Two-Heel Drive’s Tom Mangan — the godfather of this little hiking-blogging corner of the interwebs, has gone all open-source on us and launched a new how-to site called Hike Hacker.
It’s already amassing quite an archive of tips and tricks from other hikers, ranging from how to properly hold trekking poles to getting those waterfall snapshots looking great. Definitely worth checking out if you’re looking for a how-to refresher course, or just want to get a few ideas to try something new on the trail.
A few weeks ago, Winter Warlock emailed me to say he’d be away from his snow-covered Adirondacks en route to a wedding in Japan. He had a little bit of a layover here in the L.A. area, and wanted to know if I could recommend any dusty Western peaks that would take care of his hiking fix until he got back home.
I recommended the “hike that got me hiking” — the Mishe Mokwa Trail to Sandstone Peak — still after all this years one of my favorite trails in L.A.
The Warlock just posted a great write-up of the trail, which he seemed to dig quite a bit — especially our Western penchant for just naming things what they look like. Check it out, then try to get out to Sandstone and see for yourself! Or, if it’s too hot for you to explore here, poke around the Warlock’s site for some great snowy mountain shots that are guaranteed to cool you down. Even if it’s just mentally.
The latest issue of Backpacker arrived in my mailbox this morning. Instead of the usual scene of outdoorsy bliss, this month’s cover had a big ol’ Google Earth hiking route plastered across the front.
Immediately, I turned to the cover story — “iHike” — which offers “a complete guide to the digital revolution — and how to join it.”
Even though it doesn’t mention Modern Hiker anywhere, it’s still got a ton of surprising and useful information for us crunchy technophiles — like knowing that lithium batteries last twice as long as alkalines in GPS units, or that metal carabiners can interfere with satellite reception. It’s also got side-by-side comparisons of different mapping programs, online photo storage sites, and even tips on getting better photos and videos while on the trail.
It’s a really nice 8-page intro for anyone who’s looking to make more work for themselves after they get home from hiking — whether your audience is a bunch of blog readers or just the folks back home.
Just remember us web old-timers, ok?
Image by matildaben.
Personally, I’m not one for puzzles of any sort. If the solution doesn’t become apparent to me within a few minutes of starting, I end up just getting frustrated and angry. Maybe puzzles are supposed to teach me a life-lesson about dealing with that, but so far they’ve been unsuccessful.
However, I do have a lot of “puzzle people” in my life, and a puzzle that tests your knowledge of geography is ok in my book. Or, at least, as good as a puzzle is going to get.
See how well you know the planet at National Geographic.
Via Contours.
Recently, Google released version 4.3 beta of their beloved Google Earth program.
It’s a minor update, but does add lots of shiny new bells and whistles — like day and night lighting effects, increased 3D views and buildings, and a new Street View layer to match up with the same view on Google Maps. Basically, lots of pretty eye-candy, and the ability to create theoretically possible clear-sky views of downtown L.A. and the San Gabriel Mountains.
The Google Earth Blog has done an excellent job of rounding up all the new features into one easy to view video demo. Be sure to stop by and check it out, then download the new Earth software by following this link:
A few days ago, Google quietly added some fancy new contour lines to its “Terrain Mode” on Google Maps.
As noted before, most of the prominent peaks are labeled, as well as other geographic features. In National Parks, campgrounds, ranger stations, and a few trails show up, too — but our local National Forests are still missing this information … although honestly, I’m sure it’s just a matter of time.
Now, when are we going to get to print these things out instead of having to buy topographical maps?
Via GOBlog, courtesy Team Geared Up.
The National Park Service has updated and upgraded the maps on individual parks’ web sites.
They’re basically high-res scans of those Park maps they hand out at Visitors’ Centers — so while they’re not really suitable for hiking, they are great at getting an overview of a specific area you’re planning on visiting … and will at least show you which trails are most likely to be crowded.
There’s a small green rectangular button beneath the banner image on each park, which will fire up the streaming, zoomable flash map. Previously, clicking on any map link on an NPS page would open up a PDF map, which would either display the same information or take down your entire computer with a browser crash.
So yeah, these flash maps are a marked improvement.
Via National Parks Traveler.
A nasty strain of the flu wiped out half the floor in my office building this week, myself included, so I haven’t been up to date on the latest developments of our little hiking blogosphere.
Rick at BestHike dug up a site called Trailspotting, which has one of the best implementations of in-line Google Maps on a hiking site that I’ve seen.
Its “Just the facts, Ma’am” approach, clean design, an excellent organization make this a highly-recommended site for checking out trails in Northern California. I’ll be checking back on this one often.
I got back in from an excellent stay in Joshua Tree, and will be trying to catch up with some of my write ups for the site over the next few days. I just got slammed at work, so it may be a bit, but I’ve got three varied J-Tree hikes to add to the list, as well as a pre-tree journey to Sunset Peak by Mt. Baldy.
So I’m gonna be busy. Also, I’m still in the process of cleaning out all my equipment.
In the meantime, however, I thought I’d do a little experiment with some video. Now that ReadySetConnect is very kindly hosting the Modern Hiker, I’d like to abandon the Google Video for some higher-resolution QuickTime videos stored locally, instead.
This is NOT a replacement for all of the information and commentary offered in my usual write-ups, but if people dig these and think they add some value, I’ll work to incorporate them more prominently in the future.
Keep in mind, this particular video from Sunset Peak is rough … and there wasn’t a whole lot of finesse put into it, but it’s a start. Let me know what you think / if you’d like to see better ones on hikes in the future. I’ll try to put my camera’s video function to better use.
Continue reading ‘Video Trial’
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