Despite my yoga-and-yogurt appearance, I’ve mountaineered, dog sledded, hot air ballooned, snow shoed, snow boarded, fly-fished, kayaked, rafted, barged, canoed, surfed, swum with dolphins and ridden horses, mules and camels. I have an advanced open-water diver certification and double-jointed elbows that unnerve my rock climbing partners. I also worked a hiking guide, before being sidetracked into journalism by the University of Washington Daily, which I edited in 1996.
My first scuba article won a Lowell Thomas bronze in 2007 for adventure writing.
Calm as a Hurricane’s Eye
Winner of the Lowell Thomas bronze, 2007, adventure writing
Road and Travel: Everything in Honduras is slow, slow as I’ve never experienced. Heat leaches muscle fiber, skeletal strength and all ambition. Coral sand grits under my bare feet, after the espadrilles unlace. Even the lightning pulses long and lazy on the ocean’s horizon.Tropical diving downshifts yet another gear, if such a thing is possible.
Eyeball to eyeball with Canada’s migrating salmon
BBC Travel: My brain froze as I submerged into the cold water of British Columbia’s Shuswap Lake. But the discomfort paled as I watched sockeye salmon – hundreds of cherry-tinted fish with moss-green heads – turn overhead like a kaleidoscope. At the end of an epic 4,000km journey, they were waiting to swim the final leg upstream to spawn and die.
Ride Out the Coronavirus in Your Backyard, Not the Backcountry
Sierra: Residents in gateway communities ask visitors to stay home
Surfing the Wild Pacific Rim
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Tofino – halfway up Vancouver Island’s west coast – is one of the world’s premier cold-water surf sites. Squeezed into wetsuits, hoods and booties, the locals ride year-round. Even during a winter storm surge.
Wild and wicket: extreme croquet
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Players take a genteel picnic pastime into all-terrain overdrive, hacking across rotten logs and mole holes.
How One Man’s Obsession Created the Edmonds Underwater Park
Scuba Diving Magazine: Bruce Higgins created a movement of divers that transformed a Seattle-area patch of sand into a beloved dive site. Read the web-version.
AARP’s Guide to Washington’s Olympic National Park
Emerald wilderness, ancient trees, eagles, orcas and limited wi-fi
7 Scenic Days Hiking the Amalfi Coast
Afar: This weeklong journey spans Naples, Capri, and the Amalfi Coast, complete with cliffside stays and superb local specialties like pizza and limoncello.
A Look Under the Hood
Cold-water divers explore Puget Sound’s jade underbelly
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: I grew up on the coast of Puget Sound, galloping along drift logs and squelching across mud flats. Yet the inland ocean remained a cipher: a reflecting pond for the snow-shadowed mountains. Now I’ve plunged through the looking glass.
5 Ways To Be Frigid In Alaska
Travelgirl, photos and text: Like many cheechakos (newbies to the north), I’d had a sort of Glacial Age impression of cold weather in the Land of the Midnight Sun. Come fall, the freeze descends, trapping musky hermits in a sheet of ice, right? Then the survivors huddle up with homebrew and sled dogs, gazing at Russia’s balmier shores like eagle-eyed Sarah Palin. I did not expect to swim. Outside. In September. Paddling the Inside Passage.
This 7-Day Jordan Trek Pairs Trails with Stylish Stays
Afar: Hike through Jordan’s ancient cities, stargaze in a premium desert camp, and watch the sunset from the shores of the Dead Sea.
Messing Around in Boats
Road and Travel: A British narrowboat excursion certainly ranks among a few of the world’s favorite things, along with raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens.
13 Truly Wild Outdoor Experiences at Hotels Around the World
Marriott Bonvoy Traveler: With activities ranging from falconry and aqua yoga to diving shipwrecks and desert stargazing, here are outdoor experiences at hotels around the globe to amp up your next vacation
Skimming the Surface
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: The [four-person racing kayak] arrows across the lake. The glide is like that of a rope swing, except it goes on and on, and we never splash land. Caught in the midsummer night’s dream of it all, I find the sport irresistible.
The Best Small Ship Cruise for Wildlife in Alaska
Afar: UnCruise’s floating basecamps offer rare and intimate views of the state’s iconic animals, including whales, bears, salmon, and eagles.
Takin’ it to the Streets
Seattle Post-Intelligencer: In full scrimmage, they weave like alley cats, grind together like monster trucks, freeze into track stands: perfectly balanced on the pedals and as still as the Space Needle. Insanely agile, they’re also street players – all rollies and hoodies on thrashed, chopped, thrift-store cycles. Urban bike polo. So gritty. So graceful. The mix deserves its own word: grungelegant, perhaps.
The Ultimate Arizona Guide for Adventure-Seekers
Afar: Explore Arizona’s caves, trails, and skies with this 7-day outdoor itinerary.