Today on THE ROCK FIGHT (an outdoor podcast that aims for the head) Colin & Justin break down some of the more interesting and exciting headlines to come out of the outdoor industry and community from the past week.
On the docket this week:
What are WE doing this weekend? Colin & Justin are going to meet up in person for the first time ever! (04:03)
An article from The Trek covers how much trash is on the PCT (07:41)
Colin's review of Shitthropocene, Patagonia's new move about fast fashion and themselves (13:30)
Nepal's Supreme Court limits Everest climbers and bans helicopters from shuttling gear up the mountain (19:12)
New report from The Dyrt shows that less than half of all campers actually used their camping reservations in 2023 (23:20)
Paddling Magazine's report of a missing man and his dog in the Grand Canyon (32:12)
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Episode Transcript
Colin (00:08):
Welcome to the Rock Play where we speak our truth, slay sacred cows and sometimes agree to disagree. This is an outdoor podcast that aims for the head. I'm Colin. True and joining me today, he doesn't need Mount Everest. He already has Mount Tam. It's Justin Hausman.
Justin (00:23):
Good morning. I'm on top of Mount Tam right now. Should
Colin (00:26):
We do that? Can we figure out a way to record outdoor locations? I guess we could just make it up. No one really
Justin (00:32):
Would. What do you mean? I bought Mount Tam.
Colin (00:36):
Is it that windy up there?
Justin (00:38):
1700
Colin (00:39):
Feet or whatever?
Justin (00:40):
How did good? Yeah. 2,700. Yeah, probably
Colin (00:42):
Is always 27. I said 1700. 2,700 is
Justin (00:45):
What it's, yeah, something like that. Yeah. I think it's 26 50 or something.
Colin (00:48):
It is funny. I think it's no matter where you are, everyone I've known from the Bay is always like, oh, Mount Tam. I am sure that's almost like an orienting landmark, right? For sure. Is that kind why people talk? It's there's Mount Tam. I know where I am. It's
Justin (01:00):
Really prominent and it's a pretty cool looking from three sides. It's almost a volcanic just is a perfect wedge. So it's the tallest thing on this side of the Bay. Mount Diablo taller in the East Bay, which is a double peak, which is pretty cool. Mount Diablo is dope. You can actually see the Sierra from Mount Diablo, which is neat. You could actually see the Sierra from Mount Tam on sometimes, every once in a while if the air is super clear and there's a lot of snow in the Sierra, you can see it from Mount Tam. So
Colin (01:31):
What do you see in there? There's a little white ridge way. The distance white line The
Justin (01:35):
Distance, yeah. Although I was on a backpacking trip once with my wife, I dunno, it was five or six years ago in the Sierra, and we were at a cool trailhead that's pretty high in the immigrant wilderness called Gianelli. And I think you started out at 9,600 feet and we were just of bopping around. You're not above tree line, but there weren't a ton of trees and we were looking to the west and kind of following you could see, okay, here's the mountains, here's where the valley starts. And there was this peak way off in the distance and I was like, what the fuck is that? And I started, I got my map out and I was like kind of orienteering where we are, what direction that is. And I realized that's Mount Diablo. That's like 200 miles away and you could see it. No way. It's pretty cool. I mean John Muir talked about being able to see the Sierra from the Bay Area all the time on Peaks in the Bay Area back in the whatever. That was the 19th century.
Colin (02:24):
He was high.
Justin (02:25):
Yeah, that's true. I mean, was he? I bet he was. I don't know.
Colin (02:28):
I'll
Justin (02:29):
Bet he was.
Colin (02:30):
Well, today we're going to run through some of the more notable and exciting headlines to come out of the outdoor industry and community in the past week, including some news from the Mount Everest area. That's why we started with that Everest kind of joke. But before we get there, a few programming reminders. A hardy welcome to all of our new listeners. If you've just joined the Rock Fight, please through throw some stones and follow the show wherever you're listening, whether that's on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or any other podcast app, just please click follow so you're subscribed and you never miss an episode. And then head over to rock fight.co sign up for our newsletter. Comes out every Sunday and includes stuff like outdoor history, outdoor industry history, our Justin Hausman retrospective, rose colored Hausman. I need some more rose colored Hamans from you buddy. I know you do.
Justin (03:10):
We got to,
Colin (03:11):
I know you do. You got to send those over and a bunch of other goodies and go to rock fight.co and click on join the mailing list. And lastly, you want to pick a fight with the rock fight maybe to send us an email to say hi. We love hearing from our listeners and we also want your suggestions for what Justin can do next weekend. This is your opportunity folks. Send suggestions for what Justin should do next weekend to my rock fight@gmail.com.
Justin (03:37):
Please don't throw rocks actually though at us.
Colin (03:41):
Well, you'd have to drive to our house or something.
Justin (03:44):
Yeah, I don't want that.
Colin (03:46):
What if you opened an email and it looked like it rock was coming at you?
Justin (03:52):
I just don't, don't want to get hit by rock. I don't want to get into a rock fight basically. You're the
Colin (03:55):
Wrong show,
Justin (03:56):
Man. I don't want to get into a real one. I just want to make sure people understand this is the metaphor.
Colin (04:01):
It's the metaphorical rock fight. Alright, well we're recording this on Friday, May 3rd. See, I got it right in the outline. You sure did. I did right. And you're hearing it. I probably almost screwed it up, but I was writing this yesterday and you're hearing it on Monday May 6th, which means that in between then and now, we had ourselves a weekend. In fact, Justin and I, while you're listening to this, we're still on our weekend because it's time for America's favorite podcast segment. Not what is Justin doing this weekend, but what are we doing this weekend? Presented by Long Weekend Coffee. Justin, what are we up to this weekend?
Justin (04:31):
We have plans this weekend. I was just going to, yeah, I'm going skiing this week. I'm going to snow. I thought you knew.
Colin (04:40):
Am I just going to be in the parking lot That campground watering? Justin?
Justin (04:44):
Justin, are you here? We're doing our first annual meet and greet. Colin Little, not bike meet and greet. See if you're real after all.
Colin (04:58):
Well, when my wife shows up, just wheeling a TV with my head on it like Max. That would be
Justin (05:02):
So amazingly cool. That would be cooler. I hate to say it. That would be cooler.
Colin (05:07):
Like tie the TV to a bike. Yeah,
Justin (05:09):
Just like, okay. All right. Let's
Colin (05:11):
Do I can do this buddy. Yeah,
Justin (05:12):
Let's do this. That would be so
Colin (05:13):
Amazing. Like an eighties afterschool special, like your friend to the TV or something
Justin (05:16):
Like that. I'm wanted to be real and you're just,
Colin (05:20):
It's a modern adaptation of Pinocchio trying
Justin (05:22):
To drink a beer with you. Just clinking it on the glass on the screen.
Colin (05:26):
Call me R 2D two and stuff. That'd be so
Justin (05:28):
Sweet. That'd be so sweet. Well, we're headed down to beautiful Montana, DERO State Park in Los Soso, California, the central coast to do a little mountain bike riding. We're going to do some surfing, but it's going to be windy as hell, so we're not going to do that. That's our plan. We're going to drink some long weekend coffee. We're going to,
Colin (05:44):
Oh yeah, we got to bring some long, we got to bring some long weekend coffee. Do you have a grinder? Like a little hand Grindr? Oh yeah.
Justin (05:48):
Are you kidding me? Okay.
Colin (05:49):
You kidding? You're in charge of coffee.
Justin (05:50):
Yeah, that's good. That's smart. But yeah,
Colin (05:53):
Longtime listeners will remember that I'm not a huge fan of camping and that Justin is a huge fan of camping, so I'm just going to be relying on him the entire
Justin (06:00):
Time. Such a mistake. Such a huge mistake. All my camping is solo. So you Oh, I'm sorry. You wanted a grinder you could use too? I don't think so. Yeah, I
Colin (06:08):
Brought 3.6 ounces of carne asada that
Justin (06:11):
Is not enough to share. All my camp equipment is like Justin, it says it's labeled and then in parentheses only child underneath it. So just so that you know that I do not share my stuff.
Colin (06:22):
What's parenting as an only child? That must be tough. You have no point of reference for siblings or sharing or being fair?
Justin (06:31):
No, because when one kid grabs it from the other kid, I'm like, yeah, I get it. I get it. I mean, that makes sense to me. She's
Colin (06:36):
Older than you have to be stronger, but But if you're in the central coast area, you're listening to some Monday, you might be able to come find us. That's a good
Justin (06:44):
Point. Yeah, good point. Yeah, you should
Colin (06:46):
Come
Justin (06:46):
Ride with us. Just don't throw rocks, but yeah, Colin's going to share
Colin (06:50):
His, put an overly tall man riding around with a guy who has a TV on a bike
Justin (06:56):
And the overly tall man's wearing bedrocks. Colin's going to share his location data with everybody that listens to the rock fight later on today. Follow
Colin (07:02):
Him my Strava. Yeah,
Justin (07:03):
You can just hit him up.
Colin (07:07):
All right. Well, what we're doing this weekend is presented by a long weekend coffee, which we'll be drinking this weekend while we camp, and we are taking suggestions for future editions of Justin's weekend, which is typically what we talk about in this segment. But if you want to start your days off and your ventures and all your weekends off the right way, you hit the long weekend doc coffee, you load up on a batch of beans and then you check out at promo and you enter the promo code Rock 10 at checkout and you'll get 10% off your first order long weekend coffee. I guess we're kind of making this a long weekend on our own sort
Justin (07:36):
Of Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Colin (07:37):
Yeah. More weekend and coffee please. Alright, so first thing I got for you today, I was reading an article on the trek.co, which is a hiking and backpacking site. Yes. And there was an article this week about two scientists who threw hikes to the PCT last year and they stopped every 10 miles. Have you read this?
Justin (07:55):
No, I'm just saying yes a lot.
Colin (07:57):
Okay. I appreciate your agreement and support of my narration here. They stopped every 10 miles or so to document and pack out all the trash they found within a defined sampling area to determine how much trash actually exists on the Pacific Crest Trail. So they didn't actually pick up everything or document everything they saw, but they used a scientific method to determine an estimation of how much trash is actually on there while also packing out anything they possibly could literally pounds at a time really in often case. Yeah, it's a pretty interesting article. I think you'd enjoy it, but I want to start with you and ask you what do you think the estimated amount of trash on the PCT
Justin (08:33):
Estimated?
Colin (08:35):
Estimated? Yeah. This is after they did the whole thing. Every 10 miles they would stop. They would take soil samples, they'd find things, they found everything from a butter knife to carb parts, which they didn't backpack that out. Right. The car parts. But car
Justin (08:48):
Parts,
Colin (08:49):
Yeah. Well think
Justin (08:49):
About, I mean the PT goes through well, yeah, good point. Also, there's parts in Northern California where it crosses interstate five at one point. Yeah,
Colin (08:59):
Totally. There was the whole tunnel section down here by the McDonald's. Then you get up into Oregon and you're going through towns. Did they talk
Justin (09:04):
About that in there? I mean, yeah, I could
Colin (09:06):
See the being, yeah, it was concentrated in the higher use areas clearly, but there wasn't really a spot that they found. I think there was zero. There was definitely very thin.
Justin (09:14):
So pieces. So that's anything from a gum wrapper to apparently a carburetor.
Colin (09:18):
Yes.
Justin (09:18):
Along the entire 2,650 mile length of the PCT.
Colin (09:22):
Correct.
Justin (09:26):
10,000,
Colin (09:27):
200,000.
Justin (09:29):
Holy shit.
Colin (09:30):
Yeah, I was like, that's a really big number.
Justin (09:33):
Wow.
Colin (09:34):
Right.
Justin (09:35):
The other thing that's amazing ahead, I would just would like to know how much of it was like, did they plot it?
Colin (09:41):
Yeah, there's a ton of info. The article, I linked it, it's in the ally. I think you should definitely check it out. I'll send it to you later so you can read it. I think you'd really enjoy reading it. But the thing they point out, which I thought was interesting, it's like most of the stuff is kind of incidental. It's inevitable. If you're out there, you're going to litter unintentionally. Just use something like accidentally in a pack, then little corner from that packet of goldfish or whatever. It falls on the ground. Right? Yeah. It's really hard if you're out there for six months, that's to not leave something. I guess that's true. Well, another thing they mentioned is sometimes the tip of your hiking, your checking pole breaks off and you don't notice until the next time you stop. Right now that's left behind. So it is kind of inevitable that we're going to muck things up even with best intentions. But man, 200,000 pieces of try, that's a
Justin (10:27):
Lot. I mean, I guess I've seen photos of people packing out trash on the PCT with giant garbage bags full of it. But again, I always just sort of assume those are in the high traffic areas. I mean, I'll say I don't really encounter a whole lot of garbage when I'm way out in the middle of nothing. I guess I have, and if I do, it depends if it's dispersed camping, but in my car, yeah, you're going to find sadly like shotgun shells and bottle caps. But backpacking, once you get out of the obvious spots, it's pretty rare that I find anything. But I guess you do. I guess you sometimes do.
Colin (11:05):
Yeah, I think even stuff that's close to a population area, if it's a mountain bike or a trail where people run or hike a lot. I mean, you can find the occasional empty goo pack, things like that. And I tend to pick stuff up if I find it, but I think for the most part, I'm not usually disgusted as I'm hiking on some of these places, even on PCT close to my house where it's close to Julian again, it's near a road, you'd think, oh, it's easy on and off a lot of people out here, but that's usually pretty clean, but it kind of makes sense. I mean, it's a long way to go.
Justin (11:34):
How many bodies did they find?
Colin (11:38):
Can't they didn't want to disclose that?
Justin (11:40):
Yeah, pickup up stuff. I'm amazed that people don't pick stuff up more often. I mean, I don't always, but even around town, if I'm just on a walk and I see a can of someone had a beer on the alley and left it, I'll pick it up and toss it in a recycling bin. I'm always amazed when you see people note something and then walk right
Colin (11:57):
Past it, keep walking by. I have done that and then immediately felt guilty and go back and pick it up. You're like, oh, there's that thing there. I should pick that up. You can go to pick it up. Yeah, the kind of bike path that's along the main road near my house, it's a really busy road and I think there's often trash out. I think it's probably mostly because of high speed vehicles and buy stuff flying out the back of pickup trucks or whatever. But yeah, it's just yesterday there was a piece of cardboard, a piece of foam and then a plastic bag. And I knew, and there's also, because we're in the city that we're in, there's lots of trash can public trash cans, so it's not that long of a walk. I'm not carrying, I mean I have carried stuff home before, but it's like I know there's a trash can 50 yards that way. I'll just go throw it away. Weird.
Justin (12:35):
I feel like there needs to be way more community accountability for things. I agree. That kind of thing is a great example. I don't know why I think of, well, I do know why, because for the first few years I lived here, there were forest fires all the time and half of 'em are started by trucks, dragging chains. And until you live somewhere where that's a common thing, you're always like, why would a truck drag a chain every day? Some truck is towing something and there's a chain is dinging along to
Colin (13:01):
Highway Tinder
Justin (13:02):
File. And I'm always like, I have before been in situations where I can actually, it's full enough road or they've stopped and I'll be like, dude, you're dragging your chain. And usually they just freak you off.
Colin (13:14):
But you tried,
Justin (13:14):
But you tried. There should be so much more of that. I feel like there have definitely been times where I've been on a trail and someone right in front of me walked past a piece of garbage and looked at it, kept walking and I'll make it loud like, geez, I'd pick it up.
Colin (13:30):
Speaking of they tried, have you seen the new Patagonia movie?
Justin (13:34):
Wait, I thought you were kidding. No. For some reason when you said they tried, I was thinking of they live that weird, horrible speaking of they
Colin (13:41):
Live, have you seen the John Carpenter? Apparently I saw a headline this morning. Not impressed with Oppenheimer. How
Justin (13:46):
Old is John Carpenter? Like a thousand.
Colin (13:48):
I'm just like, come on dude. Oppenheimer was incredible. I love you John Carpenter, but it's time to
Justin (13:53):
Stop talking. There weren't enough bloody talking heads in it.
Colin (13:56):
Yeah, I'm sure. I wouldn't like Oppenheimer when I'm in my eighties too and I've got, I don't want to watch the three hour movie. Right.
Justin (14:04):
I've seen parts of it. I've seen part of the Patagonia movie of the unpronounceable movie, the Pacini.
Colin (14:12):
Yeah, I watched it yesterday. We've gotten multiple listeners have sent that over for some commentary, so I think you need to watch it. Maybe we will address it formally down the road, but
Justin (14:21):
Okay. They've put out a bunch of movies lately too, by the way. I
Colin (14:25):
Usually like Patagonia movies. You didn't like it. I think they have a self-awareness problem. I don't think they quite understand who they are anymore or they're trying to be something that they're not. I
Justin (14:34):
Get that. Well, I will watch it. They put out a bunch of other movies that aren't about themselves in the same week. Leave it to Beavers where it's about Beaver dams and a follow up to Undammed, that really good dam movie they put out a long time ago,
Colin (14:52):
Which is a really good movie, by
Justin (14:53):
The way. Yeah, that's a good one. I watched a couple of those, but no, I haven't seen it yet. It's long. It's like an hour, right? Or four, five minutes. Minutes. Minutes.
Colin (14:59):
It's a long time. Yeah. There's a little too much featuring Let's feature ourselves in this and it made it just feel, and it's also trying to be funny and I think the general brand tone of Patagonia is not funny. It can be enthusiastic when you see people dancing and doing their R one video. It's kind
Justin (15:14):
Whatever. I would say Patagonia has a bit of a rye vibe. Sure. Maybe slightly. But they're trying
Colin (15:18):
To go full mockumentary. They're doing this Philomena k rip off. It had the opposite effect for me of what I'm like, I'd rather just go watch four back to back like John Oliver rants on this topic than sit through
Justin (15:32):
This. Well, I'll be honest with you, I don't really want to watch any documentaries ever about something that's bad.
Colin (15:38):
Well, and that's their point is they're trying to bring some levity to the situation, right. About fast fashion and whatnot.
Justin (15:44):
Sure. But I know about fast fashion. I know that we have too much stuff. I know that capitalism is probably horrific. I at this point, pretty well convinced that western civilization is the worst thing that's ever happened. I'm there. I know all this. I don't want to watch a documentary about Ukraine. I don't want to watch a documentary about Gaza. I don't feel like I need to. I already, that sounds bad. I'm not trying to say I don't want to be informed, but it's a tough ask for me to put on a 45 minute documentary about how we have people buy too much clothes. I know that.
Colin (16:19):
No, but you are informed. That's why you're saying that. I agree with you. It's just like that. What about Ukraine that won the Oscar, which I'm sure is absolutely incredible and timely and summarizes everything that how I probably personally would feel of it. I know it would. I would not look forward to that experience.
Justin (16:35):
I don't want a movie to end and me to be like or look at my daughters to be like, fuck.
Colin (16:43):
Right. And I think what you just summarize is my beef, and I think I said we're not going to spend too much time on it, but just to kind of, I don't know who the audience is, I think is actually what it comes down to. Because if the audience is guys like you or me or people like you and me, well we already know this stuff. And I think the tone of it was off putting enough that if you're not already a Patagonia fan, it might have the opposite effect and you might just be like, stop pumping your own tires so much in this film. So that was my takeaway is like, I guess good job on the swing. You took a big swing, you tried something new that you've never done before, but this on the heels of fashion is none of our business. Then this is just a little kind, continuing that trend of like you got to get that self-awareness back. Go back to sowing in vote the assholes out labels, that was great. Don't buy the jacket great. These really sort of simple things that are really impactful. So
Justin (17:31):
That's just my, well, I'm observing judgment until I see it. I mean, I stand by my waffling belief or not belief. I don't know what I'm trying to say that I don't know enough to know whether or not it's more impactful to have a huge brand that sells a lot of stuff, but gets the right message out versus just not existing at all. I don't know what the answer is. Again, I tend to, all the other movies that they made last week are really good,
Colin (18:01):
Really good
Justin (18:02):
And very impactful and very important. So I tend to give Patagonia the benefit of the doubt. I'm going to watch it. I think maybe,
Colin (18:08):
I don't know. You just said you weren't going to watch it.
Justin (18:10):
I did. I said, but now I feel like I should. So we could talk about it some more. But you know what I did watch that I really enjoyed that made me feel like a million dollars. Moana, this awesome series on, I think Disney about octopus Octopuses. Octopuses.
Colin (18:22):
So great. This wasn't the Octopus teacher one was
Justin (18:24):
It? No, no. It's probably similar, but I don't remember what it's called. The Kingdom of the Octopus. Rise of the octopus. It's just amazing. And when it's over, you're like, God, I love life. I love the planet, I love all this. And I'll be honest, I'm much more likely to be thinking about my impact on things and what I can do about something, watching something that's really beautiful that isn't even talking to me about like, oh, and by the way, they're totally fucked. It's just like, Hey, look at all this amazing stuff. That's what makes me want to pick up litter and stuff. Go outside and do the right thing, not, I just don't need anymore. We don't cover negative stuff anymore to Adventure Journal. We just stopped. It's like, I don't need to write about the pebble Mine don't need to write about something that's been devastated. I mean, it just doesn't seem to, I don't know. That's not the kind of news I want.
Colin (19:10):
Let's get into some
Justin (19:11):
Headline. Let's get into some heads.
Colin (19:12):
So we talked a lot a few months ago about the news coming out of Everest of some new regulations to control littering and poop on the mountain and the out of control growth happening there. Well, there was some news this week actually. A lot of news came out of Everest this week and per explorers web.com, Nepal's Supreme Court has ordered the government to limit the number of climbers allowed on Everest. It also bans helicopters above base camp on all its mountains apparently, which they probably have been shuttling stuff up and down Anaperna lately.
Justin (19:44):
Yeah, I think.
Colin (19:45):
But it orders new regulations to limit garbage on its peaks as well. So according to the justices, the government can only issue climbing permits after specifying how many climbers will be allowed according to available capacity. And he helicopter flights above gaze camp will be banned except for rescues. And finally, climbing teams must submit a list of gear and supplies. They're carrying up the mountain and must leave a deposit and they receive back their deposit only after proving that they brought everything down. That's
Justin (20:09):
A cool idea. That's a really cool idea. This
Colin (20:11):
Is a huge should do that.
Justin (20:14):
We should do that somehow. This would obviously be a huge headache, but it would be kind of cool. I don't know how that would work. There's no way for it to work. I was just going to say, it'd be kind of cool if when you went to get a backpacking permit somewhere, they weighed your pack and it's like if it weighs less when you come back, Uhuh, we're keeping that
Colin (20:34):
Deposit. Yeah, you take your food and water out and wait your base. Yeah,
Justin (20:37):
It makes it, did you leave something out there? But yeah, that's cool. Did you know
Colin (20:41):
There's 200,000 pieces of trash on the PCT? Yeah.
Justin (20:44):
That's a cool idea. Good for you, Nepal. But that's only on the Nepal side obviously. It's
Colin (20:48):
Only on the Nepal side. I mean it's going to be, how are they going to enforce it? There was some mentions in the same article about some of the richest outfits are partners with the helicopter business or they're already getting pushback for it. But I mean none this stuff happens without, you got to start somewhere.
Justin (21:03):
Yeah. I don't know. I actually don't know. I mean, I have no idea. If you don't get a permit, what happens? Is there somebody checking your permit? I've never understood how that works. That's
Colin (21:13):
Right. And I got to think this will start next year. Right? Already people on the mountain, it's prime climbing season right now
Justin (21:20):
Mean I could look into that obviously be an easy answer. But I've always wondered about that because obviously you have to pay a lot to get a permit. I think it's a significant amount of money. I think it is,
Colin (21:30):
But I don't think they cap it. But
Justin (21:32):
Also, who's checking,
Colin (21:34):
Right? Who's rolling up to that badass new side at Evert Space Camp going, all right, let's see your permits. Is that how it
Justin (21:39):
Works? I don't, have you ever seen that? Have you ever heard of that? No. Me either. Well,
Colin (21:43):
And actually that kind of segues into the next piece that came out of ever this week. I sent you that video. We always hear these stories about Everspace camp, about the trash on the mountain or whatever. Well, someone shot a aerial view of Everspace Camp this week. Yeah. Do you see how vast it is?
Justin (21:58):
It looked like Lollapalooza.
Colin (21:59):
Yeah. Maybe bigger
Justin (22:01):
Or wait, they don't do it in Lollapalooza anymore. Right. That was like we were kids.
Colin (22:05):
No, they do this. Why in Chicago this summer?
Justin (22:06):
Okay. I should have said Coachella
Colin (22:08):
Trying to date yourself
Justin (22:09):
There. No, I didn't mean to. I'm like, wait, is that even a thing anymore? Should I said Coachella?
Colin (22:13):
Whatever Boomer.
Justin (22:14):
Hey. Not even close, asshole. I'm I'm older than you. Exactly. But you're not even close. Come on. That's true. I wish, God, I wish
Colin (22:23):
You were a boomer.
Justin (22:23):
Yeah, we would be having the show. We would be probably retired and that's true. We'd be hanging out and we wouldn't be worried about anything. Isn't that amazing? We'd be worried about nothing or we'd be worried about something that was stupid.
Colin (22:35):
Right? Trump's going to come along and save us pretty soon. It'd be great.
Justin (22:38):
God, I wish I was a boomer. Anyway, what were we talking about
Colin (22:41):
Ever? Space camp video. Oh yeah, that's link it in the show notes. It's incredible. It kept going. It just kept going and going and going. How many tents, how long would it take to walk from one end to the other? Like an hour
Justin (22:53):
Probably because it, you're pretty high elevation and if you get real tired, they probably have, do they have electric bikes out are what's that? Do they have electric bikes up? There are people just whizzing around on rad power bikes between probably from the McDonald's to their tent
Colin (23:08):
To go get your massage and then go to the movie theater.
Justin (23:10):
It's amazing. But what's cool about this is it feels like it's getting a little bit closer to my dream of Everest just being canceled for five years. It's like little baby steps toward that.
Colin (23:19):
Alright, next thing we have up, we had a study came out this week that according to campsite booking out of the dirt, you ever use the
Justin (23:25):
Dirt? Nope. But I know of it, but I know I don't use it.
Colin (23:28):
So apparently less than half campers, 42.7% used all the reservations they made in
Justin (23:33):
2023. That's so annoying.
Colin (23:35):
In a press release this week, the dirt states that amid the overall increase in the number of Americans who camp and the scarcity of campsites, overserving campsites has become a strategic to make sure you have a spot of the campers who canceled reservation in 20 23, 87 0.3 canceled with more than 48 hours notice and 32.2% pulled the plug with less than 48 hours notice some canceled multiple reservations in different timeframes and that leaves sold out campgrounds with open spaces going unused. So you can't more than I Do you think this is a real
Justin (24:06):
Problem? Yes. This is a huge problem. I mean, you have to do it though to a certain degree. So especially in the Bay Area, they open campsites six months in advance. It's kind of a complicated situation, but we were just the beneficiaries of this. A few weeks back, my next door neighbors wanted to go camping at this zone over by the ocean near us and they booked two weeks because you can book up to 14 days or whatever, and that's kind of the only way to secure. So you booked that six months in advance and okay, I have these two weeks and then you kind of decide when can I go? When can I go? In their case, they couldn't. So they ended up going, okay, you can go for us on these few days and you can go for us on these few days.
(24:46):
And then a few of the days just never got collected. The site next to us was empty the night that we were there. Probably a similar situation. Someone booked it and just couldn't quite get there. But you have to because for some reason, I'm not sure why it matters. It's really hard to book one day. You have to kind of book a bunch at once. But yeah, it's a huge problem mean, I thought it was at first when you're reading that, I thought that was just going to be people that legitimately just didn't show up. They couldn't. But yeah, I mean I've done it. You kind of have to, or even backcountry sites are the same way. I booked a bunch of sites in Yosemite last summer or permits and then the weather turned to shit and I was like, well, I can't go. And so I would always call and cancel. So they're open for walkups, but I'm sure there were people that would've booked had it been available
Colin (25:33):
Isn't just the nature of it. I mean, I feel like if you're booking, if I'm booking a last minute trip, I know I'm going to be limited by my choices because I didn't plan in advance.
Justin (25:42):
Well, yeah. Yes. But also that sucks.
Colin (25:46):
It definitely sucks. But what do you do about it?
Justin (25:48):
Well, more campgrounds. I mean, I think ultimately what this means is that there are more people camping than there ever have been before. And how often do you hear of a brand new campground? I mean, it happens, but it's not often. And so you have a much bigger population than we had at all in the fifties when most of these campgrounds seems like they were built. And then you have more people camping than we had per capita than back then. And they're all trying to squeeze into campgrounds that were built decades ago for an entirely different population with an entirely different outlook on camping. So of course it's going to be like this. So I just think we need way more campgrounds. It's going to be like this without, I mean, you can get fancy and weird about reservation systems and I know they're trying to, because change it a little bit. So it makes it easier to sell sites that have been because as it is now, a lot of these places, they don't have any infrastructure. So if you cancel, there's no way for them to know. There's no way for them to check. So they're out in the middle of nothing. And so if there's newer ways apparently to make it easier to buy sites that have been canceled, which is cool, but honestly just more we just need more campgrounds or you just make everything first come, first serve and just say tough shit. I don't know.
Colin (26:56):
I was saying that's an option. I mean it definitely, I feel like it impacts people, especially on the East coast where you don't have the abundance of BLM land like we do. So if we decide last minute, I want to go camping, no, I can't get a reservation, just places we can still go.
Justin (27:07):
I very rarely use campground reservations unless if it's in the summer, I never do. For the most part, I'm just dispersed camping. So the only time I really do is when the mountains are covered in snow and it's a huge issue. I don't know. I don't know what to do. But I mean here I live in a place that's very outdoorsy. There is one that's not true. There's two, only one of them is really desirable. There's one campground area, one state park that people literally want to camp at. And of course it's always booked. You can show up midweek maybe, but not in the summer, but you could now maybe get a site. But in the summer it doesn't matter. It's always booked. There's another less desirable one kind of on the other inside the bay, or not inside the bay, but facing the bay where it's hotter and it's not quite as nice. And you might be able to get sites there, but not really. But that's it. There's nowhere else to go. There's literally no other campgrounds. So millions of people live up here.
Colin (28:02):
I don't know, maybe this is a matter of what you want to do because the idea of if I live in Oakland and that one on the other side of the bay is like, I probably wouldn't want to go camping there anyway. Well,
Justin (28:11):
Those are in Marin. There's other, I mean,
Colin (28:14):
Oh, there you're talking about, well, okay, well even Sam Taylor near your house. I know you like to pop up there with the kids every once in a while, but it's like that's not your preference. If you want to go camping, you wouldn't be like, oh, let's just go to that place. You'd want to go somewhere else where you don't normally get to go to. Right. That's
Justin (28:25):
100% true. So yeah, good point. But I mean, I'm also, this is kind of what I do for a living. So there's a lot of people who go camping once a year, but the bay isn't, that's a notoriously bad for it because it's a pretty outdoorsy community and there's no open public lands around here. None. You have to drive at least three hours to get to anything like that, but really a little bit further. Really. So it's for the most part, you got to book your sights and it makes it really hard. And everybody grumbles. Everybody hates it. I don't know anybody who doesn't.
Colin (28:53):
I dunno, man, I'm kind of into, you can always find some place to go. There's a you
Justin (28:59):
Really? Yeah,
Colin (29:00):
Sure.
Justin (29:01):
I swear to God, man, you would not, well if you're booking six months in advance, but if it's like Thursday you're like, oh, the weather looks great, let's go camping this weekend. No, you're screwed. You know what you can do? You can pay a hundred dollars a night at a hip camp. Someone will, you can put your tent up in their horse pasture or something for like a hundred bucks. You can usually find something like that, but
Colin (29:21):
Get out of your comfort zone. Yeah, I understand. Same thing in the campgrounds. If it's a get out of, go find that unused piece of BBL M land, pull over and set up your tent. Figure it out. Come on. It's adventure. I said
Justin (29:34):
There isn't that though. I mean there is if you want to drive four hours. Oh yeah, no,
Colin (29:37):
That is where there
Justin (29:38):
Isn't for sure. This is that. I mean, a lot of, most people, people don't live near BLM land. That's BBL M land. It's isolated. Most people don't live near Forest Service land out there because isolated. So most of us, that's a huge commitment to get to it. But you know what else you can do? You can just camp. You can just camp in your house.
Colin (29:56):
That's what I'm saying. Make a little tent plan to be, get better at planning. It's
Justin (30:00):
Pretty cozy. I don't like that. That's the thing. This is actually a big issue with me. I don't want to have to plan camping. The whole fucking point of camping is I want to sleep outside tomorrow. The mood struck me to go outside. And that's why people, I love to talk crap about Denver or Colorado generally speaking, because I'm really envious of it. Like you can live right in all these places where you can just backpack from your house. There's so many options there. And I guess if you lived in the foothills of California, you could do that too. You could just bite into Sierra. But I don't have that option. And so it annoys the shit out of me that
Colin (30:36):
You have a bit of a drive no matter where you're going to go, unless you're going to go to these little local places. That makes a lot of sense. I get that.
Justin (30:41):
Yeah. And that's how most people are though. I mean, most people live in urban areas. Can I tell you a cool story about where we're about to go camping? Yes. That I think our audience would appreciate.
Colin (30:49):
Let's do it.
Justin (30:50):
So I dunno if it's at this campground and you're going to think I'm making this up, but I'm not at this campground, or at least I'm sorry, in the state park. I don't remember when this happened, but it definitely did. This isn't like an urban legend somehow. Some way. Well, probably pretty easy. They saw him, but a guy was busted decades ago for getting into an outhouse and being under the toilet, under
Colin (31:16):
In the toilet down.
Justin (31:18):
Just like him, this weird fetish or whatever. But women would go in there and squat on the thing and do their biz and there was just a guy under there. They caught him
Colin (31:29):
Doing
Justin (31:29):
It. Yeah, they finally, I pulled him out. It was like a big news story.
Colin (31:33):
How long was he in there?
Justin (31:35):
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if
Colin (31:37):
He was, how did he get in
Justin (31:37):
And out? Dunno, through the hole. Don't remember any of that. I have no idea.
Colin (31:43):
Is it weird that I'm more excited to go now?
Justin (31:46):
I don't know. I can't point out which outhouse it was,
Colin (31:49):
But yeah, you better figure it out before we get there.
Justin (31:50):
It's still like the gnarliest thing I've ever heard. Apparently that's happened in other places too. It's like
Colin (31:55):
People, if you can't find me for a few hours, don't go searching around the outhouses because I won't be there. I
Justin (32:00):
Promise. I dunno if he was in a hazmat suit or what. I don't remember the details.
Colin (32:05):
I'm sure that was part of the allure for him.
Justin (32:08):
Isn't that wild?
Colin (32:09):
People are fucked
Justin (32:10):
Up, man. Some people. Yeah. Yeah.
Colin (32:12):
Alright, well the last story we got today, rock fight paddling correspondent Joe Poto, check from Paddling magazine reported this week that he reported in Paddling magazine, actually that this past week, a story of a man missing in the Grand Canyon. Joe writes at the National Park Service, is searching for a missing man and his dog in the Grand Canyon and believes the pair may have launched on the Colorado River on a homemade raft, actually included a picture of the raft, if you want to take a peek there. On April 21st, 2024, the NPS located a presumably abandoned Toyota Tacoma belonging to Thomas Lee Robeson of Santa Fe, New Mexico at Lees Ferry. The launch point used for the majority of paddlers embarking on a Grand Canyon River trip and a press release. The park service published images of Robeson who's 58 with his 11-year-old Welsh Corgi, along with a photo of the homemade wood and raft. Neither have been seen since this writing on April 29th. Are you looking at that?
Justin (33:05):
I'm looking at it picture. So this picture, where did they get this picture? He took it himself. I
Colin (33:09):
Don't know. That's one thing I didn't say I looked for. I don't know where they got the image, but I think they seem pretty confident that this is what he was on. For the folks listening, it's literally three planks of wood that's somehow kind in a very rudimentary way, lashed together, and he's got a, but
Justin (33:23):
You have some pretty intricate carvings on them of fish and plants
Colin (33:27):
And stuff or whatever the aliens told him to carve. But he also has an old school, it's not even a PFD, like an old school life jacket, like an over the neck one that will keep you
Justin (33:38):
Low also really well illustrated. Yeah.
Colin (33:40):
So my guess is we're never going to see this guy again. Right? I mean, I'm trying, it's more of like what's his intentions here?
Justin (33:49):
Okay, so 58. So he's not that old. I mean this, I don't He
Colin (33:53):
Took his dog.
Justin (33:54):
Yeah. I mean, down
Colin (33:56):
The Colorado River.
Justin (33:58):
I just read a story the other day about this crazy billionaire guy who, I forget which a mountain you've heard of went mountain climbing and apparently just walked off and everyone was like, oh, he died, I guess. Oh, well. And they had a funeral and everything. You never found him. No, they did. He's living in Cyprus with some 19-year-old girl or something. So I don't know. Maybe it's something like that. I don't know.
Colin (34:25):
That's actually, I hadn't considered that. I'm thinking, is this a suicide thing? Is this sort like, Hey man, if I'm going to go, I'm going to load up my dog on my three plank bra and go paddle down the Grand Canyon and
Justin (34:35):
See how
Colin (34:35):
Long I can last
Justin (34:36):
My was bode at the end of point break where he is just like, you know what? Let me out. I got to do it. I don't know. That's gnarly. That sucks.
Colin (34:43):
I do love the renegade spirit though. I think we should celebrate people who want to charge into
Justin (34:48):
The wild. Absolutely. Yeah. I don't have an issue with that. They're comfortable. I know that there's issues with, okay, it costs money to rescue people when they do something. I totally get all that.
Colin (34:55):
I understand that.
Justin (34:56):
But the spirit, I totally celebrate.
Colin (34:58):
Yeah. I don't care what the, I mean, obviously he had weighed some the potential outcomes here. I You go on to the Grand Canyon, it's going to be gnarly even if you're with a seasoned guide. Right? I mean, it's like there's a lot of things that can happen there. And you're on what he's paddling on. I'll make sure I link to that too in the show notes if you folks at home can see what we're talking about. But I think it's just kind good for you. This is the guy, this is the way I'm going to go out. Or Yeah. Or if he's in Cyprus with a 19-year-old and his little corgi, and this was just something to mislead everybody. Whatever. Good for you, man. Is there any sort of crazy thing you flirted with doing in the back country? You ever have your,
Justin (35:38):
Huh?
Colin (35:39):
Or what would your equivalent be? It was another story. I forget the name. It's a good
Justin (35:44):
Question.
Colin (35:45):
There's someone who, I'm pretty sure they decided it was a suicide. He went up on Mount Lafayette, which is in the White Mountains in New Hampshire in winter and just sat down and he froze to death, right? I mean, it was an exposed day. It was windy and probably below
Justin (36:01):
Zero. Below zero. What a wild way to do it.
Colin (36:03):
Yeah. I should find, you'd actually find the story probably pretty interesting. I'll find the details on it. But that was just sort of like, all right, this is it. And went up there and punched out
Justin (36:14):
Now. No. Kind of a bummer
Colin (36:15):
That people had to bring him back down,
Justin (36:16):
I guess. Well, right. Yeah. I mean, that sucks. I've never really thought about, I mean, I've read plenty of stories about people making homemade rafts and doing these wild things or whatever, but no, I don't think I have a big, ambitious, wild sort of thing like that to do. At least not that I've ever thought of before. I mean,
Colin (36:35):
Look, I think there's probably a good chance on our Grand Canyon guy that maybe he's intentionally trying to end his life at the same time. I really hope he turns up and we learned more about what he was thinking going off
Justin (36:45):
On his three plate. He's managing a cinon somewhere.
Colin (36:48):
That'd
Justin (36:48):
Be the best. Yeah. Have
Colin (36:50):
You met, we said his name. What was his
Justin (36:52):
Name? Oh, the Grand
Colin (36:53):
Canyon guy. Thomas Lee Robeson. Yeah. You met Tom. Is that a Corgi? Who manages the Cinnabon down street at the airport?
Justin (37:00):
He was talking about the Grand Canyon.
Colin (37:02):
Oh God. What he said. He said he paddled the whole thing on three pieces of wood. Isn't that crazy? That's how no way
Justin (37:10):
He did. That's how I end the story. I mean, this isn't like me making this up, but that's how I end the story of the place of expedition where this old guy in this nursing home would be telling all the people there that he wrote
Colin (37:21):
A stone, the snowmobile.
Justin (37:24):
They're all like, yeah, all right, whatever. Crazy guy. And his son was like, no, he actually did that. That's amazing.
Colin (37:30):
That's the best.
Justin (37:30):
Yeah.
Colin (37:31):
I hope I'm old and delusional one day just telling stuff that I, some of it I did, some of I didn't. You'll never know and neither
Justin (37:37):
Would you, frankly. Yeah,
Colin (37:38):
I'm happy either way.
Justin (37:39):
Yep.
Colin (37:41):
Alright man. We can wrap it up there. I guess we should. I was going to say what's going on, but I guess I know what's going on. You're packing for your camping trip back? The camping
Justin (37:47):
Trip? Yeah.
Colin (37:48):
Yeah. I got to pull some bins out. I got to go find my tent.
Justin (37:50):
The bins? Yeah. I wasn't going to bring a tent, but now it's going to be cold, so I got to bring a tent.
Colin (37:55):
Why? I just put drop, drop the sides on the, I guess I can do that. A little soft topper.
Justin (37:59):
I'll still bring a tent just in case. Yeah, good point.
Colin (38:02):
Alright, well that's the chafer today. Listen, the rock fight, it's a production of rock Fight LLC for Justin Hausman. I'm Colin Truth. Thanks for listening. Do all that stuff we said at the beginning, go click, follow, go sign up for our newsletter, do all the good stuff, share the show, share our website with some pals. Spread the rock, fight words, the word of the rock fight, I should say, with people that you know who might be interested or maybe people who aren't even interested. That would be great. So anyway, he's here to take us out. Krista makes, he's going to sing the rock fight fight song right now and we'll see you next time. Rock fighters. Rock
Chris DeMakes (38:34):
Fight, rock fight. Rock fight. Rock fight. Rock fight. Rockside. Go into the rock bike where we speak our truth, stay sacred cows and sometimes agree to disagree. We talk about human power out outdoor activities and pick bikes about topics that we find interesting. Black culture, music, the latest movie reviews, ideas in for the head. This is where we speak our truth. This is where we speak our truth. Rat Aite.