Packing for a Family Adventure

Wed, 4 Jan 2012 20:36:10 -0700

PACKING FOR FAMILY ADVENTURE ROAD TRIPS: 3 SECRETS ALL PARENTS SHOULD KNOW

Two things remain the same when you're packing for a trip to the great outdoors:
1. You'll bring the same amount of stuff for one-night weekend getaways under the stars and epic three-week, multi-state adventures; and it will always fill up your storage space to overflowing.
2. You need more diapers and wipes but fewer kid toys than you think.

We're trying to teach three-year-old Chloe a little about owning and packing stuff. Once, I left a toy bag open in her room between camping weekends and asked her to re-load it with toys and books for next time. She haphazardly threw into it a random variety of useless but comical junk- a drawing from school, a baby toy from the bottom of her closet floor, a stethoscope (see left). True, she was given unlimited choice and WAY too much power for her young age, so of course her selections weren't the most sensible. What did I think would happen? My point still stands: it doesn't really matter what toys you bring along.

When it comes to packing for a self-sufficient family adventure, making methodical choices rather than haphazard toddler-esque decisions can make a big difference in how smooth (even successful) your trip turns out to be. We've been on adventures with and without children, so there are a few things we've learned along the way. Not that we get it right every time, but here are some packing principles we adventure-seeking parents try to live by.

Puzzled Parents, Prepare to Pack
 Everything you need. And maybe definitely way more.

1. Keep gear loaded and ready to go in bins or drawers
This virtually eliminates frantic chaos the night before leaving. We have designated bins to store different categories of cooking, eating, cleaning and first aid equipment. When they're not in use on a trip, these "essentials" bins basically stay loaded with supplies and stacked in the garage. Packing the truck is a cinch. I've found that it's better to wash items and re-stock these bins right after a trip rather than going through it all the night before leaving. Also, it's definitely worth it to purchase dedicated flatware, mugs, pots, and bowls that stay packed and ready to go. There's nothing worse then watching your friends drink a warm camp mocha because you left your travel mug at home in your kitchen.
Similarly disastrous, if you ran out of batteries, paper towels, or band-aids on the last outdoor trip, you are likely to forget before the next go around. Sure, you can buy most of these things at a gas station or Wal-mart in any small town you go through, but c'mon isn't the fun of being self-sufficient, well, self-sufficiency? And, as Mark can tell you, I HATE going to the store for just one thing. It's like admitting defeat in the entire planning and packing department. Keep the ready-to-go bins as "ready to go" between adventures as you can and save your brain from a hectic night before of packing the essentials.

2. Re-package food and organize meals in advance.
We've discussed this previously on the blog about snacks for toddlers, but it's a keeper.
From infant formula, to snack foods, even to fresh fruits and veggies for meals, in general the food you buy and bring from the store isn't packaged efficiently. I spend a lot of our packing time before an adventure in the kitchen, and as house-wifey as it may sound, I really enjoy that part of trip organization. Rather than bringing a whole canister of hot chocolate or an entire box of Kix cereal, portion out what you'll use and bring it in a plastic baggie (double bag if it's powder!). Wash and cut up vegetables such as tomato slices, celery sticks, or diced bell pepper and bring in a stacking plastic container or a waterproof baggie. The more you simplify the packaging, the more trash you can recycle or dispose of before you're out in the wilderness and the quicker you'll be able to find the food you want when it's time to chow down.
Fellow adventurer mom Marni Woods (CA) even goes one more level of efficient by placing food components in the ice chest chronologically, according to the order of when that item will be used in a meal. This is planning and packaging at it's best when it comes to easy meal-times on a camping trip. Great idea, Marni!

3. What goes in the carry-on bags? Don't overfill your vehicle's backseat.
There's nothing worse than opening the kids' door at a rest stop and having ten loose items come crashing out. Yes, that's melodramatic. But still.
Chloe gets to bring one backpack filled with a couple of car toys (finger puppets and the sticker book are still my favorites), a juice box, and her jacket or vest in case it's cold (or after dark) right when we get out to set up camp. We try to minimize our junk in the backseat to just my purse, a headlamp, the maps bag, and some snack food and paper towels in a market bag in the backseat - hey, I didn't say empty, just minimize. Maybe one duffel bag of clothes and blankets can go below Chloe's leg area (since she's up pretty high from the car seat), but for the most part we try to keep the passenger area free for, well, passengers. You'll be less frustrated about finding what you need while your partner drives, and your kids will appreciate the breathing room.

Bonus secret:
I know, I know, the real puzzle is how to fit all of that sleeping gear, cooking gear, clothes, food, diapers, tools, bikes, pack-n-plays...I didn't even go there. See, the answer to that depends so heavily on your travel set-up and your child's age that it's almost useless to discuss in general terms.
The only thing I know is that once you go overnight a few times as a family, you'll get better at paring down to the basic necessities for your camping, eating, and adventuring style. You'll also find little creature comforts that help you all survive more comfortably- like a travel-size bottle of real shampoo (no camp suds for my hair; can't stand the feeling) or Mark's treasured espresso maker for our morning camp mocha- these things are simple yet very satisfying. The main point is, you can be self-sufficient in your adventure traveling even with kids - think about people "overlanding" in covered wagons on the Oregon trail 150 years ago. Although I bet their belongings filled up the storage space to overflowing, too. And they had a hard time figuring out where to pack the kitchen sink...
Give us your input:
Do you have a secret to packing your truck or off-road vehicle? How did your amount of stuff change when you added a child (or children) to the backseat? Prefer towing a trailer where everything is already packed for you? We would love to see pictures and comments below.

For our next modification in packing and organization, I'd love to upgrade our camping essentials stack-able bins to something more durable and rugged, but with a good variety of sizes. Any suggestions?

Story by Brooke Stephens
Posted on http://adventureparents.com/blog/mom-chronicles/267-packing-for-family-adventure-travel-3-secrets-parents-should-know.html

Ann Brooks Carter, Passes at 94.

Wed, 4 Jan 2012 19:26:35 -0700

http://www.rand-wilson.com/obituaries/obit_view.php?id=27

Ann Brooks Carter, 94; mountaineer traveled globe:

Late afternoon on the day that H. Adams Carter, the longtime editor of the American Alpine Journal, died, his wife, Ann, called the then American Alpine Club president.
Recalls Jed Williamson, "She said in her finest Boston accent, 'Jed, Ad died at lunch today. Thank God the journal is at the printer.'"
Ann, who had become a climber herself after meeting her mountaineer husband, was his longtime assistant at the AAJ. Ad Carter died in 1995.
Last month, after being diagnosed with cancer and told that little time remained, a chipper Ann, 94, told Williamson, "I am in the peak of my decline."
No stranger to a vigorous life, Ann Brooks Carter took her athleticism to a higher level after meeting H. Adams Carter, the mountaineer she would marry.
Her parents liked to hike up Mount Washington in New Hampshire on wedding anniversaries when they were able. Mrs. Carter topped them by spending part of her first wedded winter braving the mountain’s windblown snow.
“I was no climber before our marriage in 1942 during World War II, but I was quickly indoctrinated,’’ she wrote 15 years ago for a collection of tributes to her husband, who died in 1995, that was published in The Himalayan Journal.
Although Ad was officially the Editor of the American Alpine Journal, Ann spent almost as many hours as he did editing text and reading galley proofs. The side benefit for both of them was that they seemed to always have a place to stay with a fellow mountaineer during their many world travels.
“I soon learned the basics of rock climbing and helped test new types of boots and rope,’’ she said of the period early in their marriage, when her husband was in the US Army. “My first ‘expedition’ was to Mount Washington in New Hampshire during the frigid February in 1943. The summit of the mountain holds the record for the world’s highest recorded wind speed. We were testing cold weather and mountain equipment and had ample opportunity to sample both wind and cold.’’
Mrs. Carter, who brought warmth and practicality to chilly mountain travels with her husband, died of colon cancer last Wednesday in Kendal at Hanover, a retirement community in Hanover, N.H., where she moved six years ago after 58 years in Milton.
She was 94, an age most consider elderly, not Mrs. Carter. Her mother lived to 101; her father to 100. After a doctor cautioned in October that she had little time left, she was walking with her son Peter, who lives nearby in Norwich, Vt.
“Instead of saying, ‘woe is me’ or ‘this isn’t fair,’ she grabbed my arm and said, ‘You know what the silver lining is about this? Now I’ll never have to grow old,’ ’’ he recalled. “And she was serious.’’
From the beginning, many chapters of her life had a timeless quality, as if torn from an adventure story.
She was the second child and the oldest of three daughters born to Malden District Court Judge Lawrence G. Brooks and Susan Morris Hallowell Brooks.
Her father considered himself a liberal Republican and was in his mid-80s when he joined the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and others in a civil rights march in Alabama from Selma to Montgomery. Her mother was a Radcliffe College graduate, a Quaker, and a gifted storyteller who, not long before dying, wrote a series of vignettes called “Random Recollections of a One Hundred and One Year Old Grandmother.’’
Mrs. Carter was born on Feb. 10, 1917, and “we always expected a blizzard on her birthday,’’ said her sister, Charlotte Read of Concord. “She was born in a blizzard and on a remarkable number of anniversaries of her birthday we would have a wonderful snowstorm and hitch a toboggan behind the pony and go out for a ride.’’
As a girl in West Medford, Mrs. Carter “had a most beautiful little Arabian horse, which had the name Aladdin,’’ her sister said. The family purchased the horse from composer John Philip Sousa.
Mrs. Carter went to Shady Hill School in Cambridge and the Cambridge School of Weston before attending Smith College in Northampton, from which she graduated in 1938.
Longevity ran in her friendships as well as her family. She was part of a circle of six close friends at Smith, five of whom attended their 70th reunion.
After graduating, she taught at Shady Hill School and was at a party when she met Hubert Adams Carter, who went by Ad.
“They were playing touch football,’’ their son said. “He was the quarterback and she was the end. She caught a pass, and he said; ‘Well, she looks like she has some athletic talent. Maybe I’ll ask her out on a date.’ ’’
They married in 1942, when he was in the Army, trying winter food and equipment for troops.
“Our first week of married life included living on nothing but the Army’s developing K rations for testing purposes,’’ she wrote in an essay for a collection published by her retirement home.
Months later, they headed to Mount Washington in February to see how everything worked in winter weather. She used an ice ax to hike with him above the tree line at Tuckerman Ravine.
“During the night the experimental wool underwear and our heavy down sleeping bags kept us comfortably warm as the temperature dipped into the minus numbers,’’ she wrote. “The wind was anything but comforting. But it was just what we wanted in order to test the strength and stability of the tent. The constant loud flapping and snapping in the little two-man tent made sleep next to impossible for me.’’
Granted, the couple spent much of their marriage sleeping in houses, but “at the end of the war, Ann and I took our 2-year-old son, Nat, with us on our belated honeymoon to Chile,’’ her husband wrote for the 25th report of his Harvard class.
He taught for more than 30 years at Milton Academy, where Mrs. Carter became a parent-away-from-home to foreign students. She also assisted her husband when he edited American Alpine Journal for many years. And when he traveled to countries and continents around the world, she was usually with him, staying in base camp when the climbers went to the summit.
The Carters often traveled with other elite climbers such as Bob Bates, who died in 2007, and his wife, Gail, of Exeter, N.H.
“I was very lucky to have these trips with Ann,’’ Gail Bates said. “She was the best possible person to be traveling with under difficult circumstances. She was tremendously hardy, very determined, and just really good company.’’
In addition to her son and sister, Mrs. Carter leaves another son, Lawrence of Chestnut Ridge, N.Y.; a brother, John of Weston; and nine grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 2 p.m. on Feb. 12 in the gathering room in Kendal at Hanover in Hanover, N.H.
Untroubled by the constraints of age, Mrs. Carter was always willing to try something new. On Columbus Day weekend, a few days before she was diagnosed, she was 80 miles or so from Hanover, staying at her family’s place in Jefferson, N.H., near Mount Washington.
“The foliage season was fairly in full bloom, and the forecast was for three days of rain,’’ her son said. “I called her and said, ‘If you can get back over here this afternoon, let’s go up in a balloon.’ She said sure, and that afternoon, we were floating a mile up over the mountains of Vermont in a hot air balloon. That was pretty typical of her. Instead of saying, ‘Are you crazy,’ she climbed right in, and up we went.’’

In part by By Bryan Marquard | GLOBE STAFF JANUARY 04, 2012

Deep North: A Trip to the Arrigetch Peak

Mon, 2 Jan 2012 09:40:31 -0700

Patagonia ambassadors Tommy Caldwell and Hayden Kennedy set out on a winter attempt of a new alpine route in Alaska's Arrigetch Peaks. They chose winter for a ski approach to this remote backcountry locale. Corey Rich and Dane Henry document the effort that yielded a new 1,300' route by Caldwell, Kennedy and Rich: 511+X, M2 Deep in the Alaskan Bush.

Corey Rich, Adventure Photographer and Filmaker, put together an incredibly ambitious trip…to summit AND document unclimbed peaks in the Arctic Circle! He put together a great team of adventures and friends.

Production Company: Novus Select
Director: Corey Rich
Cameras: Corey Rich & Dane Henry
Editor: Dane Henry