Gadling fans know that I have long extolled the
virtues of Patagonia. The region on the southern tip of South America is probably the most beautiful, pristine
wonderland for adventurers on the planet. I thin it is better and more beautiful than Yosemite, especially if you have
ever dared to go to Yosemite during the high tourist season in summer. If you have ever experienced the traffic,
pollution and the gazillions of families in the valley with their RVs, you know what I’m talking about. Well, to show
you what I mean, take a
look at this wonderful series of photos taken by the ballsy team that recently climbed Patagonia’s Cerro Torre.
These are stunning images that very much back up what I’m talking about.
OutTraveler.com
Now I honestly haven’t a clue how I
ended up at OutTraveler.com. For one I like men and
I must say the chiseled, toned, and very visually appealing hunks featured in the stories on travel destinations like
Istanbul, Austin and the Galapagos Islands surely might be my type, yet the only problem is I’m not theirs. If you
haven’t guessed by now OutTraveler doesn’t refer to just being out in the woods, but more so about being out of the
closet. Perhaps you needn’t be in or out of the closet to read the travel suggestions in the current online spring
edition, but for the most part Out Traveler boasts themselves as being the standard of Gay travel. I took a moment to
read the piece on Istanbul, an area I’ve wanted to visit
for quite sometime to see what the column recommends for the extremely liberal traveler in Turkey’s most popular city.
What caught my attention most was the rating system used which rates things like: gay-friendliness, domestic
partnerships, adoption laws, anti-discrimination laws, HIV info and the Gay scene. Not my average travel guide for
sure, but I’m sure this information comes in handy to somebody out there. (No pun intended.)
Gadling on AOL Travel
Some of you may have noticed, perhaps because you came
here from there, but we here at Gadling.com have done a couple of helpful travel pieces this week for the good folks at
AOL.com. We worked our brains over how best to satisfy the AOL audience as Spring
approacheth and people are making plans. And we settled on seven ideas for seven days.
write ups on the best secret places to go in Mexico and Hawaii, as well as both East and West Coast Trips (Even through I’m from the West Coast, Neil
lives there now in So Cal, so he handled the West. And since I live in
York
piece by Adrienne on Caribbean Trips. Anyway, if you came
to Gadling.com from these pieces, then welcome! Bookmark us and come back often. If you are a Gadling.com regular or
occasional visitor, go check out these pieces, maybe they’ll give you some inspiration to do some traveling.
NYC Long Path
Getting out of New York City
can be a daunting task. First, you generally need a car, and many of not most Manhattanites do not own one. But when I
do consier getting out and doing some outdoorsy stuff, I think about attempting hikes like the Long trail, discussed at
some length in this Backpacker article
by Johnathan Dorn. Dorn hikes the Long Path, the gargantuan, snaky 329-mile trail running from the George Washington
Bridge (on the Jersey side) along the Palisades escarpment and deep into the heart of the Shawangunk Mountains (or
Gunks), through the Catskills Park, and pressing into the Adirondacks. Over numerous weekends Dorn and buddy James hoof
it along more than half the trail’s total length, some 150 miles, and experience all the travails and exhilarations of
such a long haul.
Urban Explorer at Explorer's Club
Neil gave us a nice little dose of Urban Adventure in this
post he did a while back, but I have to say I want to know more. I am fascinated by the concept, the idea of
experiencing a place everyone thinks they know well in a completely different way.
I more or less consider
myself a bit of an urban adventurer. When I was a kid growing up in California, at
a very young age I’d head out alone into my small town to find its hidden places, the nooks and shadowy corners and
empty buildings where I suspected not many people had been. That was a huge thrill to me to find an old warehouse or
tunnel where no one had been for a while.
And now that I live in a major metropolitan area, I still find
myself poking about here and there, especially if I’m alone and coming home after a few drinks, in search of a hidden
tunnel or secret passageway.
And I’m also a major fan of The Explorers Club. Located on the Upper East Side in a beautiful stone building, I’ve been up
there for a whole series of events including the Doc Fest and the famous dinner. I’ve also interviewed the Club’s President
and have spent a lot of time roaming around the halls. The connection here is that in the spirit of adventure, the
Explorer’s Club hosted a series on Urban Exploration with urban explorer Steve Duncan. Duncan has spent the past
decade scaling bridges, crawling through tunnels and playing Indian Jones beneath the city’s sidewalks.
Amy
over at Newyorkology did a fine post about the event, which you should read.