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TrailGroove Blog

A Blog by the TrailGroove Team

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  • Aaron Zagrodnick 244
  • Mark Wetherington 76
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Gear | Trips | Food | Technique | Reading

Entries in this blog

Trips

Backpacking the Tetons: Grand Teton National Park & More

Memories can be painful and happy. As I drove through the darkness past the national park boundary near Moran Junction, I reflected a bit on my last trip to the Tetons. In June 2001, my Boy Scout troop took a trip to Grand Teton and Yellowstone, and during that trip we backpacked one night up Granite Canyon. I know it was my first backpacking trip outside of Colorado and maybe my second or third backpacking trip ever. Two distinct memories pop out from that trip. I remember how beautiful the mou
tmountainnut

tmountainnut in Trips

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Trips

Spooky and Peekaboo Gulch: A Slot Canyon Loop Hike

Southern Utah, the Colorado Plateau Desert; of all the world this place is unique. Here the desert is a maze. Canyons and gulches dissect the plateau into a great network, a labyrinth of lost alcoves and secret glens which one could spend a lifetime exploring without even scratching the surface. This is a land of colorful sandstone sculpture, carved by water as the artist. Water can do incredible things when sandstone is its canvas. Given time, a tiny river here carves a grand canyon.
michaelswanbeck

michaelswanbeck in Trips

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Technique

Winter Hiking & Backpacking: Keeping Water from Freezing

When temperatures never rise above freezing on a winter backpacking trip, or even for day hiking in very cold conditions your tried and true 3-season methods of carrying water may not offer the best approach. In this trail tip, we’ll take a quick look at different containers that will give you an advantage when it gets cold, as well as some other tips to keep your water in a liquid state. Storing water bottles upside down is one trick that is helpful when it comes to winter water stor
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Technique

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Trips

Empty Spaces: Hiking Carrizo and Picture Canyons

“Half of Colorado is beautiful and half of it is ugly, and the same is true for Oklahoma. But people only talk about the beautiful half of Colorado and the ugly half of Oklahoma.” Our friend, Steve, said this as we dined together in downtown Aspen, and he is a man who knows, as a fellow native of Oklahoma and longtime resident of Aspen, Colorado. While I think calling any of it ugly is harsh (although, understandably, if you live in Aspen everything pales by comparison), Steve has a point a
Susan Dragoo

Susan Dragoo in Trips

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Food

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Freeze-Dried Meals

A staple technique used in pre-packaged backpacking meals, freeze-drying is a process by which food (typically already cooked or a product that could be eaten raw) is frozen and the pressure in a chamber lowered. As a result moisture in the product is almost completely removed and foods that are freeze-dried can last years or even decades without refrigeration. A commercially available freeze-dried meal prior to rehydration. Freeze-Dried Meals Pros & Cons Compared to at-
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Food

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Technique

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Weather Inversion

In mountainous areas most live in the valleys and often hike in the mountains – normally a colder environment as you gain elevation. However in winter, often a surface temperature inversion will form in these areas as cold air, in contrast to the norm of temperature decreasing several degrees for every 1000 feet gained, remains trapped in the valleys, and often along with the any air pollution that may exist. Inversions are likely to happen during periods with long winter nights, calm
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Technique

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Trips

Hiking the Vermilion Cliffs & Exploring Grand Staircase

Vermilion Cliffs National Monument is a vast plateau in north central Arizona and adjoining southern Utah. The 280,000-acre (roughly 20 miles east-west by 20 miles north-south) monument includes the rugged and beautiful Paria Plateau and Coyote Buttes North and South. The plateau is also known as the Sand Hills. Many hikers and photographers visit The Wave, Paw Hole, Cottonwood Cove, and White Pocket. All those are worthy destinations, but going beyond yields even more impressive hikes, views, a
Steve Ancik

Steve Ancik in Trips

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Gear

Trail Tip: Using a Backpacking Bear Canister as a Cooler

While a camp stool is perhaps the most popular multi-use application for a bear canister, this tip is best suited for short trips when you're trying to put an emphasis on good food and cold beverages. Bear canisters are a piece of gear added, reluctantly, to the kit of most backpackers only when required for an upcoming trip. However, if you're wanting to freshen things up in regard to food and don't mind some added weight, the underappreciated bear canister can help you turn your fir
Mark Wetherington

Mark Wetherington in Gear

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Trips

Back in the Day Backpacking at the Grand Canyon, 1980

In May of 1980, my dad decided to hike across the Grand Canyon. And I of course wanted to go with him – for each of us, the chance to hike across the largest canyon in the country was too good to pass up. My dad was going to turn 60 later that summer, and I was almost 27 at the time. Even though my wife and I had an 11-month-old son, we chose May of 1980 to make the trip. We acquired the required permits, which were easy to get at the time. As it turned out, we couldn’t hike all the way across t
Steve Ancik

Steve Ancik in Trips

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Trips

Backpacking to Russell Pond in Baxter State Park, Maine

Less than a mile up the trail and the space between my shoulder blades already aches. I’m regretting the overpriced mini tube of sunblock, which the dense trees and clouds have rendered unnecessary, the extra layer I threw in at the last minute, and my insistence on healthful foods that caused me to pack two pounds of green beans and carrots fresh from the garden, a jar of sunflower seed butter, and three loaves of German bread the size, shape, and weight of bricks. My last backpackin
AndreaL

AndreaL in Trips

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Gear

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: EN Rating (Sleeping Bags)

An EN rating (European Norm 13537) is a testing and rating system that standardizes sleeping bag temperature ratings across manufacturers into a relatively easy to understand and comparable scale. Achieved by measuring thermal efficiency utilizing a sensor-equipped mannequin in a specialized environment, the results of an EN Rating are comprised of 4 parts, and generally you’ll just focus on the comfort rating (women), and the lower limit (men). Backpacking sleeping bags that have an
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Gear

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Trips

An Empty Sky Island: Backpacking the Guadalupe Mountains

The badlands of West Texas are among the most thinly settled lands in the country. Sparse and desolate, this region west of the Pecos is nearly uninhabited. Only 5000 people occupy the 8000 square miles that stretch between the Guadalupe Mountains on the Texas-New Mexico border and the Rio Grande. It is a land unsuited for agriculture or even grazing, with little grass or fertile land. What water there is can be salty and unpalatable, as likely to cause digestive distress as to quench thirst. Fe
HappyHour

HappyHour in Trips

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Technique

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Postholing (Snow)

One of the least enjoyable methods of snow travel, postholing is the usually unplanned effect of your foot falling through the outer surface of the snow and sinking to the knee or farther. The result is a deep hole in the snow as if it had been dug by a posthole digger prior to placing a post in the ground. Travel in this manner is quite difficult, requiring large amounts of energy while testing a hiker’s patience. Postholing in deep snow makes for difficult and strenuous travel.
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Technique

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Technique

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Terrain Association

Terrain association is a backcountry navigation process by which one can navigate and determine their position using a map, by evaluating terrain features seen on the map, and matching up what you’re seeing in the field to the map. The method when used alone can be described as “approximately precise”. By orienting yourself and the map to a specific direction – north for example – that jagged peak directly to the west, the river in the valley below, combined with the small hill on your right for
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Technique

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Trips

Oasis in the Desert: Hiking & Exploring Coyote Gulch

The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a huge and spectacular park in southern Utah, and while many hikes in the area have become quite popular and are often well documented, this doesn’t mean these hikes don’t come without a set of – sometimes unexpected – challenges. As we drove down the dusty back roads of Utah towards a remote trailhead to begin our backpacking trip of Coyote Gulch in April 2014, I was blissfully unaware that I’d soon find out firsthand some of the challenges tha
Steve Ancik

Steve Ancik in Trips

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Gear

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Fabric Hydrostatic Head

At what point will it leak? In the outdoor industry, hydrostatic head (often abbreviated as HH) is a measure of the waterproofness of a particular fabric, most applicable to the fly of a shelter, canopy, and / or floor materials, as well as rain gear. The measurement reflects how high a column of water a secured piece of fabric could support before leakage occurs. This column of water is measured in millimeters, and the test is performed with a special machine or apparatus that applies water pre
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Gear

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Trips

Distant Corners: Hiking the Oklahoma & Texas Panhandles

Lines drawn on a map are peculiar. Sometimes they follow terrain features and make complete sense. Oklahoma and Texas, for instance, are divided both politically and geographically by the Red River, a natural enough line of separation although its shifting, serpentine course has made boundary disputes a regular thing. Other lines are more confusing, and seemingly arbitrary. One example is the region containing the “panhandles” of these two states. Oklahoma’s panhandle is a strip of la
Susan Dragoo

Susan Dragoo in Trips

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Gear

Backpacking Jargon: What Are Backpack Load Lifters?

Load lifters are adjustable straps running from the top of each shoulder strap to the top part of the pack body (and ideally to the top of the frame) on many packs designed for overnight carry and beyond. By tightening these straps, the top of the pack is prevented from sagging backwards and a more efficient weight transfer to the hipbelt is achieved by removing weight from the shoulders. An angle of about 45 degrees (running upwards from the shoulder strap to the pack body attachment point) is
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Gear

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Gear

Backpacking and Hiking Jargon: Shoe Stack Height

With footwear being one (and especially important) component of a successful and enjoyable hike, it can pay to become a bit more familiar with the terminology used to define and classify all the choices that are out there. When it comes to stack height, this is a specific measurement of the distance of the bottom of your foot from the ground and overall height of the shoe underfoot. Generally when comparing footwear in a similar class, most of the differences in stack height will be in the form
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Gear

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Food

Trail Tip: Backpacking Freeze Dried Meal Fill Lines

Why every freeze dried meal out there doesn’t already have a fill line on the packaging is a bit of mystery, but luckily we can memorize our own. For example, most Mountain House meals call for either 1 ⅓, 1 ½, or 1 ¾ cups of boiling water. Instead of having to precisely (or imprecisely) measure out that exact amount of water to boil, or worse yet attempt the dreaded cups to milliliters conversion without the help of the internet in the backcountry, we can remember and make our own specific fill
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Food

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Trips

Hiking the Hoodoos & Badlands of Northwestern New Mexico

In the San Juan Basin of northwestern New Mexico, there are several incredible badlands and hoodoo areas, such as the Lybrook and Burnham Badlands, the Fossil Forest, and the Bisti/De-Na-Zin, Ojito, and Ah-Shi-Sle-Pah wilderness areas along with several others. I have had the pleasure to visit, hike, and photograph the first four listed above. These badlands, mostly managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), feature many bizarre and wonderful hoodoos and rock formations, from tiny mushroom
Steve Ancik

Steve Ancik in Trips

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Trips

Backpacking the Henrys Lake Mountains of Idaho & Montana

A few drops of rain and an empty parking lot greeted us at the trailhead where we paused for a few moments of contemplation. I’m not sure if I was more nervous about the responsibility of backpacking with a dog for the first time or if my girlfriend was more nervous about Lolo and I spending the weekend in grizzly country without her there to supervise. Lolo just seemed excited and happy, which were contagious emotions and aside from occasional hunger and tiredness proved to be the definitive fe
Mark Wetherington

Mark Wetherington in Trips

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Food

Apple Crisp Backpacking Dessert Recipe

Fall is in the air. The nights are getting crisp and the moist leaves on the ground have a pleasant and earthy odor. It is a wonderful time loved by many backpackers. Here’s a quick and simple yet yummy dessert that conjures up visions of autumn. Apples, cranberries, and cinnamon spice….all flavors of the fall. This backcountry apple crisp is a tasty treat for two or a decadent dessert for one. This backpacking dessert is a perfect complement for chilly fall weather. Apple Crisp
PaulMags

PaulMags in Food

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Trips

Towering Beauty: The Wahweap Hoodoos of Southern Utah

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a huge 1.9 million acre park in south central Utah, full of scenic wonders and surprises. One of my favorite subjects to photograph is the scattering of hoodoo formations that are found here and there on cliff edges and slopes. Hoodoos are formed when a harder, more resistant layer of rock protects a softer layer underneath. As erosion from water, freezing, thawing, and wind all work their magic, the rock layers are exposed and form into towers of r
Steve Ancik

Steve Ancik in Trips

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Technique

Hiking & Backpacking During the Fall Hunting Season

Fall – a time of the year when the crisp air is enjoyed and the greens of summer are replaced with hues of orange and yellow. And, it’s also the time that we as hikers contend with hunting season. Strategies for hiking during this time range from doing nothing different at all to simply staying home, and while hunting season is a worthy pre-hike consideration, by taking a few steps and modifying our gear and routine just a bit, we can continue hiking during hunting season with a few changes to o
Aaron Zagrodnick

Aaron Zagrodnick in Technique

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