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posted by Luke @ 08:26 0 Comments
Zion for Sale! Saturday, April 12, 2008

An area of land inside Zion National Park has been purchased by a couple from California and they are building a house inside the park. The area within the park was for sale and the NPS wanted to purchase it, but lacked the money to do so, mainly due to complete lack of money injected into the NPS since 2000.

WNYC featured a piece on this yesterday on their Living on Earth show which you can listen to.

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posted by Luke @ 05:42 0 Comments
bpa and nalgene Tuesday, March 18, 2008

there has been a lot of talk recently about leaching of bisphenol a (bpa) from plastic water bottles, especially from nalgene bottles. as a past user of nalgene bottles, which we used all the time in the states i've been looking around for an alternative. basically at room temperature they leak into water, and if boiling water is used the quantity leached is greater. so is it harmful, according to studies yes, and wikipedia has an article about it which explains some of the health risks. forgot to mention, baby bottles, they can be made from bpa, so check or use glass which is safest.

found this article which details the alternatives and recommends which is best.

posted by Luke @ 05:31 0 Comments
Pack It Out Monday, February 11, 2008

So you want to do some hiking and camping outside of camp grounds in the National Parks. You should check if you need to "Pack It Out" as this is common.

Inyo National Forest website is the best out there that explains in detail what you need to do:
http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/inyo/recreation/wild/packitout.shtml

To the point information like this can be hard to find especially about going to the toilet in the wild, so I advise you to read it. Some tips that you just don't get in guide books or from the nps.com

posted by Luke @ 09:34 0 Comments
Spot - GPS Tracker Monday, February 04, 2008

For hikers who want to go into the wild on there own, or want a back up system for a group of hikers this is a great solution and it is low cost too.

Spot is a GPS device that also has a messenger system built in although this is limited to "Help", "OK", or "911". Although for a week hiking or longer it is an excellent solution that only costs $150, plus an annual subscription of $99 per year.

For an additional fee of $50 a year you can also have the device send you a location update every 10 minutes which could be an extremley low cost "child-tracker" or stick it in your car boot as a anti-theift device.

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posted by Luke @ 03:55 0 Comments