🌎 The world is weirder and wilder than you think
A newsletter for people who’d rather be outside!
Hello world!
Out here in the high desert, we are shifting to summer, and most of us will be spending less time in the desert canyons and more time on the river!
This week starts with a trip to the Amazon and then 13.8 billion years of cosmic history stretched across a desert and ends with climbers, surfers, and paddlers disappearing into corners of the map most people will never visit.
Never forget, whether you’re looking up at the universe or down a remote river canyon, there’s still plenty left to explore!
See you this summer?
Saludos!!
Nico in Moab!
🧗 The granite dome in the Amazon
📍 Cerro Pajarito, Mavecure Domes, Colombia
For generations, the Puinave people have climbed the granite domes of Mavecure to gather medicinal plants, seek refuge, and connect with the landscape. Now, with support from Colombian climber Ivan Macías and the Colombian climbing community, the combo of ancestral knowledge and climbing is building a movement in this corner of the Amazon.
The goal goes far beyond sport. By equipping routes and training new climbers, the Puinave hope to support scientific expeditions, document unique summit ecosystems, and create new opportunities for indigenous-led exploration in one of the most remote corners of the Amazon.
Macías is not new to the community, for the past two years he has repeated old lines and put up new ones on Cerro Pajarito (see below), the largest of the domes. Pajarito was first climbed by a German team in the 90s and has only seen a handful of ascents since.
In September, he is planning a trip to improve the bolting of the original German route, to proivde the community an easier way to reach the summit of Pajarito.
Here is a place you can donate to the bolt fund.
Check out this approach and the views!!
You can learn more at Colombia Oculta!
⏳ Humans: a brief blip on the cosmic scale
📍 Mojave Desert, USA
On a dry lakebed in the Mojave, a group of humans build out two physical scale models. One covers humans on earth, the other covers time itself: 13.8 billion years of cosmic evolution stretched out across the desert.
This is a science film that meets existential crisis, tracing everything from the birth of the universe to the tiny sliver of time humans have occupied it. Watch this one on the biggest screen you can find.
📊 Full scale model:
https://www.toscaleseries.com/time
⏱️ 10 minutes
🌊 One of the planet’s strangest waves
📍 Kimberley Region, Western Australia
Dylan Graves and Anthony Walsh head deep into the remote Kimberley in search of a tidal rapid that may have never been surfed before. These tidal waves are among the rarest and most intimidating on Earth, formed by massive ocean surges squeezing through narrow river systems with terrifying force.
The crew pushes into croc country, huge tides, and unpredictable water in what feels less like a surf trip and more like a proper expedition.
⏱️ 20 minutes
🧗 Wild Granites of wild Nevada
📍 Nevada, USA
A granite paradise called the Wild Granites? Hello, why is this place not better known? Go on a van trip with Alex Honnold and a few days climbing with Tommy Caldwell to be reminded that chasing first ascents in the middle of nowhere can still be done in the lower 48.
Add sand dunes, donkeys, locals, and Honnold’s energy, and you get something uniquely American.
⏱️ 22 min
🚣 Into the wild on a packraft
📍 Oregon
Big water, long carries, remote camps, and the kind of terrain that only really makes sense once you’re fully committed to it. This packrafting mission feels less like a sport edit and more like modern exploration — messy, exposed, and deeply rewarding.
⏱️ 6 minutes
🧗 Climbers vs. Mexico’s hardest route
📍 El Salto, Mexico
On the towering limestone walls of El Salto, Matt Segal and Emily Harrington attempt to free climb one of Mexico’s hardest routes in a single push. The film balances huge exposure and brutally technical climbing with something quieter: two elite climbers trying to stay in sync under pressure. Emily Harrington especially shines here, moving with the kind of precision and composure that makes impossible terrain look almost casual.
⏱️ 15 minutes
⚡ Bonus News
⛰️ American trail runner Tyler Andrews climbed from Everest Base Camp to the summit in just 9 hours 55 minutes, smashing the previous oxygen-assisted speed record by more than an hour. If verified, it’s one of the most impressive endurance performances ever seen on the world’s highest mountain.
🧗 One of the weirdest climbing gyms in America is back. Oklahoma City’s legendary 90-foot grain silo climbing walls have reopened under new ownership, giving an iconic piece of climbing history a fresh lease on life.
🔗 Yosemite scrapped its reservation system for Memorial Day weekend and immediately got a reminder why it existed. Visitors reported multi-hour traffic jams, packed parking lots, and long lines just to enter the park.
🎿 U.S. ski visits dropped 14% this season as weak snowfall hammered many Western resorts. The numbers are a reminder that even an industry built around powder isn’t immune to increasingly inconsistent winters.
🚁 A father and his two-year-old toddler became stranded near the summit of Freel Peak (10k ft) in the Sierra Nevada and required a helicopter rescue. Is this kid sure to have daddy issues?
🏕️ Canada is making all national parks and historic sites free this summer to encourage more people to get outside. The bad news: campsites are about to become an absolute bloodbath to book.
🧗 Heir to the Mango fashion empire was arrested in connection with the death of his father after a fatal hiking accident in Montserrat, Spain last year. The billionaire suspiciously slipped and fell 300 feet while the two were hiking together.
🧠 Long Reads & Opinions
Heads up, take your time with these ones…
🧗 El Cap solo you’ve never heard of
Everyone knows Alex Honnold. Far fewer know Russel Mitrovich, a climber who unceremoniously soloed the aid route Zodiac on El Cap back in 1999, decades before free soloing became an aspirational hobby.
With no partner and no rope, Mitrovich had to back clean every piece of pro he used to get himself up the 16-pitch climb.
It’s one of Yosemite’s most fascinating forgotten stories. Turns out, he was just trying to impress a girl!
https://www.mountainlifemedia.ca/2019/07/the-solo-of-el-cap-you-probably-havent-heard-of/
🏔️ Beneath the perfect pyramid
Alpamayo, in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca is often called the most beautiful mountain in the world. The 19,500ft (5950m) peak is like a blade of ice and granite. This film, shot in the moment by Chilean mountaineer Michael Millan, documents the climb as he moves from the valley to the top, across icy exposure and up the steep finish.
Enjoy the staggering scenery on one of alpinism’s most aesthetic objectives!
🏞️ The valley America chose to drown
Before it became a reservoir supplying water to San Francisco, Hetch Hetchy was considered one of the most beautiful valleys in the Sierra Nevada — a near twin of Yosemite itself. This documentary dives into the bitter fight between John Muir and the rising conservation movement against politicians and engineers who believed flooding the valley was a necessary sacrifice for a growing California.
More than a century later, the debate still hasn’t disappeared. Between the history, politics, dam construction, and modern restoration efforts, the film becomes a fascinating look at the moment America decided wilderness could be both sacred and expendable at the same time.
🧗 The blind leading the sea stack
We saw a new film was released about blind Brit climber, Jesse Dufton, who was born with only 20% central vision.
And we thought it is worth revisiting this award-winning climbing film that follows Dufton on an astonishing lead ascent of the Old Man of Hoy, a towering sea stack off Scotland’s coast, where route-finding, commitment, and trust matter as much as climbing ability.
🌍 Suffering the FOMO?
(Pssst, this is where you should be right now!)
🚵 The Black Hills of France
Forget manicured bike parks! The Terres Noires (”Black Hills”) near Digne-les-Bains look like someone dropped a slice of Utah into France’s Provence region: black shale ridges, endless natural lines, and surreal badlands terrain that has become one of Europe’s most iconic freeride and enduro destinations.
The sweet spot is spring and fall, when temperatures are cool and the famous black dirt delivers absurd traction.
🎥 Stoke
🏄 Surf capital of Europe
While you are in Europe, head down to Ericeira, Portugal which has everything: beginner beaches, heavy reef breaks, cliffside viewpoints, seafood restaurants, and enough surf history to keep you entertained between sessions.
Spend a week here and you’ll understand why surfers from across the continent keep coming back.
40 minutes from Lisbon
One of Europe’s most famous surf zones
Home to the Ericeira World Surfing Reserve, the only World Surfing Reserve in Europe
Dozens of established breaks, from beginner beaches to world-class reef waves like Coxos and Ribeira d’Ilhas
🎥 Stoke
💥 Stay Stoked. Stay Wild. See you on the next send!
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❤️🔥 Your StokedAF fam 🤘
