Southern Indiana Trails

It’s been nearly a month since Pawel Szafruga summited all of Colorado’s 14,000-foot peaks in one self-supported thru-hike, and Szafruga is still waiting to drink a celebratory cold beer. That’s because his body cannot yet handle alcohol. “My bloodwork is still screwy, and I had some really bad liver numbers that looked like I was going into liver failure,” Szafruga said. “Right now I’m trending in the right direction but it will be another few weeks until I can drink.” Szafruga pushed his body to extreme limits during the self-powered linkup of all 58 peaks, a dizzying feat that took him 43 days six hours and 50 minutes to complete. He started his trek on July 14 at the base of the Barr Trail, which links Manitou Springs with the summit of Pikes Peak. Szafruga then followed a circuitous route across the Sangre de Cristo and San Juan mountains, then up through the Sawatch and Elk ranges, and finally back to Colorado’s Front Range, where he descended Longs Peak on August 26 to com...

This article was first published by VeloNews.com . To get more of their premium content along with your Outside subscription, join Outside+. Endurance cyclist Payson McElveen has set the fastest known time (FKT) when crossing Iceland in fewer than 24 hours on his bike. On Saturday, September 11, the 28-year-old who is based in Durango, Colorado set out from Akureyri, a city on Iceland’s northern coast, and arrived in Vík, the country’s southernmost coastal town in 19 hours and 45 minutes. The journey was rugged, remote, and made challenging by turbulent weather. The north-to-south speed crossing was the brainchild of McElveen and adventure athlete and photographer Chris Burkard. McElveen said that while a fast ride was part of the goal, moreso was his desire to pedal into a personal challenge and to become intimate with the country he was traveling through. Iceland’s Highlands can be crossed only during the Icelandic summer. For the rest of the year the highland roads are close...

I hate to tell you this, but your mountain bike probably doesn’t fit you. If you bought a bike in the last five or so years, there’s a substantial chance that the frame is too big for you, your seat is too far forward, and the handlebar needs to be cut down or even replaced. But bro! you spray at me from the tailgate of your lifted TRD Pro, You don’t even know me, bro! You’re right. I don’t know you. I have never seen you on any bike, much less your current shred sled, which is of course totally dialed. And I have no idea just how hard you ride. But here’s the thing: I’m probably still right. I know, because it almost happened to me too. It’s not really our fault. But if you won’t listen to me, listen to Lee McCormack. McCormack is one of the foremost instructors in the sport, a Boulder, Colorado–based skills-book author, bike fitter, and coach with more than two decades of experience. He’s personally worked with, by his estimate, about 8,000 mountain bikers, ranging from to...

If you’ve taken a free yoga class on YouTube in the past couple of years, there’s a good chance you did downward dog or crow pose with instruction from Austin, Texas-based YouTube personality Adriene Mishler. Mishler has been running her free channel, Yoga with Adriene , since 2012 and, thanks to her approachable teaching style, calm demeanor, and a pandemic that sent everyone scrambling for at-home workout videos, she now has over 10 million subscribers. Mishler’s goal isn’t to be a global yoga celebrity (although she is); instead, the former trained actor and Adidas ambassador wants to make the practice available and accessible to everyone. She teaches yoga for chefs, teens, writers, gardeners, those struggling with social anxiety—basically, it’s yoga for the people, and none of it feels preachy or exclusive or like you need to know anything about it before you click play. She’s also the co-owner of Practice Yoga Austin , a studio where you can donate anonymously or not at all, de...

Sure, giving a tampon to a fellow camper in need will earn you major kudos in the area of personal preparedness (if you’re a dude, you get extra points). But in some wilderness or survival situations, a well-deployed tampon  can be a lifesaving hack. Search for “tampon survival hacks” on the internet and you’re bound to discover a whole slew of creative and somewhat outlandish uses for this little cotton pellet. Not all of them are practical. “There’s a lot of creative arts and crafts going on,” says Dan Baird , a primitive-survival expert and backcountry guide at the California Survival School. “Are you going to carry a tampon because it can do all those things? Or are you going to make smarter decisions about understanding priorities and preparation?” But according to Baird and three other survival experts, there are several scenarios where tampons can become a crucial tool. For those who aren’t familiar with its anatomy, a tampon consists of a bullet-shaped cluster of tightly...

When you think about a ghost town, maybe you picture a spooky, abandoned collection of old buildings where you poke around curiously for a half hour. Or a tourist trap with pricey boutiques and bistros tucked inside old-timey facades. Those ghost towns certainly have their place, but there’s another kind: the wild ghost towns on public lands, where getting there is half the fun and exploring them is an adventure. Whether traveling on foot or by boat, inside a 4×4 or on a bike, here are some of the best ghost towns across the U.S. Animas Forks, Colorado High in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado, you’ll find Animas Forks, a preserved alpine mining camp with all kinds of accolades for elevational prowess. Established in the mid-1870s, it’s one of the highest ghost towns in the country at 11,200 feet. By the mid-1880s, it was home to 450 people and a newspaper with the highest elevation printing press in the U.S. The town was abandoned by the 1920s. The area is now managed by the BL...

You reach the trailhead after a long drive and begin marching into the woods in search of those brilliant fall colors that arrive each year with the first chill. Then, a depressing reality greets you: the trees are already skeletal, their leaves crumpled on the ground. Yep, you mistimed your fall foliage adventure. There’s a new method to find peak fall colors, and it could help you decide whether or not to trek to your favorite grove of trees. Our Outside Inc. colleagues at Gaia GPS now have access to satellite images from the United States Geological Survey and the European Space Agency, and the pictures capture the reds, oranges, and yellows of fall foliage. Here’s how these satellite images can help you plan your next leaf-peeping adventure. Where to start: the Fall Foliage Prediction Map (Photo: Courtesy SmokyMountains.com) Start your planning with the fall colors prediction tool on SmokyMountains.com. Created by David Angotti and Wes Melton, this map uses meteorological d...