Outside Podcast

Spiders and other hairy scary critters are everywhere. It’s best—for us and the planet—if we can figure out how to coexist. Backpacker executive editor and devoted spider enthusiast Adam Roy wants to teach you how to do just that. In this episode, he takes our arachnophobic producer Maren Larsen on a journey to go from being a spider-killer to a spider-watcher, where she will stare directly into the eight beady eyes of her greatest fear.

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There’s no way to guarantee that your kids will embrace nature and adventure, but you can do some things to point them in the right direction. Just ask Steven Rinella, host of the MeatEater TV series and podcast, whose earliest lessons to his three children included getting them comfortable with holding worms and snakes and bugs. Or talk to author Katie Arnold, creator of Outside’s Raising Rippers column, who took her first daughter on a multi-day river trip before she could walk. For this episode, aspiring outdoor super dad Paddy O’Connell quizzes Steven and Katie about the lessons they’ve learned while trying to raise dirt-footed tumbleweed nature kids.

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For endurance athlete Dillon Quitugua, ultramarathons are a way to empower fellow Pacific Islanders and also work through the pain of the abuse he’d suffered as a child. Growing up in Hawaii and Guam, he’d been regularly beaten by his father and was diagnosed with PTSD as a teenager. When he began running after college, it enabled him to process what he was feeling. But as he pushed himself to take on longer distances, the physical and emotional toll of the effort caused him to relive the trauma of his past. And yet, for Dillon, the only choice was to keep going—until he reached a place of love and forgiveness.

If you’re suffering from abuse or you know someone who is, help is available. Call or text the Child Help Hotline at 800-422-4453. Or reach the the National Domestic Abuse Hotline by calling 1-800-799-SAFE or texting START to 88788.

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Indigenous model and activist Quannah ChasingHorse lives her life in two very different worlds. Growing up in a tiny Native village just south of the Arctic Circle, she has seen the effects of climate change firsthand her entire life, and she says that it left her with no choice but to become an activist. But for as long as she can remember, she’s dreamed of becoming a model. When her activism work got her noticed by a scout at Calvin Klein, she saw her chance to live both dreams at once. In this episode, she tells the story that landed her on the cover of Outside Magazine and has been turned into a documentary from the North Face called Walking Two Worlds.

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The singer, songwriter, and guitarist for the Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie applies the same approach to ultramarathons that he does to touring: just keep moving. A decade ago, he got into distance running almost by accident, entering a trail race in Northern California with little idea of what he was doing. He’s since become a passionate and committed ultramarathoner, entering close to 50 races and training hard even when he’s on the road with a band. For Ben, running is a way to both connect back to the playfulness of childhood and embrace the unknowns that come with pushing your body and soul to the limit. As he laps the U.S. on a joint tour with Postal Service and Death Cab for Cutie, he talks about the freedom he finds on the trail and the lessons he learned this summer after breaking down physically and emotionally during the hardest run of his life.

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Nothing says “for better or for worse” like forcing your wedding guests to trek 60 miles to a ceremony deep in the jungle. While many people dream of nuptials involving elegant dresses, long-winded toasts, and tasteful floral arrangements, others hear the call of the adventure wedding. The more hardcore the experience, the more meaningful it is for all involved—or something like that. In this episode, we bring you the story of a union forged in the Guatemalan rainforest, where a creature came in the night to drink the blood of one of the guests.

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What really happens to you when you spend months trekking the Pacific Crest Trail? Getting tired and filthy is just the start of it. We talked to dozens of PCT thru-hikers during their resupply in Ashland, Oregon—a popular stopover point some 1,500 miles into the 2,665-mile route—about how their really long walk through the mountains had changed them. For some, the journey had been exactly what they imagined. For others, it was full of surprises.

Want to learn more about life on the PCT? Follow reports from the field at backpacker.com/pct2023.

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Artificial light makes it impossible for most people in North America to see the Milky Way. But we don’t have to live like this. As we learn more about the impacts of light pollution on wildlife and ourselves, we are finding ways to bring some healthy darkness back to our communities. This week, we bring you an episode from the talented team at the Sidedoor podcast from the Smithsonian that investigates the history of our addiction to artificial light and explores a growing movement to be smarter about how and when we illuminate the world around us.

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When Pam Houston traveled to the Nordic island nation to ride its unique breed of spirited horses, she wasn’t just after an adventure—she was urgently seeking a way to be well again. Two years earlier, she had become seriously ill with long COVID, so lacking in energy that she couldn’t take a walk. What she needed most of all was a reason to go on. In the final episode of our Summer Read series, we hear her powerful story of physical and spiritual rebirth.

You say yes, of course. But what about those other wild opportunities that you’re not so sure about? In this episode, we talk to athletes and adventurers about how accepting an invitation led them to life-changing experiences. Jimmy Chin was an unknown dirtbag climber when Chouinard welcomed him into his California home and then took him surfing at a legendary break. Conrad Anker was an up-and-coming alpinist when he got a chance to represent the U.S. in a competition in Kyrgyzstan. Timmy O’Neill was an emerging mountain athlete when he was asked to join an expedition that would conduct cataract surgeries in a remote area of Ethiopia. What they and our other guests all agree on: they wouldn’t be who they are today if they hadn’t dared to go for it.

This episode of the Outside Podcast is brought to you by Vans, makers of the ultimate summer shoe, the Vans UltraRange. With max cushioning for all-day wear, precision support for easy movement, and breathable mesh to keep you cool, the new UltraRange Neo VR3 is ultrafitted for ultra comfort. Learn more here.

America’s most classic hiking route is generally a safe place for an adventure. But not always. Since 1974, there have been 13 murders on the trail. That’s not a big number when you consider the millions of people who spend time on it every year, but it’s enough to make some thru-hikers wary of strangers. For this episode of our Summer Read series, we bring you the account of the first murder on the Appalachian Trail, the kidnapping that followed, and how one woman learned to survive.

When your most cherished childhood experience becomes impossible for your own kids, there’s only one choice: recreate it for them yourself. That’s what Jim Sperber did three years ago when the pandemic shut down summer camps across the country. He’d grown up going to his beloved Keewaydin camp in Vermont, and his three kids followed that tradition until, in 2020, when they couldn’t. But Sperber refused to let the tradition die. He and his wife created their own version of Keewaydin in and around their home in the New York City suburb of Bedford Corners, complete with riflery, campfire songs, and an overnight in the woods. It proved to be a wild adventure in parenting—and a magical summer for their family.

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When W. Ralph Eubanks began exploring his family’s homeland, he fell in love with it—and came to understand how this troubled part of the state gave birth to the blues. Eubanks had grown up in another part of Mississippi before journeying to the Northeast U.S. to pursue life as a writer and scholar. But when fate brought him back, he was drawn to the Delta’s topography, realizing that the only way to understand the region’s history—and his own—was to walk the land.

Backpacker editor Zoe Gates sets off to discover if chatbots are the solution to our trip-planning woes. Preparing for wilderness excursions can be frustrating, even for seasoned adventurers. Tsunamis of online information—conflicting top ten lists, distracting ads, and trip reports of varying quality—can stand between you and getting out the door. Artificial intelligence tools claim to deliver detailed travel itineraries in response to just a single question, but can a robot really design a safe, worthwhile adventure? In an effort to simplify her weekend excursions, Zoe experiments with Outside’s in-development chatbot, Scout—and is totally at the whims of her computer.

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There are passionate birders and then there’s Peter Kaestner, whose devotion has him traveling the globe in pursuit of the ultimate record. Fewer than 20 people have seen more than 9,000 species, and nobody has reached 10,000, though Kaestner is closing in on it. For this episode of our Summer Read series, Ornithologist and writer Jessie Williamson tags along with him on a rollicking South American adventure.

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After years of pushing himself to go as big and far as he could, Alastair Humphreys realized that the most valuable trips we take are usually the ones right out our doors. Back in 2011, he coined the term “micro adventure” and ever since he’s been extolling the many upsides of doing things that we can squeeze in around the margins of real life: biking to a nearby hill and sleeping there for a night, an afternoon creek hike, even just climbing a tree. The point is to embrace simple, pure outdoor fun wherever we can find it, which can do wonders for us.

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Your head is pounding, your muscles are cramping, and your heart is racing. And that’s just the start of it. Heatstroke kills thousands of people every year, including extremely fit outdoor athletes, who can be overcome quickly and with little warning. In the first episode of our 2023 Summer Read series, we hear a story about that demonstrates just how easy it is to get overheated—and what science tells us about how we can keep our cool.

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If you want to know what it was like to travel this legendary trail, there’s only one way: get on a horse and follow all 2,000 miles of it. That’s what writer Will Grant did, retracing the route from Missouri to California over four and half months. He cooked his own meals and never knew where he’d end up camping on a given night. It was a grueling feat of endurance and logistical fortitude, but it gave him exactly what he was after—the chance to truly understand the people, land, and history of the American West.

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Studies show that astonishing experiences in nature can have life-changing benefits, and that even small everyday doses of time outdoors can have immediate impacts. Those are two of many revelations Outside contributing editor Florence Williams uncovered during her investigation into the latest research around awe. Informed by conversations with leading awe experts, Williams guides us through the emerging understanding of what awe does for us—and how being open-minded can better facilitate experiences of this singular emotion.

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The actor’s flight into space in 2021 left him with an urgent desire to make us aware of the fragility of our home—a feeling that has yet to fade away. Media reports at the time, as well as Shatner’s own writing about his voyage with Blue Origin, focused on the grief he experienced looking into the blackness of space. But there was always much more to it. As part of an exploration into the power of awe for Outside, contributing editor Florence Williams spoke to Shatner, now 92, about how confronting forces larger than ourselves—be that beauty and wonder or horror and sadness—can be overwhelming yet ultimately transformative.

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There’s a reason the acclaimed author wrote his latest book in the voice of a dog: it enabled him to run free all over an imagined seaside park. Eggers has always been a writer compelled to break boundaries, and in The Eyes and the Impossible he’s at it again, crafting an all-ages story about a brave mutt named Johannes and his crew of committed friends: a seagull, a pelican, a racoon, and a one-eyed squirrel. Together they hatch a plan to free the park’s bison from their pens so that they, too, can roam where they will. For Eggers, who writes on a sailboat in San Francisco Bay and has a passion for unique flying experiences (old planes, ultralights, jet packs), the book was a chance to delight in a simple and pure kind of adventure storytelling.

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When veteran climber Mark Jenkins came up with a plan to witness a solar spectacle from the summit of a 20,000-foot peak, he had little idea what he was getting himself into. The fact that the obscure mountain in Argentina he’d targeted was extremely difficult to access was just the start of his challenges. After recruiting an old climbing buddy to join him, and arriving safely in South America, the duo ran into trouble at every stage of their mission. And yet their bold and bumbling quest delivered an unexpected triumph. Just in time for the summer solstice, we’re bringing back this classic adventure from our archives.

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Working the front lines of America’s wildfires is a difficult and dangerous job, but that doesn’t mean everyone who signs up is chasing adventure. While physical and mental challenges are part of the attraction, what draws many to the field is the camaraderie that comes with working in an unpredictable environment alongside a committed crew. And what makes a great firefighter isn’t a high tolerance for risk so much as the ability to be calm and assertive no matter what the day brings. In this episode, we speak to a trio of firefighters about how and why they fell in love with one of the most demanding jobs out there.

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As America continues to grapple with political uncertainty and an uneasy relationship with the planet, the author and environmentalist makes the case for an expansive and inclusive grassroots movement. McKibben, who wrote the first book on climate change for a general audience in 1989 and later founded the international climate campaign 350.org with a small group of college students, has lately been focused on growing Third Act, a nonprofit that organizes people over the age of 60 to take action on climate change. In this special episode, we share McKibben’s recent live talk from the 2023 Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride, Colorado, in which he discusses lessons learned in decades of environmental activism and where the climate movement goes from here.

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Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi’s new film, ‘Wild Life,’ captures the saga of Doug and Kristine Tompkins, whose devotion to conservation and each other led to the creation of extraordinary national parks in Chile and Argentina. For Chin, the origins of the documentary go back more than 20 years, when he was first welcomed into a group of climbers who were friends of the Tompkinses, including Rick Ridgeway and Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard. Eventually, Chin met the Tompkinses and learned about their ambitious vision for conserving millions of acres. In this episode, Chin talks about the incredible journey behind the making of ‘Wild Life,’ and Kristine shares her experience of opening up in front of the cameras and where Tompkins Conservation goes from here.

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Among the world’s harrowing marine survival stories, the strangest might be a crew’s escape from one of the earliest submarines. It was 1851, and the 26-foot-long sub, designed and captained by a Prussian carpenter, was powered by a couple sailors spinning treadwheels. When the vessel floundered during a trial run and began sinking to the bottom of a German harbor, there was only one very frightening way to get out alive—which is why the crew got into what was almost certainly the first-ever underwater fistfight.

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You don’t have to be an astrology buff to believe that the moon and stars have a special kind of power in our lives. Talk to almost anyone who’s spent time in the wilderness, and they’ll tell you that there’s a connection between celestial bodies and our own. In this episode, an astrology skeptic explores how our adventures can sync us up with otherworldly cycles and forces in ways that we don’t yet understand.

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When the largest tornado ever recorded touched down in central Oklahoma, amateur storm chasers, professional meteorologists, and thrill seekers were expecting a show. What they got was a deadly lesson in the unpredictable power of nature. On May 31, 2013, forecasters warned that the approaching system posed extreme danger, but that didn’t do much to scare away anyone willing to risk it all to get close to a Category 5 tornado. For them, the fact that science couldn’t fully explain how a twister is formed or how it might behave was a big part of the appeal.

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How have these indoor spaces have become hubs for the outdoor community? Over the last four decades, climbing has gone from a countercultural activity that took place entirely on natural rock walls to a highly competitive sport that, for the most part, happens inside. And yet, the scene a climbing gym very different than what you find in a yoga studio or spinning class. There’s something special about roping up, even if there’s a ceiling over your head. We dispatched our intrepid producer, Maren Larsen, to spend 16 hours straight in a popular Denver climbing gym to understands what exactly keeps people coming back.

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When a BASE jumper slammed into a red-rock tower and his parachute snagged on a ledge, there was only one way to save his life: go up and get him. That’s how climber River Barry ended up getting suddenly pulled into a daring rescue operation in Utah. In this episode from the team at the Out Alive podcast, we hear how Barry snapped into action and took charge during a perilous moment. With no formal rescue training, she had to improvise—and put all her skills to the test.

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Some experiences are unforgettable for both very bad and very good reasons. A violent car wreck that ends up putting you on a path to the summit of Mount Everest, for example. Or an injury that ends your Olympic dreams but introduces you to the love of your life. Or a bike crash that leaves you literally naked on the trail—but with a reminder of your great luck. Because sometimes it’s the hard left turn that makes everything go right.

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In her podcast, FOGO: Fear of Going Outside, Ivy Le takes on the great outdoors—very, very reluctantly. The result is a lot of jokes about poop, icky things in nature, and why people choose to sleep on the ground. But FOGO also offers a refreshing take on a nature show: Ivy is the daughter of Vietnamese immigrants and she presents an alternative approach to the “reckless white men” that she says have dominated this space. In her first season, Ivy learned to camp. This year, she upped the ante and tried hunting. Here experience proved to be more enlightening—and humbling—than she ever imagined.

Please tell us what you think about the show and how we can make it better. Fill out a brief survey at outsideonline.com/podsurvey

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Chasing the elusive permit fish is an exhausting endeavor for the most seasoned anglers. So why would a total newbie even try? That was the question facing Paddy O’Connell, who was invited to fish for permit at the spectacular Blue Horizon lodge in Belize with a legendary guide. Paddy had always embraced adventure, but like a lot of outdoor athletes, he hated being terrible at new sports in front of other people…which meant that this trip would be a radical—and likely painful—learning experience, no matter what.

Please tell us what you think about the show and how we can make it better. Fill out a brief survey at outsideonline.com/podsurvey

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Challenging solo trips can be immensely rewarding. Just ask competitive bikepackers, who ride grueling courses through the backcountry carrying everything they need to survive. Completing these multiday journeys requires embracing solitude; in fact, for many riders, that’s the appeal. This week we present an episode from the talented team at Radiolab that features one of the stars of the sport, Lael Wilcox, plus an everyday athlete who latched onto bikepacking at what was already the loneliest moment in her life.

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There’s no more difficult or uncomfortable physical challenge than holding your breath underwater for an extended period. Which is why the Air Force has long made breath holds part of its training programs for parajumpers, or parachute rescue specialists. If your duty is to pull downed military personnel from waters all over the world, you need to prove your ability to perform in the most hostile and unforgiving conditions. In this classic episode from our archives, we join a parajumper candidate who finds himself facing elimination from training for the most surprising reason: he can hold his breath way too long.

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When Scott Pirsig’s close friend Bob Sturtz suffered a stroke deep in Minnesota’s Boundary Waters, Pirsig had no choice but to leave him in the wilderness and make a desperate sprint to get help. The two men had been on an early-spring canoeing adventure when Sturtz started acting strangely: it started with a headache, then he became disoriented, lost control of his hands, and stopped speaking. Pirsig’s only choice was zip him into a sleeping bag and beg him to stay put while he raced off into the fog to contact first responders. In this replay from our Science of Survival series, we hear the story of a harrowing scenario in the woods wild and an enduring friendship.

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Why do we keep skiing, despite the crowds, the cost, and the unpredictable conditions? Spend an entire day on a chairlift and you’ll find out. Outside contributing editor Gloria Liu rode up and down (and up and down…) a lift at Truckee’s Northstar California Resort, talking to fellow skiers and snowboarders about the many hassles and challenges to enjoying a day in the mountains—and what makes all the effort worth it, at least some of the time.

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In Aspen, Colorado, and other alpine communities, the future depends on making sure the weirdos and oddballs are still welcome. That’s what gets concerned locals the most animated: any suggestion that their neighborhoods are becoming exclusive playgrounds for the rich, forcing out the gonzo characters that help make them so special. What’s needed, according to planning experts and many longtime residents, are smarter growth strategies that include affordable housing, increased transportation options, and forward-thinking management of public lands. For this episode, we take a walk around Aspen and ask what it’ll take to get such things done.

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She was one of the world’s best big-mountain freeskiers—and then, suddenly, she decided she was done. Angel Collinson’s announcement shocked the sport and left fans wondering what was going on. The fact that she’d started living full-time on a sailboat with her partner, and without and solid plans for what was next, only made people more curious. As Collinson, 29, tells it, after more than a decade of ripping down insanely steep slopes, trying to “make friends" with her fear, she began to question whether the thrill-seeking habit she’d fallen in love was actually good for her.

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For an episode of our new podcast, The Daily Rally, the professional skier talks about learning to get out of his own way while on an expedition in Alaska. He was on Denali, struggling mightily to keep up with his extremely fit teammates as they climbed towards the summit. At first, he tried to convince them to slow down. When they ignored him, he was furious. Then he took a moment to look at himself—and realized that what was really making him angry was his own bruised ego. That realization freed him to fully enjoy a remarkable experience.

The Daily Rally is a new weekday podcast featuring short stories of resilience in the face of big challenges and unexpected adventures. You can follow The Daily Rally on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you like to listen, and nominate someone to be featured on the show here.

Emily Pennington wanted to see it all. But life on the road was fiercer than she ever imagined. After almost half a decade of planning a cross-country expedition to see every one of America’s National Parks, she quit her job, left her home and her boyfriend in Los Angeles, and set off in her van to find herself in January of 2020. Almost right away, a pandemic, a string of natural disasters, and a breakup sent her veering way off her roadmap—and searching for healing in the unforgiving magnificence of our public lands.

After suffering a brutal accident while on a kite-skiing expedition in Patagonia, Jim Harris’s painstaking recovery took a sudden leap forward when he had an experience with magic mushrooms. The adventure photographer had been pushing hard with his rehabilitation efforts and making impressive progress, but when he took mushrooms while at a music festival to have some fun, something very unexpected happened: suddenly, muscle groups in his legs that had been unresponsive since his injury started firing. Thus began a fascinating journey that offers insights into the emerging science of psychedelics and physical healing.

Endurance athlete Mallory Arnold was struggling with extreme fatigue when her coach made an unexpected suggestion: start eating meat again. Arnold, 26, had adopted a plant-based diet in high school and was initially reluctant to reincorporate to animal protein. But she was also desperate to avoid the post-training crashes that left her passed out on the floor. So she decided to give meat a try—and immediately realized that she had no clue how to cook even a simple chicken breast. Thus began a journey with the Outside Food team that took her from a family farm to a whole-animal butcher to a professional kitchen, with the primary goal of finding her lost energy while actually learning to enjoy preparing and eating meat along the way.

For a community of hardy souls in Maine, there’s no better way to feel fully alive in winter than immersing yourself in the frigid Atlantic. Yes, the entrance is jolting. But if you take it slow, you allow for what members of the group call “a conversation with the nervous system” that produces a sensation you can’t achieve any other way: a powerful, blossoming inner warmth that’s both delightful and grounding, leaving you with a lasting elevated mood and enhanced feelings of empathy and responsiveness. In this episode, from our friends at the Outside/In podcast, we learn how the dippers found their way to this bold practice, and why they’ll never give it up.

Interested in trying cold-water immersion? Outside/In offers some safety tips before you get started).

Figuring out how to get better sleep and more excise and is hard—which is why we tried out some new programs for you. Every year, Outside reporters put their bodies and minds on the line to test new routines designed to help us become healthier, happier, more productive human beings. Hear from three of this year’s subjects about what stuck, what didn’t, and how you can benefit from our mistakes.

If you’ve ever seen a skier pull a hot dog out of a jacket pocket while on a chairlift or devour a towering plate of nachos back at the lodge, you know that few athletes chase calories harder than skiers. And with good reason. Charging down a mountain in the cold empties your body’s glycogen stores—fail to refuel, and you’re going to get sore and sad very quickly. And when it comes to favorite power-up snacks, every skier has an opinion, from endless gummy worms to peanut butter straight from the jar. But you can also fill your tank on scrumptious meals prepared by chefs with a real passion for stoking winter sports athletes. In this episode, we explore the wild world of skier nutrition to get you hungry for your next powder day

Escaping the craziness of the season to head into the wild can sound amazing—right up until that overnight snowstorm crushes your tent. Because while the appeal of getting out there, away from the bustle of parties and gifts and eggnog, can inspire especially bold trips, there might be nothing more disappointing than a holiday mission that ends in disaster. For our final episode of 2022, we bring you a collection of tales from intrepid travelers who learned the hard way that eating dry turkey while debating politics with uncle Fred is hardly the worst way to spend a vacation.

Witnessing the Aurora Borealis can feel like you’re glimpsing another world. For some people, that’s exactly what’s happening. Photographer Hugo Sanchez captured his first images of the spectacle accidentally, when he was taking shots of a meteor shower. But soon he became hooked, and then, when his young son died, the dancing lights took on a whole new meaning. In this replay of one our favorite episodes from our archives, we hear the story of a man who found a sense of purpose in the wintertime sky.

Talk to the victims of crashes and their families, and they’ll tell you: when a motor vehicle injures or kills a bicyclist, the American justice system lets drivers off the hook. The harsh truth is that our roads are frighteningly dangerous for cyclists, and our country has a high tolerance for traffic deaths. In this episode, part of Outside’s ongoing coverage of cycling crashes and deaths, we chronicle two incidents that reveal deep problems with our legal system and consider the work that needs to be done to make our roads safer.

Racing around a mountain resort to aid injured skiers sounds like the ultimate adventure job. But with housing and other costs soaring, getting paid in fun is no longer cutting it. Last year a battle over wages in the ski industry sparked conversations about what those workers—who frequently put their lives on the line—deserve. In the final episode of our fall Weekend Read series, we bring you the story of a Utah patroller who is doing everything he can to raise a family in the winter paradise he loves.