Your adventure went too far
Bicycling.com—an entertaining and informative web site—has an article about Al Newman, a hard-driving, semi-retired, 73-year-old entrepreneur who just rode his bike around Antarctica and thereby completed his quest to cycle on all seven continents. Reaction one: Whoa. Atta boy. Reaction two: I wish the article had been a little less evasive about how long he...
The Great American Rail Trail: a glass 52 percent full
Do you like maps and bike trails and visions of grandeur? Of course you do, and this is your website: the Great American Rail Trail is taking shape. For anyone with the time and ambition to ride across this continent, a smooth, safe and continuous bike trail would be an unalloyed godsend. No more risk...
Ladies: eat, pray and stretch that check
They’re homebodies. And they’re affiliative, depending on social and emotional bonds to get through daily life…or so we assume, because when they travel they like to travel with others. And by they, we mean men. Editors for International Living—the on-line and print publication that encourages retirees to find new adventures and, crucially, save money by...
People in glass lookouts shouldn’t throw the first stone
Sometimes that old wine just can’t be decanted into a new bottle. Case in point: you have some property near Yellowstone. You want to make some money off it, so you build high-end cabins. You put in wi-fi and a flat screen TV and queen beds—equipping them like a modern condo in downtown Seattle...
No service, no sequester
You’ve got two weeks off, America, and there’s gas in the station wagon. The tent is packed, along with your camp stove and a jug of DEET. You were thinking of maybe Yellowstone or Yosemite. But now you’re anxious, which is exactly how you’re supposed to start your vacation. But this is a more acute...
Oldsters one-upping each other at the top of the world
On Everest, there’s always someone older coming up behind you Back in 2008, Japan’s (then) 75-year-old Yuichiro Miura was about to set the record for being the oldest person to climb Mount Everest—until Nepal’s 76-year-old Min Bahadur Sherchan beat him out, getting there one day ahead of him. There was no trash talking...
Hiking for thrill-seekers
How did the walkabout become benign? A hundred-and-some years ago, “a long walk” could have meant raw-boned pioneers thrusting themselves into uncharted territory. Predators, starvation and meteorological calamities. Today, it usually means something so safe you could do it on a first date with a stranger you met through Match.com. You don’t get...
High adventure at low altitude
There’s a difference between summer peaks and winter peaks. In winter, you summit quickly because the peaks you reach are typically found at the end of a chairlift. You start the day at sea level in San Francisco, let’s say, and with a little luck and a tailwind you are standing at the top...
Before they’re gone: A different kind of bucket list
Normally, a bucket list is litany of things you want to see or experiences you want to have before you are no longer of this earth. Or, more precisely, before you are too much of this earth. Now the Weather Channel has given us a list of things you want to see before they...
Good advice for older travelers
It’s easy to be irritated with the New York Times “Booming” section, or subdomain, or whatever we are supposed to call it. Like many features aimed at Baby Boomers, it seems to slide easily into the morbid. There are upbeat stories, certainly (like a recent slideshow on attractive women who have decided not to dye...
Denali wins again
Let’s focus on the success here: climbing solo, AARP-eligible adventurer Lonnie Dupre reached 17,200 feet on Denali, in January. Not to belabor this, but he carried all his food and fuel, alone, to 17,200 feet, in January. He was planning to reach the 20,320-foot summit today but, as his website reports, “extremely...
Old Brit wrestles shark, saves children
Oh, you can say it isn’t Jaws. You can point out that the poor animal was probably sickly, possibly dying. But it doesn’t diminish the fact that 62-year-old Welsh grandfather Paul Marshallsea, along with a couple of other old dudes, walked into the ocean off Queensland and harassed a shark until it swam off, apparently...
