What makes a good season of television?

For superfans of the outdoor survival series Alone鈥攜es, I count myself in this clique鈥攖he recipe is straightforward, but admittedly long. We want drama, danger, some pain and suffering, ingenuity and craftiness, and plenty of action.

And if one of the survivalists kills a moose, musk ox, or some other large animal, that’s pretty cool, too. Sounds easy enough, right?

The opening episode of Alone’s season 12, which aired Thursday night on The History Channel, checked nearly every square on my proverbial Alone bingo card. Someone tapped out. Potentially dangerous animals menaced the survivalists. There was pants pooping! And yeah, a contestant even hunted and killed a large critter.

If the rest of the season is anything like episode 1, we are in for a treat.

A Desert With Resources Galore

Spoilers ahead! For some of us, survival reality TV is America’s fifth professional sport, and Alone is like the Olympics, Super Bowl, and Stanley Cup Playoffs rolled into one. A few weeks ago we learned that season 12 of Alone would be unlike previous ones due to its location: South Africa’s Great Karoo desert.听Throughout the 11 previous seasons,听Alone has sent survivalists to the Arctic Circle, Vancouver Island, Mongolia, and even Patagonia. But never has it staged a season in a hot and dry environment.

I assumed the hunt for fresh water would define the season. Indeed, the opening episode boasts the tagline听The Land of Great Thirst.听

That still may be true, but the opening episode delivered the first curveball of this season: contestants (and viewers) discovered that fresh water is in abundance. All of the survivalists have been placed along the banks of a massive lake somewhere in the Great Karoo.

But just how potable is the water in this lake? This question unfortunately comes up later in the episode.

Like all season debuts, episode 1 introduced us to the full cast in brief snippets听before focusing on a handful of survivalists for their first few days in the wild.

We spent meaningful time with Will, an exotic animal rancher from Texas; Pablo, a video editor from Florida; Kelsey, a horse trainer from Montana; Jit, an outdoor educator from New Zealand; and Katie, a survival skills instructor from Australia.

All five got to work building their temporary shelters, boiling water to drink, and then scouting the area for food. This final task shed light on the potential action we may see later in the season. It turns out the Great Karoo is teeming with big game animals that could feed a person for weeks: warthogs, kudu, springbok antelope, baboons, and yes, even water buffalo.

My heart started hammering when Will climbed onto a rocky bluff to spy on a troop of baboons and came within feet of a massive kudu. Seventeen years ago I visited South Africa and ate a few kudu steaks during my trip, and the meat, while somewhat gamey, was tender and juicy.

As it turns out, a delicious animal was killed on episode 1, but it wasn’t a Kudu. While patrolling her territory on her second day in the field, Kelsey crept up on a warthog. She then fired two direct shots into Pumbaa, even after admitting to being a novice with a recurve bow. Kudos to Kelsey for quickly realizing that it would not be feasible to walk the half-mile back to camp with the 100-pound carcass. After quartering the animal and dragging its听meat back to camp, she enjoyed a dinner of crispy back bacon.

The kill rocketed Kelsey way up in my mental ranking of the ten contestants. As an Alone completist, I’m accustomed to meeting both strong and weak participants during each season’s opening episode, and I always assess听each person’s strengths by the backstories we see.

Of the five we met in episode 1, Kelsey obviously gained a huge advantage with the kill. That said, I was most impressed by Katie, who teaches survival skills in the arid Australian bush. In one scene Katie smelled a nearby warthog before she could even see it, and immediately recognized the herd’s game trail. I expect to see her bring down one of the hearty pigs at some point in the season.

I also had high hopes for Jit, an Outward Bound instructor from New Zealand. But alas, it was not to be. On his third day, Jit developed a nasty stomach bug and suffered some unfortunate and messy diarrhea, soiling his fancy hiking slacks. No, I did not have “pants pooping”听on my Alone bingo card, but hey, the moment absolutely ratcheted up the drama. Moments later, we saw Jit doubled over in agony, grabbing his abdomen. He eventually called for medical help, becoming the first contestant to drop out.

What was to blame for Jit’s angry bowels? There are only two possible culprits: the prickly pear cactus he barbecued and ate, and the nasty, film-covered water from the lake that he boiled and then drank.

My guess is that the water, while abundant, is filled with pathogens. And while season 12 of Alone may not become a fight against thirst, it may become one against water-born illness.

What Is 鈥楧rop Shock?鈥�

Over the last few听Alone seasons, the opening episodes have mentioned the term “drop shock,” which refers to the feelings some contestants have once the helicopters depart, leaving them alone in the wilderness. In the past, contestants have admitted to experiencing a wide range of emotions in this particularly vulnerable moment: overwhelmed, nervous, paralyzed, and yeah, even terrified.

During my reporting for this season, I phoned several past participants, and nobody copped to having felt true drop shock the moment they were left alone. But they had other perspective to share on the sensation.

“Being dropped off in the woods, or going on on a solo adventure鈥擨 do that stuff all the time,” Clay Hayes, the winner of season 8, told me. “For me it just felt like I was on another backcountry hunt.”

“I didn’t understand the folks who felt that way鈥擨 was excited to finally be out there,” Jessie Krebs, a participant from season 9, told me. “I love getting back into the wilderness.”

In his , season 9 participant Dr. Teimojin Tan said day hikers who realize they are lost in the backcountry suffer a feeling akin to drop shock, and the swirling emotions often cause them to become more lost. “One of the best advice is to take a knee. You need to take a break, take a breath in, and figure things out,” he said.

Krebs, who lives outside of Pagosa Springs, Colorado, said she often saw this reaction during her time working for wilderness therapy programs. People who were not accustomed to backcountry living, she said, sometimes became paralyzed by anxiety the moment they were left in a wilderness setting.

“They get this wide-eyed look. Everything has changed, and they are so thrown out of their element that they can’t function, like even go to the bathroom or sleep,” she said. “And then, after a few weeks, everything is fine. They’ve gotten accustomed to the new environment and everything is fine.”

The trouble with experiencing paralysis like this on听Alone is that the opening few hours in the wilderness are so important. A survivalist must locate a suitable spot for a temporary shelter and scout for potable water. They must also set up their cameras and begin filming themselves.

Hayes, an experienced bowhunter, said he did feel a series of other emotions once he was dropped off on the banks of Chilko Lake, Canada, for his season. Hayes wasn’t a fan of听Alone prior to applying to be on the show, but once he was accepted, he went back and binge-watched many of the seasons. Suddenly, once the chopper left him beside the lake, he found himself in a somewhat familiar position.

“When I was finally dropped off, I realized that now I’m the guy living the experience that I had been watching on the show,” he said. “It was extremely surreal.”

The post It鈥檚 the First Episode of 鈥楢lone鈥� and Survivalists Are Already Killing Big Game appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

The twang of a recurve bow听echoes from the television speakers, and on screen, a man wearing camouflage ducks behind a clump of fir trees.

“Holy cow, I nailed it,” a voice whispers. “My heart is pumping so fast right now.”

The scene marks the turning point of season 6 of the survival reality show Alone, and first aired on June 21, 2019 on the History Channel.听 It captures the moment when Jordan Jonas, a 35-year-old hunting guide from Idaho, shot and killed a bull moose鈥攐ne he’d spent several weeks stalking across the tundra in northern Canada. Securing 500 pounds of moose meat represented a massive advantage in Alone’s survivalist competition. Every season, the show sends ten survivalists to live in the woods for as long as they can, subsisting off of whatever food they can forage or kill. The final contestant to tap out takes home a $500,000 prize.

As the rest of the season unfolded after Jonas’s monumental kill, the bounty allowed him to thrive amid the frozen arctic. He eventually lasted 77 days and won the grand prize.

“When I finally got the moose, it was pure joy,” Jonas recently told 国产吃瓜黑料. “I couldn’t buy a Lamborghini and be that happy.”

Jonas wasn’t the only person to celebrate鈥擜濒辞苍别’蝉 producers and staff recognized the moose kill as a major milestone in the show’s history. For five seasons, Alone survivalists had tried, but failed, to kill a big game animal like a deer or moose.

Six years after Jonas’ hunt aired on television, the moment has come to represent a turning point for the series. Alone’s sixth season brought millions of new viewers to the show during the depths of the pandemic. In subsequent seasons, tens of thousands of would-be survivalists applied to participate. The show听even spun off satellite survival series like Alone: Australia, Alone: Frozen,听补苍诲听Alone: The Beast.听

“That moment totally changed what we were seeing with the show,” says Quinn Fegan, Alone‘s longtime casting director. “So much more story was created by taking down a big game animal. The show gained credibility with the hunting community, and afterward we were able to access people with truly impressive big game skills.”

A Pandemic Darling

础濒辞苍别听returns for its 12th season on Thursday, June 12, and this year producers will send contestants to South Africa’s Karoo desert 国产吃瓜黑料 will publish episode recaps throughout the season. Over the last decade, the show has become one of the most successful survival reality series in history. New York Magazine,听its ninth season attracted 20 million viewers.

It’s hard to remember that when听Alone debuted in August, 2015, it was just the latest in a series of similar shows to hit the airwaves, like Naked and Afraid,听Life Below Zero,听补苍诲听Bear Grylls: Survive.听

What separated Alone from its peers was a confluence of timing and serendipity. During the early months of the COVID pandemic, the show’s sixth season was picked up by streaming giant Netflix.听As millions of Americans experienced the boredom and loneliness caused by social distancing rules, they recognized relatable themes in the show.

Over the course of a few months, Alone became media darling, garnering coverage in and , well as public endorsements from celebrities.

“All of a sudden Tom Hanks is talking about us in interviews,” Ryan Pender, the show’s executive producer, told 国产吃瓜黑料 in 2022. “Up until that point we were that show that flew under the radar.”

It didn’t hurt that season 6 was far more dramatic and exciting than past editions. Survivalists caught massive fish out of Canada’s Great Slave Lake. They weathered sub-zero temperatures and freezing听wind. And Jonas’ thrilling moose hunt provided a heart-pounding crescendo.

Alone’s rules and format鈥攖en survivalists each choose ten survival tools and then film themselves living in a solitary state in the woods鈥攁lso set it apart from its peers. So did the unmistakable moments of cin茅ma v茅rit茅 that seemed to happen with regularity.

Cameras captured participants breaking down, sharing moments of intense reflection, and revealing secrets about themselves.

“You have a tremendous amount of time to think鈥攂eing out there lets you look at your own life, one step removed,” says Clay Hayes, the winner of Season 11. “You think about what type of person you are, what type of relationships you have. You get to examine these things like nobody gets to do in modern life.”

No Big Game After Five Seasons

Alone’s 2015 debut was somewhat rocky. Producers dropped the ten survivalists in a deserted stretch of Vancouver Island, dense with woods and mired in rain. Two dropped out within the first 24 hours. By the end of the first week, just four participants remained.

“We were concerned,” Pender said. “A lot of money was spent on this, and the idea was not yet proven. It’s not that the concept wasn’t solid, it’s just that not all of the participants knew what they were walking into.”

During the early seasons, participants caught fish, trapped rabbits and mice, and harvested mushrooms and other edible plants. Some chose a bow and arrow as one of their ten survival tools, and others boldly proclaimed their intentions to hunt deer, bear, or other large creatures.

But nobody ever did. And at some point, every season turned into a battle of starvation. Even the champions predominantly lived hand-to-mouth.

Season 1 champion Alan Kay ate small shellfish called limpets. Brothers Jim and Ted Baird won the fourth season鈥攖hat year participants competed in teams of two鈥攂y squishing tiny rock fish. The next season, winner Sam Larson claimed the crown simply by resting and burning body fat.

These strategies, while successful, didn’t always make for dynamic television.

“It just seemed like they weren’t the greatest at finding people who could really survive out there,” Jonas says. “You never got the sense that anyone was able to be truly sustainable.”

Jonas told听翱耻迟蝉颈诲别听that he had mixed feelings about Alone when a friend showed him seasons one and two back in 2016.

“Watching the guys freak out about bears was the reason I applied to do the show,” Jonas said.

How Jordan Jonas Bagged a Moose

A professional hunting wilderness guide, Jonas applied for听Alone after returning from a ten-year span in Siberia. He had lived alongside a native nomadic tribe, the Evenki, and learned their ancestral skills for living in the subarctic.

Jonas was too late to participate in Alone’s season 3, and then seasons 4 and 5 went by without any response from the casting department. Then, almost three years after he applied, Jonas received a call from producers asking if he’d be interested in season 6 “I was like ‘I can’t say no, the doors are opening up,'” he said.

At a pre-show boot camp for would-be participants, Jonas said he was surprised to see few people with big-game hunting experience. Jonas said the other participants were far better than him at other wilderness skills, like constructing animal traps. But he wondered if those skills would keep him alive.

“I was struck that people hadn’t really done a lot of fishing and hunting, at least as much as I would have expected,” Jonas said. “Living with the Evenki, you see what skills you really need for living in the woods.”

The most important element, in Jonas’ mind, was killing a large animal that could keep him fed for weeks or months.

That was his strategy from the moment he was selected. Given Jonas’ wiry, thin frame, he assumed he’d be unable to gain enough fat to out-starve the others.

“My plan was to catch a bunch of fish, make a big stinky fish pile in the woods, and then hunt a bear that showed up to eat the fish,” Jonas said. “But right away I saw signs of moose in my area.”

Elements of Jonas’ moose hunt, which spanned 20 days, are sprinkled throughout the season’s opening five episodes. He spotted moose tracks and then located the trail the animal’s game trail. He strung up a trip wire made from tin cans to alert him when the moose was in the area, and even built a series of corridors with downed trees to steer the moose toward a clearing suitable for the kill. The entire process was new for the show.

“I wasn’t comparing myself to what people had done on prior seasons,” Jonas said. “I was comparing myself to what was possible given my own personal experiences. Had I ever been on a hunt for two months and never even had an encounter with an animal? No.”

But Jonas’ struggle didn’t end once the moose was dead. He had to butcher the animal, smoke the meat, and then store it somewhere away from predators. A wolverine found the butchered meat and stole some of it鈥擩onas had to kill the animal with a hatchet.

The entire ordeal added elements of drama that previous seasons lacked. Even as Jonas and the season’s runner up, Woniya Thibeault, kept fighting听through the barren winter, the storyline kept viewers engaged.

“Jordan taking down the moose and watching his interaction with the wolverine was mind-blowing,” Pender said. “Watching him do things that people had never seen on Alone was absolutely wild.”

Reaching a New Community

Leftfield Entertainment, the production company behind听Alone,听has a website where fans can apply to be on the show. In the early seasons, the website regularly accepted 10,000 or so applications each year. By 2007, that had swelled to 25,000 annually.

Fegan, who has been with听Alone since season four, told听国产吃瓜黑料 that 70,000 people applied for season 12. Thanks to听the increase in applications,听Alone‘s casting department has a deeper field of seasoned survivalists to choose from compared to years ago. The deeper field has made the show a better watch.

“Back in season 4, even听if you were using a bow for the first time you might still make it on the show,”听Fegan said. “That’s not the case anymore.”

Ever since Jonas’ takedown, hunting big game has become a huge priority among applicants. Since season 6, even survivalists without a hardcore hunting background made sure to become skilled at bowhunting before shipping out. Jessie Krebs, a participant on season 8, said she went to an archery gym for several weeks before departing for the show.

“There was only so much I could do in a few months, but my right arm got to be pretty buff,” Krebs told听国产吃瓜黑料.听

In some regard, Jonas’ successful moose hunt was akin to breaking an imaginary barrier, like the four-minute mile: once that threshold was broken, it opened the door for others to repeat the feat.听In subsequent seasons, additional participants brought down big game animals. Roland Welker, the winner of season 7, killed a musk ox and lived for several months off of the meat. During season 8, Clay Hayes, a professional bowhunter, shot a deer. Hayes also won.

Still, stalking a deer or musk ox represents a massive gamble. Time spent traversing the land in search of animals takes a survivalist’s attention away from fishing or foraging. It requires massive amounts of energy. When Hayes finally brought down the deer, he hadn’t eaten fish in ten days and was beginning to experience symptoms of starvation.

“You have this deadline looming over your head caused by food,” Hayes said. “You can see yourself getting skinny, and you know your time is coming to an end. It’s really stressful. When I walked up on the deer laying in the grass, the weight of the world just evaporated.”

And killing an animal no longer guarantees victory, either. Timber Cleghorn, a 35-year-old survivalist from Indiana, stalked and killed a moose during season 11.听Cleghorn said the moose kill actually increased his anxiety as the season went along.

“Having the moose put a ton of pressure on me, because in my mind it meant I had to stay and win,” Cleghorn told 国产吃瓜黑料.听“If I don’t win and I have this moose meat, it will look terrible. I didn’t like that the choice was taken away from me, and I struggled with that late into the show.”

Cleghorn eventually tapped out after 75 days.

But enough would-be听Alone contestants were inspired by Jonas’ successful hunt that many still regard him as a role model. In the years after his success, Jonas said prospective Alone participants reached out to him to ask advice on how to win.

“Sure, the show can be hacked by getting chubby and hanging out in your shelter,” Jonas said. “But if you’re actually trying to live in the woods, I tell people to be active, go hunt, and be the master of your own destiny.”

Articles editor Frederick Dreier will be covering season 12 of听Alone with weekly recaps. In 2022 he wrote about the show’s ninth season, which was held in Labrador, Canada.听

The post 鈥楢lone鈥� Was Forever Changed by a Moose Hunt in the Canadian Backcountry appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Sailors have been known for telling tall tales. So when Terry Kennedy, a now 83-year-old sailor, would talk about swimming with his friend off Mexico鈥檚 remote Revillagigedo Islands in the late 1980s, it鈥檚 understandable why some questioned if it was all true. The charismatic friend he was always going on about was, after all, a 22-foot giant manta ray.

This extraordinary bond between man and manta is the focus behind the new film , premiering at Tribeca Film Festival on June 8th, World Oceans Day. If The Octopus Teacher could change the way the world sees cephalopods, this film will surely move you to care more deeply about mantas. The documentary follows Kennedy on a final expedition, a 鈥渄ying wish,鈥� to swim with his friend Willy one last time.

An ex-Hells Angel and Vietnam vet sailing Baja鈥檚 Sea of Cortez on a boat named Erotica in the 80s, Kennedy is a local legend with no shortage of stories. But the one that forever changed his life鈥攁nd the lives of the Pacific manta rays in these Mexican waters鈥攚as how he became friends with 鈥淲illy Wow.鈥�

It all began one morning in 1988, when Kennedy was on his sailboat off San Benedicto, a tiny uninhabited volcanic island in the Revillagigedo Islands chain, 210 miles south of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

鈥淎ll of a sudden, there’s a big old bang on the side of the boat. The boat actually moves about a foot in one direction. I thought we got hit by another boat, but looking around we were the only ones in the [area],鈥� Kennedy shared with 国产吃瓜黑料.

鈥淚 look over the side and here’s this giant manta ray half the length of the boat. And the boat’s 46 feet long. Well, I can’t pass this up,鈥� he recalled. An expert diver who鈥檚 clocked more than 14,000 dives, Kennedy has taken a lot of chances in his life. At this point, he had only seen a massive ray in the distance; he had never been in the water with one before. Not wasting a moment, Kennedy grabbed his tank and his fins, and jumped over the side. But once in the water, saw the ray was gone.

鈥淗e just vanished. As I looked down to make sure I had my fins on, there he was right below me, about four feet down. Nothing but massive black coming up right underneath me. There’s nothing I could do鈥ut hang on.鈥�

And off they went. Kennedy says he hung on, gently, to the back of this gigantic manta ray while it took him for a ride. 鈥淎fter about 15- 20 minutes, he brought me right back to the boat. And then he did the same thing the very next morning.鈥�

So began a nearly 20-year-long friendship between Kennedy and Willy, his name for his new friend (鈥淲illy Wow鈥� being his full name). 鈥淲henever he’s feeding on the south end of the island, he recognizes the bottom of the boat,鈥� Kennedy believes. With a gentle slap of his wing on the hull of the boat, Willy signals him to come take another dive.

An Unlikely Conservationist

Some of you reading this are likely thinking no one should be touching鈥攁nd especially riding鈥� a . But these encounters happened over 37 years ago, when little was known about the lives of manta rays, even by marine biologists.

Since no one believed Kennedy鈥檚 encounters of riding a magical manta, he started to film them. From then on, when he talked about Willy, he’d be able to prove that these incredible moments happened by pictures and video. It was also Kennedy鈥檚 quick camera skills that documented what would become a catalyst to protect these same mantas.

On February 14, 1994, fishermen aboard two Mexican boats moved into the waters around San Benedicto Island with nets, baited hooks and harpoons seeking to catch and kill anything they could鈥攊ncluding Kennedy鈥檚 friends, two other giant manta rays he swam with other than Willy. Mexican law prohibited commercial fishermen from fishing within two miles of Revillagigedo Islands; these fishermen were only 200 yards from shore.

As eyewitnesses, Kennedy and his then partner, Joyce Clinton, were horrified yet managed to document on video and camera what later would be called . What they captured on camera attracted international news, and the swift attention of the Mexican president to intervene and soon after declare the Revillagigedo Islands a Biosphere Reserve, which increased the no-take zone to 12 miles around each island.

In 2016, UNESCO declared the islands a World Heritage Site, and in 2017,听 it become the largest marine protected area in North America. These islands are now known as the 鈥�,鈥� and home to one the largest aggregations of manta rays, and sharks, in the world.

The Last Chance to Find Willy

Kennedy鈥檚 incredible encounters with manta rays defied everything that was known about ocean life at the time, and changed irrevocably our understanding of mantas. After , founder and director of the and one of the leading authorities on the species, saw the sailor鈥檚 footage, he secured funding for one of the first major manta ray research projects. This work led to an entire field of manta research that tracks over a thousand individual mantas at these islands. The affectionate names Kennedy gave to his manta friends in addition to Willy鈥擱osy, Chevy, Tippy鈥攕cientists still use today.

Kennedy鈥檚 bond with Willy goes beyond research, suggests The Last Dive director Cody Sheehy: 鈥淲illy wasn鈥檛 just tolerating Terry鈥攈e was engaging with him, leading him through underwater canyons, protecting him from sharks, or just playing.鈥�

Terry Kennedy and his wife Dawn, watch the sunrise before the last dive. (Photo: Chance Falkner)

For nearly two decades, Willy always found Kennedy, who would then climb onto his back and the two would communicate on a level no one else could understand. Willy could read his mind, Kennedy believes鈥攚hat Dr Rubin says 鈥渋sn鈥檛 an unreasonable thought.鈥� Rubin鈥檚 research suggests that manta rays can identify us by the unique signature of our bioelectric field.

It was another chance encounter that brought Kennedy鈥檚 friendship with Willy to the big screen. Sheehy, a sailor as well, met Kennedy while he was anchored off Loreto, a coastal town on Baja California Sur, nine years ago. One evening over sundowners, Kennedy鈥檚 stories started to flow. 鈥淚t became clear that this man wasn鈥檛 just another cruiser鈥攈e had lived a life most people couldn鈥檛 even dream of,鈥� states the filmmaker.

Sheehy, admittedly, was also a bit skeptical at first of Kennedy鈥檚 stories about Willy鈥攗ntil he saw the footage. 鈥淲hen I found out about the massacre, and the role that Terry played in bringing attention to it, especially at the level of the Mexican president and the protections that came from it, that’s when I realized this is a great human story, a story of redemption.鈥�

鈥淭he reason why the mantas are still there is because of [Terry]. It just shows what one person can do,鈥� says the director. 鈥淭hink of what else people will be inspired to do [after watching the film].鈥�

As Kennedy aged, his life moved to land. Now in his 80s trips to the islands are more challenging, and maintaining a boat that can make the journey is expensive and tiring. So Sheehy saw a way he could take Kennedy back home to see his long lost friend. The last recorded Willy sighting was in 2012, and giant manta rays have been reported to . So it鈥檚 not unreasonable to think Willy could still be around. Kennedy hasn鈥檛 stopped thinking about Willy in all these years; he worries his old friend thinks he forgot about him.

Kennedy had a troubled past, but none of that mattered under the surface. He not only found redemption in the ocean, but healing. Blue therapy is a growing body of research that shows time in or near water reduces stress, anxiety, and symptoms of PTSD. Scuba diving, in particular, has proved transformative .

How to Swim With Mantas鈥擡thically

While Kennedy was the first known person to ride a manta, it鈥檚 now considered harmful and extremely discouraged. But the close connection Kennedy made with Willy and all the footage he captured proved there is so much we don鈥檛 know about manta rays and ocean life in general. The sailor鈥檚 unusual bond ultimately became the catalyst for protecting manta rays and all life around Revillagigedo Islands.

What are the dangers today for the mantas around these islands? And is there still an ethical way to swim with them?

Today, the biggest threats to mantas are overtourism and boat strikes, both around the islands and on their migratory travels. 鈥淎s Revilla is a remote location, technically protected by both a National Park and the World Heritage Site, it’s largely a safe space for these animals,鈥� says Karey Kumli, project manager at Pacific Manta Research Group. 鈥淗owever, there is the occasional illegal fishing, primarily at night; we know this as the liveaboards keep their AIS scanner on and watch for lights.鈥�

Yet tourism plays a powerful role in protecting the manta rays. 鈥淚t wasn’t until all the tourist boats came [to Revillagigedo Islands] that the fishing really was enforced. So it’s crucial that there’s tourists there,鈥� says Sheehy. 鈥淭he money and the jobs brought to those islands show the Mexican government could justify their position on keeping it in the national park and [staving off] fishing,鈥� he adds.

Now the issue is how to keep tourism here ethical and responsible. Mantas like to come to the surface, but getting hit by boats is one of the biggest threats to them right now.

“The tourism operators are really good about understanding that too many people in the water, and touching and riding mantas, is not going to be good for mantas,” notes Sheehy. “The film, and our team really, is behind the idea of sustainable diving with the mantas.鈥�

In the 10 days they were filming the documentary around the islands, a manta got hit by another boat, adds Sheehy. 鈥淚f [mantas] get hit too many times, they’re not going to want to be around tourists, right? And then all those diving experiences that the operators are getting money from will disappear, because the mantas won’t come anymore.鈥�

Kennedy鈥檚 final chance to find his long lost friend is no fool鈥檚 errand. Individual mantas have been identified through photo-ID for up to 33 years鈥攖he worldwide age record for the oceanic (giant) mantas. When they look back at photo sets taken 10-40 years ago, ninety-five percent of those animals have made at least a second appearance, shares Kumli.

If you think you spotted Willy or any other manta ray, you can submit photos to the 鈥淲hen divers submit manta images from Revilla to us, we do a quick scan for re-sighted animals. We’d recognize Willy in a heartbeat,鈥� adds Kumli. Willy has four signature black dots in the shape of a diamond on his right shoulder.

Will Kennedy find Willy? You’ll have to watch the film to find out. While their encounters changed so much of what we know about mantas, so many mysteries remain. Why did Willy pick him to be his friend? What is certain is that an unlikely conservationist became a hero for the ocean鈥攔eminding us of how much we have yet to discover鈥攁nd that anything is possible. But bring a camera if you want anyone to believe you.

_________________________________________________________

Kathleen Rellihan is the Travel and Culture Senior Editor at 国产吃瓜黑料 who swam with mobula rays (Willy’s smaller cousins) in Baja California Sur, Mexico. Seeing a manta ray while scuba diving Australia’s Great Barrier Reef was a lifelong dream. Now another one is spotting Willy herself.听

The post 鈥楾he Last Dive鈥� Follows a Diver鈥檚 20-Year-Long Friendship with a Giant Manta Ray appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

At first, the breeze felt wonderful鈥攁 blast of chilly air to dull the afternoon heat.

It was Sunday, June 1, and I was standing at the entrance to Denver’s Civic Center Park, welcoming guests to the, clad in my sweat-stained volunteer t-shirt. In front of me, 15,000 or so guests swarmed the park. Some crowded the main stage to see indie folk singer Hazlett. Others rushed to the Denver Art Museum to catch former National Park Service director Chuck Sams III speak about the ongoing public lands battle. Others still mingled around booths for The North Face and REI.

People fanned themselves to cool off, others sat under trees or tents. And when the light wind began to blow, everyone felt a momentary respite from the baking sunshine.

And then the wind got much stronger.

I looked to the west. Dark clouds from over Colorado’s Front Range were speeding toward Denver, a whirling mass of grey and green. It looked like the scene in Independence Day is about to arrive.

Anyone who has lived in Colorado for more than a few years knows this scene鈥攊t’s the precursor to the thunderstorms that roll across our state almost every afternoon in June through August. The storms blow in like hurricanes, drop inches of water, light up the sky with bolts of electricity, and then vanish, usually within an hour.

You don’t want to be on the side of a fourteener when one arrives. But if you’re out camping, you can duck inside your tent, read a chapter of your book, and then emerge to pristine conditions. These storms are why Coloradans overuse the cliche Don’t like the weather? Just wait 5 minutes.听

But what happens when a thunderstorm descends on 15,000 concertgoers in a city park? As it turns out, something kind of magical.

Big Crowds, Bigger Ideas

Last year we debuted the 国产吃瓜黑料 Festival and Summit in downtown Denver, and the event鈥攁 blend of music, films, celebrity speakers, outdoor films, and a celebration of outdoor recreation culture鈥攕urpassed our wildest expectations. The 国产吃瓜黑料 Summit attracted a smattering of industry leaders and brands. About 18,000 people attended that inaugural festival over the two days. They danced to up-and-coming acts like Say She She, queued up to meet celebrity speakers like Diana Nyad and Shaun White, and packed an auditorium to check out the lineup of outdoor films.

For 2025 our goal was to make the weekend even bigger, and for the most part, we succeeded, drawing nearly 35,000 people to Denver’s Civic Center Park. Diana Nyad came back, alongside magician David Blaine, climber Alex Honnold, surfer John John Florence, and two former National Park Service directors (among others).

We added听 国产吃瓜黑料 Ignite, a Shark Tank-like pitch competition for outdoor innovators (Kyle Siegel of Raide Research Packs won the $100,000 grand prize). And at the 国产吃瓜黑料 Summit, attendees got to meet Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings and hear Hipcamp founder Alyssa Ravasio talk about launching a start-up.

I attended all four days, and based on my own highly unscientific survey of vibes and vibes alone, I’d say that the marks we earned were positive.

As I wrote last summer, this event represents an experiment for those of us who work for 国产吃瓜黑料’s parent company, 国产吃瓜黑料 Inc. For two days, editors, advertising reps, marketing types, and other employees cosplay as event producers, working alongside a professional event production company, Groundswell, which manages the event. We put down our keyboards and spreadsheets and pick up walkie talkies and nylon zip ties. Instead of selling ads or writing stories, we do crowd management.

So you can understand my concern when I saw the storm clouds barreling down on the park. I saw one lightning flash, then another. Um, what are a bunch of editors and advertising salespeople going to do about that I wondered.

Flash of Lightning, Driving Rain

The emergency training I’d gotten prior to the event (that was reinforced constantly by the event managers) echoed in my brain. In the case of extreme weather, help people to an exit, point them to shelter, and clear the park.听

And just like that, the drops began to fall. Hazlett wrapped up his set, and the giant screens adjacent to the stage beamed a message.听We are temporarily halting the festival due to weather. Please seek shelter.听

Gentle rain quickly turned into a driving downpour. Lighting crackled overhead. Wind gusts toppled trash cans and blew them across the park as if they were Kleenex.

I looked across the park and saw volunteers shuffling the public toward the McNichols building on the north side of the park, and also into the Denver Public Library and the Denver Art Museum. I ran to one of the emergency exits and flung it open, and began pointing attendees to the Denver Post building on the northeast side of the park.

It’s impressive how quickly 20,000 people can move after a loud thunderclap or two. And within ten minutes or so, the park was a soggy听and blustery鈥攂ut mostly empty.

A mom with her kids ran by me toward the exit. “Do you think we will come back?” she asked. Guessing that the tempest would end within the hour, I told her to find shelter nearby, but to stick around.

An Impromptu Performance

What do you do to pass the time during a Colorado thunderstorm? Get creative. That was the mantra for the 45 minutes that elapsed during our hiatus.

I cowered under a white tent near the the festival entrance. But every few minutes, my walkie talkie pinged to life with updates from other buildings. As it turns out, people were using the break for impromptu entertainment.

Inside the McNichols Building, one of the performing acts, Brothers of Brass, began playing to the crowds standing shoulder to shoulder in the main hall. Someone texted me a video of the dance party.

At the Denver Art Museum, comedian Eeland Stribling, who was on a panel of outdoor comics, picked up the microphone and performed a comedy set for the soggy guests packing the auditorium.

I looked out from my shelter and saw a few hearty souls sitting in the rain despite the evacuation orders, letting themselves get drenched.

And then, like so many other Colorado thunderstorms, this one simply blew on, to the east, and disappeared.Sunshine chased off the last fragments of clouds. People emerged from their shelters. And before I knew it, a massive queue formed at the main entrance. Thousands of people had stuck around.

More Cowbells

Above: scenes from the rain delay at the 2025 国产吃瓜黑料 Festival

It took us about 30 minutes to open up the tents, set up the toppled trash cans, and ready the park for visitors. At one point I strolled along the massive line to get in to tell people that we’d soon open.

I half-expected to be pelted with trash or beer cans for being the messenger of a delayed festival. But no鈥擨 was met with good vibes and high fives. Yes, some folks were still soggy from the downpour, but people were ready to get back inside and party.

When I think back to the 2025 国产吃瓜黑料 Festival now, the moment I always come back to is this. When the park was finally ready, the other volunteers and I opened the gates and welcomed everyone back in to see the remaining three bands: Waxahatchee, Trampled by Turtles, and Lord Huron.

Several dozen 国产吃瓜黑料 staffers and volunteers crowded the entrance. Someone banged a cowbell. Everyone cheered. As the thousands of guests re-entered the park, they high-fived us, hugged us, and gave us fist bumps. Yes, some of the embraces were wet. We didn’t care.

The midday heat was gone, chilled down by the rain storm. The sun began to set above the Front Range as people strolled out to the main stage. The opening bluegrass bars of a Waxahatchee song echoed through the park, and people began to dance. It was just another perfect evening in Denver.

I heard someone say: “Well, that’s Colorado for ya.”

Articles editor Frederick Dreier is no longer seeking shelter from the storm.听

The post The 2025 国产吃瓜黑料 Festival in Denver Was Electric. Here鈥檚 What You Missed. appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

I鈥檝e slept on glaciers, mountains, beaches, and鈥攎ore than once鈥攗nder roadside bushes mid-hitchhike to a trailhead. But few camps have required more preparation than my latest: one night in a backyard in a bougie Chicago suburb.

Let me explain.

In normal times I live deep in the Wisconsin Northwoods with a team of sled dogs. But for the past few months, due to a combo of family illness and my husband running the Iditarod, I鈥檝e been staying in the city with my in-laws鈥攁nd I鈥檓 starting to lose my mind. The place is completely jarring to me. You鈥檝e never seen such perfect grass. There are no bugs (how?!). And while my in-laws are as kind, warm, loving, and funny as people can get (if they weren鈥檛 my family, I鈥檇 be plotting secret ways to make them my family) they鈥檙e also the kind of people who, when I wonder aloud if it鈥檚 stopped raining, turn away from the window to pull out their phones and check an app. Needless to say, I soon started feeling awfully disconnected from the natural world.

Luckily, someone I know well has spent years giving advice on how to connect with nature from the suburbs鈥攁nd that person is me. Yup: over almost a decade of writing an outdoors advice column, I鈥檝e counseled many a letter-writer about accessible ways to get outdoors, and one of my go-to pieces of advice has been to sleep in the backyard. Have I tried it? Well鈥o, actually. Not since childhood. But it鈥檚 not like sleeping outside is hard, right? You just grab some blankets and lay out under the stars. A night like that was exactly what I needed, and anyway I had access to a great yard, shaded with maple and pine. It abutted four other backyards, separated only by a low picket fence, but surely the neighbors wouldn鈥檛 care.

鈥淛ust wait,鈥� said my cousin-in-law, with something like relish in his voice. 鈥淭hey will call the HOA on you.鈥�

鈥淔or sleeping in your own yard?鈥�

鈥淭his is the suburbs,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t is almost certainly against the rules to sleep in the yard.鈥�

Challenge accepted. I dove into planning the mission like any good adventurer with bad cabin fever. First, I consulted the HOA bylaws, which were 28 pages single-spaced, and felt encouraged by what I found. They mentioned nothing about sleeping outdoors, but I could legally pitch a tent or canopy for 72 hours, after which I鈥檇 receive a written warning and have 14 days to correct the violation. By my calculations, this meant I could actually camp for 17 days before incurring my first $50 fine. That would bring my total cost to $2.94/night鈥攃onsiderably less than the expense of campsite rental at a national park! After the fine, I鈥檇 be invited to attend a violation hearing, which would presumably involve a light chat over free snacks. If the neighbors did call the HOA on me, at least now I was prepared.

As for the actual sleeping arrangements, I didn鈥檛 have overnight gear with me and wanted to keep things cheap, so I had to get creative. It was supposed to rain all week, so I bought an ($11.37) and four ($0.98 each), figuring I鈥檇 lie out on the grass. Temps would drop to the low 50s, so I鈥檇 be fine with household blankets and my fleece pajamas. Just as I was gathering supplies, I looked out the window and saw a plague doctor staring back at me鈥攐r, upon double-take, a green-uniformed man in PPE, spraying pale mist around the house from a stiff hose. The pieces came together: This was why the yard had no bugs.

I went outside and asked which pesticides he used; he didn鈥檛 know. So I called the company and spent almost an hour switching from one customer-service agent to another, all of whom seemed completely baffled as to why I鈥檇 care. I treat my own gear with permethrin鈥擨鈥檓 not completely opposed to insect repellents鈥攂ut I wasn鈥檛 loving the idea of sleeping on grass glistening with fresh toxicants. So, I bought a . I鈥檇 been wanting a hammock anyway, and at least this way I鈥檇 be off the ground.

By then it was early evening, and I was feeling decidedly cranky about the whole endeavor. Even with a ton of outdoors confidence and relatively low standards for comfort, I鈥檇 still put in a few hours鈥� effort and over 60 bucks for my supposedly free and easy campout. Plus, the weather was gray, the kind of endless drizzle that seems to come from nowhere and seep into everything all at once. Sleeping in storms is one thing in an expedition, but leaving a plush guest bed for a damp suburban yard felt entirely less enticing. Anticipating a stiff and soggy night, I trudged to the far corner of the yard to hang the hammock and pitch a quick rain fly. The tarp鈥檚 tie-downs would be at a better angle if I tied them to the shared picket fence, but that seemed like a provocation.

Every campsite has its wildlife, and this one was no exception. No sooner had I wedged myself into the hammock than the neighbors鈥攁 man and woman, mid-50s鈥攃ame out and stood on their deck, just 20 feet away. I popped my head up and said 鈥淗i!鈥� but they didn鈥檛 respond. Abashed, I retreated, pulling the edges of the hammock over myself, peering through the crack with one eye. Were they calling the HOA on me? The man looked at his phone, then dropped it back into his pocket.

鈥淭he woman鈥檚 wearing a long dress that disappears against the beige siding of her house, perfectly camouflaged to her environment,鈥� I texted my cousin-in-law.

鈥淲hy are you like this?鈥� he texted back.

The neighbors seemed to be pointedly gazing at everything except me. They pushed a deck chair several feet to the right, considered, then returned it to its original position. They knew I was there. I knew they knew. They knew I knew. None of us acknowledged it. After a few minutes of angsty silence, they went back inside.

That鈥檚 the thing about most wildlife. They鈥檙e more scared of you than you are of them.

The hammock swayed, and despite my wariness, I felt relaxed. I heard a sound like flapping; it was, I guessed, a kid on a snare drum a few houses down. Nearby, something crackled. Was it insects dying? No, just leaves, blowing gently around me, and the porch lights flickering on next door. The dark sky, peeking through roofs and branches, was the most familiar thing I鈥檇 seen in a long time.

I slept lightly in the hammock, swaying in and out of dreams. There was that snare drum sound again. Maybe it was a bird; maybe it was both. The squirrels, the shifting branches, the windows opening and closing, all melded into one layered sound, and the abutting yards鈥攚hich had struck me at first as structurally enabled nosiness鈥攂egan to seem more like a communal watering hole, the exact kind of shared space I鈥檇 been missing. When the sun rose, through mist, another neighbor came out and stood silently on the grass.

Backyard camping wasn鈥檛 quite as easy or cheap as I鈥檇 preached. And I didn鈥檛 feel connected to wilderness. But I felt like part of a place again, and maybe that mattered even more.

The post I Tried Camping in My Own Backyard. It Was Way Harder Than I Thought. appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

For more than four decades, Steves has guided Americans through the art, food, and culture of Europe, first with his bestselling guidebooks, then as host of his long-running PBS show, Rick Steves鈥� Europe. But lately, the seventy-year-old travel expert has fallen for a different kind of journey: long-distance hiking. From the Tour du Mont Blanc to the Alta Vias in the Dolomites, Steves now prefers alpine trails and mountain huts to museums and city squares鈥攁nd he thinks you will, too.

The Hike That Hooked Him: In September 2021, I went on a six-day, sixty-mile trek on the Tour du Mont Blanc. Here I am, supposed to be this expert on European travel, and I鈥檝e never done a multiday hike in the Alps. I loved the rhythm of my feet on the trail. It鈥檚 therapeutic. It was something totally new to me, and now I want to tell everybody what a great travel option it is.

On His Most Recent 国产吃瓜黑料: This past summer we did the Bernese Oberland Traverse. I wanted to link together some of the most venerable lodges in the Eiger and Jungfrau areas. I used Grindelwald as the springboard and hiked deep into a valley. At one point we were on a ridge high above, looking at lakes stretching out [below]. We heard the alpenhorns blowing and knew that coffee and schnapps would be served at the hut. It was enough to make a Lutheran raise his hands to the sky to praise God.

The Next Hike: This summer we鈥檙e doing a one-week hike along the Alta Via routes in the Dolomites. I鈥檓 still a fair-weather hiker, so I don鈥檛 want to sleep outdoors. I鈥檒l stay in the rifugios and huts along the way.

How Hiking Helps Him at Age Seventy: It forces you to get in shape before the trip. My body feels stronger on a hiking trip. My legs and of course my lungs feel better, even my voice is stronger. It鈥檚 an intangible value to be out there.

His Secret to Enjoying a Hike: Hire a sherpa service to take your bag from one hut to the next. That way you can just hike with your day bag and hiking poles and get lost in nature without thinking about the weight on your back. I鈥檓 not looking to impress anybody with how heavy a pack I can carry, and neither should you.

Advice Travelers Want from Him: Our focus isn鈥檛 on hotels as much as it used to be, and I think that鈥檚 because of . Advice on eating is more important than ever. Every night in Europe I鈥檓 out there for four hours checking out restaurants, because people want to know what鈥檚 good. People also want to know the nitty-gritty like how to navigate public transportation, and whether a place requires reservations. After COVID, a lot of the greatest sites in Europe expect you to reserve a spot. In Amsterdam alone, the Van Gogh Museum, Anne Frank House, and some of the best restaurants all required this.

Why Instagram Influencers Can鈥檛 Replace Travel Experts: I look on social media and I see people having a wonderful time showing off how great their trip is, but I don鈥檛 think it鈥檚 great for other people to plan their trips off of that. There鈥檚 a ton of information online but it鈥檚 all crowdsourced. So, all of a sudden anyone who has traveled to Paris can be the expert on where to get the best hot chocolate. But nobody is asking how many places did they try? Because the answer is usually one. There are a lot of amateurs sharing travel information out there, and there鈥檚 nothing wrong with that, but do these people know how to tell you how to best use your valuable time in Florence? I think that鈥檚 why guidebooks are still here, in fact they are growing. I鈥檓 selling more guidebooks than I鈥檝e ever sold in my life, over one million a year. It鈥檚 because we go there鈥攎y team and I spend 400 days of research time in Europe every year to update the books. Americans have the shortest vacation time in the free world. Time is a resource. And that鈥檚 why we want expert advice.

The post Rick Steves is Still a Travel Icon at Age 70 appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

The post The Summer 2025 Issue appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

I live in New York City, where it is a commonly held belief that people walking four abreast on a public sidewalk deserve summary execution. I also run in New York City, often alone but just as often with run clubs鈥攊n other words, in groups of as few as four or as many as a hundred, and on the same extremely crowded streets. And as run clubs grow in popularity, so does the potential for conflict or, at the very least, bad vibes.

Urban run clubs are easy to hate. Early on Saturdays and Sundays, when our fellow citizens are schlepping bleary-eyed in search of coffee, we are bright, fit, and in their faces, breaking the morning calm by shouting 鈥淗eads up!鈥� in our best coach voices. On weekday evenings we鈥檙e out in force as well, flaunting our energy levels and shaming the office workers desperately trying to get home or to a bar. Run clubs have themes that veer from the quotidian (neighborhood, ability, identity) to the easily mocked: Runs that end at a taqueria! Run clubs for singles! Run clubs that aren鈥檛 overtly for singles but are, tbh, really for singles! The group selfies for the 鈥榞ram, the branded merch, the giveaways of goos and gels, the after-parties鈥攊t鈥檚 all a bit much.

(Even I hate run clubs at times, and I run a run club! The Not Rockets, which, you will be pleased to learn, has no social media presence.)

A lot of the hate is simply about space. Any city worth living in doesn鈥檛 have enough of it, so anyone visibly occupying it becomes a target. One group of 50 runners on a riverside esplanade causes a brief bottleneck. Half a dozen such groups running simultaneously provokes outrage鈥攁nd not just because pedestrians are afraid they鈥檒l be trampled by Hokas. It鈥檚 also because, for as long as we runners are there, swarming around the non-runners, we are a hot, sweaty, unignorable sign that no one here has enough room to breathe.

No one expects this to change either radically or soon. After all, New York and other cities鈥攆rom London to San Francisco鈥攈ave always been experiments in density: How many people can you cram into tiny apartments and narrow streets before they start murdering one another? The answer, surprisingly, is 鈥渕illions and millions.鈥� It turns out, we like living this way. As crime rates have dropped nearly everywhere since the 1990s, it feels as if we鈥檝e learned that we can actually get along, despite our infinite differences, by (mostly) trying not to mess with people unnecessarily and also by trying (mostly) not to freak out too badly when someone messes with us unnecessarily.

One of the ways we manage this is by complaining: to friends, co-workers, whoever sees us for twenty-four seconds on their FYP. Run clubs are just the latest, trendiest subject to kvetch about, and it’s my contention that the loudest complainers in fact love run clubs for giving them such a meaty, persistent topic to post about鈥攋ust as runners themselves love to whine about double-wide strollers, lost tourists, and inattentive dog-walkers. It’s a release that allows us all to feel equally self-righteous, to feel that the city belongs to us, whoever we may be, if only for a moment. Because in the backs of our minds, we know who it truly belongs to, the common enemy at which we鈥攔unners and non-runners alike鈥攔eally should direct the full force of our ire, our anger, our hatred: cars.

This piece first appeared in the summer 2025 print issue of 国产吃瓜黑料 Magazine. Subscribe now for early access to our most captivating storytelling, stunning photography, and deeply reported features on the biggest issues facing the outdoor world.听听

The post Why Everyone Hates Run Clubs鈥攁nd Why You Should Join One Anyway appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Technology has rendered modern Americans both more connected鈥攁nd more isolated鈥攖han any population of humans in history. In fact, some researchers have gone so far as to declare a “loneliness epidemic” in reference to our increasingly desperate need for IRL connection and community. That said, knowing that you need new friends and actually making them are two very different things. Building community can feel like a vast and nebulous proposition; it’s hard to know exactly where to start.

The good news is that if that you’re an outdoorsy type, there are plenty of opportunities to make connections. Joining a group run or ride is one of them. However, volunteering might be the one you can feel best about. That’s especially true now: amid federal funding cuts, conservation and trail organizations need help now more than ever. Plus, it’s pretty dang fun. Anyone who鈥檚 ever received or handed out water at a race knows how volunteering can be both fulfilling and exhilirating. And at the end of the day, you’ll have connected with a tight-knit group of people who’ve come together over a common cause. That can lead to lifelong friendships.

Here are seven other service opportunities that may lead to new pals.

1. Become a Trail Ambassador

Trail building requires some advanced knowledge and skills, but if it鈥檚 what you鈥檙e after, the leads volunteer vacations that involve building and preservation, and the has info on mountain bike鈥搒pecific trail building days near you. Want something a little less labor-intensive? Consider becoming a trail ambassador instead. The U.S. Forest Service is currently seeking volunteer ambassadors for national forests along Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. The position is most needed from May through October and requires that you travel the trails (by foot, bike, or horseback) and pick up debris, repair signage, maintain trailheads, interact with hikers, and report any issues to recreation staff. Not local to the area? Trail ambassador opportunities exist across the country, from Oregon鈥檚 Columbia River Gorge to .

2. Serve as an Active Buddy for Someone With a Disability

痴别谤尘辞苍迟鈥檚 provides adaptive sports programming, equipment and instruction for those with disabilities. One of their volunteer gigs is called Active Buddies. This means if one of their grant recipients wants a friend to go out biking, hiking, skiing, or paddling with, you show up. Some training required; locations vary. Adaptive sports programs like California鈥檚 , Utah鈥檚 , and Colorado鈥檚 also have volunteer gigs.

3. Plant Flowers at an Urban Farm

There鈥檚 WWOOFing for farm work all over. But what if you just want a fun farm job that involves picking flowers or fruit? , less than an hour from New York City, has community work days; in Champaign, Illinois, trains volunteers to weed, plant, mulch, and harvest flowers; and at , an urban farm near Oakland, California, you can help package CSAs, build planter boxes, or harvest vegetables.

4. Clean Up a Beach With a Social Club

Join an organized beach cleanup or stage your own. The Surfrider Foundation has all the info you need to get involved. Find beach cleanups, lake cleanups, or inland river cleanups that aim to intercept trash before it gets into waterways and, inevitably, the ocean. Here鈥檚 a fun option: San Diego鈥檚 free-to-join social club, called Apr猫s Surf Club, organizes surf sessions, beach cleanups, and social gatherings that aim to make surfing more inclusive and inviting. They host live music, post-surf coffee, and have member discounts.

5. Be a Volunteer Astronaut (Sort Of)

There are many ways to be a citizen scientist: You can count bumblebees, monarch butterflies, or American pikas (which are ); observe birds in your area for the Audubon Society; record light pollution for the Globe at Night campaign; or track eastern hemlock within national forests. Those are all good options, but this one might be the most fun: NASA relies on 1,200 people across the U.S. who they call . Duties range from hosting sidewalk telescope sessions at local libraries to lunar eclipse watch parties.

6. Protect Turtle Hatchlings in Maui

Options abound for animal welfare volunteer gigs. You can help rescued farm animals at an animal sanctuary near Woodstock, New York, work with rescued pigs an hour north of Seattle, or walk dogs at the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in southern Utah. And your locale humane society likely needs volunteers. But if you want to make a vacation out of it, may we recommend the , where you can help research and protect the nesting activities of hawksbill sea turtles on the shores of Maui.

7. Take Care of a Backcountry Hut in Maine

Systems of backcountry huts run by groups like the Sierra Club or the Appalachian Mountain Club often rely on volunteers to monitor and maintain their properties. In Vermont, the Vermont Huts Association and the Green Mountain Club both depend on . This gig for Maine Huts and Trails is a winner: You鈥檒l stack wood, organize the hut, and do snow removal to help out the on-staff caretaker; in exchange, you get to stay at the hut for free.

This piece first appeared in the summer 2025 print issue of 国产吃瓜黑料 Magazine. Subscribe now for early access to our most captivating storytelling, stunning photography, and deeply reported features on the biggest issues facing the outdoor world.

The post Why Giving Back Could Be the Antidote to Loneliness appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Two summers ago, I went shopping for a . I鈥檇 just moved to the Lake Tahoe area, and everywhere else I鈥檇 lived, races and group rides were how I鈥檇 made friends. I knew that if I could find a good weekly ride, I would find my new community.

The first ride I checked out had only three participants, including myself. The next was attended by riders who seemed mostly new to one another. Then I went to a ride hosted Wednesday nights by , a bar/restaurant/gear shop in the North Lake Tahoe hub of Truckee. I arrived at 5 p.m. to find thirty or so riders milling around in front of the shop. Everyone seemed to know one another. I was standing alone, wishing for an invisible-鈥檛il-now manhole to open beneath my feet and swallow me when a woman walked up, introduced herself, and offered me a ride to the trailhead. Another rider asked if it was my first time. When I said yes, he replied, 鈥淭hanks for coming.鈥� An hour and a half later, at the bottom of the descent, I watched the group cheer for the last rider, a gray-haired gentleman they called Ben. I noted once more that everyone seemed to know each other. But this time that didn鈥檛 make me want to fall through a trapdoor. It made me want to come back next Wednesday.

Friendship and community are popular topics these days, and the conversation in recent years has often turned to the notion of the third place. According to the late sociologist Ray Oldenburg, who coined the term, a third place is one that鈥檚 outside the home (the first place) and work (second place), where people can meet and socialize with strangers, acquaintances, or friends. Third places are posited as a solution for finding and building community during a time when Americans are increasingly alone. 鈥淒o Yourself a Favor,鈥� the Atlantic advised in 2022, 鈥渁nd Go Find a Third Place.鈥�

What always puzzled me was this: Just because you live near the kinds of establishments that are traditionally identified as third places鈥攍ike bars, coffee shops, parks, and libraries鈥攄oesn鈥檛 mean you鈥檙e going to become friends with your neighbors. My sister and her husband, for example, live two blocks off a charming downtown drag in the Bay Area, but they鈥檝e struggled to make local friends.

Americans who live near amenities like these are more likely to meet new people than those who don鈥檛, according to a 2021 community life survey. But the same survey also found that more than half of Americans who live in 鈥渧ery high-amenity鈥� areas chatted with strangers at most a few times a year.

Outdoor places and spaces like run clubs, group rides, gear shops, trails, ski areas, and others also fit Oldenburg鈥檚 criteria for third places. They鈥檙e free or low-cost to attend (the cost of gear notwithstanding). They bring people together from different backgrounds and put them on equal footing, an effect called 鈥渟ocial leveling.鈥� And they facilitate casual conversations.

But the outdoors may be even better than traditional third places at bringing people together and sparking the lasting connections that form a community.

A third place is less about where people gather and more about what they do together, says Debbie Rudman, a health sciences professor at Toronto鈥檚 Western University who is co-leading a four-year study on third places. 鈥淚t鈥檚 the doing that becomes the point of connection,鈥� she says. 鈥淭he relationships, sense of belonging, and community build from that.鈥�

That鈥檚 in part because a key ingredient to community-building, besides a place, is time. This is one of the biggest barriers to community building in our productivity-oriented culture, says Kathy Giuffre, a professor emerita of sociology at Colorado College. 鈥淲e feel like we can鈥檛 waste our time to go to a coffee shop and just sit around for a couple hours and meet the regulars.鈥� At a third space like a run club, however, the activity itself demands spending time together. Participants also return week after week, becoming regulars and forming bonds, because they enjoy running and its .

Even if someone does find the time to go to a coffee shop, these spaces don鈥檛 necessarily encourage interaction. Starbucks bills itself as a third place, historian Bryant Simon noted in 2009, yet 鈥渙ne learns they do not have to talk at Starbucks. Actually one learns not to talk.鈥� Sharing an activity, by comparison, makes it easy to strike up casual gab: You can bitch about the hill you鈥檙e climbing, or ask which race someone is training for.

Some argue that run clubs don鈥檛 qualify as third places because of their emphasis on exercise, or productivity. The researchers I spoke to disagreed. The guise of productivity may actually work in our favor, says Giuffre. 鈥淚t almost gives people an excuse to do something that鈥檚 actually quite pleasurable, which our society makes us feel really guilty about,鈥� she says. 鈥溾�業鈥檓 exercising, so it鈥檚 OK.鈥欌��

Hedman, who studies what makes sports clubs so effective at building communities, prefers the term 鈥渟hared goal鈥� to productivity. It鈥檚 this goal orientation that gives sports clubs such staying power as third places, and even sets them apart from other 鈥渄oing鈥� spaces like, say, an art class. As members return regularly in pursuit of these goals, relationships develop through friendly interactions and shared experiences, 鈥渂e they fulfilling, terrifying, or triumphant,鈥� he writes in a 2024 paper. People with these kinds of emotional ties, he says, are more willing to contribute to 鈥渃ollective undertakings.鈥�

I鈥檝e seen the power of outdoor sports to create what I call a community鈥攁 diffuse network of people who have bonds both tight and loose, yet nonetheless feel an accountability to one another that supersedes their individual ties. Several years ago, when my then-fianc茅 was hospitalized after being hit and nearly killed on his bike by a careless driver, we received messages, visits, gift cards, meals, flowers, Venmo transfers, and care packages from not only friends and family, but also near-strangers and acquaintances. At the time, the influx was so steady that it felt like our community was performing acts of kindness like cyclists in a paceline, each member taking a turn at the front and then peeling off to let the next rider through. After we left the ICU, his brother said, 鈥淭his was probably the worst thing that鈥檚 ever happened to us, but it wasn’t a negative experience.鈥�

The notion of third places may be evolving from Oldenburg鈥檚 original definition. Considering what people do together, not just where they gather, dispels the idea that third places are static, pre-existing physical spaces that people visit to get their daily dose of connection, Rudman says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 the people who actually create the third place by doing the activity.鈥� We become the regulars, the characters that define a place.

I like this concept of a third place as one you make, not just one you find. I did keep going back to that Wednesday night group ride, and the following summer I started to help lead rides as a shop ambassador. (RMU provides me with a small bar tab and a few items of gear in exchange.) But according to this theory, every rider who comes helps to create the experience I look forward to each Wednesday. Maybe that explains why I often feel compelled to say the same thing whenever I see a new face: 鈥淭hanks for coming.鈥�

This piece first appeared in the summer 2025 print issue of 国产吃瓜黑料 Magazine. Subscribe now for early access to our most captivating storytelling, stunning photography, and deeply reported features on the biggest issues facing the outdoor world.听听

The post Looking for a Third Place? Get 国产吃瓜黑料 appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.