Outdoor News Update: Solar Kayaks & Antarctic Ship

Filed in archive Outdoor News on November 27, 2007

Here's the best of the outdoor news I missed.

Solar Powered Kayak Takes the Effort and Fun Out of Kayaking

The entire unit costs $1100, not including a kayak. It attaches to your existing boat and turns into a catamaran it would seem. Not sure why you would spend that kind of cash on something like this when you could just have a small fishing boat and accomplish the same thing, but what ever floats your boat.

Wade Interviews Andrew Skurka

Wade: With so many challenges and such an amazingly long trip, what was the lowest point for you on this trek?

Andrew: There were a handful of lows, all mental, not physical, though sometimes the physical part exacerbated the situation. The first low was in late-May/early-June in California, from around Donner Pass to Castle Crags State Park - I had just had one of the most amazing backcountry experiences in my life (through the High Sierra in mid-May, 5.5 days without seeing anyone and 400 miles of this outdoor crown jewel all to myself) and then
walked into the logged-over and scenically inferior stretches of northern California. Another low was near Washington's Glacier Peak Wilderness - it was the end of a 5-week 900-mile stretch in which I'd walked on snow and had been tortured by mosquitoes every day while maintaining a 37.5-mile pace, and I was completely mentally drained.

Icy Rescue as Seas Claim a Cruise Ship

They were modern adventure travelers, following the doomed route of Sir Ernest Shackleton to the frozen ends of the earth. They paid $7,000 to $16,000 to cruise on a ship that had proudly plowed the Antarctic for 40 years.
But sometime early yesterday, the Explorer, fondly known in the maritime world as "the little red ship," quietly struck ice. There were the alarms, then the captain's voice on the public address system calling the 100 passengers and the crew of about 50 to the lecture hall, according to passengers' accounts on the radio and others relayed from rescuers and the tour operator.