Ms. Jewell has her first headache.

A group called the Southern Forest Watch has filed a lawsuit against the National Park Service for its introduction of a backcountry camping fee in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

A couple of years ago I wrote in defense of this fee.

I don’t feel the same anymore.

The state of Tennessee needs to get out of the way of the Park Service and allow an entrance fee. Considering how many vehicles enter that park from the Volunteer State’s testament to all things garish, Gatlinburg, the state itself should consider creating a fund to cover at least a portion of what would be collected if a fee was put in place.

The Smoky Mountains backcountry is occupied almost exclusively by locals. The vast majority of those who visit the system’s most traffic-rich park rarely venture more than 50 yards from their vehicle, unless it’s to get frozen yogurt or approach a mother bear and her cubs.

The majority of trail maintenance and upkeep is done through a supportive collection of advocacy groups and now their efforts are being rewarded with a $4/night fee. For folks who have been backpacking in this highly under-rated wilderness for nothing more than the time it took to complete a small form at the trailhead, it’s much more about the principle of the fee than its amount.

Still, with fees come logistics, reservations and without doubt, increases.

The bottom line is that its absurd to charge backpackers a fee when without an ounce of equivocation, the majority of park upkeep costs stem from having to accommodate a perpetual stream of food-stained mini-vans and ear-splitting Harley Davidson riders who think everyone else within a ten-mile radius wants to hear them coming.

image from nps.gov

I’ve been to enough wilderness medicine courses, backcountry hotspots and generally interact with enough dirtbags to know that in the trenches of the outdoor adventure sect, somewhere around where dreadlocks start to appear below the shoulder on white people, that REI is looked upon as some sort of cutthroat, outdoor product body snatcher, an unholy, ever-present strip-center testament to everything the outdoor spirit doesn’t embody.

Well, I’d like to exorcise those demons. And here are five vindications for the great unwashed who preach such nonsense (I’m talking about people who literally don’t ever wash) to consider the next time they land at the trailhead with a broken french-press or shattered headlamp.

#1: Locations just about everywhere
Any business with a ubiquitous major market presence, like Cheesecake Factory or Ross, is automatically lumped into the imaginary “big business” cabal sent from planet Deep Pockets to plunder precious pot and beer money from the change-purses of poor, van-dwelling rock climbers broken down along CA 395. (Somehow Apple and Starbucks dodge this stereotype.) Look kids, market presence is a good thing. REI’s ability to lease space close to the Wal-Marts and terrible taco chains of the world means that when you forget something, you probably won’t have to go too far to get it. I see last minute and emergency shoppers in my Vegas REI every time I’m there. (I don’t need to ask, but the odor and climbing capris are usually evident enough indicators.) However, if you leave Denver proper and don’t discover you need a can of fuel until you’re rockies deep into the mountains, well then have fun paying Grand Lake mark-up on your IsoPro.

#2: Whatever you need
We gear nerds have some unique needs. Like titanium sporks and tent footprints for a Big Agnes Fly Creek UL2. (Although anyone silly enough to pay what’s charged for tent footprints anywhere shouldn’t be complaining about price. Ever.) I love small locally-owned gear shops. Many of them have stuff that is of much higher quality than what REI’s primary demo is willing to lift from the rack. Like, serious mountaineering garb and aid climbing gadgets. However, many of them just don’t have the shelf space for the goofy gear amenities a lot of us have been suckered into thinking we need, like those folding butterfly chairs. Once it becomes part of our pack’s standing inventory, we’ll find a reason to bring it along. And thank you REI, for having it in stock when we leave it in the garage.

#3: Return policy
Just as every manager of a highway-exit hotel chain location is cursing the day Holiday Inn Express made us all believe a night’s stay must include a waffle maker and rubbery half-moon omelets folded over some lukewarm cheese product, every other outdoor gear store in the industry laments the day REI’s return policy became the baseline for adequate customer service. Absolutely people abuse its magnanimous take-back strategy, but if it was eroding the co-op’s revenue, limits would be put in place. Fact is, it’s super gracious of the company to do so. And lest we forget, all those returns get fed right back to the hungry gear-buying public come quarterly garage sales, which are way safer for discounted gear than meeting some sketchy dude in jean shorts from Craigslist in back of a CVS to buy his “used-once” 20° down bag. (Shudder.)

#4: It’s a Co-Op
Take that, corporate America. All the anti-Wall Street 99%ers should take themselves a quick lesson in business operating structures before assailing the nation’s largest retail organization of its kind. It was started by a bunch of mountain climbers who held the same belief about business that most of its modern-day detractors currently espouse. That little $20 piece of flat plastic members keep in their wallets actually means something. Co-ops are considered by the conscious capitalism set as the answer for big business tyranny. It’s a clearly transparent organization (try uncovering the contact information of Apple’s board members) that also gives tens of millions every year to environmental causes.

#5: The dividend
Yep, fully aware that it goes right back into the next pair of Smartwool socks or Prana flannel. But that makes it a rolling investment. Spend a lot one year and your dividend goes up. Larger dividend, the more spent next year. There is without question some bonafide retail marketing ju-ju going on here, as your very presence in the store with money in hand pretty much scripts in blood that you’ll spend more than what’s on your mailer. Every other gear retailer sounds the sale alarm come early spring to coincide with REI’s annual give-back. Backcountry.com, Moosejaw.com, Altrec.com and Campmor all hop on the 20% off bandwagon. Like Super 8 does with the dry cereal and weak coffee.

So quit bitching people, REI is more than worthy of our business. And if you’re lucky enough to have nearby a local outfitter with tons of beta on what’s out back, then awesome, there’s a lot to be said for those guys. And by all means, give them your business. I do, every chance I get.

Just remember though, no one’s out to get you. They just want to get you outdoors.

At no point ever during the set up of a “400-foot free fall pendulum rope swing between a slot canyon” should you utter the words, “We’re working with what we got.”

Tip of the beanie to Adventure Journal.

Lindsey Vonn is as physically captivating as she is athletically accomplished.

Considering just how great a skier she is, that’s saying a lot. So why isn’t that enough?

But let’s not kid ourselves, her looks matter. A lot. (Just ask Google.)

If for no other reason than to celebrate the athletic body over the mop handle-thin runway figure, I’m all for seeing the bodies of athletic women revealed in sweaty sauna room photo shoots and against the pocked brick walls of a hipster loft above some affluent ski town’s craft cider bar. However, what does that do for the athlete other than drag her into yet another droll, pop-culture debate about whether she’s really good or just really hot?

Those in the know, know. Those who glean world news from magazine cover shots and 64-point headlines in Aerial Black simply have yet another woman in sports known for being a pretty good skier but more importantly, for how she looks in ski boots and a sports bra. And without fail, she’ll be condescendingly propped up by the fascinatingly vacuous entertainment news world with vacant turns of phrase like “Girl is in shape” and “She’s single guys!”

Does this kind of exposure advance the cause of promoting women’s fitness or only further weigh it down? What’s it do for the great female athletes who don’t resemble the heroine in a Frank Frazetta painting?

We simply can’t help but reduce our best women into sex symbols. Sure, she’s making the most of her opportunities. She’s smart. Ms. Vonn knows athletic prowress fades and injuries haunt every gate. Get what you can, when you can. Certainly there are more than enough editors, producers and sponsors to help you do that.

I can tell you this, the more half-nude cover shots (sigh) the iconic Lindsey Vonn does, the less of a chance she’s going to have of being accepted by the guys. At least by the guys that matter.

On that note, why does it matter if she can compete against the guys? Ultimately, I don’t see the point. The more often we juxtapose women against men the wider the divide becomes. Billy Jean King wiped the court with a loudmouth chauvinist decades ago and yet, we’re still in the same place, aren’t we? Every great female athlete does not have to be turned into someone else’s cause.

The best male skiers know exactly what she’s capable of. Her trainers, coaches and ski circuit writers know what she can do. Why do we have to dumb-down accomplishment for the sake of a vapid pop-culture cover story? It seems to me that we’re growing ever more desperate to ensure those who don’t matter understand what’s being talked about. Far too much time is spent contributing to the din of the unsophisticated.

I could see it now: Red Bull sponsors it. ESPN2 covers it. And Outside blogs about it. She wins or loses. Either way, we’ll still never know who’s better. But it sure will garner a lot of tweets. It just won’t do much for the acceptance of women as equal athletes.

Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe some aspiring young skier can see through the rouge and cover art exclamation marks and envisions herself on the podium wearing gold, not sprawled across a cat track in a two-piece. If even one young girl is inspired to that level of greatness, maybe that’s enough. Provided of course, that’s the intent of what’s happening today.

Now look to the window, and could we darken the eye liner a bit?

This is normally something I’d strongly oppose but there is a strong argument in allowing the Navajo & Hopi the same form of commercial access to the canyon as the fed has, given how we acquired the canyon. I’ve seen portions of their lands and lifestyle. It’s a rough life. Clearly, some decorum would be appreciated. The tram’s a bit much.

Scott Secco – 2012 Demo Reel from Scott Secco on Vimeo.

 
The Stuff Sack is a week’s worth of Internet cool about gear, adventure travel and outdoor pursuits.

Adventure filmmaker Scott Secco made a mountain bike demo reel. And we should be glad he did. I love to ride dirt. Like most who do and also work nine-to-five, I don’t get enough time to do it. Then, I see films like the one above, films with hours of stoke packed into a few minutes. This is well beyond capturing stuff to share with buddies on the local bike group message boards. No, this is a filmmaker in love with his subject, telling us all about it, like a kid who just got home from school with his first A.

Highest resolution shot to date of Machu Picchu. Go ahead, zoom in on all 16 gigapixels of one of the most hiked-to destinations on the planet. Once you think you can’t peer in any closer, your screen resolution defrosts and you realize the guy in the stripped shirt has kind of a belly, is wearing Nikes and his shoelaces are black. Oh, and his buddy in the red bucket lid is taking pictures of pink flowers. Incredible. Try not to waste five minutes.

Desert Air: Earth Captured from a Paraglider. In contrast to the bugeye level view of the Machu Picchu supershot, this aerial portfolio of rare locations was captured from a paraglider to show us the beauty found in vast, exotic landscapes. Sure, it’s a “forest through the trees” message; but who cares? It works beautifully.

Boston Harbor is home to a man in a canoe. Michael Richard Smith has spent the last several weeks paddling around Boston Harbor in a 14-foot canoe, sleeping on docks and tethered next to multi-million dollar yachts. He insists he isn’t homeless and appears quite lucid about his living arrangements. The cool thing is that despite people calling the authorities about him, he’s perfectly within his rights and the Coast Gaurd is letting him be. Float on.

The Stuff Sack is a week’s worth of Internet cool about gear, adventure travel and outdoor pursuits.

A Restless Transplant: Found this on Adventure Journal. It’s the story of a guy who’s doing what most of us want to do but can’t. Or have convinced ourselves we can’t. It’s the ongoing ramblings of Foster Huntington, a guy from NY who said “I’m done here.” and took off in a VW to see what the country had to offer instead. Turns out, quite a bit. Give it a bookmark.

Topo Designs. I’m a bag man. (Sounds cool, right?) No, not that guy, just someone who likes duffels, packs and sacks. (Don’t do it.) These guys in Colorado are making some practical and creative places to put things and I’m down for one for one those Klettersacks.

Waiting for Lightening is the movie about the guy who jumped the Great Wall of China on a skateboard. Not Fonzi; Danny Way. I read about it when it happened, somewhere on the fringes of the news. I’m not sure why I passed by it at the time. But a good documentary should give you reason to pause, something to consider. Judging by the trailer, there’s more to this guy than I care to concern myself with the first time around. I’m in.

The State I Hate is an enjoyable tirade of admitted prejudice and then self-actualization confessed by a West Coast surfing snob who learned to love — well, tolerate — Florida’s surf culture, the very culture where I learned to surf. It’s a solid essay from the January, 2013 issue of Surfer.

The Center for Biological Diversity reports that “Without federal protections, wolves in Wyoming’s vast “predator” zone can be freely shot, snared or trapped; killed from aircraft; and pursued on four-wheelers and snowmobiles. Wolf pups may be killed in their dens.”

The four-wheeler part sounds fair. I mean, wolves are pretty fast.

Evidently there may be a link between Five Hour Energy and the deaths of 13 people. If found to be true, I wouldn’t be totally surprised that a small bottle of an unregulated liquid intended to catalyze your adrenal system marketed heavily to those who frequent remote truck stops and half-lit 7 Elevens in the middle of the night tends to have an unfavorable effect on your ticker.

And another thing, if so much of America is hopped up on something intended to give us more energy, why the hell are we still in a recession?