Linda and David Mullally, authors of “Best Hikes with Dogs: Central California,” will sign books and give a slide show at the REI in Mountain View, REI Mountain View, 2450 Charleston Road, at 7 p.m. Wednesday, July 23. Note: Backpacking…
Hiking
High-altitude hiking
by tom • July 2, 2008 • 6 Comments
Those of you not chained to the local trails by a Newspaper column about nearby hikes may actually experience the thrill of sacrificing 50 percent of your lung capacity because the view’s so much better up there in the Real…
Media (books, DVDs, etc)
Dan White’s backcountry don’ts
by tom • July 2, 2008 • 5 Comments
I keep blogging about Dan White, hoping some of his writing skills will rub off, but anyway, Mr. Cactus Eater shows some promise as an outdoor blogger with a list of things not to do on a backpacking trip. Highlights:…
Hiking
State of the blog update
by tom • July 1, 2008 • 8 Comments
The first half of ’08 is over, so what the heck, let’s look at how things are going around here. I shifted to Bay Area coverage around this time last year and installed a Google Analytics counter to measure our…
Hiking, Media (books, DVDs, etc)
Book review: “The Cactus Eaters”
by tom • June 30, 2008 • 7 Comments
I took a day off from hiking yesterday to read Dan White’s “The Cactus Eaters: How I Lost My Mind — and Almost Found Myself — on the Pacific Crest Trail.” Oddly enough, my summation before reading the first sentence…
Media (books, DVDs, etc)
Meet Dan White, Cactus Eater
by tom • June 27, 2008 • 3 Comments
Dan, who shares the unfortunate name of a notorious San Francisco double-murderer, has a new book out about his long-ago adventure up the Pacific Crest Trail. It’s called “The Cactus Eaters,” alluding to the time when, in an extreme expression…
Gear
MSR Reactor camp stove reviews: raves mostly
by tom • June 26, 2008 • 1 Comment
For fun this morning I went looking for reviews of the MSR Reactor backpacking stove, Mountain Safety Research’s response to getting its butt kicked, innovation-wise, by those JetBoil upstarts. GoBlog touted its arrival in October 2006, Backpacker magazine made it…
Hiking
Five-day Bay Area Ridge Trail hike
by tom • June 25, 2008 • 4 Comments
Reservations apparently are still available for this nifty fund-raiser for the Bay Area Ridge Trail for 45 miles over five days from Castro Valley to Martinez — somebody else will haul all your camping gear and food. It’s $225 (or…
Wildlife
Bay Nature’s site relaunch
by tom • June 25, 2008 • 5 Comments
Bay Nature magazine, of my favorite publications on the planet, has revamped its Web site with a bunch of cool features like events calendars and maps of Bay Area attractions. Also has videos like this one: They’ve also put all…