Nicholas Justin Nowers, 20, no address, was arrested on charges of criminal trespass of a non-dwelling and camping in the park.

Brenda Sue Martin, 48, no address, was arrested on charges of criminal trespass of a non-dwelling, camping in the park, failing to stop for an officer, two counts of interfering with an arrest and assaulting a police officer.

Both were booked into Purgatory Correctional Facility. According to Public Information Officer James Schafer their main concern was that these guys are a nuisance for families trying to enjoy the park. But the couple was found sleeping in separate restrooms shortly after midnight. The only family that might enjoy the park is the Adams family.

There must be a better solution than putting them in jail.

Debts to the Gainesville Regional Utilities (GRU) have forced the Alachua County Fair Association to close down their campsite in the past as the county government wouldn't approve the application to use the fairgrounds for camping until a repayment plan is set up and agreed for the GRU debt.

Fortunately, the GRU have agreed on a debt payment in which the fair association will pay a percentage of its gross income to the GRU from campsite rentals. Fourty-five percent of the first $15,000 in gate receipts, fifty percent of any income above $15,000 and up to $30,000 and thirty-five percent of the gate receipts above $35,000 will go to the GRU.

Eventually, the non-profit organization will be able to pay more $44,000 in utility bills owed and also debts owed to individuals and businesses who showed cattle at the fair held the previous year.

http://www.alachuacountyfair.org/

The Backwoods Dash is a three-day non-profit indie music and camping festival set on Memorial Day weekend, May 28-30 on Keystone Lake at Walnut Creek State Park in Prue. This is the event that will kick-start the outdoor music festival season.

Below is the lineup for the three-day event:

Friday (May 28)
12:30 a.m.: Digital Graffiti (Tulsa) late-night set with light show
11:10 p.m.: Paul Benjaman Band (Tulsa)
10 p.m.: Rock Bottom Ramblers (OKC)
9 p.m.: Dante and the Hawks (Broken Arrow)
8 p.m.: HipHopotamus (Tulsa)
7 p.m.: Roger Jaeger (Tulsa)
6 p.m.: Duende (Tulsa)

Saturday (May 29)
12:30 a.m.: The Moai Broadcast (Tulsa) late-night set with light show
10 p.m.: Red Dirt Rangers (Glencoe)
8:20 p.m.: Eleven Fingered Charlie (Austin, Texas)
7 p.m.: Sam and the Stylees (Tulsa)
6 p.m.: The Jeremy Miller Band (Austin, Texas)
5 p.m.: Steve Liddell (Tulsa)
4 p.m.: Whirligig (Tulsa)
3 p.m.: Parallel Play (Dallas)
2 p.m.: Joel Wade (Tulsa)
1 p.m.: Pillo Talk (Broken Arrow)
12 p.m.: Kayla Fitzgerald Jacobs (Wichita, Kansas)

Sunday (May 30)
12:30 a.m.: Ghosts (Tulsa) late-night set with light show
11 p.m.: Flatland Travelers (Stillwater)
9:30 p.m.: Cody Clinton & The Bishops (Tulsa)
8 p.m.: Project Huckleberry (Tulsa)
7 p.m.: Go Action Team (Austin, Texas)
6 p.m.: Ray Bridgemay (Cabot, Ark.)
5 p.m.: The Move Trio (Tulsa)
4 p.m.: The Televised (Tulsa)
3 p.m.: Joe Mack (Tahlequah)
2 p.m.: Michael Gibson (Austin, Texas)
1 p.m.: Will Porter (Marietta)
11 a.m.: Veterans Memorial Service

Read more about this story at Tulsa World. Some tips on getting the best spot for camping for this type of event. For more information about Backwoods Dash, go here.

A trail mix can really make a difference on the trail especially when you're trying to cover as many miles as possible in a day. It gives you the energy you need to go on. It might not give you a boost like power bars do but the energy supply is there and the energy is slowly released. Trail mixes are not meant to replace meals but they're great for snacking in between meals. You can buy ready-made trail mixes at the supermarket but making them yourself can be both tastier and healthier if you do it right and cheaper too.

Wherever you may be, you never really know for sure when a disaster will happen. When the giant tsunami struck Aceh, nobody knew it was going to happen but it did. That was years ago and the world has not ceased to be unpredictable. There's never a time to panic or worry too much about what might not happen but it doesn't hurt to prepare for  a disaster.

The Birmingham City Council and Birmingham Resilience Team in the United Kingdom have issued a leaflet advising families to stock up on "hurricane" survival kit which includes a sleeping bag, camping stove, first aid box and wellington boots even though Birmingham rarely ever suffers a natural disaster.

However, some survival experts say that this type of preparation is a bit extreme for a city like Birmingham. They say people shouldn't spend a £100 on things they're never going to use.

Since Haiti was hit by the devastating earthquake on on January 12, 2010, Kelty has donated about 300 tents to the people made homeless in the aftermath. Charity work like this is always good for making your brand known to the world. Richard Branson certainly brought Virgin Atlantic on the map when he helped rescue some hostages in Iraq.

The people at Kelty are hard at work to help those affected by the earthquake. They also had help from the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of Haiti as well as Jenny Dubin (a volunteer who donated countless hours of her own time to help with earthquake relief), Partners in Health (an organization that brings modern medical care to poor communities around the world), and the Clinton Foundation.

A good number of these tents have been used to set up a village providing temporary shelter for 750-800 children who lost one or more parent in the quake.

Based in Boulder, Colorado, Kelty uses the natural backdrop of the Rocky Mountains to test, create and continually innovate within their diverse outdoor product families of Apex, Backcountry, Trail, Basecamp and KIDS. Kelty combines the best in new technology with a healthy dose of common sense to create exceptionally made, affordably priced outdoor products. For more information on Kelty, please go to www.kelty.com, or call 800.423.2320.

Yesterday, March 3rd, Mike Hanson begins hiking the Appalachian Trail. The 2,174-mile hiking trail is one of the longest in the world. It takes the average hiker 6 months to complete the trail and more than 11,000 people have made it the whole way.

Maybe four or five of them are blind and Mike Hanson will be joining their ranks in about 7 months, God willing. The first blind person to hike the entire 2,174 miles was Bill Irwin, who did it in 1990 at age 50 with his guide dog in 8 months. Irwin is also the author of Blind Courage.

Hanson will be relying on his walking stick and the voice commands from his GPS phone to guide him. His journey will be filmed by Gary Steffens, of Fresh Image Video Productions in Mound but no one will interfere with the navigation. He expects to cover 15 miles a day.

Good Luck to Mr. Hanson. Hope all goes well for him.

The first time I hear someone claim to have perfected the art of S'mores is when Kurt Flecksing and Sean Starovitz opened up their S'more Cart in front of the Urban Culture Project's Paragraph Gallery. It's all for charity with the aim of raising funds and awareness for artists who want to help the community through public and interactive pieces.

These guys have a system going to make S'mores very quickly. One of them roasts, the other squishes the marshmallows and chocolate together, that sort of thing. The cart uses an open, wood-burning fire attached to a rolling S'mores prep station. An open flame on the sidewalk never fails to attract attention. It's an excellent idea especially when nobody else is doing it.

Furthermore, taking over a campfire is a natural thing to do which gives these guys the opportunity to engage the public and talk about how they support the arts.

Camping gear is expensive, especially tents and it's probably the main reason why many are reluctant to go camping. It's a big investment, more so in these tough economic times and a tough one to make until you're sure you're going to camp regularly. One way to know if you're going to like camping is by cabin camping.

It's cheaper in the short term but much more luxurious than normal camping. It's not like sleeping in a cabin tent on a camping mattress. It's more than that. The walls are solid and you're going to be sleeping on a bed. Sometimes there's a dining table or a small table. There's even a couch in some cabins. It's a great way to camp during winter.

These cabins are available in many state parks in the U.S.. They don't completely eliminate the necessity of camping gear. You still need a camp stove and cookware for cooking, towel, flip-flops and toiletries. If electricity is available, you can bring some appliances.

http://www.koa.com/facilities/kabin/

According to eVent, their fabrics "lets sweat escape up to twice as fast as common waterproof/breathables.". Now that's a big claim but is it true? It seems to me that GoreTex "breathes" at the same rate judging from the video below. The only way to know for sure if this claim is true is by using a high-speed camera and timing it.

It may be just a slight difference but who knows how it performs in real life situations. That slight difference can be significant, or not. I have to say that it's more of a magic show than real proof.

The simple answer to this is the number of walls. 2 vs 1. But what does it imply?

It's not just that 2 walls keep you warmer than 1 wall in cold weather, double wall tents are known to keep you dry even better than single wall tents. This is because in a double wall tent, the fly keeps the rain and snow at bay while the inner tent expels the moist air so that it condenses on the fly (in cases ventilation doesn't do the trick) which then drips to the ground instead of the user.

A single wall tent has to rely on one wall to do both i.e. deal with moisture from inside and outside. So the fabric has to be waterproof and breathable. Breathable fabrics may not be enough to battle condensation effectively so you have to rely on venting.

The upside to single wall tents is that they're lighter and less bulky. Double wall tents have more parts and hence heavier and bulkier.

At 11,239 feet above sea level, Mount Hood is the highest mountain in Oregon and a magnet for adventure seekers. Like many places like it, it's also where many accidents have happened.

We mourn for Luke Gullberg who was found dead Saturday due to hypothermia. Two other hikers are still missing and search has been suspended due to heavy snow that cover most of the clues and the fact that the chances of finding them are very slim according to rescue experts. But for fear of avalanches, it doesn't seem like the search will continue anytime soon.

Anthony Vietti, 24, and Katie Nolan, 29, are young, healthy, experienced and well equipped but they'll have to make it on their own for now. Good Luck to them.

Getting a permit to backpack overnight at the Grand Canyon is not easy. Half of the applications are denied. Lining up in person on the day when the permits become available does guarantee acceptance even if you've come a long way. In fact, if you're not a local, your chances of getting a permit are quite low.

At least, that's how it will stay until February 2010 when locals will no longer have priority. This is not good news for some of the locals.

Hiking is tough on the knees, especially when you're carrying a heavy backpack. Even when you're young, it's wise to go easy on your knees so that at a later age you can still enjoy hiking.

Thank God for trekking poles. By using these, you take some of the pressure off your legs when you're walking. They give you a boost when you go uphill, absorb some of the impact as you go downhill and give you a better workout.

Trekking poles also help you establish a rhythm when you hike. Your hike becomes much more efficient when you have rhythm.

The trekking pole is one such important backpacking equipment.

Dunno Munson has been feeding bears from her porch for  10 years and this is what she gets.

As it is written, the state law allows persons with valid handgun carry permits to possess handguns in all parks, natural areas, campgrounds and similar public places. Local governments wishing to keep guns out of their parks have until Sept. 1 to opt out.

Read more..

Essex - Partners in Adventure is a unique camping experience that includes disabled and nondisabled youths. In this environment, children of different abilities learn to play with one another, accept one another and acquire knowledge that they can use later in life, Executive Director Deborah Lamden said.

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The award gives us the opportunity to recognize these individuals annually and to draw attention to one our community's important economic engines — the camp industry.

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Going to the woods was once a part of what it meant to be an American. Visits to the National forests today have declined by 13 percent.

Factors that contribute to this decline are include rising gas prices, the popularity of video games and the Internet, and an increasingly urban and aging population less inclined to camp out.

Critics, however, blame it on fees charged for hiking trails and visitor centers, a proliferation of noisy off-road vehicles and the declining proportion of the Forest Service budget dedicated to recreation.

Read more from the Sun Journal.

President Obama and family will be going to Yellowstone on Friday August, 14 then the Grand Canyon on August 16.  The Obamas will also be rolling through Grand Junction and Phoenix.

Like everyone else, they won't be charged the admission fee.

Read more about it at Backpacker.

It turns out that weight is not the only concern when carrying a backpack. According to this article, incorrectly fitting a backpack may cause pain in the neck, shoulders, upper back and lower back.

According to a release from the American Chiropractic Association, backpacks are a "leading cause of back and shoulder pain for millions of children and adolescents."

Find out how to correctly fit a hiking backpack.

The entry fees being waived range from $3 to $25 but it doesn't apply to fees charged for camping, reservations, tours or concessions.

August 15-16 will be the last weekend this summer that the National Park Service is offering this free admission. The other weekends were June 20-21 and July 18-19.

All 391 national parks across the country will be free. For more info, visit NPS.gov.

VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - 95 percent of our province is in high or extreme forest fire danger and could ignite at any moment. That's from Jeanne Rucker with the Kamloops Fire Centre.

It's very volatile out there that even a small spark from a camp stove could ignite a huge blaze.

Read more..

EDINBURGH, Scotland, Aug. 9 (UPI) — Scottish national parks are dealing with camping equipment so inexpensive many visitors simply abandon tents and sleeping bags, rangers said.

All thanks to the supermarket chain giants Asda and Tesco. 2 person tents cost $15 at Asda and a little bit more at Tesco but with 2 sleeping bags thrown in.

These incredibly cheap tents have been a problem for the officials at Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park for 5 years now.

Read more..

Camp Fannin, where about 200,000 United States Army infantrymen trained from 1943 to 1946, could soon be honored with a Half Mile of History marker in downtown Tyler.

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