Defining Adventure with Will Gadd across the Canadian Rockies

July 29, 2014 by Gavin McClurg

Vol Bivouac (fly camp) style adventures seem to be all the recent rage in this rather off-route, deeply addicting fringe sport that a friend recently pointed out quite eloquently as “ridiculous”. Flying plastic and strings hundreds of miles without an engine, everything needed to survive on your back. People keep going farther and farther.

Stupid Lines in the Stupidly Pretty

July 16, 2014 by Gavin McClurg

I was very tempted to call this post “Balls Deep” in honor of Tony Lang, who started this rather genital based thread after watching my Spot page and noticing that the flight track did in fact have quite a phallic outline. Of course that was not exactly what I set out to do. Coming off 7 straight days of flying some incredibly awesome tasks (including a 204 km send into the Palouse region of Eastern Washington, a place I’ve always wanted to see), but hardly crushing the US Nationals in Chelan I was in a bit of a funk.

Pushing Hard in the Alps

June 22, 2014 by Gavin McClurg

21 spring days in the Alps chasing it. Here are the results.

Freefall

April 22, 2014 by Gavin McClurg

We’re talking about all of this and George says, “hey do you want to go skydiving?”. He had purchased a parachute on ebay this winter. It arrived in the mail packed and he got his buddy Jake to take him up to 10,000 feet in his plane and he jumped out and free fell 6,000 feet. He’d never done any skydiving before. It went well so he and his son packed it that night with the help of YouTube and he jumped again the next day. That also went well. Are you getting an idea of who George is?

EXPERT: How to Avoid a Storm

January 11, 2014 by Gavin McClurg

A little shared knowledge of storm avoidance if you’re wandering around by sea or air, as featured on the Red Bull Adventure Channel. Check it out!

An amazing year. A look back at 2013

December 30, 2013 by Gavin McClurg

My mom writes a Christmas letter every year and always asks my sister and I to write a paragraph of what we did. For the last 13 years mine has been a discourse on wherever the boat had gone that year. Caribbean, South Pacific, Melanesia, Australasia, Africa, etc. Needless to say, it hasn’t been very dull. As I started writing this years recap I fully expected a somewhat more toned-down account.

The Higher You Get, The Higher You Get

October 18, 2013 by Gavin McClurg

We got home to Sun Valley exhausted but in good spirits. Cool fall nights and shorter days had already set in, the Aspens were already going golden, the tourists had left town. In my opinion Sun Valley has the best big air flying on Earth. A number of recent distance records, including my own world mountain record this summer of 240 miles confirms this opinion, but what we don’t often get to do is fly here in the absence of fear. Flying in Sun Valley is usually a pretty full-on affair.

500 Miles to Nowhere

September 9, 2013 by Gavin McClurg

We were four pilots in total: Nick Greece, myself, Nate Scales and Matt Beechinor; each of whom have held the foot launch record in North America for some period over the last 13 months, all but Nick’s set from Bald Mountain, Sun Valley. The route chosen was once again an incredibly aesthetic line of about 500 miles, and we’d learn quite a bit more technical and difficult than what we did in the Sierras, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

Flying the Apocalypse

August 16, 2013 by Gavin McClurg

Gavin McClurg soars the bowls on Baldy as the fires break out
The Firest Commence
Panorama of the fires off the top of Baldy
Matt Beechinor. Mad Skills
Incredible night of flying
Flying the Apocalypse on the Niviuk F-Gravity
Nate gets out his brand new Peak 3
Radical

On the 8th of August a little lightning caused fire took off near Beaver Creek, sw of Hailey just a few miles; and just north of two much larger fires that had already torn through over 200,000 acres of scrub and pine forests. At that stage there were just over 100 crew on the Beaver Creek fire and the TFR (temporary flight restriction) was just inside our launch on Baldy, so we headed up the hill for what would end up being one of the last flying days of August. Of course the rest you all probably know- the Beaver Creek fire was upgraded to the nation’s top priority. It quickly grew into a fire nightmare, eventually nearly 2,000 fire fighters from around the country and dizzying number of aircraft descended on our little valley to try to save it. Jody and I and over 2500 others were evacuated on the 16th. Most people have been allowed to return home, but a few areas, including ours are still on mandatory evacuation, but the fire, now at over 110,000 acres is nearly 100% contained.

It was one of the most memorable soaring sessions I’ve ever had. Nate got to take his new Niviuk Peak 3 for a spin, I got to deepen my love affair for my new F-Gravity, and most of the flying crew in Sun Valley got to fly the bowls, something that happens very rarely. Many thanks to Chuck Smith for grabbing these shots!

We’re going to Jackson Hole!

August 14, 2013 by Gavin McClurg

Since the big day Sun Valley has been testing my patience. And the town has been winning. I’d been riding my mountain bike way, way too much. Throwing acro hucks in the morning and evenings. Both very fun activities. Yeah, the town is great too; not even that busy for a bitchin’ ski town. Luckily most of the yahoos prefer to engulf Jackson Hole (Tetons and Yellowstone) and leave us alone.