One Year Later
10 Jul
It was a year ago today that we all put on our heavy packs and headed into the Yosemite backcountry towards the John Muir Trail. Our batteries were full, our memory cards empty, and our expectations uncertain.
On our first anniversary, it’s only fitting that we’ve reached a major milestone in this epic journey: we’ve locked picture on our feature film, MILE… MILE & A HALF, and we are now ready to head into final post-production stages.
As part of our upcoming Kickstarter Campaign to raise finishing funds, we held our first free public event last Friday night at Adventure 16 in West Los Angeles. The evening was an overwhelming success, drawing a crowd of more than 200 people. Our panoramic photos were displayed, a new featurette was screened, and Opus Orange performed a powerful acoustic set that blew us all away. We equate the evening to making it over Mather Pass (a difficult & technical climb for us all). A lot of time & energy brought us to that moment, but seeing the crowd’s response made it all worthwhile and re-energized us for the challenges ahead.
Wait! Does that mean we still have to climb Forrester Pass?
In addition to daily updates on our Facebook page commemorating our journey last year, we’ll be making a concentrated effort to continue our blog postings, including photos and other fun updates. For those of you who are interested in helping us along the final stretch of this journey, we’ll be sending out announcements about our Kickstarter campaign.
Thank you, again, for being so supportive of our project, and many thanks to Adventure 16 for hosting our first event. If you’re in the West LA area, some of our photos are still on display for a limited time.
-The Muir Project
Pass It On
25 Jun
One good story deserves another, right?
We were so lucky that Michael Koehen found The Muir Project, interviewed us, and pitched our story. Now, we’re featured in Mammoth Times Sierra magazine, with a cover photo, 5 pages and a wonderful overview of the project so others can get a feel for it all.
When Mammoth Times told us we were the feature story, they also relayed a terrific story about how the article is traveling the JMT. Apparently someone had picked up the magazine in Mammoth, read the JMT/ Muir Project article while on the trail and then passed it on to another hiker going the reverse direction. How can you not love that?
Our project began as a simple desire to complete the trail and enjoy documenting the process. Along the way, our mission expanded. We hope that The Muir Project will inspire others to step out of their box and have their own adventure. On the trail, through their art, in any way that makes their heart soar, we hope everyone has the chance to set, fight for and achieve their goal.
And every step of the way, we’ve been greeted by warm thanks for the project and an overwhelming response by people wanting to get involved. Well, now here’s your chance. We’ll be embarking on a Kickstarter campaign soon, and we need everyone to share this story (and give what you can) to bring us these last few steps. (more details on that coming soon…)
We’re so proud of what we’ve accomplished, the team we’ve gathered and all of the people that believe in our mission. We hope you’ll continue to join us on this journey by continuing to pass it on.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOHN MUIR
21 Apr
Happy Birthday to John Muir.
According to wikipedia there are 6,555 national parks worldwide. When he was born in Dunbar Scotland 174 years ago there weren’t any. If that isn’t a legacy to be proud of I don’t know what is. He helped to create the idea of what it meant to preserve our wild places. Luckily for us, some of his greatest achievements were here in California where not only our group, but hopefully generations to come will be able to stroll through places that haven’t changed much from the days before humans even existed.
So many people throughout history are remembered for destruction and pillage, it’s nice to know that nearly 100 years after he passed and close to 200 since he was born, not only is he still remembered for what he saved, but his writings, political actions and exploits still inspire us to do right by his legacy.
“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” Indeed John Muir, I only hope that wherever you are the views rival the ones you saved here on earth.
TRAIL CHOW
4 Apr
When prepping for this one-month adventure, one big emphasis of mine was FOOD, and in particular – dinners. With our large group, I wasn’t about to spend all that money on prepackaged freeze dried dinners that add so much waste with individual packs, and have such little flavor. (We did bring along a few as backups as we had no idea how hungry we’d actually be on the trail, but they were never used.)
Although Durand added copious amounts of cayenne to everything anyway, I tried to give us options that had flavor, protein, veggies & tons of carbs.
There are wonderful resources for backcountry cooking and menus on-line, my favorites being:
http://shop.maryjanesfarm.org/store/c/3-Food-Pantry.aspx
http://www.harmonyhousefoods.com/
I was also surprised at how much you could find in the regular grocery store aisles.
A few of the groups’ favorite meals from the trail:
•Deconstructed Pizza
•Double Potato Chowder
•Black Bean Burritos (Mary Janes Farm’s beans rock!)
•Cranberry Drop Biscuits
•Pasta with Homemade Sauce (My personal favorite. It took 3 days of dehydrating it in the oven, but worth every minute.)
One note I’ll make about the trail menus: a “portion size” varied between the different recipes, and I tended to err on the higher side with 4 guys in the group. But no matter how ravenous we were at dinner, we always had leftovers for lunch (except on deconstructed pizza night), which turned out be a huge blessing when one of our lunch drops didn’t make it.
It was a challenge to cook and (yes, actually, bake) everything in the Jet Boil, but it so sweet to feed everyone with only 1 pot. Add another small pot for the ramen appetizer and/or coffee and we were set.
I was proud of my “Iron Chef of the Trail” title, but even more proud that I didn’t have to wash a single dish the entire trail. Sometimes, it pays to be the cook.
BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME?
12 Mar
We haven’t been short on footage, and for that I’m grateful. But there are certain moments when I lament we didn’t do justice to the beauty and grandeur that surrounded us. Blame it on exhaustion, uncertainty as to what was in store for the remainder of the day’s hike and, occasionally, excessive caution for gear that’s made to withstand at least some weathering.
One such instance of over-protection was our climb of Pinchot Pass. A storm started rolling in during our ascent, and as we rushed to cover our packs filled to the brim with electronics, the thought of getting dumped on (or worse, struck by lightning at the top of the pass) weighed heavy on our group.
Safety trumps artistry in moments like these, but I wish that I would’ve stopped and allowed myself the opportunity to fire off a few shots. There is nothing more impressive…more indicative of this amazing planet’s power…as the storm clouds unleashing their fury on mountain passes.
We rushed up and over the pass as quickly as we could, salvaging a handful of opportunities to snap off a shot, but that pass will not be showcased nearly as impressively in our documentary as it was that day.
In the past few days, I’ve finally come to peace with that.
We set out to capture the trail in the only way we knew how. THAT goal was accomplished. I do hope to return one day and do even more justice to what we saw on the trail. But no matter how many times I return…no matter how many shots I take…they’ll never leave me breathless like seeing it with my own eyes.
And for that, I’m glad mine weren’t always behind the lens.
