Good Craic – Best Outdoor Blogs
Have you noticed? We are experiencing a huge renaissance in outdoor blogs. The content that people are writing and creating is remarkably good. Here are a few of my favorites. There’s no way I can mention all of them this month, so please add yours in a comment.
My friend Chris White, continues to dazzle me with great writing and photos of mountain climbing in Japan with his latest post on Gods & Ghosts. His posts are always sublime. Red Yeti has a good post on Tent Tips and I enjoy Scott’s personal backpacking videos on TheBackPackerTV. Like me, Jolly Green Giant was on a spring AT section hike last week and I enjoyed reading his trip report. I’ve also been following Crazyrunnerguy’s blog and the podcasts from Practical Backpacking.com, where my favorite episodes are Backpacks 101, an interview with Brian Frankle of ULA ,and an interview with Greg Garrigues from Pacific Outdoor Equipment on sleeping pads.
If you don’t visit the hill walking blogs of the UK, I suggest you give them a try. They have a vibrant outdoor blogging community. John Hennessy’s Collected Musings of a Hill Wanderer has great photos. I believe Mike Knipe’s wit is legendary, or it should be, but you can judge for yourself on Northern Pies, which I find fun to read. Mike is about to set off on his 9th TGO Challenge with some 360 other participants in the 30th anniversary of this event. I was introduced to him by Martin Rye of Summit and Valley, a gear junkie at heart like many of us, who’s hill walking photos and narrative are also first rate. If you visit these blogs, be sure check out the other sites that they’re linked to and enjoy the feast.
If you’re wondering about the etymology of the word "Craic", it means something like companionable relaxed conversation in Gaelic.
Related posts:
Thank you for the mention.
Thanks for the mention of my blog in your post today. Funny enough, I’ve found that blogs like yours tend to offer more specific and practical knowledge/experience that tends to get lost in mainstream website forums. I think the combination of both, and the acknowledgement that something can be learned from anyone, is what continues to fuel our collective backpacking hobby. Many simple ideas are born out of merely looking at gear in a different light and it often takes sharing it to give others the same “ah-ha” moment. Probably the biggest help for me is learning about others opinions on gear before I spend the money on it. Before the era of blogs, I typically purchased items I was interested in just to be disappointed to learn that the item didn’t perform to my expectations or to learn that there was something better on the market. With blogs and backpacking forums, I have enjoyed learning about the experiences and gear choices of others as it helps push me in the right direction. I think it is also fair to say that it takes these kinds of thoughts from people around the world as different markets offer different options and it is nice to see the bigger picture. Keep up the good work. – JGG.
Scott – I’m still amazed that you would drive 1000 miles to climb Mt Washington from Illinois. That’s passion!
Check out the Virginia State Parks blog at http://blog.virginiaparks.org and we’re part of the Outdoor Bloggers Summit http://outdoorbloggerssummit.com/
Jolly-Green-Giant expresses my sentiments exactly. I get so much out of your gear posts (and others who are kind enough to spend their time and money testing and reviewing), and of course all the great trip reports from the beautiful north-east. Keep it up!!
This post was a good idea. There are so many blogs out there it is hard to find the good ones (you only have so much time to read). I already read about 1/2 the ones you mention but I will now check out the others. I do notice there seems to be a disproportionally large number of blogs from the UK (?).
I would like put my blog and web site in the ring; BackpackBaseCamp Blog
I stay focused on backpacking and camping. I’m also looking for contribuitons (writing not money)if there is anyone reading this who would like to write about hiking and backpacking from time to time but is not interesting in creating their own site.
Robin
Like I said, there are just too many good blogs out there for me to list this month. In future months, I’ll post more of the blogs that I’m reading. As for why some many in the UK – well a lot of my favorites are international including Japan, Australia, and Germany. There are many reasons for this having to do with my upbringing, my going to school abroad, and a fondness for regional linguistic differences, dialects, idioms, and lexicons within the English language, since I have a graduate linguistics education. I also read a lot of US blogs and hiking forums in many different genres like bushcraft (which is fascinating), search and rescue, mountaineering, and so forth. Expect to see mention of these in the future. Thanks for the question.
I’ve noticed that the number of referrals I’m getting from the USA has been creeping up recently – and has suddenly gone a bit mad.
And this post explains why.
Many thanks for the kind words… in fact, I’m just about to go off for a bit of a simper….
“I do notice there seems to be a disproportionally large number of blogs from the UK (?).” From my view there is a lack. So many people hike and backpack over here. I want more. One to look out for in the Summer will be Terry Abraham’s web site when he sets it up. He makes great videos and takes top photos. Here is a taste of his work
http://www.livefortheoutdoors.com/Videos/Search-Results/Camping–backpacking/Terrybnds-latest-video—The-Priest-Hole-Cave-Experience/
Mike Knipe is on cloud nine now that he is global:) I am glad you found his blog. Good read and good guy. Thanks for the kind words and I have updated my links of late and will be adding more sites I visit. I expect you’ll find something new on there soon.
Mike is great – can’t wait to meet him face to face. Thanks for the tip about Terry – I’ll be on the lookout.
I have been spending a lot of time here reading up on some adventures but mostly opinions. Now I know what kind of writing you do from 6-10, a question I didn’t get a chance to ask. Impressive.
I have wanted to respond to a couple of articles but now find I cannot contain myself after viewing the Priest Hole Cave Flick. Very inspiring. Thanks for all the insight and links.
Thanks for the link; I appreciate it.
The more I push myself in social networking items, the more folks amaze me at what they’re doing and subsequently writing about. Twitter just freaks me trip (especially the search function. Find out what people are doing RIGHT NOW!).
To pay it forward, I have been following Brad Hefta-Gaub at his blog, http://brad.sweat365.com/. He also tweets at twitter.com/ZappoMan.
Some countries are vastly underrepresented in the blogosphere and I have only to think of Ireland. It’s got the hill country but where are the walkers? I only wish that I could do more to address this but my happily living in the U.K. means that my time for this is limited. Again, thanks for the kind words and the steady flow of referrals.
Hey Earlylite, another gr8 post! If you have a chance, take a look at my blog. Any tips & suggestions are highly accepted. I always enjoy reading your posts. Keep up the good work!
Steve
aka, The Pilgrim.
http://www.crudeanalysiz.blogspot.com
Wow – thanks for the kind thoughts there Philip!
And like Chris (i-cjw.com), I have to agree with Jolly-Green-Giant’s comments above. The blogs are invaluable at preventing me spending even more money on the kit.
But also blogs like Chris’s that convey amazing experiences in the mountains are something that keep me sane.
One of my favourite UK bloggers is *PTC. Who, despite being full-time heating engineer, somehow manages to find time to write a column for one of the two biggest UK outdoors mags (Trail) and write a blog combining excellent kit reviews with insipiring reports and photos.
The comments on some of his posts turn in to something more akin to a forum than a set of blog comments!
I’ll second the vote for Petesey (PTC*) above — a good writer on top of a dedicated Scottish hiker. Spend a half hour with his accented commentary and breathtaking pictures and you may wind up yearning for the highlands yourself.
I concur – I’ve been following him on twitter and spent some time on his blog this week. Great photos, reviews, the works.
Love your blog and for sure will come back a visit! Come by Alabama Rock Company and say hello! Keep up the great work!