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The Joy Trip Project

#BlackLivesMatter, Commentary / 17.10.2017

As I walked to the coffee shop this morning I noticed a neighbor rolling out an American flag. He was no one I recognized, perhaps he’s new. But with all due respect I made eye contact with a smile. I gave him a friendly nod and said, “good morning”. He seemed to return my greeting with a note of caution and a mumbled “morning”, like a man anticipating an unwelcome confrontation. Without breaking stride I just kept walking and went about my business. As a journalist it’s my job...

Alpinist, Climbing, Diversity, In Memoria, On Assignment / 16.10.2017

When my friend Aimee Copp, the director of the Adventure Film Festival invited me to come to Boulder to take part in this wonderful event she asked me, “So James, what are your working on?”. I immediately told her about an exciting story that I’m writing  for Alpinist Magazine about a French climber who died on Aconcagua in 1995. She asked me to appear on stage at the Boulder Theatre to tell this remarkable story. If you’ve read the memoir of the great American climber Lynn Hill you may...

Adventure Film, Alpinist, Appalachian Trail, Climbing, Diversity, Essays, Film Festival, Film Review / 13.10.2017

After a long day of watching movies and a late night of drinking, I slept with a man I love. Certainly no lapse of judgement, my friend Jeremy Collins invited me to share his bed in the Boulder Adventure Lodge at 1AM rather than drive twenty miles back to Golden through a sloppy storm of rain, sleet and snow. A few weeks earlier at another one of the many film festival events that we attend together, he joked with a crowd during a Q&A that we had shared...

Capitol Christmas Tree, Charitable Giving, Joy To America, Special Events, U.S. Forest Service / 02.10.2017

Every year the U.S. Forest Service is charged with delivering an 80-foot evergreen tree to the American people to serve as the U.S. Capitol Christmas Tree. Chosen from a national forest somewhere in country the tree, commonly called the People's Tree is a symbol of our great national heritage of environmental conservation and preservation. For the past three years it has been my piviledge and honor to accompany the People's tree from the site of its harvest across the country to where it is delivered to the grounds of...

Commentary, Diversity, Fly Fishing / 19.09.2017

On my 51st birthday, Chad Brown, a friend and colleague, took me fly fishing on the Clackamas River in the pouring rain. Two days earlier I saw the forecast for showers in the city of Portland, Oregon. It didn’t look good, but I hoped for the best. At 5AM Chad arrived at my hotel with his chocolate lab named Ax. The handsome dog lifted his head for a quick scratch behind his ears as I ignored the bright orange sign on his tactical harness that said, “DO NOT PET”....

Commentary, Diversity, Photography / 01.09.2017

A recent blog post described me as “a champion in the effort to bring more diversity to the outdoors.” As much as I appreciate the compliment, the statement appears as the cutline to a photograph at the head of an article that goes on never to mention anything that I might have done to earn the title of “champion”. The author never contacted me for a quote or even referenced a single one of the 800+ stories published on this blog or the scores of magazine articles, radio...