Adventure in 60 Seconds: Blind Thru-Hiker, 64-Year-Old Solo Kayaks Atlantic, Hardest Adventure Race Underway

Photograph by Mark Watson, Wenger Patagonian Expedition Race. See more photos like this in our Ultimate Adventure Bucket List.

A roundup of the latest adventure news from around the web.

Triple Crown in Sight For Blind Hiker?
Expeditions News reports that blind hiker Trevor Thomas, 41, plans to attempt to thru-hike the 3,100-mile Continental Divide Trail. This will be a follow up to his successful thru-hikes of the Appalachian and Pacific Crest. So what are you doing this spring? (Expedition News)

64-Year-Old Finishes Trans-Atlantic Solo Paddle
After 99 days and 3,320 miles, hexagenarian Polish adventurer Aleksander Doba finished his solo paddle from Dakar, Senegal, to Acarau, Brazil. Others have kayaked across the Atlantic before him, but Doba is believed to have pulled off the longest-ever solo-kayaking voyage in his customized, 23-foot sea kayak. (Grind TV)

12,500-Mile All-In Trek Underway
Samuel Gardner is now 32 days into his epic hike, which includes the Triple Crown (Pacific Crest, Continental Divide, Appalachian Trails) plus one more, the North Country Trail. He hopes to finish in a year. (Adventure Journal)

Wenger Patagonian Expedition Race Surges
It may be the world’s hardest expedition race in the world’s most stunning place for adventure. And it’s happening right now. It’s also one of the trips featured on our Ultimate Adventure Bucket List. (The Adventure Blog)

Lonnie Dupre Thwarted From Winter Summit on Denali
Minnesotan explorer Lonnie Dupre had to turn back at 17,200 feet when the weather turned bad on 20,320-foot Denali. He plans to return next January to try again for the first solo winter summit of the mountain. (The Adventure Blog)

—Edited by Mary Anne Potts

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Surfing Legend Andy Irons Dies, Heat Improves Performance, Send Your Name to Space

Check in daily for a look at what we are reading in the news...

Andy Irons Death Investigated As Possible Methadone Overdose
Triple world champion surfer Andy Iron, 32, was found dead in his hotel room in Dallas yesterday, after suffering from dengue-like symptom. He was on his way home after pulling out of the Rip Curl Search competition in Puerto Rico due to his ailing health. Our hearts go out to his family. Read the article in the Adventure Journal >>

Phys Ed: Will Training in the Heat Improve Your Performance In The Cold?
Time to take your training somewhere tropical. A new study published last month by the University of Oregon looked at if competitive cyclists’ performance would improve in the cold if they trained in hot conditions. The answer was yes—the heat acclimated cyclists improved 4 to 8 percent more than the control group. Read the article in the New York Times >>

Send Your Name to Mars While Watching the New Rover Get Built
Now there's an option for those of us who love the idea of space travel, but never became an astronaut and will never be able to afford Richard Branson-styled citizen space tourism: You can send your name to space with the Mars rover with a new interactive project from NASA. If we were still in second grade, maybe that would be enough (though we'd still have the chance to grown up to be an astronaut, too). Read the story at Time.com

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Everest Gets Cell Service, Robot Pioneers Space Travel, More

Check in daily for a look at what we are reading in the news... 

Everest Gets 3G Cell Phone Service
The rooftop of the world has just been suited up with 3G cell phone service that goes clear to the summit by Ncell, a new private telecommunications company based in Nepal. Climbers currently tend to carry bulky, expensive satellite phones to communicate. Get ready for Everest summit photos popping up on Facebook. Read the New York Times article >>

NASA Robot Pioneers Space Travel (Video)
NASA will send its first humanoid robot, Robonaut 2, to the International Space Station on the Discovery shuttle departing this week. R2 will spend the next decade doing scientific research and mundane tasks. If it does well, it will graduate to Space Station chores such as vaccuming, cleaning filters. See a video in the Guardian >>

Why Do the Bike-Loving Dutch Refuse to Wear Helemts?
The Netherlands boasts the world's highest per capita use of bicycles. And yet only .1 percent of cyclists wear helmets, compared to 38 percent in the U.S. Read the Wall Street Journal article >>

 

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Travel Apps Reviewed, Banff Kicks Off, Chupacabra Decoded

Check in daily for a look at what we are reading in the news...

Mobile Travel Guides Can Help, But Trust Books
The New York Times looks at what’s working and what’s not in mobile travel apps. Read the article >>

Banff Mountain Festival Kicks Off
Well, if you are reading this, you are probably not headed out to arguably the best adventure festival around. But you can look at the schedule—which includes our friends Andrew Skurka, Gretel Ehrlich, Greg Mortensen, Alex Honnold, and Timmy O’Neil—and imagine asking your favorite adventurers how they made a life out of doing what they love. Don't worry, our National Geographic scouts will bring back all kinds of great new adventure tales for all of us. Learn more >>

Chupacabra Science: How Evolution Made a Mythical Monster
Just in time for Halloween, scientists say they can explain what the mythical blood-sucking monster really is…. Read the National Geographic News story >>

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Goat Vs. Man; Next-Gen Parkour; Moo-bile Tech in Africa

Check in daily for a look at what we are reading in the news...

Goat Vs. Man
New York Times writer Tim Egan comments on the recent incident in Olympic National Park where a mountain goat—an herbavoire, even—gored an experienced hiker and lorded over him while the man bled to death. Egan suggests our natural balance is broken. Read the article.

Next-Gen Parkour
Wired.com looks at parkour’s all-stars, including founders Danny Belle and Sebastien Foucan, to show how next-gen parkour incorporates bikes, inline skates, and skateboards in the hands of action sports aficionados. See the gallery.

Moo-bile Tech in Africa
The winner of Apps 4 Africa, the country’s first mobile application contest has been announced. The app, iCow, helps farmers maximize bovine breeding potential by tracking the fertility cycle of their animals. The competition was aimed at getting top local developers together to find useful solutions with smartphone technology. Read the article.

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Surfers Witness Indonesia Tsunami, Iran Hikers Get Trial, Everest Guide Lost in Slide

Check in daily for a look at what we are reading in the news...

Australian Surfers Witness Indonesia’s Tsunami
With death and injury tolls rising, Indonesia's aid workers continue to deal with the aftermath of the volcanic eruption, earthquake, and tsunami that each hit in separate parts of the country over the past few days. A few Australia surfers were anchored off the Mentawai Islands when the tsunami hit. Here’s their account.

Trial Approaching For American Hikers Detained in Iran
Note to self: Do not even think of hiking anywhere near Iran. Some 16 months after three American hikers were jailed on spying suspicions after straying from Kurdistan into an unmarked border with Iran, a trail date could be set for early November. Only the two men, Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer, will be tried. Fellow hiker Sarah Shourd was released earlier this fall on humanitarian grounds. Read the article at CNN.com.

Veteran Everest Guide Lost in Avalanche
Few will see the summit of Everest ever, let alone 19 times. Last weekend legendary climber Chhewang Nima Sherpa was swept off Baruntse in an avalanche while setting ropes for commercial climbers. Search & Rescue efforts could not locate the Sherpa. Read more on Gadling.com.

Adventure in 60 Seconds: Ultraraces, an Uber-Climber, and the Mother of Paleontology

By Tetsuhiko Endo

The problem with many adventurers is that they don’t know when to say when. Climbed Everst? Why not climb it without supplementary O2? You like to ski and BASE jump? Try combining the two, and why not add a wingsuit for kicks? You might call this the Mallory Paradox, named for the man who’s reason for obsessively trying to climb Everest was simply “because it’s there.” Well, folks, the challenge is always there, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you should take it.

Questions of advisability aside, runners of all ages put the Mallory Paradox to practice this week when, in an apparent ode to all those “when I was your age stories.” They ran a marathon up Mt. Lemmon, near Tuscon, Arizon, starting at 3,000 feet above sea level, ending at 8,000 feet above sea level and, you guessed it, going uphill the entire time. As the New York Times reported, “They did it for the bragging rights, for the challenge, for the health benefits, for the pure absurdity of it all.” In other words, “because it’s there.”

Daredevil Skydiver Felix Baumgartner Grounded By Lawsuit

By Tetsuhiko Endo; Photograph by Luke Aikins/Red Bull Photofiles

Felix Baumgartner’s attempt to break Joe Kittinger’s 50-year-old record for the highest successful skydive has hit what could prove to be a terminal snag today, as his sponsors, Red Bull have issued a statement calling an immediate halt to the Red Bull Stratos program. The announcement comes after months of hype and delays for what was increasingly seen as a shining example of privately-funded space exploration. The idea was to take the career skydiver, who likes to call himself “The God of the Sky,” up to an altitude of 120,000 feet in a modified helium balloon, and drop him out in hopes that he would break the sound barrier—and also survive. Despite the obvious dangers of such a mission, it wasn’t the logistics that brought an end to the project, it was the litigation.

Update: One of Three American Hikers Jailed in Iran Released

By Alyson Sheppard

After 410 days in jail, Sarah Shourd—one of three American hikers imprisoned in Tehran on espionage charges—was released this morning on $500,000 bail. According to her lawyer, she was on her way to the Swiss Embassy for protection, but where she will go from there is still unclear. Her family has requested she be allowed to return home to the United States because Shourd has medical problems including precancerous cervical cells and lumps in her breast. She was not receiving medical treatment while in prison.

Last week, Iranian officials announced Shourd would be released to mark the end of Ramadan, but the judiciary called it off. It is uncertain why this decision was reversed and her release granted. The judiciary said the other two American hikers, Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, would need to stay in jail for at least two more months for their “pretrial detention.”

Shourd, 31, Bauer, 28, and Fattal, 28, were arrested on July 31, 2009 after supposedly crossing the Iranian border during a recreational trek in the Kurdistan mountains of Iraq. They have been held in mostly solitary confinement at Evin Prison since then, reportedly having no access to a lawyer or doctor and little contact with the outside world. In May, their parents were allowed visitation. This summer, Amnesty International, President Barack Obama, and others demanded the hikers’ immediate release because they have yet to face a criminal trial.

Read the New York Times story here.

Adventure in 60 Seconds: K2 Speed Summit, Teen Rock Climber, Research Shows Ditching Tech Helps Relax

Text by Tetsuhiko Endo

Just when we thought another scene of Karakoram climbing had entered the history books, Austrian Christian Stangl surprised the world with a solo, speed summit of K2 this week. In a single, 70-hour push (with one rest and an emergency bivouac), he went from base camp to peak and back to base camp. Upon returning he told Explorersweb.com: “If mountain climbing were as the last 70 hours here at K2, I would immediately stop.” For more classic meditations on K2 climbing, check out the entire report.

And while the men dominated the mountains, it was the boys who ruled the crags. Fifteen-year-old French wunderkind Enzo Oddo has repeated Chris Sharma’s generation defining route Realization, reports Climbing Magazine. The route is famous for being the first one to unequivocally carry the grade of 5.15a. Climbers have since topped out on harder routes, but it will always be the first, and among the most respected in the world of sport climbing.