After losing a friend in a packrafting incident seven years ago, Luc was rattled to the core. It became a catalyst for a new chapter in his own packrafting journey, where he totally reassessed his own skillset and started learning more about safety. This led him to write The Packraft Handbook, which we focus on in this episode. Those of you who already have a copy of the book will enjoy the extra background on the book writing process and getting to know Luc on more of a personal level.

Annie shares some of her most memorable packrafting and bikerafting adventures in Scotland and Greenland. We hear about her encounters with muskoxen, quick sand on a glacier-fed river, and dealing with a sinking raft. We also talk about the dynamic of doing trips with a romantic partner.

Sarah lives in Alaska, where she finds joy in many outdoor activities, from wild ice skating to backcountry skiing and packrafting. She teaches mental-health informed online fitness programs for outdoors people. We go down many tangents in this episode, from the joys of bear encounters in the Brooks Range to some of her earlier packrafting mishaps. We talk about fear management in an outdoor setting, including her intentional approach to building confidence and nervous system capacity. She...

Jeffrey Creamer is a packrafter based in Colorado who loves designing creative whitewater expedition routes. His favourite trips combine hard whitewater with backcountry skiing or ski mountaineering, often in remote areas of the lower 48 where people don’t typically explore. In this episode we chat about many of his most memorable adventures, including a Bull Lake Creek trip and adapting the ‘Du’Mor’ packraft route to include several ski legs. We also talk about packrafting Upper Cherry...

In this episode we talk about Willem’s signature trip style, including how he plans his trips and what it is he enjoys most about multi-week adventures. We chat about some of his earlier trips in Scandinavia, Greenland, a packraft-assisted traverse of the South Island of New Zealand and a near-death experience during a four month traverse of Norway. Willem’s written trip recounts and photographs have provided inspiration for people all over the world, with many packrafters following his...

Sheri Tingey started working in design in the outdoor industry in Jackson Hole when she was a young adult. It wasn’t until she was in her mid-50s that she founded Alpacka Raft with her son, Thor. After almost two decades battling chronic fatigue, Sheri was ready to get her teeth stuck into a new project. With somewhat serendipitous timing, Thor asked her to build him a boat. And so the vision of Alpacka Raft was born. In this episode she shares some of the evolution of the outdoor gear...

Welcome to the second episode in the storytime series. Steve Fassbinder, known to most simply as “Doom” has been pushing the limits of human powered exploration for years. His passionate pursuit of low-impact, human powered adventure has led him to adopt many creative styles of exploration, including being an early adopter of bike-rafting. He is currently based in Mancos, Colorado where he and his partner Lizzy are busy setting up Scullbinder Ranch and running bikerafting tours in their...

The tables are turned as Dulkara answers questions put to her by her mother, Janine Martig. Dulkara bought a packraft before she ever sat in one, at a time when they were little known in New Zealand. She already had a passion for outdoor adventures and remote journeys but packrafting made her view topo maps with fresh eyes. In this episode, she shares the camaraderie and excitement of some of her trips, including a sweaty mission in the Kimberleys of Australia, a journey in the Fairweathes in...

Avid ‘packraftineer’ Stanley Mulvany has spent decades exploring the rugged terrain of Fiordland and South Westland in New Zealand. Most of his routes have virtually no trails or human impact. He also completed a mostly solo traverse of NZ’s Southern Alps, in a few stages. He is a retired doctor, now 71 years old and is showing no signs of slowing down in the outdoors. For the last 9 years he has incorporated packrafting into his missions. In this episode, Stanley talks about some of the...

Forrest McCarthy blazed the way for modern-day packrafting in the lower 48 in the early 2000s. Our conversation ranges from his early years of getting into adventure and his love of the desert lands in Southern Utah to a couple of his most memorable packrafting trips. He shares a scary moment on a solo trip in Patagonia, where he was separated from his packraft. He also talks about an upcoming research trip in the Brooks Range with Alaskan friend and legend, Roman Dial. We finish off...