Into the swamp

Headed into the swamp for a few hours in search of alligators. Lots of jungle, six-foot-tall ferns, and murky brown water. Saw turtles, swamp lillies, and herons, but no alligators. Silas did catch a strange-looking fish in the murk under our boat, though...

Florida

Flew to Florida for the holidays (wife is from here) and immediately plunged into grandparent-fueled, amusement-park mania. Thankfully, there is Sea World. Sea World is pretty awesome. Octopuses, orcas, and a walrus that is a splitting image of Jabba the Hut. Plus, a stingray drew blood on my finger while I was feeding it, which doesn't happen everyday. (On a side note: why do stingrays always look like they're smiling? They're the happiest creatures in the sea.)
Looking forward to getting a canoe into a swamp soon to look for alligators. Hopefully they won't draw any blood...

Good roads

Came across these images today from my last trip to Bolivia (back in the days of slide film). They are from a road that some people consider the most dangerous in the world. At the time I rode it, one car per week was going off the edge. As you can see, when that happens you don't survive.
I wrote a few stories about my time in Bolivia for various magazines, only one of which lives online. It's probably not the best I've written, in fact it was put together from the unused scraps of several other stories (to my editor: sorry!), but it does give a true sense of what it's like to ride a bike down there. The opener and a link to the full story follows these images...

"Bolivia's Wild Rides"
by Aaron Teasdale
Technically it was a road ride. Though in Bolivia — land of the most terrifying roads the world has ever known — that wasn’t exactly reassuring. In reality, it was a ragged, serpentine ribbon of mud and rock that rockets down 11,000 feet in 49 miles. Starting from Le Cumbre, a frozen, desolate pass at 16,000 feet, it plummets through cloud and cloudforest and waterfalls that land mid-road, into muggy tangles of jungle that spill over the roadside like groping green tentacles. Astoundingly, it is the main “highway” between the capital of La Paz and the cloud forest town of Corioco. Declared the “World’s Most Dangerous Road” by the Inter-American Bank, it features 10-foot widths, sheer 1,000-foot drops, and a multitude of small white crosses to remind drivers of the motorcycles, jeeps, and buses that routinely pitch off its precipices. Call it road biking Bolivian style.

Alistair Matthew, owner and chief guide of Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking, stood atop Le Cumbre preparing a dozen clients for their upcoming plunge. Without cracking a smile he said, “If you do find yourself going off the edge, please try to leave the bike behind as they’re quite difficult to come by down here.”

To read the full story, go here.

First ski day of the year!

Courage

New story hits mailboxes

My latest story should be arriving in mailboxes any day now. Encompassing a summer's worth of overnight bike rides, or S24Os, it features epic riding, family shenanigans, and a big picture of me and my two boys mountain biking on our super-long, three-seater bike. We call it the Teasdale Train.

The cover is a self-portrait from a solo-overnight on Sheep Mountain, my favorite near-Missoula backcountry ride, with ultralight camping gear this September. Took about ten tries to get the shot right. I'll do another post about that soon, with a few alternate covers we considered from the same shoot.

The cover and opening spread are below. If you'd like to see the entire article, go here.

The night run series

I often run late at night. Not because I love running when most people are going to bed, I'm not even much of a runner, but because days are busy and I meant to run and all of a sudden it's 10:00 p.m. and, by Jove, I'm not going to let that stop me from getting a run in that day. So out I go.

I also recently purchased a Canon S90 camera, which is a rocking little point-and-shoot that shoots RAW files and has surprisingly good low light performance for a camera its size. I was so excited about this that I started carrying it on my runs. At first I just wanted to see what it could do in low light, but then I started having fun taking pictures on Missoula streets in the dark of the night and it evolved into a mission: shoot at least one shot on every night run.

So now it's a series: Missoula By Night; or A Night Owl With Running Shoes and a Camera; or Mommy, Who's That Strange Man Standing in the Street Taking Pictures of Streetlights?

I'm not sure what to call it yet, but here are the first few images...

Into the wildest of wilds

Benjamin and I recently trekked into a remote, rarely-visited area of Glacier Park for four days of hiking, writing, beaver-channel jumping, and grizzly bear tracking. I'll be doing a longer report from the trip soon. For now here are a few teaser images...

 

Last rides of the year

I love riding in late autumn. The air is always crisp and bracing. The colors are muted yet rich. The trails are firm and snow lingers in the shadows. Here are a few images from recent rides...