MattBritish Columbia, Canada
British Columbia is Canada’s westernmost province, bordering on the Pacific Ocean to the west, Alberta to the east, Alaska to the northwest, the Yukon and Northwest Territory to the north, and the states of Washington, Idaho, and Montana, in the United States, to the south.
This is a short summary of events. For ongoing coverage visit the Alpinist.
Photo courtesy of mikep on Flickr.
One week ago, on May 11th, a team of five climbers and two guides began their final ascent to summit Denali (also known as Mt. McKinley) in Alaska, which, at 6194m, is the tallest mountain in North America. When they left camp they had about 1000m left to climb and the weather looked “perfect”.
Originally introduced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service to control vegetation, Asian carp have overrun the Mississippi River. With no natural predators the fish are reproducing at a alarming rate and now threaten to enter the Great Lakes. Although there are four species, the most famous is the silver carp, which jump out the water en masse when boats pass, often injuring boaters.
Place
The Sultantate of Oman
Location
In southwest Asia on the Arabian peninsula bordering the United Arab Emirates to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west, Yemen to the southwest, and the Indian Ocean and Gulf of Oman to the east and northeast, respectively.
The folks over at Planet Gear, a discount online outdoors clothing and equipment retailer, were kind enough to donate this awesome book, Lonely Planet’s Guide to Travel Photography, for me to to give away to my readers.
I had just returned to Canada after living in Taiwan for six years and had snowboarded only once in that time. It was Easter Sunday, and our local hill was closed, so my brother and I were hiking up it to session the snowboard park. A girl was snowboarding down the hill. The sun was shining and the snow was soft. She had a big smile on her face. She carved in a long arc on her heel edge and then slid to a stop ten feet away, and plopped down on her butt in the snow.
Paul Nicklen is a wildlife biologist turned nature photographer. In this talk Nicklen discusses his work as a photographer and problem of melting polar caps with a passion and sadness that cannot be faked. He receives a standing ovation for this heartfelt presentation and, in my opinion, is a likely contender for TED.com talk of the year. If you haven’t seen it yet, you must watch it now!