My two good friends and I take a road trip to Quebec in mid-December to stay in log cabins, go snowmobiling, and wandering around the old city to experience the holiday magic.
Category Archives: Adventure
Arctic Journey: From Greenland To Alaska
Two film crews explore the spectacular wilderness of the Arctic. The people who live there face dramatic changes.
Part two takes viewers from East Greenland to Alaska. The region around the North Pole is one of the greatest and least-known wildernesses in the world – and it’s rapidly changing due to global warming. 350 people, most of them Inuit, live in Ittoqqortoormiit in Greenland. The nearest settlement is on neighboring Iceland. Almost 800 kilometers of Arctic Ocean separate the two islands. The film team accompanies an Inuit family through Scoresby Sound, a fjord system on the eastern coast of Greenland.
They travel hundreds of kilometers in small boats through pack ice, passing icebergs as high as skyscrapers. On the way they meet whalers who are hunting for narwhals in summer. In this Inuit culture, narwhal skin and polar bear goulash have ensured survival for thousands of years. Greenpeace and WWF activists want to stop whaling and polar bear hunting – but this poses a threat to the indigenous way of life on Greenland.
On the expedition through the world’s largest fjord system, the team learns about the consequences of global warming: melting permafrost and a rapid increase in greenhouse gases. The changes are worrying. Some say they have brought benefits to the far north — the ice breaks up earlier and so too does the hunting season. However, the risks outweigh this benefit. The knowledge and way of life that have been passed down from generation to generation may soon be unsustainable.
Arctic Journey: Svalbard, Norway To Siberia (Video)
The Arctic is one of the most fascinating regions on our planet, and one of the most threatened. Two film crews explore its spectacular wilderness in a two-part documentary. Part one takes viewers from Norway’s Svalbard archipelago to Siberia. The region around the North Pole is one of the greatest and least-known wildernesses in the world, and it’s rapidly changing due to global warming.
The retreat of Arctic sea ice can be observed everywhere along the Arctic Circle, presenting those who live there with dramatic changes. This documentary takes viewers on a journey through the Arctic circle and explores those changes. It begins in Norway’s Svalbard archipelago, a place to see one of nature’s most spectacular displays — the northern lights. With the ice retreating, cruise ships can now travel further north than was previously possible. This places a strain on the fragile ecosystem.
But more visitors may also mean more awareness about the risks that face the region, and more motivation to protect the Arctic. But as if often the case, protecting nature in the Arctic is at odds with economic interests. Russia, in particular, is keen to sell Arctic fossil fuels to the rest of world. The film next takes viewers to the gas-rich Yamal Peninsula in northwestern Siberia, where the Russian company Novatek has built the northernmost industrial facility on the globe.
Further East in Yakutia, two noises fill the air: the relentless buzzing of mosquitoes that infest the Siberian tundra in summer, and the steady dripping of the thawing permafrost on the banks of the Kolyma River. The film’s journey ends in Chukotka in the northeast of Russia, a region closer to Alaska than to the Russian capital Moscow.
Travel & History: Source Of Water For ‘Kakigori’ Shaved Ice In Japan (Video)
A geologist travels deep into Saitama Prefecture to investigate why whale fossils are being found so far from the nearest ocean and why the shaved ice there is so delicious.
The dessert is kakigori, a traditional Japanese shaved-ice specialty that has quickly become the dessert of choice at some of America’s most high-profile restaurants, and continues to grow in popularity. In its home country, however, kakigori has been popular for literal centuries: The idea dates back to the 11th century, when frozen blocks of ice from lakes would be preserved in the winter, only to be finely shaved and served with sweet syrup to Japan’s elite class in the summers. In the 19th century, when ice became more widely available, the public was able to try it, and now — thanks to electric refrigeration — kakigori is ubiquitous during warmer months.
Winter Hiking: ‘Great Smoky Mountains’ In December 2020 (Video)
The Great Smoky Mountains turned into quite the winter wonderland last week. A few inches of snow may not sound like much, but in the Southeast it’s cause to drop everything and hit the trail. Decided to try my hand at a silent (well, technically one-word) hiking video. Hope it gets you excited for winter.
The Great Smoky Mountains are a mountain range rising along the Tennessee–North Carolina border in the southeastern United States. They are a subrange of the Appalachian Mountains, and form part of the Blue Ridge Physiographic Province.
FULL-TIME CAMPER TRAVEL: CATHERINE GREGORY – June Lake Loop In The EASTERN SIERRAS, California (VIDEO)
Filmed and Edited by: Catherine Gregory
Come along on a road trip to the Eastern Sierra. I know that many viewers aren’t able to hike for varying reasons so I wanted to create a video of locations that are all accessible by vehicle (during the non heavy snow months). No hiking required. These are spots everyone can enjoy and all very beautiful….including 4 lakes within the June Lake Loop.
Travel Video: Street Food And Hot Air Ballooning In Cappadocia, Turkey (2020)
Hello again from TURKEY! This is our last STREET FOOD IN TURKEY video from the series, and we had an AMAZING time here. Today, we are showing you the BEST Turkish food Cappadocia has to offer and also bring you on a hot air ballon flight, and take you to Göreme National Park for breathtaking views over this crazy place.
We are starting early in the morning for a hot air balloon flight with Voyager Balloons. We took their Ultra Comfort Flight (75 mins/8 people max.) and our pilot Ali was knowledgable, fun and kept us up to date with how high we were flying. The flight was SO smooth, the sunrise was gorgeous and it was a UNIQUE experience! We highly recommend Voyager Balloons!
After our flight, we were HUNGRY and ready to eat CAPPADOCIA FOOD. The local specialties are Mantı (Turkish dumplings) and Testi kebab (pottery kebab). The mantı were stuffed with beef, covered in a sour yogurt sauce and chili oil. Traditionally mantı are made to be extremely small. The testi kebab was sealed in a pottery vessel and lit on fire. The restaurant owner then cracks it open and pours out the DELICIOUS stew.
Beef, onions, tomatoes and tons of spices make up this dish. We tried testi kebab in other tourist restaurants in Cappadocia and it was terrible. YOU MUST check out THIS restaurant – the kebab was flavourful, the portion was large and service was very friendly! Next, we visit and explore the national park to see the fairy chimneys up close. It was a beautiful sight to see these landscapes. Before heading to our “cave room”, we stopped to pick up another local specialty – CAPPADOCIA WINE! Cappadocia is famous for their endemic grapes and the caves allow wine to be stored in ideal conditions, so the wine here is fantastic. We picked up a Kalecik Karası and enjoyed a glass from our private terrace of our cave room.
Outdoor Sport: ‘The Path Less Paved’ – Gravel Biking
For decades, cycling disciplines have diverged, and in some cases, even polarized from each other. Road bikes stay on the road and mountain bikes stay on the trails. But in our contemporary age of cross-functional design and innovative engineering, bikes have more recently started to transcend their own genres.
Take gravel biking. This relatively “new” sport is actually a reboot of what cycling was up until the mid-20th century, before concrete and asphalt roadways spread across the developed world. Now, gravel has taken the backcountry freedom and exhilaration of mountain biking and blended it with the speed, efficiency and achievable distances of road cycling. Skinny tires, but not too skinny. Powerful yet light hydraulic disc brakes. Gear ratios that encourage speed both up and down the terrain.
Gravel bikes evolved due to an insatiable demand for riders to explore. Not just a Trailforks route or a Strava segment, but capitalizing on the thousands of miles of dirt and gravel roads that exist in rural regions. The result is more bikes rolling through more of the landscape, unhindered by the need for constructed trails or an asphalt surface.
Gravel follows the path less paved.
Travel & Adventure: ‘Biking In Greenland’
Connected by a beautiful ring of light, traversing the fields of ice that form the majestic wilderness of Greenland is an experience like no other. Hard to reach, with an almost prehistoric terrain, and a climate that feels imagined for a novel—there is something both daring and challenging about the world’s largest island. But it poses a uniqueness, something strangely difficult to find in a world of global travel and instant messaging.
During the dim wintry months, these vast plains are stacked with three to five meters of snow. Not many people travel to these immense ice masses in January, even fewer to cycle across. But that is what Tobias Woggon and Philip Ruopp settled upon for their next adventure. In Nordic Cycle, Woggon explains that not many people who took their tour had experienced biking at minus 30 degrees. “I consulted our friend Max,” he explains, “who had been riding his bike in Lapland, Finland the year before and was already experienced with the necessary technology and knew how to handle the cold.”
European Train Travel: ‘Belmond Venice Simplon Orient-Express’ – “Vintage”
Take the classic route from London to Venice, the gateway to the Orient. This breathtaking journey through rural French farmlands and Swiss Alpine valleys can be travelled in either direction, or both. Go further afield with Paris to Istanbul, an authentic adventure over six days to the edge of Europe. Delve into culture with stops in Budapest and Bucharest before arriving in soulful Istanbul.
Paris to Berlin is the newest journey in the repertoire, a thrilling voyage connecting two of Europe’s most vibrant cultural hubs. The tradition of the grand tour thrives with a luxurious escape on the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express.
An uncontested icon of the rails, this train has long captured the hearts and imaginations of glamorous guests. Three elegant dining carriages exude culinary sophistication, from Lalique glass inlays in Cote d’Azur to black lacquer panels in L’Oriental. A steward in blue and gold livery waves with a white-gloved hand, welcoming you on board with a knowing smile. Settle in to your cabin, adorned with art-deco details and French-polished cherry wood, and sit back as a grand voyage begins.
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