The Joy Trip Project

One of the things I love most about this podcast is the ability to tell amazing stories. And in the process I also help to raise awareness for some very important causes. With your support the Joy Trip Project has been able to back more than few Kickstarter campaigns as well as provide financial support to folks in need through Indie-Go-Go. And it was just such a request that reminded me of a story I did in 2008 when I met my good friend Chad Jukes. He's currently looking for support to climb the highest mountainin the world Mount Everest.

"I’m a staff sergeant in the army," Jukes had told me. "Back in 2006 I was running convoy security operations over in Iraq and my truck hit an anti-tank mine and ended up shattering my heel bone and breaking my femur."

Recorded at during the time of the Irag War this interview aimed to explore how soldiers like Jukes were dealing with the aftermath of devasting injuries received in combat.

"After a few months I ended up contracting an infection a fairly serious infection in my heel," Jukes said. "And when they went in to repair that they discovered that the infection had done a lot of damage to the bone. At that point they gave me a few options. And one of them was amputation."

At the time Jukes was only 22-years-old and he was faced with one of hardest decisions anyone would ever have to make. Should he abandon the hope of recovering his damaged foot or allow the doctors to remove his leg from below the knee?

At that point I went online and started doing some research and ended up finding a web site called the adaptive climbers organization.com," Jukes said. "And I went in there and posted on the forums with my situation. Within the day I received responses from Malcolm Daly, Pete Davis, Craig DeMartino and a number of others with advice for me, and just telling me what I could expect if I chose the amputee route."

The guys who responded to Jukes’ post were all climbers, including my old boss and long-time friend Malcolm Daly. Each of them had opted for amputation rather than preserve a damaged foot or leg. In the hopes of continuing their lives in the most active ways possible these injured athletes provide inspiring role models for wounded soldiers to recover from the tragic circumstance of war to ascend to unimaginable heights. And in this flashback edition of the podcast we're revisiting the process Jukes endured to put him on track toward an Everest summit.

Our theme music is by Jake Shimabukuro. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to fans like you on Patreon. For as little as a dollar month you can support this podcast and many adventure media initiatives covered here. For details visit patreon.com/joytripproject.

Thanks for listening, but as always I want to hear from you. So please write to me with your questions comments and criticisms to [email protected]

Journalist and author John Vaillant began his career with a profound interest in connecting stories of adventure with complex social issues. And it was on a reporting assignment to the remote regions North Western Canada that put him on the path of a remarkable narrative steeped in both ancient mythology and a modern controversy at the heart of the environmental movement.

"It was thanks to Outside Magazine that I got up there. I was doing a paddling story for them in Haida Gwaii, which is this remote archipelago off the northwest coast of British Columbia, an extraordinary place, home of the Haida Nation," Vaillant said. "One way to understand them is the Vikings of the North Pacific. Huge canoes, but they are also a great political force, very powerful environmental advocates. It was also the home of this botanically unique tree, this Golden Spruce. It was 165 feet tall, seven feet across at the base and had golden needles. Every tree from Mendocino to Anchorage, growing in that rainforest band has green needles. And there was one coming up out of that forest. You could see it from 20,000 feet in the air in a plane. There was one golden spire and it was that tree."

Sitting at the MacLab Bistro at the Banff Center in Alberta Canada, Vaillant and I had the opportunity to talk about this incredible tree. The Golden Spruce is at the center of a film which appeared at the 2015 Banff Mountain Film Festival and sets the stage for a very complicated discussion on the importance of wildlife conservation and the sustainable management of public land. In the film Vaillant helps frame the story behind why this particular tree means so much to the Haida People and their forest home.

The story of the Golden Spruce begins in a village long since reclaimed by the shadows of the forest. It was a time of plenty, but the people were taking too much from the land. A long winter came. The village was decimated by hunger and only two people survived, a little boy and his grandfather. As they fled the village the man warned the boy not to look back. But the boy could not resist. As he turned back to take one last look his feet became rooted to the earth. The spirits transformed the boy into a tree in protest at the ways of the people. And there on the banks of Yakoun is the rare and beautiful tree with yellow needle that shine like gold in the sun.

"It was a unique quirk of nature," Vaillant said. "The Golden Spruce did actually have a golden aura, a radiance that was derived from a genetic mutation of its needle’s coloring. But for the Hida, what really makes the Golden Spruce stand out is it is the only living being that connects back to that myth time."

The Golden Spruce was sacred to the Haida People. It was a botanical mystery that was glorious to behold and as an economic driver to the region it was a much beloved tourist destination. Not unlike our own icon National Parks its location and the surrounding area were set aside to be protected and preserved. The Golden Spruce also stood as a living reminder to never again take so much from the land that we might put it at risk.

Tragically though on forest land nearby on Haida Gwaii and on public land throughout North America others trees were being cut down by the tens of thousands in industrial logging operations. Through the devastating practice of clear cutting these ancient forests were being destroyed. So in a violent act of protest meant to point out the hypocrisy of saving one tree while thoughtlessly killing many others a former logger, turn activist by the name of Grant Hadwin took it upon himself to cut down the Golden Spruce in 1997. (The Gold Bough by John Vaillant ~ The New Yorker 2002)

This story and its aftermath are the subject of the best selling book The Gold Spruce by John Vaillant and the feature documentary film by director Sasha Snow called Hadwin’s Judgement. Looking deeply into the heart and mind of a man desperate to save the forest he loves Vaillant offers up an uneasy paradox and this question. Can one atrocity an act of eco-terrorism be justified by the horrific destruction of our natural resources for short term financial gain?

Hadwin's Judgement (Trailer) from NFB/marketing on Vimeo.

The book, The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth Madness and Greed by John Vaillant is an international bestseller . Hadwin’s Judgement is the 2015 Banff Mountain Film Festival winner of the best film on Mountain Environment & Natural History. You can learn more about this incredible film and the story behind it online. Visit hadwinsjudgement.com

Our theme music is by Jake Shimabukuro. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to fans like you on Patreon. For as little as a dollar month you can support this podcast and many adventure media initiatives covered here. For details visit patreon.com/joytripproject.

Thanks for listening, but as always I want to hear from you. So please write to me with your questions comments and criticisms to [email protected]

Courtesy Sweetgrass Productions

From the opening  frames of the latest film by Sweetgrass Productions the monumental scale of the subject fills the screen. In concert with vocals and orchestra the images swell with the music in pace with the magnitude of a very controversial issue and the mountain wilderness which surrounds it. Never one to shy from the dramatic filmmaker Nick Waggoner sets the stage with meticulous care, like the conductor of a great opera. At the heart of this wonderful documentary is the age-old question: Do we develop the natural world for our own purposes, for commerce and recreation or do we keep it wild? This debate which rages in the halls of the Canadian parliament pits the interests of ski resort developers against the opposition of environmental activists and in the balance lies the fate of an ancient alpine ecosystem called Jumbo Mountain.

Filmmaker Nick Waggoner

A significant departure from his usual role as a maker of big mountain ski films Waggoner is plying his cinematic skills to tell a different kind of story. Unlike the "ski porn" movies that feature gratutitous action sequences of steep downhill descents through deep powder snow, Jumbo Wild is a film with a mission. Hoping to raise the consciousness of viewers to recognize the importance of conserving the habitat of grizzly bear and the protecting of scared land of native people Waggoner uses own passion for backcountry skiing to illustrate the intricate details of a political fight that has endured through much of his lifetime.

Jumbo Wild offers up a candid view into the controversy that has divided this mountain community in the Canadian Rockies for more than two decades. After a screening at the 2015 Banff Mountain Film in Alberta Waggoner sat down with me at the MacLab Bistro at the famous Banff Centre to share a bit of the story behind this beautifully crafted documentary.

The film Jumbo Wild from Sweetgrass Productions is now available on iTunes and Vimeo on Demand. You can learn more about Jumbo Mountain and this continuing controversy online at sweetgrass-productions.com/jumbo-wild

Our theme music is by Jake Shimabukuro. The Joy Trip Project is made possible thanks to fans like you on Patreon. For as little as a dollar month you can support this podcast and many adventure media initiatives covered here. For details visit patreon.com/joytripproject.

Thanks for listening, but as always I want to hear from you. So please write to me with your questions comments and criticisms to [email protected]

In 2009 professional sport climber David Lama declared that he would summit the great mountain in Patagonia called Cerro Torre. Known around the world as one of the most difficult alpine ascents Lama proposed to make the climb up the 3128 meter spire via the infamous and highly controversial Compressor Route. But unlike those who had successfully reached the top this young athlete then only 19 years old planed to climb using just the rock’s natural features and aided by bolts and ropes only for protection in case of a fall, a technique known as free climbing. But veteran Patagonia climbers like Jim Bridwell believed that free climbing Cerro Torre was impossible.

Adventure photographers and filmmakers give us a unique view of the world. And throughout his long career taking pictures and telling stories for major magazines Peter McBride has offered up an exciting perspective, most often from the air. When he was in his 20s he flew a World War I biplane called the Vickers Vimy from London to Cape Town to reenact the first time an airplane traveled across Africa in 1920.

"I think that really gave me an interest in the aerial perspective," he said in an interview with the Joy Trip Project. "I was able to sell it to National Geographic with some good luck and that led me into a decade of doing work for Geographic and other magazines."

Through his camera McBride has shown us images of the planet most of us can only dream of. Having chosen a profession suited to his nature he admits that his work fulfills a selfish desire.

"I guess I became a photographer more because I had an interest in seeing the world to be honest," he said. "I love photography, but I love adventures. I love exploring and I love going into the unknown."

McBride’s work in photography provides us with an eye-opening look at the planet. He gives his viewers and readers the opportunity to see the place they call home in a different way. From the high mountains of the Himalaya to the jungles of the Amazon McBride has made it possible for to people to see how they and others interact with their environment and to observe their role in the natural order of things. But it’s in his most recent body of work that McBride turns his lens back toward the place where HE grew up. Flying high above the Rocky Mountains to Sea of Cortez he has been following the course of the great North American river, The Colorado.

In a series of photo essays and feature films McBride now tells the story of the river that provides food and water for more than 10 percent of the U.S. population. The hardest working river in the world Colorado has flowed for more than 6 million years. But in the span of just a few decades its precious resources have been tapped to the breaking point.

Returning to his home in Colorado Peter McBride is raising awareness for the importance of conserving water in the west. Through his films and still photographs he illustrates the plight of the Colorado and demonstrates the impact of over development and the abuse of our most precious natural resource.

JTP:

So I think it’s fair to suggest that you have been involved in different types of photo capturing all over the world, specifically what is it that made you come back to the United States and put so much effort into telling the story of the Colorado River?

McBride:

I think I came home…I still travel a lot for work today, but I came home in part because I was a little burned out to be honest. I was telling someone just last night that I wanted to try to do something that had a little more impact than just a magazine article that somebody reads going to the bathroom or something. You know…And that’s not entirely fair. Magazine stories can chance things for sure, but I guess I just wanted to sink my teeth into something that was bigger, maybe bigger than me. And I didn’t have a really huge master plan. It sort of evolved on its…as it happened and it still is. But I came home and wanted to do something just around home and not travel a bunch. I was traveling all the time and so I had to hunker down and I came back to the valley where I grew up. My father’s a pilot and I started looking at doing some aerial work. And that led into the Colorado River project that technically took me two years. But I’ms till doing tributaries. I’m still doing rafting and I’m still talking about it. It’s an issue that’s definitely not going away and it’s going getting more and more severe.

JTP

What can you tell me about what you discovered in your travels taking pictures of the Colorado River literally from its source to what had been its course to the sea?

McBride:

Well the most alarming thing to me was just to see how developed that river is. I went into this project as a Colorado native who’s used Colorado river water my entire life. I grew up on a cattle ranch. We basically have a small heard that we do out of…we don’t even make any money, we just do it to keep open space. But we use water. I grew up swimming, fishing and boating in the river and I didn’t know much about the river downstream. What amazed me was to see the infrastructure around it is remarkable on my levels. Lake Powell I knew as a boy but Hover Dam is beyond my comprehension, the enormity of that colossal structure. And then downstream to see the Central Arizona project that take water 336 miles across the Sonoran Desert to Phoenix and Tucson, to see another Colorado aqueduct go to Los Angeles 220 miles across the desert. And the network of dams below it, the Parker Dam, Davis Dam, Morelos Dam, it’s pretty remarkable to amount of engineering. And this below that to see that river actually dry up and I could just never envision that, that could be the case. There have been some mistakes that led to this, human error in judgement on how much the river actually has on an average flow and there’s been some over allocation and over consumption. And we’ve had a little bit of a water habit in certain areas to say the least.

There were some honest mistakes. You can entirely blame people. They didn’t have the information they have now. But now we have this wildcard of climate change where everybody is saying projects are heading toward a drier Colorado River basin. We’re going to lose 5 to 10 percent they’re saying. But the biggest alarm for me was seeing that infrastructure and then below it seeing what I read this amazing estuary, the largest estuary in North America denuded to nothing, it’s just cracked earth and desert and a frothy frapachino pit as I call it at the end is where the river petered out into this muck a hundred miles shy of the sea of Cortez. And then to learn that the river for 6 million years ran to the Sea of Cortez and there hasn’t been a drop of it, not a single drop has reached the sea since 1998.

JTP:

I think what I find fascinating in this is that you describe in your narrative of your film, the Colorado River is the hardest working river. And based on what you just described it sounds to me like we had already tapped it’s resources to a pretty high degree. You mentioned adding the wildcard of climate change. It’s it at that point where human interaction has really put a big strain on the Colorado River? And if that is indeed the case, what can we do to fix that?

McBride:

I think climate change is starting to play out because we’re in the second decade of drought basically. So we’re starting to feel that effect a little bit. We’re not getting the replenished flows that we once had. It’s true. The river is…it stopped reaching the sea in 80s, but a spring flow would occasionally reach the sea, but now it’s completely dry. It never kisses the sea. And on top of that, what’s making it more alarming and more urgent is the river stores four times of its annual flow in these reservoirs, mainly Lake Powell and Lake Mead. We’ve drawn those down to less than 50 percent. So we’ve taken half our bank account away already. And now everyone’s realizing, uh-oh…those bank accounts went away pretty quickly. So now everything is starting to become more prominent.

So what can we do? Well that’s the million dollar question really. Awareness in my opinion is one. Most people have no idea this is going on. They’re totally oblivious. And then on the more practical side, we’re going to have to figure out things like cost, pay structure. Water should be free or as cheap as we can make it so everyone needs it. But we pay less…we pay more for our cell phones now, which nobody had 10 years ago really. We pay more for our cable than we do water. And it’s not water, it’s the infrastructure that gets the water to us and that’s getting more and more expensive. So we need to figure out ways to do that. We need to have more tiered structures, the less you use the cheaper it is. The more you use the more expensive etc…There’s plenty of those programs out there. We need to figure out some smart agriculture. What’s the best agriculture? Should we grow cotton in the Colorado River basin? Maybe not. We need to figure out ways to regulate that, that’s smart. I believe in supporting agriculture, but we want smart agriculture. We want smart development. We also want golf courses which makes about as much sense and are regulated as much as Ag. And we should have cities and towns that are in closed loop systems, where there’s more recycling, basically it’s the same water that dinosaurs drank. It’s dinosaur pee basically. Why should be using 2 and a half gallons to flush our waste. Maybe there are better ways out there. That would be some starts. The big giant gorilla in the room is population in the Southwest and obviously the planet. But have we hit our carrying capacity is the question I like to raise.

JTP:

So if we have not yet reached our carrying capacity moving forward into the future is there perhaps a sense of optimism that can come from your work? I think it’s pretty tragic that Colorado River ends 90 miles and more from the Sea of Cortez after having for millions of years flown all the way to sea. What can we look forward to? Where is there a sense of optimism perhaps in this story?

McBride:

That's a great question. I think there’s a lot actually James. For example when I started I didn’t know squat about the river, to be honest. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve been surprised a lot. I’ve also been impressed by the number of people who have listened and learned through my limited voice. And also there are a lot of other organizations with bigger voices doing great work. I’ve had kids come up to me and said Hey I convinced my mom to tear out our front yard. we don’t have grass any more. People are waking up and there’s a greater aware

At the age of 26 best-selling author Cheryl Strayed strapped on a backpack and hiked the Pacific Crest Trail. Over the course of 94 days she traveled from Mojave California to the Bridge of the Gods in Cascade Locks Oregon, just outside of Portland where she lives today. Four years after loosing her mother who died of cancer Strayed ventured  into the wilds of nature in order to find a part of herself she felt was missing. With absolutely now experience in backpacking she made the impulsive decision to deal with her unimaginable grief with an impossible adventure.

It goes without saying. Our world is growing bigger and more complicated everyday. Especially in our urban centers where economic and political fortunes are beginning to shift and reflect the values of a much more culturally diverse population. Despite the devastating effects failing banks and climate change there are rising many new opportunities to tap into the dynamic energy and financial resources of previously under represented members of our society. Leading the way toward positive outcomes in a brighter future is urban revitalization strategist Majora Carter.

Urban Revitalization Strategist Majora Carter

"An urban revitalization strategist, or me, is a person who identifies in particular low-income  communities and in our inner cities in the States, and looks around and sees what the problems are, what the failings are and figures out strategies to improve them both socially and environmentally as well as economically," she said in this interview. "And you have to have all three involved, because it's not just about putting band aids on these communities. It's literally about increasing the quality of life, economically, socially as well as environmentally."

Majora Carter was the keynote speaker at the biannual breakfast meeting of the Outdoor Industry Association during the 2013 Outdoor Retailer Winter Market in Salt Lake City Utah. Sharing her thoughts on strategies for urban revitalization she impressed upon those in attendance the importance of reaching out to under served communities, in particular people of color. Now that a majority of the worlds' population lives in cities it is in these urban areas where we must now strive to achieve lasting change for the benefit of humanity. Working in the South Bronx borough of New York City, Carter is putting together solid plans to make this and other communities across the U.S. into vital centers of sustainable economic growth and development while helping to protect the environment. With the creation of both green jobs and green spaces in the heart of our biggest cities Carter hopes to encourage an ethos of conservation that will serve the interests of wilderness as well.

JTP:

The bulk of your work right now is in the South Bronx (New York), now work internationally but specifically what exactly have you done to revitalize that particular urban setting?

Carter:

Sure, we literally wanted to sort of flip the script on what was considered development in our community. So much of it was actually around noxious facilities and burdensome things of that nature, power plants, etc., and we wanted to change the landscape by creating more ecologically sound development. So it started with parks and greenways. And then we even went to people and started one of the country's very first green-collar job and placement systems. Now we're moving into real estate development because we understand that you can use real estate development as a platform for social, environmental and economic change, if it's done correctly and strategically. It can be a transformation tool, which it has not been used that way before in poor communities.

JTP:

So what's the disconnect? How is it that we even need to have someone like you tell us that the spaces that we occupy perhaps as residential areas or as businesses require some type of revitalization?

Carter:

The disconnect is that there are really low expectations placed on poor communities in general. And the people that are in them, and the elected that allegedly support them, the regulators who are supposed to regulating them, that kind of dynamic has been going on for generations to the point where I think even people who live there believe it. And I used to be one of them, until I realized that wait a second, if we can create the infrastructure and supports to allow better things to grow...because no one will rise to low expectation. You can't. So if you raise the expectations and give people the tools to rise to them they can and they will.

JTP:

And apparently they do. Just looking at the slides that you showed in your presentation today, you have revitalized these communities especially when it comes to urban parks. I think that there is also an opportunity, and this is what I find fascinating, to perhaps bring industry back to these areas. Tell me a little bit about what you are doing with regard to what you described as boutique manufacturing.

Carter:

Sure, real estate development and using it as a transformational tool for our communities is front and center in my mind. It's all about increasing economic diversity in currently poor communities. And to do that you've got to create a playing field that allows the type of industries to grow in that place so that people who were not gainfully employed before with the proper training can be employed in those type of things.

So manufacturing and moving manufacturing into the 21st Century, we are never going back to where we were in the 60s in the 50s. That Golden Era is gone. We can change it. And so I think that when we looked and followed the trends of what's actually happening, boutique apparel manufacturing happening domestically because Asia is no longer the great deal that it once was. And I think we're going to be seeing a lot more of that going forward. So when we're talking about what are the specific pieces, whether it's outdoor industry manufacturers, or whether it's high-end couture, what can we bring into these communities so that the people who are actually doing this work can actually see their product, and actually get a better, in real-time, understanding about their product and do it in communities that absolutely need that kind of revitalization going on right there. And meets the core business strategy of these companies. So boutique manufacturers are absolutely the people that I want to start identifying to look at these post industrial cities as the next place for them to be locating.

JTP:

Now speaking specifically about the outdoor industry, I remember, because I've been in this business long enough to remember the days when most sleeping bags were made right here in the United States. Most technical jackets, especially those that had Gore-Tex were created right here. They've moved over to China. I'm curious to know what is it that needs to be different about those manufacturers now to reach this new model that you're describing.

Carter:

From my conversation with some folks in the outdoor industry there has to be an emphasis on quality and design. And think developing those relationships with folks that are here and raising expectations of what's going to happen is going to be really important going forward. Because I do think that we have redevelop relationships that have been lost. I'm not saying that it's going to be easy.It's not going to happen over night, but we are building the foundation for us to grow what is essentially a nascent industry in the states again. And I think if we can get the right players at the table we can get the governments, we can get the businesses who are interested in doing this thing. Let them apply corporate/social responsibility, but do it with a capital C. So that they are doing their core competencies, work with municipalities and really work with the kind of groups that want to see people employed. Then you've got something really valuable that's going to grow.

JTP:

You're not talking about philanthropic institutions here at all. You're talking about real world economic development. Now we've talked about manufacturing. What about specifically with regard to retail. We have an industry that is predominantly populated in terms of employment and in terms of consumption in frankly a white majority that's starting to shift. What can we look forward to with regard to racial diversity when it comes to the outdoor industry in particular.

Carter:

Oh, I think that when you really stop think about it the outdoor industry, much of it, is outdoor inspired fashion, which we know already has a certain level of caché within inner-city communities. But I still think that we haven't really brushed the surface in terms of really building the kind of market transformation that the folks there can really be a part of and really becoming serious customers for even much bigger and better things. I think that there's a whole host of people out there who would be interested in being consumers of stuff if it was there. It's not like poor communities don't have money to spend. They do. In and of ourselves we add an enormous amount to the GDP. I would personally prefer if they were spending money on much more healthy ways to be healthy, which is really kind of exciting to think about it. So the idea that we've not really investigated how do we explore that it seems to me that is an opportunity just aching to happen.

JTP:

What do you suppose it will take. What does the outdoor industry specifically have to do to perhaps corner that market?

Carter:

Oh! Work with people like me to come up with strategies to help make it happen. Seriously, moving people to see things in a different way. That's what you have to do. You need to know what they're looking at, know what inspires them, and then figure out ways to where what would be considered strange bedfellows can find common cause and work together. You know and it is going to be through job creation. It is going to be through audience development. It is going to be through education. And when you add all those things together then you've got market transformation that supports obviously the bottom line of a business, but also supports communities and their revitalization in ways that we have not even thought of before. And those two things together, I'm really interested in people being tax payers not tax burdens. And right now unfortunately that's what we have in our inner cities, because there is not the kind of economic diversity. There is not the kind of really deliberate strategic eco

A professional ski mountaineer for more than 13 years climber Hilaree O'Neill started out her career at a very young age. Skiing since the age of three she spent most of her early days on the many 14,000-foot peaks near where she went to school in Colorado.

"When I finished college I moved to Chamonix in France for about 5 years," she said in an interview. "And that brought in sort of the more big mountain high altitude stuff with glaciers and ice climbing and all that kind of stuff. That kind of brought all the pieces together"

In 1999 she came to the attention of the North Face pro mountaineering team. Looking for elite female athlete to round out their roster TNF connected with O'Neill at the Outdoor Retailer Show in Salt Lake City, UT. With solid climbing skills and a resume packed with ascents both North America and Europe she was just who they were they looking for.

"And three weeks later I was on a plane to the India Himalaya," she said So that was my first big expedition and from then on I was hooked!"

For more than a decade O'Neill has put in two to three trips to the Himalaya each year. And in the middle of very busy career she managed to find time to get married and give birth to two sons. As a wife and mother she's still at the top of her game as world class mountaineer. Most recently in 2012, during one of the most challenging climbing seasons ever, O'Neill made a successful ascent of Mount Everest and then climbed to the top near by Lotse another 8,000 meter peak both on the same day. On tour with the North Face speakers series O'Neill visited Madison, WI to sit down and share her story a a presentation she calls the Road Not Taken.

O'Neill:

It was a huge learning curve going from the states the Chamonix was the first big learning curve of getting into skiing with ropes and harnesses and all that kind of stuff and then going from the Alps to Himalayas was a massive learning curve going from both culturally and myself personally in the sport because all of the sudden now it was becoming more about the climbing and less about the skiing and so really had to focus on those climbing skills more than the skiing for the first time in my life. It was also about sustaining mental toughness over three four five six week periods and being out and exposed for long periods of time. You know a lot of winter camping, a lot of storms. So it was a very steep learning curve. You know I think right after India I went to Russia and spent...got stuck in a storm and spent six days in a snow cave with a bunch of Russians. You know like where am I? So yes it was a steep learning curve.

JM:

So now what motivates you to do that kind of thing. You obviously had this great opportunity, but what made you stick with it?

O'Neill:

I just love the satisfaction I get from the adventure of it. Expeditions really are different in that you can plan to the best of your abilities and it never turns out the way you planned it. There's always something new that you never expected, the climbing's harder or easier or just different. And that's the part of it I love. And I really like challenging myself. High altitude obviously is something that's always been a major draw for me and I like the simplicity of it.

JM:

So now through the course of all that you also had an opportunity to fall in love and get married and started to raise a family. You've got a husband and a family and two small boys at home. I've heard you say in previous interviews that being a parent is infinitely more difficult or more challenging a mountaineer. Well I've got to know, what is it about parenting that making is so much difficult than being a climber?

O'Neill:

Well parenting I think you are not always operating within your own decisions, your choices. A lot of what you're doing is at the need or the call of your children and it's just very different. To leave and go on a mountaineering trip you're choosing things. You have actually have some silence. You can sleep at night, you know things like that. When you're home with two super active little boys it's totally cliche to say it's the hardest job you'll ever love but it's so true. It's very difficult. It's challenging mentally. You're always worried if you're being a good parent or making the wrong decisions for your kids, or the right decisions. And when you're out in the mountains, when I'm doing this job I know it so well. A lot of the guessing game is out of it for me at this point. Where as with kids, it's a day to day thing that you're learning all the time. It's challenging.

JM:

So what's the most difficult part about being away from them for such a long period of time while you're on expedition?

O'Neill:

Right now I think it's their age.

JM:

Yeah, they're 3 and 5. They're young kids.

O'Neill:

Yeah I mean my younger son, he turned 3 while I was on Everest and at that age they just change so drastically from week to week. They're growing, their vocabulary is increasing. You know obviously previous expeditions, but they're learning how to walk, getting out of diapers, like there's these huge changes at this young of an age, so that part I find really difficult, you know missing this, missing this thing and missing that thing. For them I think actually me being away will be harder as they get older 'cause for now they don't have a great concept of time and what not. You know even for my youngest it's like I went out for dinner and came back 10 weeks laters. But as they get older it's going to be more difficult for them and right now it's more difficult for me. I think for sure.

JM:

OK you just came off of Everest and I think it's fair to that 2012 was probably one of the most challenging years on the mountain in a long time. Can you give me an idea as to what you expedition experience was like during that particular season of climbing.

O'Neill:

Well I ... It was difficult. First of all, you know if was my dream to take my skis to the top of Everest. And we figured out fairly early on that that wasn't going to happen so that was a pretty big disappointment and bringing my skis down the mountain I was like ok I totally got to readjust my thinking and just focus on climbing. The climbing was much more difficult in that there was no snow. You climbing on and ice. The majority of the summit day was on rock which is super unusual. Just speaking the Sherpas who climbed 10, 12, 14 times up the mountain had never seen conditions as poor as this. That also...being a professional climber you have some experience of crampons on rock and all that kind of stuff, but I think a lot of the guided clients, it made already difficult climbing much more difficult for them and so it slowed down everybody's paces. There was more fatigue. All that kind of stuff involved and it made it very challenging.

JM: And plus there were a lot of people there too. I think that at any one point there were as many as 600 people trying to make a summit bid this season? How was that in terms of just being able to navigate your own expedition?

O'Neill:

Ironically we had gotten to basecamp pretty early and for however it worked out most of our rotations seemed to be at opposite times of other people. A ration is when you're kind of moving up the mountain to a camp and coming down. So for me that whole part, moving up the mountain and our acclimatizing and all that felt very, like we were the only ones on the mountain. You there were definitely a thousand people at basecamp at any given time. But those times we were moving on the mountain and getting ready to go for the summit we were the only people at camp 3. We were the first people at camp 2. It was much more of a solitary experience than I expected. But because again of the weather pushing everybody basically into three days of summiting in the end of may, going for the summit was a completely different experience. We decided not to take the first window simply because we knew there would be hundreds of people going for the summit. It was going to be crazy. And we'd hoped that by going on the second window we wouldn't have that but it was still...so basically that first day there were still 300 climbers on the southeast ridge. And the day we went there were about 150 climbers on the southeast ridge.

JM: That's still a lot of people.

O'Neill:

Oh a ton of people and it was chaos. For me the most important thing about climbing at high altitude is being able to go at your own pace. And you could not do that. I found that really dangerous and frustrating.

JM:

But you were able to successfully summit, which is terrific. But you took that experience and you went with Chris Ericsson to climb Lotse the very same day.

O'Neill:

yes!

JM:

How did that go? Because frankly that's an amazing feat in and of itself. Tell me how those two experiences differed for you in terms of summiting Everest under really bad conditions and then going over across the valley to Lotse.

O'Neill:

Well like a sort of a hard fact that can kind of outline the difference a little bit is that both summit days on Everest and Lotse you're gaining about the same amount of altitude. And for Everest it took Chris and I 12 hours round trip and Lotse took 5 hours. To give you an idea of how the line of people slows you down and takes you out of your climbing game and it misses with you head and so many other effects. So for me climbing Everest was frustrating, more frustrating that anything. Then climbing Lotse was just beautiful, fabulous. The summits were very different, the climbers themselves were very different. Everest is a ridge climb with a very wide flat summit. Lotse is a coulouir so it's very consistently steep. It's one straight line that goes up and then the summit is also very steep and small. You can only fit maybe four people on the summit at any given time. So two totally different climbs. Being a skier I'm much more comfortable climbing in coulouirs than on ridges. So over all I found Lotse to be akin to the kind of cl

Veterinarian and photographer Dag Goering is the co-founder with his wife author Maria Coffey in the adventure touring business Hidden Places Travel. For many years he's worked at combining his love of travel with the care and protection of animals.

“It all started with Camels really,” he said in an interview. “I was very interested in doing longer journeys across the Sahara with the Tuaregs.”

The Tuaregs are a nomadic people who travel across the deserts of Northern Africa on caravans of camels. So Goering tried to find a way to come along.

“I thought as a veterinarian, that’s my background I could bone up on some camel medicine,” he said. “And that might make me useful.”

So he did some researched and someone suggested that he go to Bikaner in India, a desert region of Rajasthan. There he hoped to learn a few thing about camels. But he was surprised to discover that camels weren’t as popular as he thought.

“Everyone said, “well ‘Camels? Why are you interested in Camels? Camels are nasty animals.’” Goering said. “ And after working there for a couple of weeks in the clinic with camels I came to the conclusion they are indeed nasty animals.

Unfortunately, he didn't learn very much. And disappointed but not discourage Goering decided to stay in India and travel. Along the way he wound up working with a non-profit organization that does volunteer veterinary medicine for camels dogs and other animals.

“And at one point we were called out to examine this newly born elephant,” he said. “So I was in the presence of all these magnificent large animals in these stables, elephant stables, and it was such a profound experience I just came home and said Maria I just want to work with elephants!”

Making the shift from camels to elephants Goering and his wife Maria Coffey began focusing their attention on the care and treatment of elephants. Through their non profit Elephant Earth Initiative to two work now to protect the habitats of elephants in the wild and their welfare among humans in captivity the couple raise awareness for the plight elephants both in Asia and in Africa

“There are huge issues to do with the welfare of captive elephants. One of the things that we bring across  in our presentation is how captive elephants are trained, are broken and then how they're kept after that, the welfare issues about that. Most people just have no idea of the cruelty that's inflicted upon captive elephants,” Coffey said. “ And then of course in the wild, like any mega-fauna they're being hugely effected by population growth, by the loose of habitat, the growth of human elephant conflict. In many places around the world it's becoming a very big issue. Elephants are very important to us and to world as a whole. Doug and I passionately believe that we have to do what we can to help preserve them.”

I had the pleasure of meeting Goering and Coffey during the 2011 Banff Mountain Film Festival in Alberta Canada. There they had on display an amazing assortment of elephant photographs that help to tell the story behind this magnificent but endangered animal in the presentation they call Elephant Enigma.

JTP:

In your presentation I heard you say that the eye of an elephant is like looking into orb into another world. And a lot of that imagery comes out in many of your photographs. What is it about the eye of an elephant that is so transformational?

Goering:

Well it is a bit difficult to describe. I think there is a strange energy, you know elephants don't have expressive faces. They're not like dogs. Dogs can sort of grimes or smile. But elephants don't have that kind of musculature. So when you look at their faces they don't really move that much, but the eyes are more expressive. It's not like other animals' eyes. It's more like the eye of a whale if anyone has ever experienced that, I could just compare it to that. And it really is like...you just know that there's something pretty profound going on behind that. You know that there's this energy coming off of that . It seems that there are thoughts and emotions that are kind of beyond our comprehension.

JTP:

You have a complete installation here at the Banff Center. And the elephant photography that you bring to this exhibit I would imagine helps to very articulately tell the story true pictures. I wonder what it is that these images are inspired to convey. For example this is that eye of the elephant. What do we want to come away with when we see something like this?

Goering:

Well I guess the challenges is how do you convey the magnificence of an animal like that, especially such a large animal with little photographs that you put on the wall? It's a real challenge. And that's why I guess I've chosen to break it up into initially just to find one photo that felt managed to bring across that depth and that feeling that there's something behind that eye. I took a lot of photographs. It's not easy to...I took a lot of photographs of elephant eyes and before I got this one right, to give it that kind of expressive look. But I think it's really...what I wanted to show little many aspects of the elephant in the end to have to give people the imagine of the elephant, not just a visual image but an image on an emotional level.

JTP:

Maria you and I were talking yesterday about the cruelty in terms of the training mechanisms that are used to break the elephant's will in order to get them to do the things that we want them to do, but you also suggested that there are more humane alternatives. First of all, why do we need more humane alternatives and at the end of the day what do we want to ultimately have as our relationship with elephants.

Coffey:

Well I think that if anyone saw images or really found out about how an elephant is broken they would realize that there is a need an alternative. The elephant is taken away from its mother at about three years old elephants are extremely social creatures and so when they're kept in isolation it's as terrible for them as it is for us. So the little elephant is completely isolated from any other elephants. It's heavily tied up. It's not given any food or water for days on end. It's taunted. It's tortured. It's poked with sticks. Firecrackers are set off in front of it. It's a really Goering inhumane, cruel process. And the whole aim of it is to completely break the little creature. And eventually when it's broken, psychologically and physically broken then one of the keepers will give it some kindness. It's just like the Stockholm syndrome. It's the removal of abuse is seen as a kindness and that creates a bond between the prisoner and its keeper. So it's a truly horrible method of breaking an animal that is as emotionally complex as we are. So I think we can also see it in human terms. We can relate to it on that level.

JTP:

It's it indeed possible to use more humane...what kind of methods might be used instead?

Goering:

Well there are new training methods that have been around, that have been developed by, interestingly enough, by psychologists and behavioral scientists in the US since the 50s. They use basically operand training methods. What it means is it uses only positive reinforcement. Absolutely no punishment. And by doing that, you just have to be...what's important in the whole process is timing and consistency. You basically...the elephant learns that a certain word signifies that a reward is forthcoming. Or it could be a sound. It's also called clicker training in dogs. If the animal hears this click or certain cue word it knows, that's a reward in itself because it knows it's going to get a treat. Very complex actions can be broken down into small steps. And basically you train each small step. You just keep showing the animal that anything that fulfills that first small step is rewarded. So you just keep building up what can be a very complex action. But it takes time. It take consistency. But it also makes for a very health relationship between animals and humans because it's not twisted. There's no fear involved in it. And animals also enjoy it. That's another interesting aspect. They actually enjoy the challenge of learning these new things. So it's an all around win-win situation.

JTP:

So when it comes to building that relationship between elephants and humans, in your travel business when you take tourists to areas where they can interact with and visit with elephants, do you have an opportunity to demonstrate to these tourists that there is a better alternative?

Coffey:

We talk to them a lot about the issues. The different alternatives are something that we're going to be working on introducing to different parts of South East Asia. So no we can only do it through Dag explaining the methods.

Goering:

What we do is take people to places where animals are kept in a relatively traditional and humane way. In a sense we take them to for example, there's one village in Laos where elephants are basically let free over night in a forested area. So they're free to mingle with other elephants. They're free to breed wherever they want to wander and they're collected in the morning again. And nowadays very few elephants have that kind 12-hour-a-day freedom. And that's a huge positive thing, so we try to...So that's where we go. We visit this village. We do some elephant rides there, but they're not the kind of rides with a houda on the back. We do the riding on the neck which is better for elephant. But we're trying to support that village because if they don't have any monetary benefit to keeping their elephants in a traditional way, they will sell their elephants. And they'll wind up in a tourist camp with a hundred elephants that are maltreated.

Coffey:

And it's interesting in this village, because there is a long tradition of mahoutmanship there. They used to keep elephants for having them in the fields and they still do that but they started this little tourist business of taking the occasional tourist,...

This summer, I traveled across the North American west, hitting  some of the top rock climbing destinations in the country. Moab, Utah, Lake Tahoe, Yosemite and Joshua Tree … plus a quick hike through the Grand Canyon.   I trained at mountaineering in the Chugach Range of Alaska and made it safely to the summit of Mount Baker in the Washington Cascades.  Next year I’ve got an even more ambitious project -- to reach the top of Mount Denali, the highest point on the continent.    But there’s more to climbing than elevation, and some of the most challenging terrain I know is right here in Wisconsin. Devil's Lake State Park, just 40 minutes north of Madison, is home to incredible high cliffs and stone walls that are perfect for rock climbing.

"People don't realize that the southwest corner of Wisconsin had no glaciers. It's called the driftless region," Anne Hughes a friend avid local climber. "And so these valleys hills and cliffs have not been leveled out by glaciers and this particular rock that we're climbing on is the center of an old mountain range."

 

Anne is among the many climbing enthusiasts from Madison who regularly defy the misconception that Wisconsin is flat and featureless.

"These cliffs rise 500 feet off the surface of the lake," she said. "That's the center piece of the park called Devil's Lake. So people who think of the Midwest as looking like central Illinois or or I-90 going across Ohio, you know haven't been to a non-glaciated region."

People have asked me if Devil’s Lake can offer much of a challenge to someone who’s climbed snow covered mountains in Colorado or vertical walls of granite 3,000 feet high.  Actually, it’s one of the most challenging terrains I know.  The rock here is relatively smooth with very little texture – which means there’s not a lot to hang onto.  It takes incredibly strong fingers and toes, and a whole lot of balance and dexterity.  It’s like the difference between ballet and football.  You need strength and stamina to play football.  You need a whole other level of skill if you want to dance on your toes for an hour.  That's why people who learn to climb in Wisconsin climb well and go on to climb all over the world.

"I climb because I love being outside. I really enjoy the fact that it's a three dimensional sport that every move is different, every climb is different," Anne said. "Climbing the same climb is different every time. So I get strong all over my body. I like the partner relationship that is almost always involved, going out with a friend or more friends. You're literally holding their lives in your hands, which is a sobering thought. It's fun, but you're really committed to each other. You're watching each other's back, making sure that she doesn't do anything unsafe that she forgot about or just was preoccupied. And look at this environment! you're outside everyday in this beautiful place doing something that makes your strong and healthy and fun."

 

For Wisconsin Life, this is James Mills

Joy Trip Project contributions to National Public Radio programs like Wisconsin Life made possible in part with the support sponsors Patagonia, Rayovac and the New Belgium Brewing Company