In Search of Solitude

In this month's Backpacker Mark Jenkins looks for the most remote spot in the lower 48. While I think his journey is very noble, I think his definition of remoteness is a little skewed. I don't think that solitude can be found with a satellite image and a GPS. 3.3 million people visit Yellowstone a year, and while most of those people barely ever leave the safety of the asphalt, it's almost impossible to get away from everyone completely. Shouldn't the overall goal of finding the most remote spot be to get as far away from every other living breathing human being on the planet. The fact that Mr. Jenkins had to pause on his journey to allow other people to pass on the same trail multiple times should be a clear indication that he had not found the most remote spot in the lower 48. Just being on a trail should be another clue. Within two hours I can be standing where there hasn't been another human being for at least ten years, and it's on public land, not a trail in sight. I'm sure it's within a few miles of an overgrown logging road that probably showed up on Mr. Jenkins's satellite, leading him to believe that there had been a disturbance to the natural order of everything within a 25 mile radius.
I think it's a pretty safe assumption that the most remote place is not within a national park or monument. While these places are truly magnificent they have had more human traffic than Paris Hilton's penthouse on New Years Eve. I do commend him on the effort and the trip sounds amazing, I'm sure he will have a lifetime's worth of stories and some of the wildlife he saw is something few people will get to witness. I guess I just have a different definition of solitude. When I go camping or leave the confines of civilization for any amount of time, I don't want to see even the slightest evidence of humanity let alone another member of our society.
My challenge to everyone reading this is to go out and find your own solace in solitude. Go somewhere that is so quiet you can hear the wind blow on a perfectly still day. Don't do it because I told you to, don't even do it for yourself, do it for the future generations that may not have an opportunity like we have then make a resolution to do some volunteer work next year to help ensure they do. If you do donate money to an organization make sure you know what they do, not just in the public light but what they stand for. We have a few organizations locally that think they are helping but nobody sees what they do where nobody is paying attention. Understand how nature works first then try to help, not the other way around.


Go where you can see all the stars and the Milky Way without street lights washing them out.

Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2008

Outdoor Retailer this year was great (not that we have anything to compare it to). We met a lot of great people, got to see a lot of great products and made some very important contacts within the industry. We could have been down there an entire week and never ran out of people to talk to or items to look at and try. Our meeting with Zach from Backpacker went very well and we were both impressed with how knowledgeable and willing to help they were. Look for our ad in their magazine starting in November.





We spent a lot of time in the Energy Solutions Arena where all the new exhibitors were placed. The traffic was a little slower than the exhibitors would have liked but it was a welcome relaxing environment after spending a few hours making our way around the Salt Palace. Everyone was very friendly and we found some great new products that are just emerging onto the market. Since we were talking directly to the founders and inventors for most of the companies they were all very excited and informative when it came to describing their product to us. We walked away from the Arena with a great sense of accomplishment and some of that enthusiasm put a spring back in our step that our early morning flight had drained from us.





We think that BivWak should have a Unimog. Maybe someday.





Saturday was filled with all sorts of events and exhibitions of every kind. We watched the Five Ten team put on a Slackline show for quite a while. They were very impressive and drew a very large crowd.





Sometimes trying out a product is both relaxing and rewarding at the same time. I think I could have spent the rest of the day in this hammock.

We would like to thank everyone that we talked to for spending some time with us. We took a lot of information from the show and hopefully we passed some along at the same time. Thanks for a great show, we can't wait until the next one.

Outdoor Retailer Show!

After waking up at 3am, flying out at 5:15 and landing at 10:30 we spent the entire day at the Outdoor Retailer show in Salt Lake City. Exhausting, but we have met a great group of people so far. We will have pictures up as soon as we get back and recover a little. We can't wait for tomorrow and possibly some networking tonight in downtown SLC. Keep up in real time with us on Twitter at Twitter.com/BivWak.

Where Once There Was Black...

In August 2006 the Shake Table Fire burned 14,500 acres in the forests of Eastern Oregon. I just happened to be there and got the opportunity to photograph the fire making it's biggest run.





Early in July I had the chance to go back to the burn and witness just how well it was growing back. I've seen quite a few burns a year or two after and they almost always look good. The Shake Table Fire is amazing. The amount of wildflowers,knee high grass and feed is abundant throughout the entire burn. It was quite amazing to see the contrast of colors with all the burnt trees as a back drop.





Don't get me wrong, the fire did get very hot and destroyed quite a few trees (a lot are actually still able to be harvested and will be soon) but the undergrowth and fallen timber in this area is out of control and when a fire does start it burns very hot and quick. This area is now very clean and supports large fields of feed and there's still lots of habitat for all the wildlife, big and small. I'm not suggesting that everyone throw their torches into the forest to help clean it up but maybe it's not the evil that everyone has been selling us since elementary school.