On Sunday October 7, around 140 enthusiastic and energetic walkers participated in the ‘Hands Across the Organ Pipes’ action – saying we love the Organ Pipes as they are and NO to a cable car.
After more than 5,000 people rallied against the cable car last May, its great to see the sustained activity of local residents against this unpopular development.
Photographer: Kim Walls.
Last weekend at Mt Hotham I was chatting with a friend about the end of the season. She said she was starting to grieve for the end of another year. I was feeling exactly the same. I feel most alive in the alpine, especially the alpine when it’s snow covered, and for me, the spring melt marks the end of the year.
Australia’s only mass start, snow dirt road enduro returns to the slopes of Falls Creek once more.
Taking off from the summit of McKay (Australia’s highest accessible point by car), or the Ski Patrol bases as used in 2017, riders will traverse the snowy peak, through single track, fire trails and the High Plains Road to Lake Guy in Bogong Village.
It happens on saturday October 6.
Mountain Journal has been reporting on the proposal to build a cable car up the face of kunanyi/ Mt Wellington for several years. The community resistance to this plan has been solid, determined and strategic. Local residents group Residents Opposed to the Cable Car (ROCC) have organised a walk and action to celebrate the beauty of the mountain, to be held on Sunday OCT 7.
Continue reading “Hands across the Organ Pipes – walk and action, OCT 7”
In terms of outdoor retail stores in the USA, REI has an enormous influence. This is both good and bad: it’s ubiquitous presence and huge buying power can threaten smaller, locally owned businesses. On the other hand, it is a co-op which shares benefits back to members, supports some good outdoors initiatives, and provides affordable gear to millions of people.
REI has also taken some significant steps to reduce its environmental impact and has recently released an interesting update on it’s efforts to source all it’s electricity from renewable sources.
Continue reading “REI: ‘our electricity has been 100% renewable since 2013’”
This is completely epic: A 1,000 km journey by bike ‘through the rooftop of Australia along backcountry trails, across exposed high plains, through snow gum woodlands and among tall native forests. The trail links two of major cities (Canberra and Melbourne) with limited resupply points and some of Australia’s best high country campsites’.
The Hunt 1000 is envisaged as a 7 day bike packing ride. It is the brain child of Daniel Hunt. A number of my riding friends have been talking about it, so I thought I would check it out.
This is a great bit of leadership from Aspen Skiing Company. They have recently unrolled a new activist campaign, called Give A Flake, which invites skiers and non-skiers alike to speak out against climate change inaction, with the launch of a variety of online tools that help activists easily contact their elected officials.
Under the banner of ‘Protect Your Passion. Join the Movement’, Aspen says ‘Sometimes caring about an issue isn’t enough. You have to do something. It’s time to turn our concern about climate change — and yours — into action’.
Continue reading “Aspen skiing company launches climate activism campaign”
Australians have campaigned for decades to protect our remaining wild ecosystems. From the Franklin River to the Daintree, Arnhem Land to the Alps to south west WA, many hundreds of campaigns have seen the creation of an incredible conservation estate. But as the saying goes, the price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Now we must be ready to defend these wild places, which once seemed safely preserved, from a range of new threats. The obvious one is climate change. But there is also a more localised and immediate threat: there are many plans to open up reserves to logging, commercial tourism and mining.
These proposals are being resisted locally wherever they arise. But unless you’re a part of a local group it can be hard to know about what threats are arising and where.
Keep It Wild is a great initiative which seeks to bring together the various threats to the conservation estate to help people to get active.
Parks Victoria have announced that sections of the Alpine National Park in north east Victoria will be closed between October 8 and 26 to allow for aerial hunting of deer.
It will include the entire Feathertop/ Razorback ridge from Diamantina hut and extending north of the Feathertop summit, and areas to the north west of Dead Timber Hill, into the Cobungra River valley, almost as far as Derrick hut. Check the attached map for full details.
Trail heads will be sign posted if the areas are closed.
The winter of 2018 was awesome. But the fact is that climate change poses an existential threat to the winters we love. A summer of crazy fires across the alps and Tasmania reminds us of what the future holds – higher temperatures, longer and more extreme fire seasons and less rain.
Yet again, climate scientists have warned that we are running out of time to cut greenhouse emissions. Yet the federal government has dropped the ball on climate action (and our carbon emissions continue to soar), so we need everyone to put their shoulder to the wheel and remind them that the community wants to see meaningful action on climate change. Please send a message to the PM, Scott Morrison, that our winter landscapes are at threat, and that we expect his government to act.
The outdoor community and the outdoor industry have enormous political power. But only if we choose to flex our muscles.
Here’s two really simple ways you can get climate change on the radar of the PM:
Continue reading “Protecting our playground means action on climate”
Lets Split is an interesting development in the Australian backcountry scene. They offer trips in NSW and Victoria for people to experience split boarding. They describe their trips as being different to guided tours: ‘rather they are an opportunity for like minded folk to come and experience Splitboarding, with people who are experienced on that terrain’.
Here is a report from their final trip for the 2018 season.
You are invited to a presentation on the 30+ day, Camino-style, walk from Sydney to Kosciuszko to seek repeal of the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act and action on feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park. The walk will begin on 3rd November. The sessions will happen in Sydney on September 13.
Continue reading “The ‘Save Kosci’ protest walk – come and hear more”
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