Wild Ideas Worth Living

Any long distance hiker will tell you about a magical encounter they had with a trail angel. Trail angels are awesome people who provide support to those on long treks — a meal, a shower or a ride into the nearest town.  Barney and Sandy Mann are two of the most well-known trail angels in the U.S. Their house is an hour from the southern terminus of the Pacific Crest Trail. The two offer hikers di...

When you think of KEEN, you probably think of their iconic sandals, the ones with bungee cord straps and big rubber toe caps. Over the years, KEEN has prioritized social and environmental responsibility. In this bonus episode, Shelby chats with Erik Burbank, the vice-president of the KEEN Effect and Kirk Richardson, a KEEN Effect advisor. Their mission is to have a positive impact on the world thr...

Mikah Meyer is a record-breaking road tripper. His cross-country adventures started at 19 years old when his dad passed away. On Mikah’s first trip, he traveled for 260 days. Five years later, he spent three years living out of a van, venturing to all 419 U.S. National Park service sites. As he documented his trips online, his following grew and he realized he had a platform. He now travels with t...

Sika set this goal 6 years ago and was aiming to achieve it in 2019. But nothing could have prepared her for the bike accident she experienced in that year during a race in Texas. Sika isn’t one to let any obstacle stand in her way and she trained hard to come back stronger than ever. Now, she uses the experience of her accident and the success of getting her pro card to talk to youth, particularl...

Joseph Mulherin is known by his stage name nothing,nowhere. He’s a musician who has worked with celebrities like Travis Barker from Blink 182 and Pete Wentz from Fallout Boy. Joe has an incredible fan base, but things haven’t always been easy for him. Since he was a kid, Joe has struggled with an anxiety and panic disorder. But he’s found that being out in nature and practicing bushcraft skills ca...

Angela Tucker is a writer, director and Emmy-nominated producer who makes narrative and documentary films. For her new series, The Trees Remember, Angela teamed up with REI to make three short films. Each short features a Black woman experiencing a moment of connection and reflection in the outdoors, showing that nature is a backdrop to our daily lives, providing space to learn and inspire. In thi...

Writer and professor Susan Lacke never anticipated becoming an endurance athlete. But when her boss Carlos Nunez offered her an opportunity to improve her unhealthy lifestyle, she went for it. What started as small changes became bigger and bigger until she signed up for an Ironman triathlon. Now, she’s breaking the mold of who we think of as an athlete - Susan is deaf, and she writes about other...

Professional mountain biker, Eliot Jackson, is no stranger to reaching big goals. He started riding motorcycles before he was in kindergarten, and ended up becoming a child motocross athlete. He won five national motocross national championships during his youth. When Eliot was 15 years old, he decided to retire from motocross.  A few years later, Eliot took up mountain biking and had the wild ide...

Tyrhee Moore is a mountaineer, outdoor guide and founder of the non-profit, Soul Trak . Growing up in Washington D.C, Tyrhee first fell in love with the outdoors on a 7th grade trip to the Grand Tetons with City Kids Wilderness Project . He was blown away by the beautiful views, but he was also impressed by his own power and ability to climb mountains. He was hooked on outdoor adventures. Several...

Using their backgrounds in apparel and marketing, Keith and Sevag launched Parks Project , a brand that donates its proceeds to conservation projects within our National Parks. But their clothes aren’t your typical park paraphernalia. Parks Project teams up with artists to create outdoorsy graphics with vintage vibes. With a unique model and huge success, Parks Project is making an impact and insp...

Country singer Brett Eldredge was at the top of his game. He had released four chart-topping records and performed with stars like Taylor Swift and Blake Shelton. But life as a touring musician took a toll on him. Brett felt like he was spending all of his time worrying about the next performance. He decided to take a vacation from stress and social media to reconnect with the outdoors. In this ep...

Adam Campbell is an accomplished mountain runner with some of the fastest known times on many Canadian mountains and trails. But being an athlete comes with risks. In 2016, Adam endured a life-threatening fall down a 200 foot ravine while running Roger’s Pass in British Columbia. But Adam came back, started running again and got married. In January 2020, Adam’s wife Laura passed away after being b...

Michelle Parker is a professional freeskier.  She takes helicopters, snowmobiles, or hikes up to steep snowy peaks and skis down them, launching off cliffs and gliding down nearly vertical slopes. She has been featured in dozens of ski films and when Michelle goes out and films on the peaks, she is often the only woman on these outings. The other athletes, the camera people, even the helicopter pi...

David Brown is one of the world’s fastest blind runners, a two-time record breaker, and the first totally blind athlete to run 100m in under 11 seconds. Jerome Avery is his running guide. The two run tethered together by a short strap. They train together almost daily to maintain their synchronization and speed, and that hard work shows on and off the track. In this episode, hear how David fell in...

 In 2016, Karel beat the record for the fastest known time to complete the Pacific Crest Trail. Then in 2018, he ran the Appalachian trail and broke the fastest known time record by four days! Karel started running as a hobby so that he could get some exercise after work. Now, just a few years later, he’s running some of the longest wilderness trails on earth.  Episodes to listen to:  Chris McDoug...

When you think of exciting outdoor activities, bird watching probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind. But in the words of today’s guest Corina Newsome, it’s like a treasure hunt. There is exhilaration in looking for movement through binoculars or listening for specific bird calls. There's also a sense of achievement that comes with identifying a specific bird and crossing it off your lis...

Trying a new sport or skill for the first time can be scary. Nobody wants to look like an awkward newbie in front of the pros, but Dylan Efron is learning to embrace the thrill of being a beginner. In fact, he’s inspiring others to do the same with his new YouTube series called Flow State . The goal of the show is to invite professional athletes to do an outdoor sport that they’ve never tried befo...

2020 has been quite a year. We had a plan for what this season of Wild Ideas Worth Living would look like, but a few months in we had to change course, just as everyone in the world did. So while our first few episodes focused on adventurers who traveled all over the world and broke barriers, we spent the rest of the year learning from guests who taught us how to find peace and a sense of adventur...

Noah Howell is one of the greatest backcountry skiers to date, and he has been named one of the “50 Icons of Backcountry Skiing” by Backcountry Magazine. He was also the second person to ski all 90 lines of what author Andrew McLean deemed the steepest ski lines in Utah’s Wasatch Mountains. Noah feels free skiing rarely traveled slopes, and for him, that freedom is also reflected in his everyday l...

When Ally Coucke adopted her white German Shepherd, Bailey, she had no idea what she was getting herself into. Ally was just a kid looking for a big, protective dog to run with her in the early mornings, and what she got became the most important relationship of her life. Now, Bailey and his adoptive brother, “Loki the Wolfdog” are Internet sensations. But Bailey has been battling cancer for the l...

Tom Putnam is a filmmaker known for writing and directing documentaries and short films. After reading Robert Pyle’s book, Where Bigfoot Walks: Crossing the Dark Divide , he felt compelled to turn Pyle’s story into a movie. After 10 years of writing and re-writing the script, Tom brought the entire cast and crew for The Dark Divide film into the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Oregon. They shot...

Clare Gallagher is an accomplished trail and ultra runner who made history when she won the Leadville 100 in 2016, a notorious 100-mile trek through the Rocky Mountains. Soon after she started her career, Clare realized that she had a unique platform as an outdoor athlete to become a dedicated environmental advocate. For Clare, working for a healthy planet is a no-brainer, and she argues that it i...

Now that Christiane is Head of Sustainability at Fjallraven, she wears “the grandma jacket” regularly as a reminder of the brand’s mission to make timeless clothing that lasts. In this episode, Christiane shares how heritage and longevity inform how Fjallraven designs and manufactures their products. Connect with Fjallraven & Christiane:  Website Facebook Twitter Instagram Hosted by Simplecast, an...

Historically, outdoor apparel and clothing brands have shrunk the same designs that they use in their mens’ lines and dyed them a supposed "girly" color (aka: purple and pink) to create outdoor gear for women. However, Edita Hadravska, Design Director at Arc’teryx Equipment, takes a different approach. She designs outdoor equipment and gear for women that take into account how women’s bodies are a...

Kailey Kornhauser is a fat cyclist. Those two words didn’t come easily to her. But as she has claimed her place in both the cycling community and the body positivity movement, they’re words she now identifies with proudly. In 2018, Kailey took on one of the most challenging rides she’d ever been on: cycling 1,000 miles across Alaska to hear about the impact of climate change on the lives of locals...