One of the main reasons I do what I do is the people I get to meet. Wherever I go, whatever I do, I always meet active people with diverse stories. And I always come away enriched.
Here’s a snapshot, from a “Backpacking North Carolina” presentation I did a couple Saturdays back at the Mayo Park Environmental Education and Community Center in Person County.
I wrote the following article for the Charlotte Observer and The News & Observer in Raleigh; it appeared in both papers on May 15. It appears here in expanded form, with links.
OK, time for your daily workout. Put on the sweats, lace up the sneakers and now to get limbered up with some long, deep stretches … .
Ashley Honneycutt was giving me a quick overview of the class we were headed to when one thing in particular caught my attention: “… and it’s all done on a roller.” Knowing that I’m a runner and sensing that I was about to wheel and make a break for my car, she grabbed my arm. “It’s not that kind of roller. Not the roller you use for running. It’s softer.” Softer than rock wasn’t that reassuring, but I followed her anyway.
Life as an adventure writer is all about survival. Not surviving the adventures; it’s the writing that’s the challenge. Or rather getting paid to do it.
When I got into this business 20 years ago at The News & Observer all I had to do to justify writing about outdoor adventure was convince one editor that people wanted to read about outdoor adventure. Fortunately, the first person I had to convince was a Travel editor desperate for regional copy. She was all too happy to run stories about Raven Rock, Medoc Mountain, Morrow Mountain and the other state parks I was discovering as a recent transplant to the state.
I was talking to Steven Wheelock, a wellness instructor at Rex Wellness in Raleigh, about stretching for a story coming soon to a McClatchy Newspaper (Charlotte Observer/News & Observer) near you when he sought to put the practice in perspective by anatomizing the four phases of the workout: 1. Stretching/warmup, 2. Evaluation period, 3. The workout itself, 4. Cool down.