Shelter for the Out-of-Doors

The Gear Guy: Outside Magazine’s Douglas Gantenbein reviews four high-quality, lightweight four-person tents from Sierra Designs (Lightning XT 4, $450), Marmot (Halo 4P, $399), Black Diamond (Oasis 3, $360), and Hilleberg (Keron 4, $825), answering the question: What’s the best high-quality lightweight tent on the market?

Do-it-all tent review from Alpinist’s Jon Walsh: “The waterproof and breathable Drizone material and the clever design provided me with everything I needed on that frigid trip. It was lightweight at just 4 pounds, 6 ounces in “bare-bones” mode, storm proof and so well ventilated that I could literally stick my head through the opening. It kept bad weather out, it was more than roomy enough for two, and I easily set it up in just a few minutes.”

One of the dangers of polar expeditions are the violent storms (pitoraqs) that can appear suddenly and without warning. The only way to survive such a storm is to tie down the tent really well, sit inside, leaning against the tent poles for extra support, and pray…

Produced by icescapes.tv

Tawoche Base Camp in the Khumbu region of the Nepalese Himalaya: Climbers Renan Ozturk and Cory Richards attempt to scale and survive the south central “buttress” of Tawoche…

“We have never actually been accused of being the sharpest bowling balls on the shelf… Tawoche in all her glory rises above us another 5,000 ft. With the view, comes the all to familiar rollercoaster of emotions that precede any alpine endeavor. Balancing fear and intuition, angst and energy, the action vs. the idea… they all flow into your already pounding cranial vault, leaving you exhausted before you’ve left the ground.”

Produced by Rock Monkey Media

The One: ultralight tent from Gossamer Gear. “It’s very cleverly designed and has the usual set of features offered with single walled tents including mesh between the tent walls and floor and a elevated vestibule for better ventilation. Spinnaker cloth is a ultralight silicone coated polyester fabric used to make sailboat spinnakers and sails.” sectionhiker.com

Produced by Gossamer Gear

Dwell magazine explores The Airstream Life: “Tucked under couch cushions and linoleum panels, I found artifacts—mix tapes, scrawled recipes, and wrinkled photographs—that chronicled the lives of those who had dwelt within the Airstream since some stranger first purchased it in 1959 from Pacific Railroad Sales in Salinas, California.”

Cliff Kuang of Fast Company writes about Western Scotland’s Ecopod–a “self-contained geodesic dome.”

“There’s no exterior plumbing or cast foundation–the pod sits on the land, with as minimal an impact as possible. The high-end appliances inside–which include a cooking range, a TV, and a stereo–are all ultra-energy efficient. Waste water, meanwhile, is stored and recycled, and the furniture is either all vintage or made from renewable resources, and the wood used in the construction–which includes a hot tub–was all locally sourced.”

Inside The Timberline Lodge

Built in 1937 as a Depression-era “jobs project” for nearly $1 million dollars, Oregon’s Timberline Lodge at the base of Mount Hood has been a site for iconic movie sets–like The Shining and All the Young Men, remains an epicenter for skiing and snowboarding enthusiasts (spawning the popular High Cascade Snowboard Camp), and has been home for the Kohnstamm family for nearly a half century.

“‘There are museum aspects of this place, and I suppose the government could say, ‘let’s make it into a museum and have ropes and glass and charge admission,’ but we’d rather it be a ski lodge than a museum,’” owner Jeff Kohnstamm tells Thom Patterson of CNN.

“Since its birth in the late 1930s as a New Deal project to create hundreds of jobs for Portland workers, craftsmen and artisans, Timberline has dug out its own place in American culture.”

photo credit: K. Kendall