The Climbing Advocate

This month’s episode features a powerful individual in the climbing world: founder of Flash Foxy, Shelma Jun. Shelma started Flash Foxy as a social media platform to provide a way for ladies to share their climbing stoke. It quickly evolved into something much larger, as now she hosts multiple women’s climbing festivals a year to celebrate women in climbing. In addition to her work with Flash Foxy...

For this episode, we highlighted the latest happenings in the Northeast. My guests were Seth Maciejowski with CRAG-VT and Mike Morin with Access Fund. They have done an incredible amount of work for New England climbers and continue to do so on a number of stewardship and acquisition projects. We covered CRAG-VT’s approach to conservation and Seth’s impressive résumé of successful acquisitions dur...

My guest today is Brian Tickle, Access Fund’s Texas regional director. The Texas Legislature was entering their session in January when I first had Brian on, and now that the session has ended we wanted to chat again about the outcomes. Brian and Access Fund had their plates full working on influencing policy surrounding funding for state parks and Texas’s recreational use statute. Brian’s work ha...

My guest for this episode is Ashlee Milanich, the executive director of the Red River Gorge Climbers Coalition (RRGCC) based in Lexington, Kentucky. Ashlee has spent the majority of her time climbing in the Red and knows the place inside and out. We covered some of the historical events and issues that climbers and the RRGCC have dealt with in the past, along with some of the ins and outs of worki...

The guests for this month’s episode came from the Midwest Climbing Advocacy Summit, held this year at Devil’s Lake State Park in Wisconsin. Jenna Winkler and Zachary Lesch-Huie from Access Fund facilitated conversations with local advocates from across the Midwest, learning more about what is happening with them on a local level. These conversations highlighted the issues that are ubiquitous acros...

This is the second part of the conversation with Access Fund Senior Policy Advisor Jason Keith. In part one, we discussed the recent success of the passing of the Emery County Public Land Management Act. This act was part of the huge public lands package that the president signed into law early last month. That discussion naturally led us into discussing the long-contentious topic of bolting in wi...

This episode’s guest was Access Fund Senior Policy Advisor Jason Keith. Based in Moab, Utah, Jason wears multiple hats in his line of work. He runs a small nonprofit called Public Land Solutions. They work to maximize recreation assets within local communities by supporting effective public land solutions (hence the name). He also is a professional advocate for the national climbing community as A...

This month’s guest was Laura Boggess, a professor, scientist, and yoga instructor based in Mars Hill, North Carolina. We discussed the importance and aesthetic of lichen at our cliffs. She doesn’t claim to be a lichen expert, but she is obviously very qualified and her passion for lichen is palpable. So how does climbing fit in? As cliff dwellers, climbers are often interacting with lichen at clos...

This episode features a conversation with Access Fund Texas Regional Director Brian Tickle and Texas Climbers Coalition President Adam Mitchell. We discussed all things Texas and confirmed that there is much more climbing than just Hueco Tanks. These guys have a lot going on down south and have for a long time. The recent acquisition of the Medicine Wall outside San Antonio is just one example of...

This episode is a conversation with Access Fund Stewardship Director Ty Tyler about the program he oversees. We chat about the growth of the stewardship program and the traveling conservation teams, tips for building trusting relationships with land managers, and recent success stories. Enjoy!

For this episode, I interviewed Joe Sambataro, Access Fund’s national access director and Northwest regional director, and Andy Fitz, with the Washington Climbers Coalition, to discuss stewardship success stories in the state of Washington. Enjoy!

Our pilot episode features a short discussion with Patagonia athletes, as well as other advocates working with local climbing organizations around the country, about what it means to be a climbing advocate. Enjoy!