Packing out Last Night’s Dinner

It’s not every day that the New York Times writes an entire article about poop.

And yet, they did exactly that last week when they sent a reporter to the top of Mt. Whitney to crap into a little plastic bag.

Fellow Gadling blogger Erik Olsen recently posted about the new environmental requirements for those scaling the largest peak in the contiguous United States: pack out what you pack in. And yes, that means your poop.

The Forest Service, tired of cleaning up after the slew of hikers who summit the peak every season and airlifting their poop down to the desert floor, has finally closed up the outhouses along the route and are now handing out baggies with climbing permits.

This change in policy was something the New York Times felt was worth some investigative journalism and therefore sent reporter Felicity Barringer and her bowels out to the West Coast to summit the peak and try out the bags.

The result is a rather engaging article accompanied by a cool video with some amazing footage–none of which, by the way, is of Barringer squatting, thank god!