The greatest rewards come when you choose to get off the beaten path and build a personalized hike that mixes challenge and fun at whatever level works for you. Read More...
I went looking for a long-distance hike in the midwest and found the 225-mile Katy Trail. No time like the present to try out my first thru-hike! Read More...
600 miles of trail and it's not the Long Trail or the AT! Sure, it's got some rough spots, but it's a nice taste of something different when you want to cover some mileage in the northeastern U.S. Read More...
We entered at Benchmark (on the South Fork Sun), exited at Silvertip (on the Spotted Bear), and had the time of our lives over a few relaxing days while making long miles in a packraft on the South Fork. Read More...
Father and son float trip in the lowlands. Experience Ryan Jordan's wild ride through skeeters and heat exhaustion, including running low on key supplies. Or... not. Read More...
The summer of 2008 got Backpacking Light's Wilderness Trekking School off to a great start. We ran three trips in three wildly different locations: Northern Rockies, Pacific Northwest, and Desert Southwest. Each allowed for a unique experience and permitted us to focus on the core curriculum of the Wilderness Trekking format. Read More...
On the Haute Route, a 21-pound pack is over-inflated. At sixty-two well-used years, I submitted myself to random weight checks to remain sub-twenty pounds and passed most of them. Making the formula feasible are the huts and hotels which always appear just when you've had enough. Read More...
With dozens of peaks above 6,000 meters (nearly 20,000 feet), Peru’s Cordillera Blanca range is one of the highest, most rugged sections of the Andes, and the most heavily glaciated of any mountains in the planet’s equatorial zone. It is a well-known mountain climbing destination, and hundreds of kilometers of hikeable trails have made the range increasingly popular among trekkers. Read More...
Stretches of the Madison River can be described as a "booze cruise," where innertube flotillas of relaxing college students and drift boats of fly-fishers fill the river. The Bear Trap canyon isn't one of those stretches, especially during spring snowmelt. Read More...
Packrafts open up the lunatic fringe of National Parks. We hiked into the Aniakchak Caldera and Surprise Lake to packraft down the Aniakchak to the Pacific Ocean. Read More...
John Muir will be forever linked with the High Sierra and California, but it was far from there that his life began, in the little coastal town of Dunbar on the southeast coast of Scotland. Read More...
Loch Lomond and the Trossachs, situated in the southwestern Highlands, is Scotland's first national park, encompassing a beautiful area of mountains, forests, rivers, and lochs surrounding Loch Lomond itself, the largest lake in Britain. Read More...
The Cairngorm Plateau consists of bare, stony undulating terrain and can seem benign in clear, summer weather. However it's edged with cliffs and steep slopes, and poor visibility is common as clouds sweep across the slopes. Join Chris Townsend as he crosses the Plateau on a freezing winter day. Read More...
Ryan Jordan and Bill Stadwiser explore the Bear Trap Canyon Wilderness (the nation's first BLM-managed Wilderness Area) by foot and packraft. Read More...
Carol Crooker exposes the insanity of Bretwood Higman and Erin McKittrick. Three pounds of shared sleeping quilt for minus 30 degree weather?! Read More...
Wise Women Jean (from 20 to 13 pound base weight) and Sue (14 to 9 pound base weight) put their new lightweight gear to the test in the field. Read More...
Jean and Sue select and test lighter gear from a dizzying array of choices while receiving an avalanche of expert advice - which they accept with trepidation, reject, or take on wholeheartedly - all the while listening to their own self-wisdom gained in their six (or near six) decades of life experience. Read More...
BPL subscriber, Al Shaver, didn’t break the JMT speed record for an unsupported hike without resupply, but his account may inspire you to try. Read More...
Long distance hikes have a unique character. BPL editor, Don Wilson, shares his perspectives on gear, technique, clothing and philosophy following a lightweight, 6-week section hike of the PCT. Read More...
BPL subscriber, Al Shaver, will attempt to break the JMT speed record for an unsupported hike without resupply. He starts on the full moon, September 7th. Read More...
The first in a series of three articles chronicling the experiences of hiking buddies Jean and Sue as they begin on the journey to lightweight backpacking. Read More...
Perspectives from the Black Forest Trail in Pennsylvania, with commentary on gear and techniques to stay warm in a hammock with less than five pounds of gear. Read More...
Perspectives from the field, with commentary on gear and technique from a 10k high camp near Mount Humphries with less than five pounds of gear. Read More...
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