Raft for the Cure in Moab this June

by Kraig Becker on

This June, the Moab Adventure Center, located in Moab, Utah will play host to the fifth annual Raft for the Cure. This fun and unique event that will offer visitors a unique blend of outdoor adventure, live music, and great food, while also raising funds for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation.

The Raft for the Cure event begins with a full day of rafting along the famous Colorado River, one of the top whitewater destinations in the entire American west. Participants will get the opportunity to experience some of the most well known sections of that iconic waterway, including the popular Onion Creek, Cloudburst, Ida Gulch, and White’s Rapid. This is medium level whitewater (think Class II or III) that wanders through spectacular canyons and scenic bluffs, offering plenty of adrenaline rushes to go along with the natural wonders. The on-the-river activities will run from 8AM to 4PM and are followed by dinner and live music in town that evening.

Organizers for the event have noticed a sharp increase in interest for this year’s Raft for the Cure, which is why they are spreading the word a bit earlier. In 2010, there were 330 participants that helped raise $20,000 for beast cancer research. This year, that number is expected to climb to 500 with six local rafting companies joining forces to help accommodate everyone.
The cost of the event is $100 for adults and $85 for kids 5-15. That includes lunch and dinner, a full day of rafting, commemorative T-shirt, and more. For more details check out the Raft for the Cure website and to register click here.

A hundred bucks for a full day of rafting is an excellent deal to begin with. Throw in some food and a concert and this is a real bargain for a weekend’s worth of entertainment. The fact that the proceeds are going to a great cause is just icing on the cake if you ask me.

[Photo credit: Sascha Grabow via WikiMedia Commons]

Organic flower farms: a trip worth making

by Elizabeth Seward on

Organic flowers aren’t as talked about as organic food. And it’s not difficult to understand why. It’s been tough getting the public at large to focus on organic food–food, something we ingest and rely on as fuel for our body. Focusing the public eye in on the importance of organic flowers, in addition to their food, isn’t an easy task. But organic flower farmers are out there and with a little field trip to one of their farms, you can learn more about organic flower farming than you’d probably guess and savor some breathtaking views while you’re at it.

%Gallery-121462%I had a chance to visit my first organic flower farm in August 2010. I pulled up to Sunny Meadows Flower Farm, a farm within the Columbus, Ohio city limits, not knowing what to expect. I had heard few things about Gretel and Steve Adams, the young couple who own the farm and farm the land. Of those few things I had heard, the general consensus seemed to be one that was in unison: Gretel and Steve are remarkable people doing something remarkable with their lives. And with this kind of build-up, I figured I could only be disappointed. Rarely does anything, particularly anyone, built up so well fill the shoes of their own reputation. I soon found out that this would be one of those rare instances, an exception to the rule.

The dust and gravel kicked up at the friction of my tires as I parked in their driveway. I slipped out of the car to find myself within a dusty fog within a summer’s haze within a lush paradise. I wondered if I was truly, actually, technically still in the city of Columbus. Intellectually, I knew that I was. But this didn’t feel like Columbus.

I grew up just two hours or so southeast of Columbus in Marietta, Ohio. Marietta is a small town, a country town. My taste for rurality isn’t one I’ll deny. I’ve always enjoyed long walks in the woods, the smell of summer, bonfires, barbecues, and wild flowers. But a certain duality within me, a flip-side that craved culture and art and good food and music festivals and people, kept me busy creating reasons to visit Columbus while growing up in Ohio. And so, for all intents and purposes, Columbus was my big city.

Columbus was where I went to feel grown-up and tempered, well-rounded and experienced. Of all the things Columbus was for me, there were some things it definitively was not. Columbus was not a place to visit an organic flower farm. I was a little miffed to return to the Ohio capital on this visit and find that things had changed, that Columbus was something other than I had decided it was long ago. As I shook hands with Gretel and Steve Adams and began my tour of their 10 acre farm, it was clearer than it ever was: there was a lot more to Columbus than I’d previously assumed.

Walking through their farm was surreal. Here I was, in the middle of an actual city, not a city like New York City, but still a fully functional city and The City of my childhood… and yet I was surrounded by blossoming flowers everywhere, their colors splattered like paint across a wide canvas. I brushed the silky petals as I walked past them. I rubbed their leaves between my thumb and index fingers. I wasted no time with concern over pesticide remnants on my fingertips–there were none. Their flowers are organic.

“Nothing is as beautiful and peaceful as a huge field of flowers waiting to be harvested, teeming with life, slightly swaying in the wind”, says Gretel, a woman who clearly loves what she does for a living. “You will see the bees flying around doing their work, monarchs love zinnias, and we encourage praying mantises and ladybugs to come to our farm and be our pest control”. Gretel furthers her infatuation with the organic flower process by explaining to me that non-organic flowers have a sterility to them, a difference that you can feel.

Steve and Gretel revealed to us pieces of their story and their selves as we walked through the dirt passageways, dimmed in some parts by plants so tall and heavy that they canopied over their stems at their tops. Neither Steve nor Gretel had experience farming before starting Sunny Meadows Flower Farm. They refer to themselves as serendipitous farmers and it certainly appears as though serendipity has been working in their favor.

An apprenticeship at Anderson Orchards seeded a passion for farming within Steve, who was lucky enough to have Gretel around, who was lucky enough to have inherited a 10 acre lot in Columbus that her father had purchased in the 80’s. Since both halves of the whole loved nature, they gave farming a shot. And as serendipity would have it, other farmers in the community stepped up as mentors for the pair. Although they also farm organic herbs and vegetables, organic flowers are the focal point of this urban oasis.

Sustainability is a way of life for the Adams. They don’t just own an organic farm–they implement organic practices in every facet of their life possible. They heat their home with wood, they can and preserve all that they can, and Gretel makes some pretty amazing all-natural soap.

I’ve heard that you don’t remember days, you just remember moments. I think this saying is meant to inspire the cultivation of moments worth treasuring and my walk through Sunny Meadows Flower Farm is a moment I still find myself clinging onto, remembering fondly. A lot of things go into the making of the perfect moment, but a field full of chemical-free flowers sure doesn’t hurt. Imagine yourself surrounded by vivid colors in a moment like this. if you like imagining that, I encourage you to research your nearest organic flower farm and pay the people behind these beautiful scenes a visit. You just might treasure your moments in their field for longer than you’d suspect.

And with that, I’ll leave you with some reasons to visit an organic flower farm straight from one of the Sunny Meadows Flower Farm owners, Gretel Adams.

1. Most flowers that are purchased today come from places around the equator where they can be grown year-round and then are shipped all over the world. Worker’s rights and chemical restrictions in these near-equator countries aren’t always consistent with those of the U.S.A. Additionally, shipping across the globe isn’t good for the environment.

2. If you buy your flowers from a local farm producer, you are not buying into that system, and you are supporting your local economy.

3. If you visit a flower farm that uses organic practices, you will quickly be able to see the growing conditions of your flowers and be able to decide for yourself which methods seem safer and make more sense. Organic is about being proactive in creating the best environment rather than being reactive with chemicals like conventional farmers do.

4. And finally, because food may feed the body, but flowers feed the soul! Coming and seeing an organic flower farm allows people to take a break from their crazy busy lives and “smell the roses” for a minute.

Nature Valley kicks off 2011 Preserve the Parks campaign

by Kraig Becker on

As we’ve mentioned on several occasions recently, Saturday kicked off National Parks Week here in the U.S. To help celebrate, Nature Valley, in conjunction with the National Parks Conservation Association, launched their 2011 Preserve the Parks campaign in the beautiful desert near Joshua Tree in California.

Nature Valley started the campaign last year after their customers expressed how much they loved the national parks. In 2010, the Preserve the Parks program raised $400,000 for the NPCA, with those funds going directly to protect national parks from a variety of threats. The 2011 edition of Preserve the Parks hopes to raise even more money, while also taking a more direct, active role in the preservation of these fantastic natural spaces.

This year, Preserve the Parks has a charismatic and charming spokesman to help spread the word about the campaign. Josh Holloway, who played Sawyer on the television show Lost, is an avid outdoorsman who also happens to love America’s national parks. He was on hand for the kickoff event this past weekend to not only help get the festivities underway, but to also get a little dirty too. Holloway joined a host of volunteers who went to work building trails and helping to protect the habitat of desert tortoises that inhabit the region around Joshua Tree.I had the opportunity to chat with Josh on several occasions throughout the day and came away quite impressed. This isn’t the case of a celebrity spokesperson slapping their name on a project and paying lip service to it. Josh truly does have a love for the outdoors and was eager to lend a hand in the actual physical work of the day. For most of the morning he had a shovel, rake, or other tool in his hand, and was doing his part alongside the rest of the volunteers who were there to take part in a restoration project.

Despite the warm weather (temperatures approached 95 degrees Fahrenheit) the Nature Valley event drew an impressive turnout from volunteers. After a brief orientation about the area, including instructions on how to avoid stepping on a tortoise den, we were off on a mile long hike to the various work sites. Once there, we broke into teams that took on a variety of projects that included clearing trails of plants and other debris to more clearly define where to walk, as well as restructuring part of the landscape to allow water to flow naturally, without causing undue erosion. These simple efforts can go a long way toward protecting the area and ensuring that those who visit it can pass through without endangering the creatures that live there.

Nature Valley has a number of other similar events planned for the summer ahead, when the program will really kick into high gear. Those events will take place in Yellowstone, Acadia, Biscayne and several other national parks. Details on those events has yet to be completed, but you can watch the Preserve the Parks website for details on when they’ll be occurring and how you might be able to join in.

National Parks Week is a time that is dedicated to celebrating the spectacular natural beauty that exists inside America’s wilderness wonderlands. It is also a great time to acknowledge some of the threats that face the parks, such as environmental concerns, land management issues, lack of funding, and more. Organizations like Nature Valley and the NPCA recognize the importance of the parks on American culture and are working hard to protect them for future generations to enjoy as well. Programs such as the Preserve the Parks campaign are a perfect model of how businesses, non-profits, and grassroots activists can all work together to improve and protect the parks.

This trip was payed for by Nature Valley, but the ideas and opinions expressed here are my own.

The effect of Japan’s tsunami on whaling

by Jon Bowermaster on

In an ironic twist of fate, Japan’s recent tsunami may have accomplished something conservationists have been fervently attempting for years: Driving a final nail into its pro-active whaling communities.

The first outsiders only recently reached the small town of Ayukawahama, which was crushed by thirty-foot waves. So was the headquarters of the biggest business in town, Ayukawa Whaling, one of the country’s most prodigious hunters of big whales.

The waves rushed six hundred feet inland, wiping out 80 percent of the town’s 700 homes. Four hundred of its 1,400 residents are missing, assumed dead. The peninsula town is described as having been reduced to “an expanse of splintered wood and twisted cars.”

In these days two weeks after the natural disaster the impact on the whaling town carries a kind of finality. Ayukawa lives off whaling. It is one of just four communities in Japan home to small fleets that twice a year hunt whales in waters close to Japan, differentiating them from the fleet that heads to the Southern Ocean each November.

“There is no Ayukawa without whaling,” said a 27-year-old whaler.The four boats of Ayukawa Whaling were sucked out to sea by the retreating tsunami waves, thrown back onto shore a mile down the coastline. The company’s 28 employees ran for the hills. All survived but have now been laid off.

The company’s chairman told the New York Times that while he hoped to rebuild the factory, refloat the company’s boats and get back to hunting whales, he admitted it wouldn’t be any time soon. It will take months and lots of money to pull his boats back onto the sea; his processing plant for whale meat was reduced to splinters.

Nearby the daughter of a 54-year-old woman scavenging for food found a tin of whale meat among the debris. “I wish we could eat whale meat every day,” said the 17-year-old. “But the whalers are so old, I think they’ll just quit or retire after what has happened.

“I think whaling is dead here.”

During the height of the Southern Ocean campaign which usually runs from November to March, many news stories can make it seem like whale hunting – and whale meat eating — is a passion for all Japanese. The reality is that Japan does not thrive on whale meat and there are increasingly fewer companies engaged in whale hunting.

Despite the success of the Sea Shepherd’s this past season – its successful harassment forcing the Japanese to end its season early and reducing its take by some 75 percent, to less than 200 whales – the tsunami waves may ultimately get credit for stopping the hunt.

If you follow the exploits of Sea Shepherd and its outspoken leader, Captain Paul Watson, you’d think they might be celebrating aboard its mother ship, the “Steve Irwin.” But Watson’s public reaction has been appropriately muted:

“Nature does not play favorites and just as the earthquake struck New Zealand recently, the fires ravaged Australia two years ago, and the tsunami struck India and Thailand not so very long ago, the message is clear — we all share the dangers of living on the water planet called earth,” he wrote.

“In the face of such peril from the forces of nature, we are all equal.

I have heard many people say that Japan’s tragedy is karma. People who say such things do not understand the concept of karma. This earthquake struck Japan purely on the basis of geography and geology.”

In another twist, the Japanese factory processing ship “Nisshin Maru,” which the Shepherd’s had hounded back to port a month early, is being used by the Japanese government to deliver aid supplies (charcoal, 100,000 noodle cups, kerosene, cranes) to the hard-hit north.

“Sea Shepherd believes that the ‘Nisshin Maru’ should be permanently converted into a humanitarian aid vessel,” suggested its website.

But the Japanese have rebuilt from the dust before and started over, with great success. One Ayukawa whaler was quoted two days after the tsunami: “As long as there are people who will carry on whaling in the absence of vessels or facilities, whaling could be revived … eventually.”

Proposed casino near Gettysburg National Park denied license

by Kraig Becker on

The National Parks Conservation Association is applauding the decision of the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to deny a license to a proposed casino near Gettysburg National Park. The Board felt that the gambling establishment, which would have opened less than a half-mile from the park, would be at odds with the solemn historical legacy and family friendly environment at Gettysburg.

The proposed casino sparked a great deal of debate in the communities surrounding the park. It was believed that it would bring a much needed boost to the local economy and provide new jobs, but opponents called the plan an insult to soldiers that fought and died there. The Mason Dixon Resort & Casino was to include 600 slot machines and 50 table games in its bid to lure visitors through its doors.

The decision comes as the park kicks off a series of events to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War. The Battle of Gettysburg is seen as the definitive turning point in that war, when Union forces turned back an invasion of Confederate troops, led by Robert E. Lee. It is believed that both sides combined for more than 51,000 casualties over the three day battle, which ultimately led to the North claiming victory over the South. President Lincoln traveled to the site some months later to dedicate a national cemetery there. His Gettysburg Address would become one of the most famous speeches in history.

So what do you think? Would a casino so close to Gettysburg diminish the historical events that happened there? Would it be an insult to those soldiers or is the need for economic development more important than that legacy? Personally, I’m glad that the casino was voted down. In my opinion, there are plenty of places to build a casino further away from a place that should be seen as hallowed ground.

[Photo credit: National Park Service]