinking about going back to grad school at the time and was applying for grad school, but I needed a year off. So I applied for a seasonal job with the park service and got hired at the Bicentennial Information Center in 1976 the nation's bicentennial. And that was 40 years ago. I've worked for them ever since." Throughout his career of more than 40 years Jon Jarvis had worked both as a law enforcement officer and a natural resources biologist. He was the superintendents of Mount Rainier National Park in Ashford, Washington, Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve in Idaho and Wrangell-St. Elias National Park & Preserve in Alaska. Jarvis finished his tour of duty as the 18th Director of the National Park Service during the Obama administration under Secretaries of the Interior Ken Salazar and Sally Jewell. Now as the executive director of the Institute for Parks, People, and Biodiversity at the University of California at Berkeley he has big plans to lead the conservation movement well into the future. Jon Jarvis is the author of the book The Future of Conservation in America: A Chart for Rough Water You can learn more about his work at the Institute For Parks, People and Biodiversity at  parks.berkeley.edu Music in this episode is provided by Jake Shimabukuro and Artlist  The Joy Trip Project has made possible thanks to the support of the Next 100 Coalition, a diverse group of environmental leaders dedicated to the preservation of public land and our natural resources through the next century and beyond. Learn more about its members and current projects at Next100Coalition.org Thanks for listening. But as always I want to hear from you so please send your questions, comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com

   Hey everybody! Yeah I know it's been way too long since the last edition of the Joy Trip Project podcast. As it happens I've been crazy busy traveling, writing and yes conducting interviews. But most of the audio I've been recording over the last several months has been going toward a series of profiles for Outside Magazine. Check out the May 2018 cover story, which I wrote, called “The New Faces of Adventure”. This wonderful spread edited by Michael Roberts with photographs by Joao Canziani features 12 emerging athletes and activists who in their own words share the stories of their efforts to make outdoor adventure more diverse equitable and inclusive. The May issue of Outside Magazine is  on newsstands now so go out and get a copy. Or hang tight watch for the online edition available on April 20, 2018 at outsideonline.com But getting back to the podcast, I was recently inspired by a remarkable post on Facebook from my friend Vanessa Garrison. She and another friend Morgan Dixon appeared at the 2018 TED Conference. As the creators of a women's empowerment initiative called Girl Trek and they were introduced virtually to the TED stage my non other than Oprah Winfry  Oprah: Hi all! I hope you're having a great TED Conference. I wanted to chime in virtually here to introduce you to two women that I think are doing some of the most transformational work on our planet. It's big. I mean it's really big. And it's wise because it's based on the wisdom of nature, that cataclysmic shifts start with just a tiny seed. These two women understand that the world is changed when nations are changed and nations are changed when cities are changed. Cities get changed when communities are changed. And communities are changed when individuals are changed. And when we look at history we know that some of the most potent change makers are, let's be real people, Black women. So let's start with them. Get these movers and shakers, get them talking. Get them dreaming and plotting and oh wow. Oh wow. Wow imagine what's going to come of that. I'd like to introduce you to the seed planners and the co-founders of Girl Trek Morgan Dixon and Vanessa Garrison!  So I'm watch this video and Vanessa and Morgan step  out onto the stage. Morgan gives a nod to Oprah and then there's Vanessa. Vanessa Garrison: Now many of you may know us. We Are the co-founders of Girl Trek the largest health organization for black women in America. Our mission is simple: ask black women, 80 percent of whom are over a healthy body weight, to walk outside of their front door every day to establish a life saving habit of walking. In doing so ignite a radical movement in which black women reverse the devastating impacts of chronic disease, reclaim the streets of their neighborhoods, create a new culture of help for their families and stand on the front lines for justice. Today all across America more than a hundred thousand black women are wearing this Girl Trek blue shirt as they move through their communities. A heroic force.  JEM: Right out of the gate Venessa lays out the basic strategy that Girl Trek recommends to its leaders and follower how they can make positive changes their lives and the communities in which they live. VG: One: to have a bold idea, bigger than anyone is comfortable with. Two: Root d in the cultural traditions of your community and lean heavily on what has come before. Three: Name it. That one thing that everyone is willing to work hard for a ridiculously simple goal that doesn't just benefit the individual but the village around them. And lastly: never ask permission to save your own life. It is our fundamental right as human beings to solve our own problems.  JEM: Let's just say that this video got my creative juices following and I suddenly remembered one of the many interviews sitting on a shelf in my office waiting to be edited. In November 2017 I attended the SHIFT Conference in Jackson Wyoming.

It was the summer of 2017 and I was just coming off a major reporting project. I'd spent the better part of a year working on series of stories about the private land owners, farmers and ranchers and their relationship with the natural world. Modern agriculture is such a big deal, because things like soil health and water quality directly impact the nutrition, physical health and wellbeing of people all over the world.  But farms no matter how big or small also have a profound effect on the overall safety and security of nearby  rivers and lakes. Across North America watersheds that span hundred, even thousand of miles connect our forests upstream to densely populated cities where urban people depend upon the availability of fresh fruits and vegetables, sustainably raised meat and dairy products and of course safe drinking water. So agriculture was pretty heavy in my thoughts when I reached out to my friend Amy Kober. She's the director of communications at the nonprofit American Rivers and I was really just checking in to see what kind of initiatives they might be working on in relation to watersheds and farming. “Well, it just so happens ,"she said “we're about to release a new film we produced on the Milwaukee River.” Amy sent me a link to a film called Alice's Garden. There I could stream it online in advance and I was pretty blown away in the first two minutes of watching it. Milwaukee is about an hour and half from my front door and I had never heard of Alice's Garden. Located in the heart of downtown this green patch of land is surrounded the urban core. With systems in place to retain rainwater and restore the capacity of the soil to support growing things, Alice's Garden helps people who live in the neighborhood to experience nature in meaningful ways through the cultivation of fresh vegetables. But what really struck me most was the environmental justice angle of this very cool short film. “If we're going to be honest, the river of Milwaukee and Lake Michigan are places that have been refashioned more for white people with means than for the community I serve on a daily basis,” said Venice Williams, an African-American woman who is the executive director of Alice's Garden. “I personally love going downtown and I love the riverwalk, but when I look up, there are very few people who look like me. So I think the rivers in this city, if we're going to be honest, have been some of those places of segregation and divide.” It didn't take long for me to realize that I wanted to learn more about this remarkable place in one of the most urbanized cities in North America. So I made the drive cross-state to have a conversation with Venice Williams at Fondy Farmers Market in heart of the African-American community in Downtown Milwaukee. There just a few blocks away where she and members of her community grow their own vegetables she told me all  about Alice's Garden. Alice's Garden from American Rivers on Vimeo. Music this week provided by Low Tree or Ziv Moran You can subscribe to this podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play or wherever you do your downloads. Please write me a review. Good or bad I always appreciate your constructive criticism. And most of all don't forget to tell your friends! Until next time, take care

At 95 years young National Park Ranger Betty Reid Soskin is a national treasure. Stationed at the Rosie The Riveter/World War II Homefront National Historic Park in Richmond, California she interprets the cultural narrative of life in America during one of the most turbulent periods in time. Drawing on her personal experience through the 1940s she offers a compelling look into the past that helps us to understand who we are today and chart a course toward a brighter tomorrow. As an African-American woman who endured and survived the racially motivated oppression of previous generations, Ranger Soskin offers young people of color especially the hope and motivation to become leaders and role models themselves in the future. Ranger Soskin addressed a gathering of more than 200 young people of color at an event called the PGM ONE Summit in Berkeley, California. PGM stands for People of the Global Majority, an emerging new generation of black and brown people around the world who are mobilizing to achieve lasting social change. Much like those of her generation who rallied to confront the   threat of foreign armies during World War II Soskin wants the young people of today to stand up against the rising challenges of the 21st century. "I've live now for almost 96 years. And what I have learn in those 96 years is the fact that ever since 1776 my nation has experienced an upward spiral, ciclical periods of chaos," Soskin said. "And it's in those periods of chaos that democracy is redefined. We're in another one of those now. Those periods provide opportunities to reset the buttons, allows us to redefine what demoncracy means. And to get on with the project of forming that more perfect union." After so many years of life experience in this country Ranger Soskin understands that the great experiment of democracy is an ongoing process. Like ascending a spiral staircase we wind our way round and round, getting higher and higher though we seem to find ourselves in the same place time and time again. And here we are back to once more test and redefine the integrity of American democracy. We've here before. Right after her talk in Berkeley Ranger Soskin shared with me her thoughts on our history and the roles each us may play to protect the legacy of our future. Music in this episode by Oren Tsor and Muted 

Outside Magazine recently featured a wonderful essay by the writer Rahawa Haile. This young woman from Miami, Florida had successfully through-hiked the Appalachian Trail. Walking solo, she made the journey of 2,179 miles from Georgia to Maine under the power of her own two feet over several months in 2016. In her fascinating story, one passage in particular stood out. "Throughout my youth, my grandmother and I took walks in Miami, where I'd hear her say the words tuum nifas," Haile wrote. "It meant a delicious wind, a nourishing wind. These experiences shaped how I viewed movement throughout the natural world. How I view it still. The elements, I thought, could end my hunger." Transformational experiences in nature are perhaps the single most compelling reason that anyone would devote months of their lives and thousands of miles walking the great National Scenic trails of North America. Every year trails like the Appalachian, the Continental Divide or the Pacific Crest draw hikers from across the country and around the world to sample the delicious, nourishing winds of the world outside. Many spend these long hikes in quiet reflection of their lives, while others use this time to heal the emotional wounds of their past. In that regard Rahawa Haile was no different. But during the intensely divisive and politically polarizing climate of the 2016 Presidential election she felt the added burdens of race and gender identity in a natural environment populated predominantly by white men. The disparities of participation among those who spend time in nature and those who don't still fall dramatically along the same distinctions of race, gender and class that divide much of our country today. But on her long journey Haile was pleased to discover that she was welcomed and encouraged to become part of the Appalachian Trail community despite hiking while bisexual, female and black. This interview with writer and Appalachian Trail through-hiker Rahawa Haile was recorded in a coffee shop in Oakland, California. Sorry about all the ambient noise, but this conversation was definitely worth sharing. Look for a feature story on Haile and the delicious winds of the outdoors in the next issue of the journal Appalachia. Music this week by Jake Shimabukuro. Check out his latest album Travels now available on iTunes or at Jake Shimabukuro.com

  On Tuesday March 14, 2017 climbing pioneer Royal Robbins died of natural causes at his home in Modesto California. He was 82 years old. A leader in the world of mountaineering he completed the first class VI climb in America on the Northwest Face of Yosemite's Half Dome and in 1961 he completed an ascent of the Salathé Wall on El Capitan. In a long career that included the founding of a global sports apparel brand that bears his name Royal Robbins was a leader in the outdoor industry and a philanthropic supporter of many organizations that encouraged environmental conservation and getting youth outside. In 2009 at the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival in Alberta, Canada I had the pleasure of meeting Robbins for the first time. He very graciously agreed to an interview on his book To Be Brave, the first in a series of memoirs that recounted his remarkable life of adventure. In this flashback edition of the podcast I am proud to share for the first time this archived conversation with Royal Robbins. Music in this edition of the Joy Trip Project by the Ahn Trio 

In 2016 the National Park Service celebrated its 100th anniversary. Throughout the year millions of people from around the world traveled across the United States to visit our historic parks and monuments. I know I personally made stops at Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon and Yosemite. It was during this centennial summer that I had the chance to meet two truly amazing people. Dave and Ilyssa Kyu are graphic artists based in Philadelphia. Through the magic of social media I connected with them in a series of Facebook posts and a remarkable project they had funded through Kickstarter. As they were traveling home after a long journey they just happen to make a stop near my home in Madison, Wisconsin. There we met for breakfast at an outdoor café to hear about more about their recent travels. "We are just wrapping up a three and half-month trip across the U.S. travel to six national parks," Ilyssa said. " We went to Acadia, Smokey Mountains, Rocky Mountains, Zion, to Yosemite and to Yellowstone. We went to each of these national parks to interview all different types of people to help us with the research for our book Campfire Stories. Anytime you mix the national parks with storytelling you're definitely going to pique my interest. Dave and Ilyssa's project sparked a wonderful discussion on the importance identity and a sense of place in the continuing efforts to protect and preserve our public lands for future generations. "We only started going outdoors as adults," Dave said. "And we where always curious to learn more about these outdoor places where we were starting to spend so much of our vacation time in. We were looking around for a book of campfire stories from these national parks and didn't find it so we thought, why don't we make it!" Inspired by camping excursions near their home in Philadelphia these two artists ventured out to find others in their tribe of enthusiasts to share their tales of the wild. From the rocky beaches of Acadia National Park in Maine to the granite cliffs of Yosemite Valley in California they drove thousands of miles in search of stories that profoundly express our collective passion for the majestic beauty of the world outdoors. In the tradition of sharing tales of adventure  around a roaring fire while camped out under the stars or huddled under blankets in a rustic lodge Dave and Ilyssa have gathered together a series of exciting narratives in a new book they call Campfire Stories. The new book Campfire Stories will be out soon. Dave and Ilyssa are taking a bit of break from writing as they embark on another great adventure. They recently welcomed the arrival of a baby daughter named Lula June. You can learn more about their project and even pre-order a copy online at http://campfirestoriesbook.com

In March 2016 a group of environmental activists came together to share a vision. Gathered from across the country this eclectic mix of men and women came to Washington D.C. in order to  collaborate on the creation of a plan to protect and preserve the natural spaces of the United States for future generations. As our National Park Service celebrates its 100th anniversary the group aims to make it possible for those in our society least likely to spend time in the outdoors to become passionate stewards of our public land well into the 21st century and beyond. Called the Next 100 Coalition this dynamic assembly of leaders is telling the stories of African-American, Latino, Asian and Native American people of color who have long enjoyed a history and legacy of conservation. As a member of the Next 100 Coalition, Dr. Carolyn Finney is helping to define a new vision of conservation that will carry us into the future. In the sincere belief that sustainable land management requires the cooperation and participation of all the American people Dr. Finney has crafted a compelling narrative that details the rich cultural heritage of our past while celebrating the great opportunities we enjoy today to build a brighter tomorrow. In this moment she wants us to realize that now is the time to set aside all that had divided us in the past in order to make a better world for the millions of children who will one day inherit the land we leave behind. I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Finney recently in Washington D.C. and she shared with me her wonderful vision of the future in an essay called This Moment. Addressing the potential lives of children born eight years ago at the begining of the administration of President Barack Obama, Finney details a series of challenges and opportunities to make proactive change in the decades which still lie before us. Dylan Rain Ash-Ostfeld is the son of Jackie Ostfeld, Co-founder/Steering Committee Chair at Outdoors Alliance for Kids and Director, Nearby Nature at Sierra Club "What we can do in this moment is work to change the nature of the next moment. What we can do in this moment is to remember, learn, fight, stand and expand who we are and who we might become," she said. "In 2008, 4,247,694 babies were born (in the U.S.). And no matter the color of their hands, they will be reaching for grass, dirt and dreams and we will need all their love and fight and possibility." Dr. Finney is the author of the book Black Faces White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors. She is a professor geography at the University of Kentucky and you can follow her work online at CarloynFinney.com

Sometimes, when we're talking about environmental conservation it's difficult to know or even imagine exactly what really mean. That's especially true when we're asked care, I mean really care about remote areas thousands of miles away from where we live work and play. One such place is the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In a region of Alaska so remote that it is only accessible by small charter airplane the Arctic Refuge is perhaps the most geographically isolated wilderness area in the continental United States. Very few people will ever visit there, but as the home many different plant and animal species including caribou and grizzly bears this remarkable ecosystem on the shores of the Beaufort Sea and the Arctic Ocean is at the forefront of the modern conservation movement. And as a bellwether of the global impacts of climate change the protection of the Arctic Refuge is a major priority for conservation groups like the Sierra Club and many other environmentally focused community outreach organizations. José Gonzalez is the founder of Latino Outdoors. His group aims to help members of the Latino community to become engaged in efforts to protect the natural environment. Along with a leader from Outdoor Afro, a group dedicated to helping African American families forge a bond with the natural world,  José and I had the rare opportunity to travel through the Arctic Refuge. Over the span of seven days we paddled more than 50 miles  along the course of the HulaHula river to experience for ourselves the unique beauty of this vast yet fragile natural habitat. In the hopes raising awareness for the importance of this and other distant wilderness areas this trip was organized to help make a connection with emerging communities of color who will one day be called upon to save them. The Arctic77 photos

If you've been following the news recently you probably heard that there was a startling discovery in the mountains of Tibet. The bodies of climber Alex Lowe and filmmaker David Bridges were discovered near the sight of a tragic 1999 avalanch at the base of Mt Shishapangma. After 17 years the legacy of Alex Lowe is continues through the lives his surviving climbing parnter Conrad Anker, his wife Jennifer and his sons Max, Sam and Issac. In his name the Alex Lowe Foundation works support and improve the lives of indigenous people throughout the Himalayan region as well as raise awareness for the importance of avalanche safety and prevention. In memory of Alex Lowe the Joy Trip Project is reposting an interview with Jennifer Lowe-Anker recorded in 2009. Her memoir  Forget Me Not shares the intimate details of her life after having tragically lost her husband, a climber, only to fall in love all over again with another one. Have you have ever thought about why you love the things you love most? And not just things, what about people? How do we come to discover those with whom we fall in love? Through the course of our lives I believe we drawn without even realizing it to things, places and people that are important to us, that make us happy. We bring them into our lives and with them comes great joy. But sometimes, actually more often than not, the thing that you love most is what keeps you apart. Jenny: I think from the beginning I knew Alex was one of those guys that was kind of like a wild bird that you might entice to hold in your hand but you could never really hold on to him. And that was part of his appeal to me. JTP: Jennifer Lowe-Anker was in love with professional climber Alex Lowe. Each with a passion for the outdoors and the wild scenic places of the world, they built a life together of adventure and travel. But with separate careers, Jenny as fine artist, there were many times when the two were apart for long stretches of time while Alex explored Jenny: Interestingly enough that's what I thought of book from the very beginning. I thought this was not going to be the average climbing story. And I'm not going to be doing a biography but what I really wanted was to show people the person that they loved from the most intimate perspective that I could give away of him because there was such an outpouring of grief and love for Alex at his death. Jenny: Very soon after we got married I decided to leave him and go off in pursuit of a better job because I didn't like the fact that I wasn't making good money and I felt like I was spinning my wheels. It was just a situation we were in and I kind of learned from him that time was precious and I wanting to make good use of my time and thinking when we're together we could do something fun once we made our money and earned it. So I took off and chose to spend a couple of months apart from him working so that we could have a different dream. JTP: Do you have any idea what it was like for him without you? Jenny: I certainly do through his letters. He missed me. We missed each other. And we wrote each other a lot. And some of those letters you get to read. He wrote very avidly. I literally have over a thousand letter from Alex through the time we were together. Jenny: We were together through our letters a lot. He sat down and wrote me nearly every night when were apart. And sometime it was in a journal form and he would spend me like 5 sheets you know over a period of a week or two weeks and little bits of writing that he did everyday to tell me little pieces of what he lived that day and share that with me. And then I would do the same back to him. So we shared the adventures we were having and we shared our caring for each other and concerns and experiencing life. JTP: What was it like on the occasion that he didn't come back? Jenny: It was very devastating. As much as anyone can say , “You know we're all going to die.” And you know when you fall in love with someone that s...

One of the things I love most about this podcast is the ability to tell amazing stories. And in the process I also help to raise awareness for some very important causes. With your support the Joy Trip Project has been able to back more than few Kickstarter campaigns as well as provide financial support to folks in need through Indie-Go-Go. And it was just such a request that reminded me of a story I did in 2008 when I met my good friend Chad Jukes. He's currently looking for support to climb the highest mountainin the world Mount Everest. "I'm a staff sergeant in the army," Jukes had told me. "Back in 2006 I was running convoy security operations over in Iraq and my truck hit an anti-tank mine and ended up shattering my heel bone and breaking my femur." Recorded at during the time of the Irag War this interview aimed to explore how soldiers like Jukes were dealing with the aftermath of devasting injuries received in combat. "After a few months I ended up contracting an infection a fairly serious infection in my heel," Jukes said. "And when they went in to repair that they discovered that the infection had done a lot of damage to the bone. At that point they gave me a few options. And one of them was amputation." At the time Jukes was only 22-years-old and he was faced with one of hardest decisions anyone would ever have to make. Should he abandon the hope of recovering his damaged foot or allow the doctors to remove his leg from below the knee? At that point I went online and started doing some research and ended up finding a web site called the adaptive climbers organization.com," Jukes said. "And I went in there and posted on the forums with my situation. Within the day I received responses from Malcolm Daly, Pete Davis, Craig DeMartino and a number of others with advice for me, and just telling me what I could expect if I chose the amputee route." The guys who responded to Jukes' post were all climbers, including my old boss and long-time friend Malcolm Daly. Each of them had opted for amputation rather than preserve a damaged foot or leg. In the hopes of continuing their lives in the most active ways possible these injured athletes provide inspiring role models for wounded soldiers to recover from the tragic circumstance of war to ascend to unimaginable heights. And in this flashback edition of the podcast we're revisiting the process Jukes endured to put him on track toward an Everest summit. Our theme music is by Jake Shimabukuro. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to fans like you on Patreon. For as little as a dollar month you can support this podcast and many adventure media initiatives covered here. For details visit patreon.com/joytripproject. Thanks for listening, but as always I want to hear from you. So please write to me with your questions comments and criticisms to info@joytriproproject.com

Journalist and author John Vaillant began his career with a profound interest in connecting stories of adventure with complex social issues. And it was on a reporting assignment to the remote regions North Western Canada that put him on the path of a remarkable narrative steeped in both ancient mythology and a modern controversy at the heart of the environmental movement. "It was thanks to Outside Magazine that I got up there. I was doing a paddling story for them in Haida Gwaii, which is this remote archipelago off the northwest coast of British Columbia, an extraordinary place, home of the Haida Nation," Vaillant said. "One way to understand them is the Vikings of the North Pacific. Huge canoes, but they are also a great political force, very powerful environmental advocates. It was also the home of this botanically unique tree, this Golden Spruce. It was 165 feet tall, seven feet across at the base and had golden needles. Every tree from Mendocino to Anchorage, growing in that rainforest band has green needles. And there was one coming up out of that forest. You could see it from 20,000 feet in the air in a plane. There was one golden spire and it was that tree." Sitting at the MacLab Bistro at the Banff Center in Alberta Canada, Vaillant and I had the opportunity to talk about this incredible tree. The Golden Spruce is at the center of a film which appeared at the 2015 Banff Mountain Film Festival and sets the stage for a very complicated discussion on the importance of wildlife conservation and the sustainable management of public land. In the film Vaillant helps frame the story behind why this particular tree means so much to the Haida People and their forest home. The story of the Golden Spruce begins in a village long since reclaimed by the shadows of the forest. It was a time of plenty, but the people were taking too much from the land. A long winter came. The village was decimated by hunger and only two people survived, a little boy and his grandfather. As they fled the village the man warned the boy not to look back. But the boy could not resist. As he turned back to take one last look his feet became rooted to the earth. The spirits transformed the boy into a tree in protest at the ways of the people. And there on the banks of Yakoun is the rare and beautiful tree with yellow needle that shine like gold in the sun. "It was a unique quirk of nature," Vaillant said. "The Golden Spruce did actually have a golden aura, a radiance that was derived from a genetic mutation of its needle's coloring. But for the Hida, what really makes the Golden Spruce stand out is it is the only living being that connects back to that myth time." The Golden Spruce was sacred to the Haida People. It was a botanical mystery that was glorious to behold and as an economic driver to the region it was a much beloved tourist destination. Not unlike our own icon National Parks its location and the surrounding area were set aside to be protected and preserved. The Golden Spruce also stood as a living reminder to never again take so much from the land that we might put it at risk. Tragically though on forest land nearby on Haida Gwaii and on public land throughout North America others trees were being cut down by the tens of thousands in industrial logging operations. Through the devastating practice of clear cutting these ancient forests were being destroyed. So in a violent act of protest meant to point out the hypocrisy of saving one tree while thoughtlessly killing many others a former logger, turn activist by the name of Grant Hadwin took it upon himself to cut down the Golden Spruce in 1997. (The Gold Bough by John Vaillant ~ The New Yorker 2002) This story and its aftermath are the subject of the best selling book The Gold Spruce by John Vaillant and the feature documentary film by director Sasha Snow called Hadwin's Judgement. Looking deeply into the heart and mind of a man desperate to save the forest he loves Vaillant offers up an un...

Courtesy Sweetgrass Productions From the opening  frames of the latest film by Sweetgrass Productions the monumental scale of the subject fills the screen. In concert with vocals and orchestra the images swell with the music in pace with the magnitude of a very controversial issue and the mountain wilderness which surrounds it. Never one to shy from the dramatic filmmaker Nick Waggoner sets the stage with meticulous care, like the conductor of a great opera. At the heart of this wonderful documentary is the age-old question: Do we develop the natural world for our own purposes, for commerce and recreation or do we keep it wild? This debate which rages in the halls of the Canadian parliament pits the interests of ski resort developers against the opposition of environmental activists and in the balance lies the fate of an ancient alpine ecosystem called Jumbo Mountain. Filmmaker Nick Waggoner A significant departure from his usual role as a maker of big mountain ski films Waggoner is plying his cinematic skills to tell a different kind of story. Unlike the "ski porn" movies that feature gratutitous action sequences of steep downhill descents through deep powder snow, Jumbo Wild is a film with a mission. Hoping to raise the consciousness of viewers to recognize the importance of conserving the habitat of grizzly bear and the protecting of scared land of native people Waggoner uses own passion for backcountry skiing to illustrate the intricate details of a political fight that has endured through much of his lifetime. Jumbo Wild offers up a candid view into the controversy that has divided this mountain community in the Canadian Rockies for more than two decades. After a screening at the 2015 Banff Mountain Film in Alberta Waggoner sat down with me at the MacLab Bistro at the famous Banff Centre to share a bit of the story behind this beautifully crafted documentary. The film Jumbo Wild from Sweetgrass Productions is now available on iTunes and Vimeo on Demand. You can learn more about Jumbo Mountain and this continuing controversy online at sweetgrass-productions.com/jumbo-wild Our theme music is by Jake Shimabukuro. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to fans like you on Patreon. For as little as a dollar month you can support this podcast and many adventure media initiatives covered here. For details visit patreon.com/joytripproject. Thanks for listening, but as always I want to hear from you. So please write to me with your questions comments and criticisms to info@joytriproproject.com

In 2009 professional sport climber David Lama declared that he would summit the great mountain in Patagonia called Cerro Torre. Known around the world as one of the most difficult alpine ascents Lama proposed to make the climb up the 3128 meter spire via the infamous and highly controversial Compressor Route. But unlike those who had successfully reached the top this young athlete then only 19 years old planed to climb using just the rock's natural features and aided by bolts and ropes only for protection in case of a fall, a technique known as free climbing. But veteran Patagonia climbers like Jim Bridwell believed that free climbing Cerro Torre was impossible. But undeterred by skeptics Lama would spend the next three years in pursuit of his goal. Having achieved a free climb ascent of the summit in 2012 his story is now the subject of a new film that premiered at the 2014 Banff Mountain Film Festival called Cerro Torre: A Snowball's Chance in Hell. Theme music by Jake Shimabukuro This edition the Joy Trip Project was made possible thanks to the support of the Banff Mountain Film & Book Festival at the Banff Centre, inspiring creativity . You can support future episodes of this podcast through our crowd sourcing website at patreon.com For as little as a dollar a month, just 12 bucks a year you can keep the Joy Trip Project on the road. To find out how just visit patreon.com/joytripproject

Adventure photographers and filmmakers give us a unique view of the world. And throughout his long career taking pictures and telling stories for major magazines Peter McBride has offered up an exciting perspective, most often from the air. When he was in his 20s he flew a World War I biplane called the Vickers Vimy from London to Cape Town to reenact the first time an airplane traveled across Africa in 1920. "I think that really gave me an interest in the aerial perspective," he said in an interview with the Joy Trip Project. "I was able to sell it to National Geographic with some good luck and that led me into a decade of doing work for Geographic and other magazines." Through his camera McBride has shown us images of the planet most of us can only dream of. Having chosen a profession suited to his nature he admits that his work fulfills a selfish desire. "I guess I became a photographer more because I had an interest in seeing the world to be honest," he said. "I love photography, but I love adventures. I love exploring and I love going into the unknown." McBride's work in photography provides us with an eye-opening look at the planet. He gives his viewers and readers the opportunity to see the place they call home in a different way. From the high mountains of the Himalaya to the jungles of the Amazon McBride has made it possible for to people to see how they and others interact with their environment and to observe their role in the natural order of things. But it's in his most recent body of work that McBride turns his lens back toward the place where HE grew up. Flying high above the Rocky Mountains to Sea of Cortez he has been following the course of the great North American river, The Colorado. In a series of photo essays and feature films McBride now tells the story of the river that provides food and water for more than 10 percent of the U.S. population. The hardest working river in the world Colorado has flowed for more than 6 million years. But in the span of just a few decades its precious resources have been tapped to the breaking point. Returning to his home in Colorado Peter McBride is raising awareness for the importance of conserving water in the west. Through his films and still photographs he illustrates the plight of the Colorado and demonstrates the impact of over development and the abuse of our most precious natural resource. JTP: So I think it's fair to suggest that you have been involved in different types of photo capturing all over the world, specifically what is it that made you come back to the United States and put so much effort into telling the story of the Colorado River? McBride: I think I came home…I still travel a lot for work today, but I came home in part because I was a little burned out to be honest. I was telling someone just last night that I wanted to try to do something that had a little more impact than just a magazine article that somebody reads going to the bathroom or something. You know…And that's not entirely fair. Magazine stories can chance things for sure, but I guess I just wanted to sink my teeth into something that was bigger, maybe bigger than me. And I didn't have a really huge master plan. It sort of evolved on its…as it happened and it still is. But I came home and wanted to do something just around home and not travel a bunch. I was traveling all the time and so I had to hunker down and I came back to the valley where I grew up. My father's a pilot and I started looking at doing some aerial work. And that led into the Colorado River project that technically took me two years. But I'ms till doing tributaries. I'm still doing rafting and I'm still talking about it. It's an issue that's definitely not going away and it's going getting more and more severe. JTP What can you tell me about what you discovered in your travels taking pictures of the Colorado River literally from its source to what had been its course to the sea? McBride:

At the age of 26 best-selling author Cheryl Strayed strapped on a backpack and hiked the Pacific Crest Trail. Over the course of 94 days she traveled from Mojave California to the Bridge of the Gods in Cascade Locks Oregon, just outside of Portland where she lives today. Four years after loosing her mother who died of cancer Strayed ventured  into the wilds of nature in order to find a part of herself she felt was missing. With absolutely now experience in backpacking she made the impulsive decision to deal with her unimaginable grief with an impossible adventure.

It goes without saying. Our world is growing bigger and more complicated everyday. Especially in our urban centers where economic and political fortunes are beginning to shift and reflect the values of a much more culturally diverse population. Despite the devastating effects failing banks and climate change there are rising many new opportunities to tap into the dynamic energy and financial resources of previously under represented members of our society. Leading the way toward positive outcomes in a brighter future is urban revitalization strategist Majora Carter. Urban Revitalization Strategist Majora Carter "An urban revitalization strategist, or me, is a person who identifies in particular low-income  communities and in our inner cities in the States, and looks around and sees what the problems are, what the failings are and figures out strategies to improve them both socially and environmentally as well as economically," she said in this interview. "And you have to have all three involved, because it's not just about putting band aids on these communities. It's literally about increasing the quality of life, economically, socially as well as environmentally." Majora Carter was the keynote speaker at the biannual breakfast meeting of the Outdoor Industry Association during the 2013 Outdoor Retailer Winter Market in Salt Lake City Utah. Sharing her thoughts on strategies for urban revitalization she impressed upon those in attendance the importance of reaching out to under served communities, in particular people of color. Now that a majority of the worlds' population lives in cities it is in these urban areas where we must now strive to achieve lasting change for the benefit of humanity. Working in the South Bronx borough of New York City, Carter is putting together solid plans to make this and other communities across the U.S. into vital centers of sustainable economic growth and development while helping to protect the environment. With the creation of both green jobs and green spaces in the heart of our biggest cities Carter hopes to encourage an ethos of conservation that will serve the interests of wilderness as well. JTP: The bulk of your work right now is in the South Bronx (New York), now work internationally but specifically what exactly have you done to revitalize that particular urban setting? Carter: Sure, we literally wanted to sort of flip the script on what was considered development in our community. So much of it was actually around noxious facilities and burdensome things of that nature, power plants, etc., and we wanted to change the landscape by creating more ecologically sound development. So it started with parks and greenways. And then we even went to people and started one of the country's very first green-collar job and placement systems. Now we're moving into real estate development because we understand that you can use real estate development as a platform for social, environmental and economic change, if it's done correctly and strategically. It can be a transformation tool, which it has not been used that way before in poor communities. JTP: So what's the disconnect? How is it that we even need to have someone like you tell us that the spaces that we occupy perhaps as residential areas or as businesses require some type of revitalization? Carter: The disconnect is that there are really low expectations placed on poor communities in general. And the people that are in them, and the elected that allegedly support them, the regulators who are supposed to regulating them, that kind of dynamic has been going on for generations to the point where I think even people who live there believe it. And I used to be one of them, until I realized that wait a second, if we can create the infrastructure and supports to allow better things to grow...because no one will rise to low expectation. You can't. So if you raise the expectations and give people the tools to rise to them they can and they wil...

A professional ski mountaineer for more than 13 years climber Hilaree O'Neill started out her career at a very young age. Skiing since the age of three she spent most of her early days on the many 14,000-foot peaks near where she went to school in Colorado. "When I finished college I moved to Chamonix in France for about 5 years," she said in an interview. "And that brought in sort of the more big mountain high altitude stuff with glaciers and ice climbing and all that kind of stuff. That kind of brought all the pieces together" In 1999 she came to the attention of the North Face pro mountaineering team. Looking for elite female athlete to round out their roster TNF connected with O'Neill at the Outdoor Retailer Show in Salt Lake City, UT. With solid climbing skills and a resume packed with ascents both North America and Europe she was just who they were they looking for. "And three weeks later I was on a plane to the India Himalaya," she said So that was my first big expedition and from then on I was hooked!" For more than a decade O'Neill has put in two to three trips to the Himalaya each year. And in the middle of very busy career she managed to find time to get married and give birth to two sons. As a wife and mother she's still at the top of her game as world class mountaineer. Most recently in 2012, during one of the most challenging climbing seasons ever, O'Neill made a successful ascent of Mount Everest and then climbed to the top near by Lotse another 8,000 meter peak both on the same day. On tour with the North Face speakers series O'Neill visited Madison, WI to sit down and share her story a a presentation she calls the Road Not Taken. O'Neill: It was a huge learning curve going from the states the Chamonix was the first big learning curve of getting into skiing with ropes and harnesses and all that kind of stuff and then going from the Alps to Himalayas was a massive learning curve going from both culturally and myself personally in the sport because all of the sudden now it was becoming more about the climbing and less about the skiing and so really had to focus on those climbing skills more than the skiing for the first time in my life. It was also about sustaining mental toughness over three four five six week periods and being out and exposed for long periods of time. You know a lot of winter camping, a lot of storms. So it was a very steep learning curve. You know I think right after India I went to Russia and spent...got stuck in a storm and spent six days in a snow cave with a bunch of Russians. You know like where am I? So yes it was a steep learning curve. JM: So now what motivates you to do that kind of thing. You obviously had this great opportunity, but what made you stick with it? O'Neill: I just love the satisfaction I get from the adventure of it. Expeditions really are different in that you can plan to the best of your abilities and it never turns out the way you planned it. There's always something new that you never expected, the climbing's harder or easier or just different. And that's the part of it I love. And I really like challenging myself. High altitude obviously is something that's always been a major draw for me and I like the simplicity of it. JM: So now through the course of all that you also had an opportunity to fall in love and get married and started to raise a family. You've got a husband and a family and two small boys at home. I've heard you say in previous interviews that being a parent is infinitely more difficult or more challenging a mountaineer. Well I've got to know, what is it about parenting that making is so much difficult than being a climber? O'Neill: Well parenting I think you are not always operating within your own decisions, your choices. A lot of what you're doing is at the need or the call of your children and it's just very different. To leave and go on a mountaineering trip you're choosing things. You have actually have some silence. You can sleep at night,

Veterinarian and photographer Dag Goering is the co-founder with his wife author Maria Coffey in the adventure touring business Hidden Places Travel. For many years he's worked at combining his love of travel with the care and protection of animals. “It all started with Camels really,” he said in an interview. “I was very interested in doing longer journeys across the Sahara with the Tuaregs.” The Tuaregs are a nomadic people who travel across the deserts of Northern Africa on caravans of camels. So Goering tried to find a way to come along. “I thought as a veterinarian, that's my background I could bone up on some camel medicine,” he said. “And that might make me useful.” So he did some researched and someone suggested that he go to Bikaner in India, a desert region of Rajasthan. There he hoped to learn a few thing about camels. But he was surprised to discover that camels weren't as popular as he thought. “Everyone said, “well ‘Camels? Why are you interested in Camels? Camels are nasty animals.'” Goering said. “ And after working there for a couple of weeks in the clinic with camels I came to the conclusion they are indeed nasty animals. Unfortunately, he didn't learn very much. And disappointed but not discourage Goering decided to stay in India and travel. Along the way he wound up working with a non-profit organization that does volunteer veterinary medicine for camels dogs and other animals. “And at one point we were called out to examine this newly born elephant,” he said. “So I was in the presence of all these magnificent large animals in these stables, elephant stables, and it was such a profound experience I just came home and said Maria I just want to work with elephants!” Making the shift from camels to elephants Goering and his wife Maria Coffey began focusing their attention on the care and treatment of elephants. Through their non profit Elephant Earth Initiative to two work now to protect the habitats of elephants in the wild and their welfare among humans in captivity the couple raise awareness for the plight elephants both in Asia and in Africa “There are huge issues to do with the welfare of captive elephants. One of the things that we bring across  in our presentation is how captive elephants are trained, are broken and then how they're kept after that, the welfare issues about that. Most people just have no idea of the cruelty that's inflicted upon captive elephants,” Coffey said. “ And then of course in the wild, like any mega-fauna they're being hugely effected by population growth, by the loose of habitat, the growth of human elephant conflict. In many places around the world it's becoming a very big issue. Elephants are very important to us and to world as a whole. Doug and I passionately believe that we have to do what we can to help preserve them.” I had the pleasure of meeting Goering and Coffey during the 2011 Banff Mountain Film Festival in Alberta Canada. There they had on display an amazing assortment of elephant photographs that help to tell the story behind this magnificent but endangered animal in the presentation they call Elephant Enigma. JTP: In your presentation I heard you say that the eye of an elephant is like looking into orb into another world. And a lot of that imagery comes out in many of your photographs. What is it about the eye of an elephant that is so transformational? Goering: Well it is a bit difficult to describe. I think there is a strange energy, you know elephants don't have expressive faces. They're not like dogs. Dogs can sort of grimes or smile. But elephants don't have that kind of musculature. So when you look at their faces they don't really move that much, but the eyes are more expressive. It's not like other animals' eyes. It's more like the eye of a whale if anyone has ever experienced that, I could just compare it to that. And it really is like...you just know that there's something pretty profound going on behind that.

This summer, I traveled across the North American west, hitting  some of the top rock climbing destinations in the country. Moab, Utah, Lake Tahoe, Yosemite and Joshua Tree … plus a quick hike through the Grand Canyon.   I trained at mountaineering in the Chugach Range of Alaska and made it safely to the summit of Mount Baker in the Washington Cascades.  Next year I've got an even more ambitious project -- to reach the top of Mount Denali, the highest point on the continent.    But there's more to climbing than elevation, and some of the most challenging terrain I know is right here in Wisconsin. Devil's Lake State Park, just 40 minutes north of Madison, is home to incredible high cliffs and stone walls that are perfect for rock climbing. "People don't realize that the southwest corner of Wisconsin had no glaciers. It's called the driftless region," Anne Hughes a friend avid local climber. "And so these valleys hills and cliffs have not been leveled out by glaciers and this particular rock that we're climbing on is the center of an old mountain range."   Anne is among the many climbing enthusiasts from Madison who regularly defy the misconception that Wisconsin is flat and featureless. "These cliffs rise 500 feet off the surface of the lake," she said. "That's the center piece of the park called Devil's Lake. So people who think of the Midwest as looking like central Illinois or or I-90 going across Ohio, you know haven't been to a non-glaciated region." People have asked me if Devil's Lake can offer much of a challenge to someone who's climbed snow covered mountains in Colorado or vertical walls of granite 3,000 feet high.  Actually, it's one of the most challenging terrains I know.  The rock here is relatively smooth with very little texture – which means there's not a lot to hang onto.  It takes incredibly strong fingers and toes, and a whole lot of balance and dexterity.  It's like the difference between ballet and football.  You need strength and stamina to play football.  You need a whole other level of skill if you want to dance on your toes for an hour.  That's why people who learn to climb in Wisconsin climb well and go on to climb all over the world. "I climb because I love being outside. I really enjoy the fact that it's a three dimensional sport that every move is different, every climb is different," Anne said. "Climbing the same climb is different every time. So I get strong all over my body. I like the partner relationship that is almost always involved, going out with a friend or more friends. You're literally holding their lives in your hands, which is a sobering thought. It's fun, but you're really committed to each other. You're watching each other's back, making sure that she doesn't do anything unsafe that she forgot about or just was preoccupied. And look at this environment! you're outside everyday in this beautiful place doing something that makes your strong and healthy and fun."   For Wisconsin Life, this is James Mills Joy Trip Project contributions to National Public Radio programs like Wisconsin Life made possible in part with the support sponsors Patagonia, Rayovac and the New Belgium Brewing Company

Typically political action can take shape only when the general populous is rallied and motivated to take a stand. When it comes to building awareness for issues of environmental protection it's especially difficult because those regions most in need of protecting are usually far away from the public eye. That's why an organization called the International League of Conservation Photographers goes out into some of the most remote habitats in the world to document the current condition of delicate ecosystems at  risk of destruction. "I've been working in the Sacred Headwaters region since about 2009, now," said ILCP photographer Paul Colangello. "And really briefly, the Sacred Headwaters is where three salmon bearing rivers all begin in one region of Northern British Columbia. So it's the Stakeen, the Skeena and the Nass. It's also home to one of the largest predator prey ecosystems in North America and it's the traditional territory of the Tahltan first nation." Paul Colangelo is one of several members of the ILCP working to protect the Sacred Headwaters of British Columbia. This region is among the largest temperate rainforests in North America. But over the past few years it's been flooded with proposed resource extraction projects. The biggest of which is Shell Oil's million acre, coalbed methane tenure right in the heart of the headwaters. Others include an open pit gold and copper mine and a mountain top removal coal mine. But the push back among the local population has been fierce. Approximately 1,500 members of the indigenous Tahltan nation have raised a lot of public awareness through blockades and sit-ins. They were actually able to stop Shell, the second largest corporation in the world. "Well somewhat stop them," Colangelo said. "They achieved a four year moratorium. But this will be lifted in december of 2012. And so we've been working in the area. That's when the ILCP got involved too and produced a RAVE." A RAVE is a Rapid Assessment Visual Expedition. A team of world-class photographers like Colangelo along with videographers and journalists go into endangered regions such as the Sacred Headwaters and work to tell its story. "We're trying to bring the Sacred Headwaters to people, because it's so remote," Colangelo said. "Most people even living in British Columbia have never even heard about it. So we're pretty much just trying to raise awareness. And we're hoping to get people's support for the protection of this area." Paul Colagello's work along with eight other members of the ILCP culminated in a book written by National Geographic explorer Wade Davis called Sacred Headwaters Sacred Journey. I had a chance to talk to Colangello back in 2011 during the Banff Mountain Film Festival in Alberta Canada. There he shared the story behind his amazing photographs and the RAVE launched to protect this remote region at risk.   JTP: Tell me a little bit about what a photographer does to help facilitate the preservation of these wild places. Colangelo: Well number one would be bringing places to people were they can't see it. You can read about a spot, but you're more likely to have a, you know a real connection and a reaction and waiting to save it if you actually see it. And then, I mean, after that, I mean, after you get to know and get, you know really deep into these issues and you get to know a region you can spot other potential problems and then make people aware of that even beyond photography. An example of that is Okanagan Mountain just this past December, the B.C. Government permitted just about the entire plateau for mining, exploration mining. And this mountain happens to be the home to the worlds largest lambing herd of stone sheep. And so I mean in 2001 recognizing the value of this herd the British Columbia government actually protected their winter habitat which is the slope of the mountain. And then they turned around and permitted the actual plateau for mining. So it's things like these,

A conversation with Aron Ralston In 2003 Aron Ralston was brash young man looking for adventure. But while exploring the slot canyons of the Utah desert he found himself trapped miles from home deep within a underground chasm his right arm crushed and pinned by a massive boulder. There he lay stranded with no hope of rescue for five days. Rolston's story was portrayed in the 2010 film 127 Hours starting James Franko. In order to escape from circumstance that would have meant certain death Ralston was forced to amputate his own arm. But he would go one to inspire millions through his incredible story of survival and perseverance through his bestselling book Between a Rock & a Hard Place. Ralstonwas the keynote speaker at the bi-annual meeting of the Conservation Alliance during 2012 Outdoor Retailer Summer Market in Salt Lake City Utah. Immediately following his presentation I had the opportunity to ask him a few questions about his ordeal and what inspired him to live to tell his story. JTP: Many people have seen the film and have read the book. The film is called 127 Hours. And the book is called Between a Rock and a Hard Place and it tells your story of a very harrowing experience in the Utah desert. I'll leave it to other people to get an idea as to what it is that, that story meant to them, but perhaps you can give me an idea. In the film, how accurate was James Franko's portrayal of your story? What did they get right? What did they get wrong? Ralston: Well I worked with the film team for seven years as it was to take it all the way from when I wrote my book to turn it into a script and then selecting a director and working with them to choose James as they did to depict me and my experience. And even working with James then to coach him through the actions. He's admittedly not an outdoorsman and to get him familiar with the desert, to get him an understanding of my experience. Not that he was trying to impersonate me so much, but to take an audience through my entrapment, the psychological aspects of the ordeal that I endured and then the liberation, the release, the triumph of it all too. And I thought it was very accurately portrayed, both from the overarching emotional stories, the themes that they highlighted about love and family and also the very physical and factual aspects of it too, all wrapped up in this extraordinary film adaptation of my experience. I think that people who watch it they know what I went through. You feel it really as you watch the film. So I was extremely pleased with what they did. I was that the point where I'm watching it with my sister a couple of times and as she's seeing it for the first time she's like elbowing me and slapping me on the knee saying , "That's so you! They totally nailed it!" Even with my family they saw how genuine it was and to do that and at the same time really make a film that moves people? That's not an easy thing. You usually have to choose one or the other, but they got it both. They got this amazing film, I thought very powerful and inspiring and then also sometimes resonated with my experience that showed that genuine portrayal. Even with my faults, somethings I'm not necessarily proud of, mistakes and foibles as they are. I couldn't have been happier. JTP: Your experience was both physically and emotionally traumatic. Can you give me an idea, can your subscribe for me what was the greatest moment of despair for you? Ralston: I think that the darkest point of the entrapment came after I had eliminated all my options of escape and was really left with still the idea that I could amputate my arm. It's just that I wasn't desperate enough yet and then as I became more desperate on the third day I tried to cut into my arm. I couldn't even cut through the skin. I felt despair and thought I'd bottomed out at that point. But then later on the fourth day I had this kind of epiphany of sorts, that I could take the knife and hold it like a dagger and try to stab m...

photo by Nick Berard Recently I was asked to create at story about outdoor recreation for the Wisconsin Public Radio program 'Wisconsin Life'. With such unseasonably warm weather I managed to get my stand up paddle board out onto Madison's lakes earlier  than ever before. So I went out on Lake Wingra with my digital recorder to gather sound and an experience to write a short essay. ~JEM SUP Wisconsin ​Spring has come early to Wisconsin this year. It's a warm day in March when I strap my Stand Up paddle board to the roof of my car and make the short drive to Madison's Lake Wingra. Winter's ice has only just retreated and the clear open water ripples beneath bright sunshine. So early in the season the boat docks haven't yet been put in place and I'm among the first to venture out. ​Eleven feet four inches long, my board eases in to the chilly water. Dressed  in neoprene booties, Lycra tights and a life jacket I hold the board steady with one foot, the other planted firmly on the wooden pier as I adjust the length of my paddle. I push away from shore with a gentle kick propelled just a little by a light breeze from the south. ​I'm a little out of practice after the winter, so it takes a few strokes of the paddle to find my center of balance on the board, to set my feet. Within minutes, though, I find that familiar rhythm as I sweep the blade through the water past the tall brown marsh grass and freeze-dried cattails along the shore. Standing tall above the water I can see swaying lake weeds beneath me and schools of blue gill that dart out before the rushing surge of my board. ​Faster now, the wind at my back, the lake's current carries me toward the far shore. With a starboard turn I paddle along the beach front … locking breath and pulse to each stroke … building first then settling to a sustainable cadence. Turning again into the wind I set a course straight in the direction of a distant tree. Matching each sweep of the paddle left side, right side and back again the blade balances the arch of travel to pull evenly through the water ever forward. Canadian Geese honk with encouragement as I go past and a family of ducks scatters, taking flight. ​With this lake all to myself I feel uniquely part of a great whole. Surrounded by water and wildlife, astride my board,  I too can fly like the birds . And as the sun slowly sets, I can see on the horizon many more great adventures on the lakes and rivers of Wisconsin.   The Joy Trip Project is made possible with the support of sponsor Patagonia  

For most of his life wildlife photographer Florian Schulz has fought to protect the diversity of animals species around the world. Working in the most remote region of the planet he's tracked and documented the wild birds of Mexico, big game animals of the African continent as well as the migratory patterns of caribou in the Alaskan Arctic. And it's in this frozen region known for its vast featureless landscapes where Florian has followed and photographed the great Polar Bears of the northern hemisphere. Florian: It's really a land of extremes both in temperatures but also in the survival of animals in these harsh environments. And for me that is so intriguing, how the natural world is able cope and adapt to such extreme places. And I found it anything else but a barren wasteland. With patient study after long months in the field Florian has come to a profound understanding of nature's most delicate balance. By observing large animals musk ox, wolves, moose and grizzly bears he hopes to make those who see his photographs realize that all of these species have a direct relationship with each other, the land and in no small way the survival of humanity. At the bi-annual breakfast meeting of the Conservation Alliance at the 2012 Outdoor Retailer Winter Market in Salt Lake City Utah Florian Schulz was the keynote speaker. Shortly after his presentation he shared with me how he first came to forge an intimate relationship with the harsh and forbidding environment of the Alaskan Arctic. Florian: I realized once I gave the land some time, once almost I got invited in I was starting to be able to see and document things that I would have never dreamt of seeing. But I have to be honest that you won't go there and immediately just see everything. I mean it's definitely important that you do spend the time and you don't too big expectations because it's a vast open place and wildlife sometimes is very dispersed. JTP: I think that's actually one of the most compelling things about your work in that not unlike ice it takes a long time to develop. You have to slow it down. I'm interested in finding out how it is that you were able to slow yourself down enough to get a full appreciation for the minute changes that you wouldn't necessarily see instantly just by being there. How did you find yourself even able to work in the solitude of that area? Florian: I think as a photographer you have it a little bit easier because if you are dreaming of exceptional images that kind of really occupies you. So if it's a question of how do you get the patience? How do you go to a remote location year after year even though you haven't been successful in finding the caribou for example? It is because you are envisioning these most spectacular images and that gives you so much excitement that you're willing to go through the millions of mosquitoes, the freezing temperatures where you're just really suffering. But that fascination with the images kind of let's you endure all of that. But I don't care enough about the suffering like that because you get rewarded with the view of an iceberg underneath the water or, you know, a view of thick bill murres diving as if they were penguins going down into the depths of the ocean. So yeah it's rewarding. That's why you can endure it. JTP: The work that you're doing helped to establish a program called Freedom to Roam and the primary premise as I understand it is to create wildlife corridors through which animal species can successfully migrate for mating, for the gathering of food. How is it that you came to understand the necessity for the establishment and maintenance of wildlife corridors? Florian: If you think about Europe and how chopped up for example the last natural areas there are you very quickly realize that any large predators life wolves, grizzly bears or even things like lynx they get dramatically reduced. They go extinct and so on if these natural areas become small and smaller.

  For companies in the Outdoor Industry day-to-day operations that protect and preserve the environment naturally make good sense. So-called green business practices are meant to be sustainable, using a minimum amount energy and mostly renewable resources to create the products and services that drive our economy. And for Andrew Winston it's become abundantly clear that despite any political and social ideology that espouses the virtues of capitalism above all else green technology in commercial manufacturing and production is the best way to for businesses of every variety to assure their long-term profitability and prosperity. Having begun his career as a traditional business consultant Winston said he started taking a closer look into how business and the environment might work together. Winston: So I went back to school for an environmental management degree and decided that I wanted to marry business and the environment and figure out how to combine my business background and what was just an interest and passion about resource use, what the foundations of business really are, which is stuff and material and how we're using too much of it. So it came from a place of practicality and profitability almost, even more than traditional quote tree hugging. That was just about business can't survive like this. And that means our society can't.   The author of two books Green to Gold and Green Recovery Andrew Winston was the keynote speaker at the biannual breakfast meeting of the Outdoor Industry Association at the Outdoor Retailer Winter Market in Salt Lake City Utah. There he shared with an audience of true believers his view on the importance of sustainability in business and why in the long run really there is no alternative.   JTP: One of the things I find fascinating about your conversation is that you talk about issues, especially issues that you describe as “TINA Issues” And that stands for “There Is No alternative”. What are a few examples of these TINA issues? And what do they mean when it comes to reducing sustainability costs?   Winston: Tina I'm really using in the broadest since. In dealing with climate change, dealing with biodiversity loss, dealing with waste,  there is no alternative. We don't have a choice any more for a lot of reasons and the forces driving that include just increased resource cost and reduced resource availability as the number of people on the planet who are getting richer grows. There's just not enough stuff. That's sort of the obvious one. But there's also transparency, the technology driven demand for knowing what's in everything. And so this just opens up companies and they have to start talking about what they're doing. And that means they actually have to start changing what they're doing. You can't be transparent about a process that they you don't want to be a transparent about. So it means that you start changing products, what's in it? Who made it? Where was it made? Were they paid a living wage? These things start being open to the world. So there is no choice. You can't compete in a world where your customers, especially big business customers won't put your products on the shelf if they don't have the data, if they don't know how it was made.   JTP: And you refer to certain technologies that allow consumers to very quickly and easily determine how much of an impact these particular products have. But you also said that we're a point right now where green will always be small because people aren't prepared to pay for something that is just green. If that's the case, at what point do we shift our thinking to such a way that we will go to a sustainable product as opposed to something that's just green.   Winston: Well, let me clarify that. What I said was the number people who pay more just for green with remain small. And that's partly out of just ability to. Not everybody can afford to buy organic food or a more expensive car that has the hybrid or electric engine.

When it comes to adventure writing the sharpest literary minds draw on the subject matter they know best. Author Angie Abdou brings to her latest book themes from an ancient English text first made popular in the middle ages. "I was a medievalist in a past life, which is a weird thing to be," Angie said at the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival. "But before I took up fiction writing I taught medieval studies." You may remember from courses in English lit the classic travel stories known collectively as the Canterbury Tales. Written by Geoffrey Chaucer in the 14th century it's a dark ages joy trip that follows the path of Christian pilgrims on their way from London to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral in Kent. "And I think for people who haven't read Chaucer they think it's a classic text and that it must be serious and religious," Angie said. "But Chaucer is a raunchy, bawdy, wild, wild text. And I always like the idea of how it might manifest, or turn into a contemporary novel, because he's writing social satire of the whole breath of medieval society. And he uses the devise of a pilgrimage to bring together diverse groups that wouldn't otherwise spend time together. So he has the fighters and prayers and workers and women and men and upper and lower, people who would normally never interact, but they're together for the space of this pilgrimage. And so he's able to satire the whole group. And so I thought where I live, what's a pilgrimage? And it's the back country ski-touring trek." Set in the fictional town of Coalton, somewhere in the Canadian Rockies Abdou tells in her book the many stories of mountain people. Drawn to a remote ski lodge by the last big snow dump of the year, these stereotypical nature lovers gather to offer up a bit of social satire on those who lead an active lifestyle. "So you have the redneck snowmobiles and the pothead ski-bums and the snowshoeing hippies and they're all…this developer guy who wants to cess out the territory and all the different groups from my town are headed back to the backcountry," Angie said. "So I get to get them together and I put them in the same hut in the back country and see what happens!" The tales are every bit as raunchy, bawdy and wild as anything Chaucer ever wrote. And in the classic style of the medieval poet Angie Abdou shares a comical story our own lives in adventure she calls The Canterbury Trail. Music this week by Jake Shimabukuro The Joy Trip Project is made possible with the support of our sponsor Patagonia. Discover their conservation and new media initiatives on their blog the Cleanestline.com. And special thanks to the Walton Works whose support underwrote travel expenses to Banff so I could bring back this and other great stories. Visit the Walton Works.com   Thanks for listening., But you know I want to hear from you. So please drop me a note with your questions, comments and criticisms to info@joytripproject.com.

If you've ever wondered how you might become an explorer for National Geographic believe it or not it can be as simple as attending a seminar. During the Banff Mountain Film Festival in a conference room at the Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada aspiring young explorers learn the ropes of turning their dreams of adventure into an assignment for National Geographic. Their works may land on television, on the web or the famous magazine with the bright yellow border. Carrie Regan, Vice president of specials development at National Geographic Television tells young photographers, writers and filmmakers what she wants to see and hear in a pitch. “In brief it's basically looking for great adventures, adventures with great payoffs, a great discovery,” Regan said. “Think about what the hook would be, what would make viewers when they tune in for the first 5 minutes say, ‘Oh, my God! I have to stick around and see if they're going to solve this mystery if they're going to accomplish this quest'.” For many, like those at this seminar, the dream of exploration began between the pages of National Geographic Magazine. Who can forget the image of early human ancestors discovered at Olduvai Gorge or the hunting eyes of the “Afghan girl” Sharbat Gula? Those vivid pictures and compelling stories have inspired people for generations to travel the world in search of adventure and scientific discovery. Since 1888 National Geographic has supported more than 10,000 expeditions to the most remote corners of the globe. And those gathered here want to be among the next group of explorers. In this seminar Regan encourages them to keep a few things in mind. ‘So really think about how this is going to be visually different,” she said “what great characters we have and what's that great payoff that will keep viewers tuned in.” Developing content across a variety of different media National Geographic is looking for new and exciting stories. Gregory McGruder, vice president of public programs at National Geographic also sits on the Expeditions counsel as well as the Young Explorers Grant counsel. He helps to pick from among the many projects that apply for support and funding. But he warns new applicants not to make up the social and culture significance the magazine is known for in their stories. He says just keep it real. “We've got really good radar for things that are shoehorned in kind of improperly,” McGruder said. “If it's something about adventure make it adventure. Don't add the cultural element as a tag-on. I mean the cultural element is fine, but it just has to be authentic.” It is this authenticity that adventure filmmaker and past National Geographic Younger Explorer Grant recipient Andy Maser brings to the magazine. Young Exploper Grantee Andy Maser Photo by Mark Christmas “I got a young explorer grant in 2009 for a project in Bolivia that blended climate change with white-water kayaking,” he said. Maser's project for National Geographic proposed to demonstrate through a paddling adventure how a warming planet might impact the availability of water in a major city like La Paz. “A lot of their water comes from melting glaciers that are rapidly receding because of climate change,” Maser said. “So we launched an expedition to study these glaciers and then paddle the rivers that flow with the melt waters of these glaciers.” Maser, who's now 26, pitched his expedition idea to National Geographic in consideration of a Young Explorers Grant. Now he's a professional adventure filmmaker. “Working with National Geographic it really opens doors. The young explorers grant is a small grant. It's only between $2,000 and $5,000,” Maser said. “But it's not necessarily the money that's the most valuable part of these small grants it's the people you meet and people you get to collaborate with and just the opportunities that you get by being associated with National Geographic.” (Learn more about Maser's Kayaking Bolivia project online: http://ngadventure...

Making the rounds at mountain film festivals all over the world is a new movie by Anson Fogel and Cory Richards. In the classic style of adventure storytelling Richards shares his tale of three climbers in his award-winning film 'Cold'. “It's a very raw real look into what's kind of going on inside my head as I did a climb with Simone Moro and Denis Urubko last winter on a peak called Gasherbrum II,” Richards said in an interview. http://joytrip2019.mhwebstaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Cold1.mp3 Ascending one of the highest peaks in the world at temperature 50 degrees below zero as the film opens Richards can't help but ask himself a quintessential question.   “What the f#@%! am I doing here? We have to get down,” he says in the film.   Gasherbrum II stands more than 8,000 feet above sea level.   “For you guys who aren't good at math that's above 26, 240 feet. There's 14 of them in the world. Obviously Everest is the highest,” Richards said. “And 9 of those peaks are in Nepal and Tibet. And 5 are in Pakistan. And for the past 26 years since the Polish advent of winter 8,000 meter climbing all of the peaks in Nepal and Tibet had been climbed in winter, but none of the Pakistani 8,000-meter peaks had been successfully climbed in winter.”   Going after this Pakistani summit through a Himalayan winter in the tradition of the great Polish climbers of the last century Richards and his team Italian climber Simone Moro and Denis Urubko of Kazakhstan attempted to do what no one had done before.   “So when we did it on February 2nd 2011 it was actually a monumental achievement. And it's funny for me to say that because I don't necessarily look at it in that way. That's not something that I think. But that's how it's viewed,” Richards said. “ ‘Cold' is basically a representation of what I think goes on in everybody's head when they're climbing. They think about their family. They think about their life. They think about the doubts they have. And hopefully it's just a real perspective, verses a chest pounding triumphant heroic film. It's not meant to be that.”   At the 2011 Banff Mountain Film Festival ‘Cold' took the grand prize. Climber, photographer and filmmaker Cory Richards also took a few minutes to tell me about his life now making movies on the highest mountains in the world.     JTP: What's really fascinating is that you actually did all the photography yourself with a handheld camera throughout the entire expedition. At high altitude that's a lot to take on in addition to actually doing the climb. What was it like to be able to be responsible for both climbing and surviving on Gasherbraum II and taking pictures?   Cory: You know it's funny a lot of people talk about just that fact, that…”what's it like to film up there?” And for me, coming from a photography background, coming from a film background, I don't actually think of it like that because that's just why I get invited to go on these trips because that's my job. So I think it's an added aspect, but it's something that's sort of hard for me to describe because it's not a tangible thought process any more. This is what I'm doing here. This is what I have to do. So I'm doing it.   JTP: At the same time though you also have to have the presence of mind to set the shot, to be able to while Simone is puking on the summit you're there holding the camera.   Cory: Yeah JTP: You can't be on your knees Cory: Yeah, it's weird! It's so true. You have to go fast sometimes to get ahead. You're trying to be the fly on the wall. But what's interesting is you're also doing the climb. So at the same time Simone's puking, I want to puke. But as a photographer and a filmmaker you realize that that's a important and special moment. You hate to see your friends suffering but you have to realize that that's pivotal. Something's happening in front of you. And because you're thinking about all that you're realizing that your own sensations become muted. You put that on hold.

  Writer and former director of the Banff Mountain Film Festival Bernadette McDonald has new book that offers a unique perspective on high altitude climbing in the Himalaya. As the author of several titles on the subject she's well regarded in the international mountaineering community. And back in 2003 she came up with an idea for this latest project at an adventure film festival in Poland. “And as most ideas do, this one began at a party,” McDonald said.   It was the after party of this festival and McDonald was in the clubhouse of the Katowice Mountain Club. She knew a number of these climbers from her years working at the festival. But in this particular situation she was sort of swamped with them, she said. There were dozens of climbers in this clubhouse and there was a lot of energy in the room.   “But it wasn't just about the festival. It was about a community of the hardest core climbers I had ever seen in my life,” McDonald said. “And the stories that I heard that night, the passion and the depth of their history in the mountains absolutely astonished me. But the other thing that struck me was that it felt like it was the end of an era because a lot of the best of those climbers had already died in the mountains. It felt a bit like an Irish wake. That's the way it struck me and I thought there was a story here. Because the situation in which they grew up, the conditions, the hardships that they endured were so different than anything that I had ever experienced and more different than most people I knew had experienced. And I somehow felt that those two things were linked.”   From the mid1970s through the 1980s Polish climbers dominated the Himalayan mountaineering scene. This generation of adventurers rose up from the horrific occupation by Nazi Germany during World War II only to be subjugated afterward by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. For thousands of young people at that time the mountains were their only escape and many of them ventured far away from Poland into the high of places of Central Asia where they distinguished themselves among the best alpinists in the world. In her book Freedom Climbers Bernadette McDonald tells their story. Music this week by guitarist Alex Chudnovsky and singer songwriter Cheryl B. Englehart   The Joy Trip Project Adventure Media Review is made possible with the support of sponsors Patagonia and The Walton Works