Outdoors

A Celestial Event: �� Eclipse Glasses

Anonymous — Tue, 16 Jul 2024 06:00:00 +0000

A Celestial Event: �� Eclipse Glasses Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 07/16/2024 - 00:00

Christie Sounart

�� Boulder alumni, staff, donors, parents and friends around the country took part in the April 8 solar eclipse viewing with special ��-themed eclipse glasses. Whether they were gazing at a full or partial eclipse, the moment brought awe and reflection.

“My son starts �� next fall, and it was really cool to wear the �� glasses together,” said Michael Woods (MechEngr’94) of Allen, Texas. “The eclipse was an amazing experience. The whole thing literally brought a tear to my eye.”

Elizabeth Eger (Comm, Engl’06; PhDComm’18) in Austin, Texas (top left), Margaret Mracek and Valerie Johnson in Somerset, New Jersey (top middle),�� Boulder Donor Relations team in Boulder, Colorado (top right), Michael Woods (MechEngr’94) and son Fischer in Allen, Texas (bottom left), Margaret Arreola’s daughter in Golden, Colorado (middle center), George Kiteley (MusEdu’66; MMus’68) (middle right), Katy Kotlarczyk, Vice Chancellor for Advancement, and her daughter in Boulder, Colorado (bottom right)

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Photos courtesy Elizabeth Eger, Margaret Mracek and Valerie Johnson, �� Boulder Donor Relations, Michael Woods, Margaret Arreola, George Kiteley and Katy Kotlarczyk

�� Boulder alumni, staff, donors, parents and friends around the country took part in the April 8 solar eclipse viewing with special ��-themed eclipse glasses.

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How Michael Washington is Uncovering Nature in L.A.

Anonymous — Tue, 16 Jul 2024 06:00:00 +0000

How Michael Washington is Uncovering Nature in L.A. Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 07/16/2024 - 00:00

Kiara Demare

A decade after graduating, Michael Washington (Jour’12) longed for the outdoor community he had found at �� Boulder. In 2022, he left his career in the music industry to become founder and CEO of Usal, a community-based program helping Los Angeles residents participate in unique outdoor activities, workshops and trips. Usal hosts about 20 to 30 events per month, including woodturning, astronomy, fly-fishing, foraging, surfing and cooking.

How did you come up with the idea for Usal?

I felt there was a missing link between people who wanted to get into outdoor hobbies and activities, and a place for them to go. A group setting didn’t exist that felt safe, accessible and approachable, while also providing resources and education on how to learn to do those types of outdoor activities and experiences.

Where does the name come from?

It’s a place near and dear to my heart: Usal Beach is a dispersed beach campground at the southern tip of the coast in Northern California that I would go to from time to time. It inspired me a lot, especially when trying to figure out my next career move.

How did your time in Boulder influence Usal’s creation?

Having those four years in Boulder was crucial. I was given the opportunity to explore and be curious — both in a social sense with meeting new people, and also adventuring in the foothills of the mountains. As I grew my career in Los Angeles, I began to lose my connection to nature. Thankfully, I made a point to find it again when I realized how important it was to me.

Where do you see Usal in five years?

The obvious thing I think about is growth. Growth to me is being able to offer what we do to more people and taking what we do here in Los Angeles and bringing that to another location.

Any final thoughts?

Before anything and everything else, this endeavor feels very true to the person I am and the person who I want to continue to be. I think stumbling over the past 10 years — coming out of college and trying to understand what that means — were important steps to feeling competent and learning what interests me, what excites me and what fulfills me. All those steps led me to eventually leave the music industry to start Usal at age 32. It’s finally coming together.

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Photo courtesy Usal Project

A decade after graduating, Michael Washington (Jour’12) longed for the outdoor community he had found at �� Boulder. In 2022, he left his career in the music industry to become founder and CEO of Usal, a community-based program helping Los Angeles residents participate in unique outdoor activities, workshops and trips.

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Robot Stuffies, Hypersonic Flight and Dinosaurs

Anonymous — Mon, 11 Jul 2022 06:00:00 +0000

Robot Stuffies, Hypersonic Flight and Dinosaurs Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 07/11/2022 - 00:00

Outdoor Exposure Benefits During Pandemic

Those with exposure to green spaces during 2020 reported lower depression and anxiety levels than those with fewer green spaces in their neighborhoods, according to a �� study published in March 2022. Researchers also found that a third of people spent more time outdoors than they did pre-pandemic. “This research shows how critical it is to keep parks and green spaces open in times of crisis,” said senior author Colleen Reid, geography assistant professor in the Institute for Behavioral Science.

Robot Stuffies for Storytelling

Ordinary stuffed animals enhanced with human-computer interaction technology can help young children’s storytelling, according to scientist Layne Hubbard (CompSci’15; PhD’21). Hubbard and �� Boulder researchers found that many children aged four to five were comfortable telling a detailed story to a toy animal that asked them questions. Hubbard hopes to eventually partner with toy companies to create more educational products. “There’s no denying that our human-human interactions will always be the most important,” Hubbard told �� Boulder Today. “But toys let us do different things. They allow us to get messy with our ideas.”

Advancing Hypersonic Flight

A five-year, $7.5 million grant from the Department of Defense will help �� Boulder advance hypersonic flight research. Aerospace engineering professor Iain Boyd — also director of ��’s Center for National Security Initiatives — is leading the effort on campus. The grant will go toward investigating an unknown-but-disruptive plasma that forms when suborbital vehicles travel at hypersonic speeds.

Heard Around Campus

“Just the other day I saw a little kid, probably in preschool, walk up to that dinosaur and her mouth just fell open.”

— Jaelyn Eberle, �� Museum of Natural History curator of fossil vertebrates, when discussing the final days visitors could visit the Triceratops skull on campus. The fossil moved back to its permanent home at the Smithsonian in May after more than 40 years at ��.

Sustainability at �� Boulder

2,900

Tons of recycling and compost diverted from landfills

170

Zero Waste events produced on campus

2.7 million

student RTD bus trips

600+

hours spent during football season sorting waste into compost and recycling after home games

86%

of Folsom Field waste diverted from landfills on football game days

5,500

bikes repaired

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News briefs from �� Boulder

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How Should We Define Camping?

Anonymous — Fri, 05 Nov 2021 06:00:00 +0000

How Should We Define Camping? Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 11/05/2021 - 00:00

Emily Heninger

An unhoused person setting up a temporary shelter in a city park. An activist spending weeks in a tent outside the state capitol. An avid hiker waking up to mountain views and steaming coffee. Campers, all?

Environmental and cultural historian Phoebe Young has spent the past 20 years delving into two questions: What does it mean to camp, and why does it matter? Her book, Camping Grounds: Public Nature in American Life from the Civil War to the Occupy Movement, discusses the history of this U.S. pastime and how its definition has shifted over time.

“When I started this project, I thought I knew what camping was,” said Young, an associate professor in ��’s Department of History. “It’s a tent somewhere in a national park, roasting marshmallows over the fire, sitting out under the stars — that’s camping.

“But the more I worked on this project, that definition [became] up for grabs. That’s one definition of camping, but it’s historically relatively new.”

Young’s work reveals what the past 150 years of camping can teach us about our society and our social contract, and why we should consider a more inclusive view of camping.

A Brief History of Sleeping Outside

Young’s exploration of the rich history of camping in America begins in the mid-19th century. Back then, sleeping outside was pretty common — something you did out of necessity while traveling and between places of lodging, or when conducting research, like John James Audubon gathering ornithological data.

This began to change after the Civil War, as the U.S. entered a period of rapid industrialization. According to Young, groups of wealthy, white Americans sought out recreational camping to stay connected with the land. Practiced largely by the upper class, camping became an elite vacation activity.

“When I started this project, I thought I knew what camping was... but the more I worked on this project, that definition [became] up for grabs."

“Unlike those who worked the land, it was less about mixing your labor with nature, but about mixing your leisure with nature,” said Young.

Suddenly, functional camping became unacceptable. Migrant workers and other unhoused people became “tramps” and “hoboes,” said Young, and were labeled a social threat.

Even as camping became more accessible during the rise of the automobile in the early 20th century, it remained restricted by race and class. Black Americans’ history with outdoor spaces — often the sites of lynchings and other traumas — dissuaded many.

“There were African American camping enthusiasts, absolutely — they protested against the segregation of campgrounds and other facilities at the Southern national parks and got [those policies] overturned in the early ’40s,” said Young. “But they had to push for it.”

As time went on, an aesthetic appreciation of nature prevailed as the highest use for public lands.

And while the focus on preserving landscapes was admirable, Young found that this “leave no trace” mindset excluded traditional outdoor pursuits like hunting and fishing. It also ignored or belittled Indigenous land uses and voices — and in many cases, those groups were forcibly removed from public lands.

The accepted definition of camping was narrowing: a leisure activity for primarily white, middle- to upper-class citizens to immerse themselves in nature’s untarnished beauty.

Camping As Protest and Function

In 2011, the Occupy Wall Street movement redefined camping yet again — and rekindled a conversation about how people use public space.

In cities across the U.S., activists camped out for weeks to protest economic inequality. Instructions for the protests said simply, “Bring tent.”

According to Young, the Occupy protests echoed the 1932 Bonus Army of World War I veterans and their families, as well as the 1968 anti-poverty demonstration in Washington known as Resurrection City. Though driven by different causes, all relied on relatively long-term encampments to drive home their message: “We’re not going away.”

Yet Occupy protesters explicitly denied the camping label.

“There’s only one way to camp … and that assumption is the problem, not the camping itself.”

“WE ARE NOT CAMPING,” read signs taped to protesters’ tents at McPherson Square in Washington, D.C. “We are assembling peaceably to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” With a circle around an image of the First Amendment, the signs insisted, “THIS IS OUR PERMIT.”

Even so, many lawmakers and media outlets portrayed the movement as perverting the idea of a beloved American activity and serving as a public nuisance.

As a result, public tolerance for camping in public parks and other spaces plummeted. Many cities — including Boulder and Denver — later enacted camping bans, with direct impacts on unhoused communities.

Yet both protesters and lawmakers were operating from a narrowly defined vision of what “true camping” was: purely recreational.

“If you are camping for functional reasons, that seems somehow problematic,” Young said. “There’s only one way to camp … and that assumption is the problem, not the camping itself.”

The conversation continues today, as cities debate where — and why — people have the right to camp freely.

“The topic of encampments and the symptoms of homelessness in our community are often polarized — it’s either about people and taking care of our unhoused neighbors, or it’s about safety in public spaces,” said Alison Rhodes (Hist, Span’01; MPA’16), director of parks and recreation for the City of Boulder.

“What we are trying to do in our work in the city [of Boulder] is both,” she said. “It has to be both. We have to support our most vulnerable community members, and our parks need to be safe for everyone.”

Balancing the needs of different communities — and understanding how those groups perceive camping and the use of public spaces — is key.

Rhodes put it succinctly: “How do we create a common ground?”

Who Gets To Define Camping?

In her work, Young raises nuanced questions about the definition of camping and how people use public spaces: Why is recreational camping in national parks seen as a patriotic, American activity, while setting up a tent in a city park is perceived as a public nuisance? Why do we glorify backcountry tent photos on Instagram while disparaging homeless encampments and political protests as eyesores and social burdens?

“It’s about how we share space, particularly our public spaces — whether that be Central Park in Boulder, Yosemite [National Park] or anything in between,” said Young. “How can we create a space for people who need and want parks for recreation, leisure, de-stressing, mental health, all those reasons — but then also for those people who are using [public] spaces for functional reasons?”

Now more than ever, recreational camping is exploding in popularity, thanks in part to social media and COVID-19 physical distancing precautions that have driven people to explore new outdoor activities.

At the same time, cities across America are seeing a rise in homelessness, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

“Almost all park systems, governments and many [other] disciplines are trying to address the growing number of unhoused in our communities,” said Rhodes. “It’s incredibly polarizing. You have folks who have incredible empathy and understanding for people who are living unhoused in park land, and you have people who demonstrate some significant stigma and lack of understanding.”

How the U.S. and its communities address these challenges could begin with a shift in perspective.“It’s about taking away the idea that there’s one highest use and that all the others should be banned … and shifting the question a little bit,” said Young. “How do we share this space? Because those spaces are so important to who we are as a nation.”

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Photos courtesy Alamy/Old Paper Studios (1905); Alamy/Photo12 (1932); Alamy/Glasshouse Images (1968); Alamy/Marmaduke St. John (2011); iStock/petejau (modern camping).

Environmental and cultural historian Phoebe Young has spent the past 20 years delving into two questions: What does it mean to camp, and why does it matter?

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Megan Patterson’s Outdoor Preschool Blends Nature and Education

Anonymous — Fri, 05 Nov 2021 06:00:00 +0000

Megan Patterson’s Outdoor Preschool Blends Nature and Education Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 11/05/2021 - 00:00

Elisabeth Kwak-Hefferan

Drop by Megan Patterson’s Denver preschool, Worldmind, on any given day, and you’ll probably see a few children climbing trees. Others will be sorting pine needles, clambering around on a jumble of boulders and digging in the mud. Come winter, the action switches to making snow angels and playing with shovels. When it rains, you might see them mucking around for worms or splashing in puddles.

But one thing is constant: The kids won’t be sitting around indoors — and they’ll be thrilled about it.

Thanks to Patterson’s (Comm’05) efforts, many more Colorado kids might soon have access to this kind of school day.

Worldmind, which holds preschool in Denver’s City Park and adjacent sites year-round, is an outdoor, nature-based school where the kids only head inside to their space at Denver Museum of Nature & Science for bathroom breaks and naps.

Though such “forest schools,” or waldkindergartens, are commonplace in European countries like Germany and Sweden, they’re only beginning to catch on in the U.S.

Worldmind certainly stands out as a unique preschool option now, but Patterson hopes other programs will follow her lead and move the classroom outdoors.

“I like to think of it as using Mother Nature as a co-teacher,” Patterson said.

The Right Fit

Though Patterson never studied the outdoors, she spent much of her childhood in Grand Junction immersed in nature or hiking and backpacking across Colorado. So when she was looking for a university that fit her wilderness-loving personality, �� made sense.

“The second I stepped on campus, it felt like the right fit,” she said.

Patterson majored in communications, but couldn’t shake an interest in education. After graduation, she opted to continue with the teacher licensing program at ��’s School of Education.

She spent the next year earning her teaching license in elementary education. Next came a stint teaching English in Jordan with the Peace Corps, followed by a return to the U.S. as a charter school instructor in Commerce City, Colorado.

Then, her career took her north — way north — to teach second grade and coach basketball and cross-country in the tiny Native Alaskan village of Stebbins. Patterson thrived in the ultra-remote town on the Bering Sea, where the only way in and out was by plane.

“In Alaska, everything centered around the school,” Patterson said. “It brought back that community piece [for me].”

“I fell in love with the idea of learning outdoors, having students take risks and learn from Mother Nature.”

Next, she moved to Colorado and completed an online master’s thesis on the forest education model at Lesley University in Boston. Patterson’s research, combined with her teaching experiences, inspired the Worldmind model.

“I fell in love with the idea of learning outdoors, having students take risks and learn from Mother Nature,” she said.

While there are different versions of forest schools built around teaching children outside, she gravitated toward those that also teach kids ecological lessons while being in nature daily. In Colorado, she couldn’t find such a program in the Denver area for her son, Aiden.

She drew from her graduate school research to launch Worldmind as a nonprofit program in 2015. At first, children attended with their caregivers.

“I really didn’t know what to expect when I started it,” Patterson said. “I just knew that I wanted to connect kids with nature.”

Outdoor Benefits

Patterson found a burgeoning body of research that suggests outdoor preschools improve mental and physical health, reduce symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and lead to better problem-solving skills and risk assessment.

When she started Worldmind, she was blown away by how enthusiastically kids and their caregivers responded to nature-based learning. She became determined to offer it to a wider population.

“After seeing all the benefits students can gain, I really wanted to make it accessible to more families,” Patterson said.

She had work to do.

Just a few years ago, there were no state child care licenses available in the U.S. for outdoor preschools. (Colorado has several such preschools, but none were officially licensed.) Worldmind hadn’t needed one because each child had a caregiver present, but that model wasn’t feasible for working parents. Another challenge — outdoor preschools can be expensive due to low student-teacher ratios needed to ensure safety. And, without state licensing options, parents couldn’t use state-based financial aid to pay their child’s tuition.

She decided to expand her program to make outdoor preschool an option for more families by attaining a state license.

"I think it’s exciting that this sort of program can gain legitimacy in the U.S., and great for Colorado to be a leader in that way.”

In 2018, she approached Colorado’s Office of Early Childhood about creating an official license for outdoor programs like hers. The state agreed to a pilot program, which kicked off in 2018. Over the course of the program, Patterson had a lot to prove — she had to convince regulators that outdoor preschools were safe for kids. She documented every animal encounter (off-leash dogs and geese) and run-ins with strangers (two minor incidents in three years) and conducted hourly weather and attendance checks.

She did have to bend on a few things — no outdoor naptime or learning to build fires — but was granted permission to keep kids outside down to 13°F with windchill and to let them climb trees.

In summer 2021, Patterson’s pilot licensing program was formally approved and Worldmind earned its permanent license — the state’s first outdoor preschool to do so.

The move makes Colorado only the second state to license an outdoor preschool, after Washington, and opens the door for other programs to earn similar bona fides.

“Outdoor preschool really aligns with so many of the values of our own teacher programs,” said Kathy Schultz, dean of �� Boulder’s School of Education. “Children are allowed to pursue their own questions and curiosities. It’s very immersive, which is what we look for in education, too. I think it’s exciting that this sort of program can gain legitimacy in the U.S., and great for Colorado to be a leader in that way.”

Since obtaining the pilot license, Patterson has expanded Worldmind’s offerings to include half- and full-day preschool programs, and in fall 2020, Patterson added an elementary school program up to fifth grade. This year, she added sixth grade.

Social-Emotional Skills

Patterson’s unique approach to early childhood education quickly earned Worldmind dedicated fans — as of fall 2021, the preschool had 40 students and a 40-deep waiting list.

In addition to the outdoor components, Patterson places special emphasis on social-emotional learning to help kids develop confidence, solve problems and interact with each other. A daily lesson for a preschooler could include playing games that teach boundary-setting or sorting horse chestnuts, whereas older children may build a model of their own community.

“I’ve found that, if you put those social-emotional skills first and build a community where kids feel safe, the academic learning naturally happens,” she said.

Stacy Grissom first sent her son, Oliver, to Worldmind’s preschool as a three-year-old; he’s now in first grade there.

“He absolutely thrives,” she said. “At four years old, he and his friends could solve conflicts without adult interaction. It was phenomenal to watch.”

Grissom said she’d send Oliver to Worldmind through high school if that becomes an option.

“I appreciate how much Worldmind really looks at each individual kid,” she said. “They let the kids be themselves and appreciate them for who they are.”

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Photos courtesy Megan Patterson

Worldmind in Denver is Colorado’s first licensed outdoor preschool.

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Camping Grounds: Public Nature in American Life from the Civil War to the Occupy Movement

Anonymous — Tue, 20 Jul 2021 18:04:25 +0000

Camping Grounds: Public Nature in American Life from the Civil War to the Occupy Movement Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 07/20/2021 - 12:04

By Phoebe S. K. Young

(Oxford University Press, 432 pages; 2021)

Buy the Book

Camping appears to be a simple proposition, a time-honored way of getting away from it all. Pack up the car and hit the road in search of a shady spot in the great outdoors. For a modest fee, reserve the basic infrastructure--a picnic table, a parking spot, and a place to build a fire. Pitch the
tent and unroll the sleeping bags. Sit under the stars with friends or family and roast some marshmallows. This book reveals that, for all its appeal, the simplicity of camping is deceptive, its history and meanings far from obvious.

Why do some Americans find pleasure in sleeping outside, particularly when so many others, past and present, have had to do so for reasons other than recreation? Never only a vacation choice, camping has been something people do out of dire necessity and as a tactic of political protest. Yet the dominant interpretation of camping as a modern recreational ideal has obscured the connections to these other roles. A closer look at the history of camping since the Civil War reveals a deeper significance of this American tradition and its links to core beliefs about nature and national
belonging.

Camping Grounds rediscovers unexpected and interwoven histories of sleeping outside. It uses extensive research to trace surprising links between veterans, tramps, John Muir, African American freedpeople, Indian communities, and early leisure campers in the nineteenth century; tin-can tourists, federal campground designers, Depression-era transients, family campers, backpacking enthusiasts, and political activists in the twentieth century; and the crisis of the unsheltered and the tent-based Occupy Movement in the twenty-first. These entwined stories show how Americans camp to claim a place in the American republic and why the outdoors is critical to how we relate to nature, the nation, and each other.

Camping Grounds rediscovers unexpected and interwoven histories of sleeping outside.

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10 Things You Can Learn at The Rec

Anonymous — Mon, 21 Oct 2019 21:54:42 +0000

10 Things You Can Learn at The Rec Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 10/21/2019 - 15:54

Joshua Nelson

Need a new hobby? The �� Rec has you covered.

Learn to roast more than hot dogs and smores with the backcountry cooking clinic.
Beginning fly fishing includes classroom lessons, practice and a trip to the river.
Ever dreamed of being a ballerina? Now is your chance — take ballet technique.
Try women’s self-defense, it’ll help your dad stop worrying about you.
Beginner Olympic weightlifting, for those who want to take their gains to the next level.
S��BA lessons are offered at all levels. ... Lesson No. 1: Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus.
Eskrima is the martial art of the Philippines, and it's primarily weapons based. Be careful!
For those who spend more time in nature than at home, consider getting your wilderness medicine certificate.
If you’ve never gone before, or want to master a triple-Lutz, the rec center has ice skating lessons.
Invented 4,000 to 6,000 years ago, snowshoeing is a great way to explore Colorado’s winter scenes.

Head over to the Recreation Services website to learn more.

Photo courtesy of �� Boulder Recreation Services

Need a new hobby?

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��'s Hiking Club is Celebrating its 100th Birthday

Anonymous — Mon, 03 Jun 2019 17:19:59 +0000

��'s Hiking Club is Celebrating its 100th Birthday Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 06/03/2019 - 11:19

Ula Chrobak

When the club started in 1919, it consisted of 23 women and 12 men. One hundred years later, it has more than 700 members.

The Four Pass Loop Hike outside Aspen, Colo., takes backpackers through alpine meadows, rocky scree, scrub and spruce forest — and some spectacular views. The Maroon Bells, two 14,000- foot peaks, put on a purple-tinged show for trekkers of the 28-mile trail.

But high-elevation terrain is also prone to fickle weather. In fall 2017, Katherine Feldmann (Bio’20) experienced this when she helped lead eight �� Boulder Hiking Club members on the hike. “We had four seasons over four passes in two days,” she said.

Many on the trip were new to hiking at 12,500 feet in a snowstorm, and “there was a lot of hesitation and uncertainty,” said Feldmann, now a club officer. She talked to hikers coming down the upcoming pass to assess conditions on the other side, concluding the team could get across safely. She encouraged everyone to push onward.

By the end of the trip, one of the students told Feldmann that the hike was the “craziest, most incredible thing he had done,” Feldmann said. “It pushed people’s boundaries to the point where they understood ‘Yeah, I can do this — I’m not limited by my past experiences.’”

And that, in essence, is the mission of the Hiking Club, which turned 100 this year. Today, the club has about 700 paying members and an email list of more than 3,000. A group of about 20 officers takes turns planning and leading day hikes and overnight trips each weekend during the school year. The club also guides longer excursions during fall and spring breaks.

After a week, I had made lifelong friends. The experience of finding my place was incredible.

The club started in 1919 with 35 charter members. An early constitution says the group’s purpose is “to stimulate an enjoyment of the out-of-door life in the mountains of Boulder, and to establish an organization of true comradeship and recreational activities.” Old photos show groups of up to about 50 people — including women, who were members from the start — hiking up Sunshine Canyon, Arapahoe Peak and Longs Peak.

Even without today’s high-tech fabrics and gear, the club made some challenging ascents. At least one ended in tragedy: In December 1946, club member Jeanette Martin slipped on an icy descent from Navajo Peak, pulling her two companions down with her as they were all tied into a rope. Martin died. The two others were hospitalized but survived. In the 1980s, a Hiking Club team completed the Maroon Bells traverse, which follows a sheer ridgeline between 14,000-foot peaks, requiring technical climbing and route-finding skills.

Club outings are less risky these days, and most officers have some level of medical training. “In the past couple years we’ve really transitioned from a small organization where the same few members go on trips every weekend to a big community,” said Katherine Halama (EnvSt’20), another club officer. “We want everyone to have the chance to participate.”

Costs, gear and know-how can prohibit students from getting into hiking and backpacking. Many freshmen lack cars to even get to trailheads. The Hiking Club provides transportation, free gear rentals, and experienced leaders to get students outside, no matter their resources. It also provides a sense of community for its members. That’s why Jason Chalmers (ChemEngr’20) joined. He moved to Boulder as a freshman from Ohio and had few friends in town. Over his first spring break, he went on a club trip to Escalante National Monument in Utah, where the group trekked through canyons, waded across rivers and gazed at the star-strewn desert sky.

“After literally a week of spending time with people, I had made lifelong friends,” he said. “That whole experience of finding my place was incredible.”

In our print edition, this story appears under the title "Finding Your Place in Nature." Comment on this story? Email editor@colorado.edu.

Photos by Glenn Asakawa and �� Boulder Heritage Center

When the club started in 1919, it was comprised of 23 women and 12 men. It now has more than 700 members.

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Doorways of �� Boulder

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Dec 2017 18:46:00 +0000

Doorways of �� Boulder Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 12/01/2017 - 11:46

Look: Portals

There are more than 360 buildings at �� Boulder and thousands of doorways. Have you strolled through some of these?

The south doorway to Macky Auditorium
The east doorway to Mary Rippon Theatre
The north doorway to Hale Science
The east doorway to Hellems Arts and Sciences
The north doorway to Baker Residence Hall
The north doorway to Old Main
The north doorway to Hellems Arts and Sciences
The archways between Education and Hellems Arts and Sciences
The west doorway to the Economics building
The south doorway to Clare Small Arts and Sciences
The north doorway to Eaton Humanities
The west doorway to the Power House building

Photos by Casey A. Cass

There are more than 360 buildings at �� Boulder and thousands of doorways. Have you strolled through some of these?

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Zero/Zero

Anonymous — Tue, 01 Dec 2015 09:15:00 +0000

Zero/Zero Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 12/01/2015 - 02:15

Christie Sounart

At age 36, Trevor Thomas lost his sight. Then he became a professional hiker.

When Trevor Thomas (Econ’93) reaches a mountain summit, he concentrates on the peak, not the view. He runs his hand along the rocks to feel whether they’re mossy or wet or cold. He focuses on the sun warming his face and the aspect of the air. Sometimes it’s humid, sometimes crisp.

On his long, calculated descents, the details from the top settle deep into his memory, uniquely his own.

“We’re a visual world — for me it’s more robust,” says Thomas, the only known blind professional long-distance hiker in the world.

“[Being blind] provides me a very rich, deep experience that I think a lot of people miss.”

Thomas, 46, lost his sight to an autoimmune disease a decade ago. Since then he’s accomplished extraordinary feats in the outdoors, starting in 2008, when he became the first blind person to complete the 2,170-mile Appalachian Trail solo. He’s hiked 18,000 additional miles since, including treks along the entire Pacific Crest Trail — from Mexico to Canada — and California’s John Muir and Tahoe Rim Trails.

Thomas was the first blind man to stand atop Mount Whitney, the tallest mountain in the contiguous U.S., also in California, and this summer he completed the nearly 500-mile Colorado Trail with only his guide dog, Tennille, by his side.

Trevor Thomas and guide dog Tennille hiked the entire 486-mile Colorado Trail in summer 2015.

Hiking has given Thomas, a law school graduate who previously worked as an events promoter, a new life and a simple purpose: To prove he can.

Thomas chased adventure long before he went blind. As a ��-Boulder student, he was an avid skier. Vail was his favorite mountain. He enjoyed skydiving, mountain biking and racing Porsches. Anything for a rush.

In 2006 Thomas was 36, fresh out of UNLV law school and planning to travel abroad while studying for the bar exam. He’d been having trouble with his vision and went to a doctor in his parents’ hometown, Charlotte, N.C., for glasses. Instead he left with a grim and rare diagnosis — his autoimmune system was destroying his eyes. There was no stopping it.

Thomas moved in with his parents and experienced what he calls “eight months of living hell.”

“That was the most excruciating experience, not physically painful, but psychologically,” he says. “I knew what I was going to have to do. I would have to learn to read again and write again. The most devastating thing for me was not knowing how I would be able to exist and make a living as a blind person.”

His sight gone within the year, he battled depression and desperation. A few days after going totally blind, a friend took him to a talk in Charlotte by Erik Weihenmayer, the first blind man to summit Mount Everest [with ��’s Jeff Evans (Anth’94) as his guide].

“I owe a lot to Erik,” Thomas says. “When he was speaking, I realized we were really similar. He gave me the strength that I needed to have.”

Thomas decided to give hiking a try. On his first attempt his cane got caught on rocks and in roots. Frustrated, he went to an outfitters store where a young clerk equipped him with trekking poles and shared his own experience hiking the Appalachian Trail, replete with run-ins with bears and wild storms.

“That got my attention,” Thomas says. “I thought, ‘If I can just do that trail, that will be the thing that gives me my life back.'”

During the 18 months it took Thomas to learn to function as a blind man in everyday life, the Appalachians never left his thoughts. He believed the only way to regain his sense of independence would be to hike the trail alone. He learned each piece of hiking gear expertly, from pitching his tent to using a cookstove.

“Much to everyone’s amazement,” Thomas says, “I followed through.”

In 2008, he walked the entire Appalachian Trail by himself. It took six months and it was grueling. He counted more than 3,000 falls and injured his ribs and feet. He read signs with his fingers at each trail intersection, but sometimes lost the trail while crossing barren rock. Whenever he was uncertain of his surroundings, he would stop and wait for another hiker to confirm his location.

“I made an average of 30,000 steps a day and I knew each one could be my last,” he says.

His fear on the trail became his motivation to adopt hiking professionally. With a new trail name, “Zero/Zero” — a reference to his sight — and a multitude of corporate sponsors, he hiked the Pacific Crest Trail in five-and-a-half continuous months in 2010. He perfected his use of echolocation, using sounds to assess his environment, like a bat. He fell only 78 times.

“I [hike] to embrace fear and see what is humanly possible for a blind person,” he says.

The Colorado Trail, which runs from Durango to Denver, was a turning point in his career. Thomas tried it in 2011 but was unable to finish: With 79,000 vertical feet of climbing at an average elevation above 10,000 feet, the trail is physically demanding and the weather completely unpredictable.

“It was the first long trail that I didn’t succeed on,” he says. “I vowed and declared that I would do that trail on my own.”

Foregoing a human guide, Thomas adopted a black lab from Guide Dogs for the Blind. The dog, Tennille, was trained to work in town and in the backcountry and she became Thomas’ main asset, alerting him to unforeseeable obstacles such as low-hanging tree branches or snow mounds.

“I’m the big picture guy, she’s my detail girl,” he says.

Now five years old, Tennille is Thomas’ constant companion.

“Trevor has a plan with Tennille and they don’t vary,” says Laine Walter, a friend who helps Thomas plan his treks. “Most people treat their guide dogs like an instrument to them. He treats his guide dog like his best friend.”

To help prepare Thomas for the Colorado Trail, Walter scoured guidebooks and typed meticulous notes for his iPhone, which talked to him along the way, alerting him to distances, nearby campgrounds and water sources.

Sponsors — Cliff Bar, Ahnu Footwear, Marmot and Diamond Pets among them — provided Thomas and Tennille with much of their food and supplies at trailheads.

“I’m like any other athlete,” says Thomas, who is fully sponsored. “If I need a new sponsor, I have to justify my existence. Luckily, it’s not really hard for me to get sponsors. We are unique.”

The 486.4-mile Colorado Trail presented plenty of harrowing situations. The most frightening of them happened as the pair was entering the San Juan Mountains along the Continental Divide. As they reached tree line and scrambled over a false summit, the wind turned and a rapid storm rolled through, bringing in lightning “like hand grenades,” hail and howling wind. Thomas and Tennille were completely exposed and trapped in a saddle.

“The weather came in like a meteor,” he says.

Thomas quickly pulled himself and Tennille under his tent’s rain fly and huddled low to the ground: “It was the scariest 45 minutes of my life.”

When the storm subsided, the pair resumed their ascent. Sunshine met them as they crested the divide.

Thomas knows the risks he takes. But risk is what he lives for.

“In a sense, going blind was a blessing,” he says. “It gave me new life, a totally new career and a new path.”

Photography courtesy Trevor Thomas

At age 36, Trevor Thomas lost his sight. Then he became a professional hiker.

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