Guides Gone Wild

I'm taking you down another one of my personal fixation rabbit holes today with the awesome Alissa Wetherbee from the Axe Women Loggers of Maine!

I was first introduced to the Axe Women Loggers of Maine when they were on the program at the Topsfield Fair, here in Massachusetts where I live most of the time. My dad has been involved with the fair forever, I grew up kicking around in the vegetable building helping to set up and break down every October, and even though my days of growing championship veggies are long behind me and my kids are only interested in the midway rides and ripoff games, I still try to get there every few years to get my fix of greasy pole climbs and fried food (and maybe a little bit of tractor pulling or demolition derby!)

Which brings me to today’s guest, Alissa Wetherbee. A few months back I saw something on Instagram that reminded me of the one time I saw the Axe Women Loggers at the Fair, so me being me, I went into web stalker mode.

Alissa’s logging sports domination came pretty organically, since she spent a lot of her childhood and teenage years cutting and processing wood for her family’s use. When she got a little bit older, instead of taking some thankless waitressing job in the summer, she parlayed her chainsaw skills into being the token girl in a local tourist trap lumberjack show. Eventually she realized that there were actual timber sports competitions that had actual  prize purses, and even though it was a lot of the same women competing in all of those competitions, there were other women - period! 

Alissa made some great friends on the circuit, and as she looked around at what some of the guys were doing in their off season, namely getting paid to demonstrate logging skills, her creative juices started flowing…

You can find more information about the Axe Women, becoming an Axe Women Pathfinder, upcoming events, all the things on the web at Axewomen.com, and you can follow them @axewomen on Instagram and Facebook as well, they share all kinds of pix from their travels and you might just be the first to know the next time Alissa has one too many shots and rolls a log down the Erie Canal or whatever...

Other fun links:

• That time the Axe Women met Queen Latifah
• That time Alissa tried to teach Peggy Keyser how to throw an axe on the 207 
• That time Alissa log-rolled the Mississippi
• What is a stock saw? 
• What is a hot saw? (And BTW Stihl, women use them too!!)
• Awesome log rolling video (in which 10 year old Libby embarrasses a grown man)
• What’s a boom runner?

And make sure to come on over to GuidesGoneWild.com to sign up to get more info on upcoming events!

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I’m amping up the creativity and inspiration today with my guest Mischa Ostberg of East Mountain Designs.

Mischa was a language polymath, lapsed artist, and occasional car camper who thought that ‘backpacking’ meant ‘wearing a backpack on a day hike’ - fast forward barely 5 years, and today's Mischa is an avid climber and new Maine transplant who just completed a celebratory trans-Acadia hiking traverse, and is feeding all of our outdoor FOMO with the most amazing pieces of upcycled art on their Instagram feed, @east_mountain_designs.

And yet, Mischa didn’t understand why I’d ever want to talk to her for the podcast.
Like, really?!?

I think you’ll all agree that Mischa belongs on the pod (just like the rest of you do!)

Mischa really is the personification of one of their delicate line drawings - magnificent when viewed as a whole, but also comprised of all these minute but important details; the closer you look, the more interesting they get!

Lots of links with this one!:

• Mischa's amazing 'fish in a frame'!
• Schoodic Institute (ME)
• SPOT
• What is a SAT phone?
• What is celiac disease?
• What is a Heller myotomy?
• Good To-Go meals
• Uinta Mountains 
• Ashley National Forest
• Otter Cliffs (Acadia National Park, ME)
• Jackson Lab (ME)
• Dick Chasse
• What is an alewife?
• She Summits, Co - listen to my episode with Amanda Hatley of She Summits, Co. here!
• Acadia Outdoor Center
• Salt Pump Climbing
• Access Fund
• Scarpa Crux Approach Shoes

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Today my guest is Sabra Davison, one of the founding powerhouse trio of women behind Little Bellas. Little Bellas should sound familiar to you by now if you’ve joined me for a pod or two before - it’s an organization creating opportunities for girls to build life skills and confidence through mountain biking fun.

As Sabra and her sister Lea started getting serious about mountain bike racing in college, they also started noticing what an anomaly it was to see more than a few women involved in most races. One fateful day, Angela Irvine happened to line up at a start with them (or should I say lined up behind them), and the conversation they struck up with her after the race turned into lots of Thai food and brainstorming about how to create a welcoming, supportive space for girls and women in the sport they all loved.

From its humble beginning in rural Vermont, Little Bellas has grown into a nationwide program that has served over 4,500 girls through camps and weekly programs for riders of all skill levels.

But don’t let all the bikes fool you - while programs encourage and support skill progression and developing greater comfort on two wheels, Little Bellas make just as many memories at snack time and through crazy games they make up and play in their groups.

I hope you’ll follow Little Bellas on Instagram or Facebook - you can also get tons of information about Little Bellas programs and mentorship opportunities on their website, LittleBellas.com.

Useful links from our convo:

• Become a Little Bellas mentor
• Lea Davison (@leaeatsalot) on Instagram (forgot to mention, Lea is a two-time Olympian and has hit podiums at multiple World and National Championships. No moss growing on the Davison family!)
• Get inspired by Angela Irvine’s story yourself!
• Cochran’s Ski Area - the Cochran family’s Olympic ski dynasty
• Little Bellas’ newest chapters
• Fresh Air Fund
• Specialized SWAT water bottle cage (with tool) 

And if you liked this conversation, you'll also enjoy these episodes:

• Lauren Jacobs, University of Maine Outdoor Leadership
• Laura Beebe, Sterling College
• Jenn Minery, Little Bellas Regional Coordinator and Mentor
• Heidi Myers of Rasputitsa (Little Bellas partner)

As always, special thanks to our sponsor, Evans Notch Lodge!

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We are back in Maine this week with the kind of guest that made me start this podcast in the first place!

Acadia Gantz is an ultrarunner and running coach with the all around best Instagram handle I’ve ever heard - she’s also a certified professional midwife practicing in the Bridgton area with Sacopee Midwives, so she’s on social media @TrailRunningBabyCatcher. It didn’t take much arm twisting for me to want to talk with her, because really, how awesome is that?!?

Acadia started trail running about 5 years ago to dissipate some of the stress from the midwifery program she had come to Maine for, and proved to be quite the overachiever, moving quickly through the marathon distance and taking on increasingly longer ultra distances. But honestly, the whole midwife/home birth thing was so interesting, we barely scratch the surface of her athletic achievements.

I hope you’ll find this conversation as fascinating and informative as I did. Even if you’re like me and the ship has most definitely sailed on your childbearing  years, Acadia’s advice about listening to your body and becoming your own healthcare advocate is still worth hearing and heeding.

You can follow Acadia @trailrunningbabycatcher on Instagram, and if you’re looking for guidance as you meld together your family planning and race planning worlds, you’ll want to check her out @canyonwren_coaching or canyonwrencoaching.com.

All the fun links:

• The Business of Being Born (film)
• Midwives College of Utah
• What is a doula?
• Certified Professional Midwife vs. Certified Nurse Midwife
• Sacopee Midwives (on Instagram)
• Run for the Hills Run Club on Facebook, IG
• Pondicherry Park (Bridgton, ME)
• Spandits Bandit Headband
• Tuff Mutt Waist Leash

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We’re leaving New England and heading west this week to talk with teacher, author, and all around activity enthusiast Hayley Diep.

This year on March 8th, not coincidentally International Women’s Day, Hayley released her first book, an illustrated kid’s story called If You Give a Girl a Bike. The book takes you along on a fun romp with the main character and her two friends as they try new things, fail, learn, and try again - which all starts when a girl is given a bike. If the littles in your life have ever been obsessed with Laura Numeroff’s If You Give a Moose a Muffin, you can probably guess what the girls are still doing at the end of their adventurous day.

Hayley’s journey to being a published author was hardly a straight, flowy line, though - more like an off-camber rock garden that had to be powered through. But just like her protagonist, Hayley didn’t let a few setbacks keep her down; she just picked herself up, regrouped, and tried  a new line.

I love Hayley’s story; it’s not too hard to see where the inspiration for her tenacious main character came from!

You can follow Hayley’s bike, surf and climbing adventures on Instagram @hayleydiepwrites, or on Facebook through her If You Give a Girl a Bike page. You might also want to check out Braden Hallett’s work (the book's illustrator) at bradenhallett.com.

Finally, school is starting soon, I hope you’ll think about picking up a few copies of If You Give a Girl a Bike and donating them to your local elementary or public libraries! Head over to hayleydiep.com, order there and throw a little extra toward one of her charity partners.

HayleyDiep.com - buy a book, or get great resources for self-publishing

Some other links from our conversation:

• Ingram Spark
• Rebecca Rusch
• All Mountain Brothers
• Melanin Basecamp
• ‘Mountain Bike Sam’ - @mtbikesamantha
• Storytime with Mr. Limata (in addition to his book reviews and live story times he hosts on Facebook, Mr. Limata has assembled an amazing linktree of social justice and literacy links - check it out!)

Wendy Eliot on Guides Gone Wild - more fun climbing inspo!

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Bringing you episode ‘Jen Squared’ today! My guest is Jenn Minery, a mountain biking coach, gravel biking phenom, Regional Coordinator for Little Bellas, Creator-In-Chief of Indigo Sole, and Fun Team Hall of Famer...

I’m going out on a limb here with my similes, but talking to Jenn is like looking through a kaleidoscope that’s stuck in a salad spinner - she is all energy and rainbows and dynamism! Her commitment to the communities she loves shines through in her role with Little Bellas, her product company side hustle that’s designed around helping others, and her tireless efforts to bring new riders of all ages and stages into the biking fold.

Make sure to follow Jenn @MudSpeckledMin on Instagram, check out all of her fun and colorful products at Indigo-Sole.com, and last but certainly not least, head over to the Little Bellas website for more information about programs in your area that are perfect for all the 'Wild Guides In Training' you have in your life!

Links to some of the other people, places and things we talked about (come over to GuidesGoneWild.com for a complete list!):

• Heidi Myers of Rasputitsa/Bittersweet/Vertical on Guides Gone Wild
• Cori Brago (Bittersweet/Vertical Fly Fishing Guide) on Guides Gone Wild
• Vertical Biking/Fly Fishing Event (September, 2021)
• NEMBA
• MassBike
• Great Brook Farm State Park (Carlisle, MA) - mountain biking-specific trail maps
• Lynn Community Health Center (MA)
• WTF Bikexplorers (now known as Radical Adventure Riders)
• 350 Seattle
• Rosie’s Place (Boston, MA)
• Youth Enrichment Services (Boston, MA)

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Have you ever stopped to wonder when your favorite outdoor activity or hobby became mainstream? How lesson and training programs get started? Where the threshold is that gets crossed, making it apparent that training instructors or guides has to happen so that newbies stay safe and maximize their enjoyment?

My guest today, Cathy Piffath of H2Outfitters in Harpswell, Maine, is ready to fill you in.

Obviously people of the Wabanacki Nations had been paddling the coasts of New England for centuries before outdoor enthusiasts decided that sea kayaking was a hot new thing. But when those of us who didn’t have generations of experience to fall back on started tempting fate off-shore in tiny little plastic or fiberglass boats in the 80s, someone had to step in to protect us from ourselves.

Cathy Piffath and her partner, Jeff Cooper, were the people that The American Canoe Association turned to for intel specific to sea kayaking, since they had recently started taking groups out to paddle the waters around their home base on Orr’s Island. So if you’ve ever gone out sea kayaking, or taken a lesson from an ACA-certified sea kayaking instructor, you’ve got Cathy (and Jeff) to thank!

I so so SO love hearing and sharing stories from women who are just quietly living their best life, doing things they love, with people they love, in places they love! Totally got all the feels from this one.

I hope you’ll check out all of Cathy and Jeff’s cool offerings at H2Outfitters.com, or @H2Ooutfitters on Instagram and Facebook - they’ve got a very fun sounding Women’s Retreat coming up in mid-August, among a million other things. But be forewarned, once you go out with H2Outfitters you’ll probably be hooked, and have to go scrounging around for your own gear.... And kayaks are kind of a b*tch to squeeze into the gear closet, just sayin.

Some useful links from our conversation:

• Orr’s & Bailey Islands Fire Department
• Popham Beach
• American Canoe Association
• Perception Kayaks
• Mountain Travel Sobek
• Performance Sea Kayaking (you can watch for free!) - Kent Ford
• Apogee Adventures
• Tow Belt
• Eskimo Roll
• Episode with fellow guide training dev OG, Tami Rogers of Maine's Outdoor Learning Center!

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Bringing you a little backcountry inspiration today with my guest, Laura Beebe!

Laura is on the faculty of Environmental Humanities at Sterling College in Vermont, and you might recognize that name, because I was introduced to Laura by Heidi Myers of Rasputitsa fame, whom I interviewed back on Earth Day. I've linked my conversation with Heidi up here because I just know you’ll want to go back and listen to that one too!

Anyway, I was fortunate to catch Laura in between a semester she spent in the desert and a field program she was heading to in Colorado for the summer. That’s already a super-cool reason to be connecting with Laura, but to make it even more incredible, wait until you hear the story of her first backpacking trip in the Tetons…. Let’s just say she was Reese Witherspoon’s doppelganger. Maybe I’m talking about Wild, maybe I’m talking about Legally Blonde, maybe I’m talking about some preternatural melding of the two - you’ll have to be the judge.

But all kidding aside, Laura’s story is a powerful testament to the importance of the right mentors and messaging, and how difficult it can be to see, never mind overcome, all the barriers we tend to build in front of ourselves.

Check out all the cool stuff Laura and her students are up to over @sterlingcollegevt on Instagram, or visit their website, sterlingcollege.edu.

And if all of our talk about outdoor skill acquisition in girls has you fired up, go back and check out my episode with Amanda Hatley of SheSummitsCo, or you can take it even further back to my episode with Lauren Jacobs of UMaine Outdoor Leadership in August - keep that inspiration going, scroll on down in your podcasting app and cue up some more fire for your ears right this second!

Some selected links from our conversation:

• Sterling College  - Environmental Humanities Program
• Heidi Myers episode of Guides Gone Wild
• Simone Manuel
• Exum Mountain Guides
• NOLS
• Vanagon vs. Eurovan

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I’m taking you on a little adventure today, a 'Ladies Adventure', with the Ladies Adventure Club of Maine.

I had the privilege of hosting some of the amazing members of LAC at Evans Notch Lodge back in early June for a weekend of hiking, biking, camping and chilling by the fire. I was so impressed with the way the weekend flowed, with the members dropping in and out, taking part in the stuff that was interesting or new to them, and not worrying about whether they were going to be able to keep up, or if they brought the right gear.

On Sunday of that weekend, I had the chance to hike Blueberry Mountain with the group. I decided to bring my little hand-held recorder with me so I could talk to some of the Ladies about the club, and a fantastic new initiative that LAC is involved in. The audio from these chats is what I’m sharing with you today.

The Ladies Adventure Club has teamed up with LL Bean, Baxter Outdoors, Back40 Events and Baxter Brewing on an initiative called the Hidden Hikes of Maine - I’m going to let Gillian Schair, founder of the LAC, tell you the rest, but suffice to say I’ve got some new ideas for the rest of my summer weekends!

If a weekend like this sounds like fun, and you want to pull together a group of YOUR besties to DIY some adventuring, I’d love to host you all at Evans Notch Lodge! We’ve still got a few open weekends left this summer and fall that will be perfect for biking, fishing, camping, hiking, and of course plenty of rosé-swilling around the campfire.

I’ve got about a million ideas for activities in the Evans Notch area, so if you’d like some help pulling together the perfect ladies weekend, or if you want to bring your neighborhood or your extended family somewhere new for some outdoor fun, drop me a line and we can start planning - email [email protected], or come on over to evansnotchlodge.com and fill out our contact form, and let’s get your next group adventure on the calendar!

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My guest today is Paige Emerson, the mastermind behind Chubby Hiker Reviews on Instagram and Facebook.

Paige’s story really resonates with me, because she took some hard stuff she was working on, mixed it with a dose of COVID, and is coming out the other end with an amazingly engaged and fast-growing community full of kind, fun, outdoorsy women – ummmm, sounds familiar?!?

Anyone who’s ever used AllTrails or read an AMC trail description knows that it can be hard to really know what you’re in for when you head to a trailhead. Sometimes you come out of a hike thinking the person who wrote the description or graded the trail difficulty had likely run across and consumed a few hallucinogenic mushrooms along the way, because the description bears little resemblance to what you just put yourself through.

Paige Emerson and Chubby Hiker Reviews to the rescue!

When Paige started writing about her hikes and trying to set realistic expectations, she struck a nerve with thousands of people who’d been feeling like the hiking community was giving them the cold shoulder.

Trying to figure out where to raise your Summits In Solidarity flag this weekend?? Paige has got you covered - she gives advice on where to go, which clothes to wear, and most importantly, where you can bring your 28-toed co-hiker cat!

Follow Paige @chubbyhikerreviews on Instagram and Facebook, or @PaigesofAdventures on Instagram - and check out all the other great press Paige and Chubby Hiker Reviews have been getting!:

Paige in Bangor Daily News
Paige on WABI5 TV

And just in case you needed a little more inspiration:

• Knox Mountain
• Flying Mountain (Acadia National Park)
• AllTrails
• Hirundo Wildlife Refuge (leave your dogs AND cats at home!)
• Bold Coast - Cutler
• Moosehead Lake Region
• Summits In Solidarity on Guides Gone Wild Podcast 

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