Articles tagged “adventure travel”

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2012 USA Pro Cycling Challenge route announced

by Kraig Becker on

Organizers of the USA Pro Cycling Challenge have announced the dates and route for the 2012 edition of the race, which will once again take place in Colorado. This year, the state played host to the inaugural event, which saw some of the world’s top cyclists competing on a course that involved plenty of climbing and altitude.

The 2012 version of the Pro Cycling Challenge will get underway on August 20th from Durango and will continue through the 26th, when riders finish up with a time trial through the streets of Denver. In between, they’ll visit Telluride, Aspen, Beaver Creek, Colorado Springs, Boulder, and a host of other mountain towns. The route will cover more than 520 miles and will feature climbs over five different mountain passes in excess of 10,000 feet in height.

This year’s race was a resounding success, bringing in more than one million spectators and generating an estimated $83.5 million in revenue for the state of Colorado. The week-long, stage race was won by American Levi Leipheimer, but also managed to attract some of the best riders in the world, including Frank Schleck, Robert Gesink, and 2011 Tour de France winner Cadel Evans.

American cycling fans should be ecstatic that this event has been so well received and is returning for another year. Colorado is a fantastic place to hold a pro-level cycling competition, as the scenic mountain passes bring drama and excitement to every day of the race. This year’s course was billed as the highest altitude cycling competition ever, and it appears that the 2012 edition is poised to up the ante even further.

Colombia’s Lost City gets long-term preservation plan

by Sean McLachlan on


Last year, Gadling’s Aaron Hotfelder braved the mountainous jungles of Colombia to visit Ciudad Perdida, the nation’s famous “Lost City“.

These remote ruins were built by the Tayrona, a culture that thrived from 200 AD to c.1650 AD. More than 250 of their stone settlements have been found in a 2,000 square-mile area. The Lost City is the largest Tayrona site known with more than 200 structures over 80 acres. One highlight is a strange carving, shown below, that appears to be a map of the city.

Unknown to the outside world until the 1975, the site now attracts an increasing number of tourists willing to make the five-day trek, and this is destabilizing some of the structures. Erosion and local narcotics traffickers are also taking their toll, Popular Archaeology reports.

Now the Global Heritage Fund has teamed up with the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History, which runs the Teyuna-Ciudad Perdida Archaeological Park, to preserve the site. The area will be fully mapped and examined, and they’ll create a management plan to reduce natural and man-made damage to the site. One good aspect of the plan is that it’s incorporating the local indigenous people. They’ve always known about the Lost City and consider it sacred, so their input will be crucial to ensure its future.

Photos courtesy William Neuheisal.

Thieves steal rhino horn from Paris museum

by Kraig Becker on

Earlier this week, two people entered a museum in Paris, used some kind of gas to neutralize the guards, and made off with a rhino horn from one of the stuffed animals on display. This was the fourth such robbery in Europe this year, as thieves look to sell the valuable horns on the black market in Asia.

The incident took place on Tuesday at the Museum of Hunting and Nature in the Marais district of Paris. Around noon, the two individuals entered the building used what is described as “paralyzing” gas on the guards, and then proceed to remove the rhino horn from the display. When they had claimed their prize, they disappeared into the streets, and at this time, there are no leads in the case.

Rhino horns continue to be a hot commodity in Asia, where they are used in traditional medicines. Because of the demand there, a single horn can fetch as much as $100,000 on the open market, which has contributed to the rise in thefts from European museums this year. Worse yet however, is the continued poaching of the animals throughout Africa, resulting in the black rhino recently being declared extinct in West Africa.

I’m guessing these thieves don’t care about the source of their rhino horn and that stealing them from museums is just out of convenience. If they lived in Africa, they would probably be brutally slaying the animals there as well.

[Photo credit: Selber Fotografiert via WikiMedia]

Witness the hidden corners of Iceland in high definition

by Jessica Festa on

In this video, Pétur Kristján Guðmundsson of TrailerPark Studios films his home country of Iceland, focusing on the diverse and unique landscape as well as the culture. The overarching goal of the film, which is called Heild, or Totality, is to “present Iceland in a way it has never been presented before, using many elements of higher-end cinematography”. In the video, viewers not only see the well-known areas of Iceland but also off-the-beaten path regions that one must be quite adventurous to get to, and extremely patient to truly capture. The video is so clear that even gentle motions seem strong, from the rippling lake to the billowing clouds. Meet locals, fly over plains, mountains, and craters, and lay under a neon-colored night sky.

To get a taste for yourself, check out the trailer for Heild here:


HEILD l Totality Trailer from Petur K. Gudmundsson on Vimeo.

Ski Mammoth Mountain for free tomorrow!

by Kraig Becker on

California skiers and snowboarders looking to get in some early turns this weekend will want to head to Mammoth Mountain tomorrow. The iconic ski resort is offering free lift tickets to MyMammoth members all day long. What’s that? You’re not a MyMammoth member yet? No worries, you can sign up for free right here.

With a current snow base of two feet, conditions are already great on Mammoth this season. As of today, there were nine lifts in operation, and the resort continues to open new runs almost daily. Throw in a terrain park and superpipe for the snowboarders, and you have one of the top winter destinations in all of North America.

As mentioned, you’ll need to be a MyMammoth member to take advantage of the free ski passes tomorrow. But that isn’t the only benefit you’ll enjoy for signing up. Members of this free insider club also receive discounted lift tickets, a smartphone app that provides updates on snow conditions, RFID cards that offer faster access to lifts, free WiFi in the lodge, and more.

We’ve been teasing the start of the ski season for weeks now, and most major resorts are already open. But with the cooler weather that has hit the U.S. in the past week or so, it is safe to say that winter is nearly ready to announce its arrival. What better way to welcome it then with a free day of skiing on one of the premiere ski mountains in the world.