NOLS Blog
Case Study: Chest Injury with Fall
The Setting You are on a climbing trip in Red Rocks, Nevada. You’ve spent the last week dialing in your climbing, swapping beta with new friends at the crag and soaking up the desert sun. Today, you decide to take a break from long routes and focus on bouldering. You’re chalking up, eyeing a new…
Backpacking the Vilcabamba Valley to Machu Picchu Alumni Trip: Inaugural Trip Reflection
An Interview with Kellsie Forbes, NOLS Alumni Trips Manager Where did the idea to create an alumni trip ...
Alumni Spotlight: How my NOLS Course Impacted My Career
Almost exactly 10 years after coming to Alaska for the first time to take a NOLS course, Asa ...
The Wilderness Risk Management Conference: a Conference and a Community
An interview with Elyse Rylander, Wilderness Risk Management Steering Committee Chair The 33rd annual Wilderness Risk Management Conference (WRMC) will be held this fall, October 20 – 22nd, in Portland, Oregon. If you haven’t attended yet, the WRMC was developed from the work of multiple outdoor programs who wanted to create a space to foster…
Case Study: Bear Spray in the Face
The Setting You are almost done with a 3-day backpacking trip in the Wind River Mountain Range of Wyoming with two of your friends. You only have a couple miles left to get back to the car, and you’re already dreaming of the cheeseburger and milkshake you’re going to have once back in town. Prior…
Case Study: Fishhooks
The Setting You’re on the first day of a twelve-day whitewater canoeing expedition down the Green River. Your group consists of fifteen students and four instructors. Everyone is paddling close together down a stretch of flat water practicing strokes, building skills, and getting to know one another. Spirits are high. People are laughing, chatting, and…
When Everything Came Into Focus — Hiking Patagonia’s Torres del Paine O Circuit Alumni Trip
I first learned about the O Circuit in 2025, a year before I actually did it. My wife and I were in Patagonia on a Road Scholar trip. It started with a cruise through the Strait of Magellan and the Darwin Passage, followed by a few days in Torres del Paine National Park doing short…
Case Study: Heat Illness on an Early-Season Wildland Fire Assignment
The Setting You are working on a Type 2 initial attack handcrew in the Deschutes National Forest during the early part of fire season. It’s one of the first assignments of the year, and while conditions aren’t extreme yet, temperatures have climbed into the mid-80s°F with full sun exposure on a south-facing slope. The crew…
Rothberg-Birdwhistel Expedition Fund: Panchachuli III Peak Climb
In May 2025, Bharat Bhushan, Prerna Dangi, and I took on a challenge to climb Panchachuli III (6,349m), believed by local residents to remain unclimbed. We aimed to approach it via the northeast route through the Meola Glacier. Despite occasional visits by military and paramilitary personnel, there was no recorded mountaineering information or documented route…
MtnMeister: Five Star Camping Cuisine
National Outdoor Leadership School - NOLS grad talks about camping cuisine on MtnMeister
WRMC presents Risk Management Award to Johnson
The Wilderness Risk Management Conference (WRMC) presented the seventh annual Charles (Reb) Gregg Wilderness Risk Management last week in Portland, Ore.
NOLS Stewardship Award Presented to Ratcliffe, Chief of NPS Division of Conservation & Outdoor Recreation
NOLS Stewardship Award presented to Bob Ratcliffe, Chief of the NPS Division of Conservation and Outdoor Recreation
NOLS Presents Alumni Achievement Award to Metcalf
NOLS Presents Alumni Achievement Award to Peter Metcalf
Black Diamond Founder, CEO to Speak in Lander
Peter Metcalf, founder and CEO of Black Diamond, will give the keynote speech during the National Outdoor Leadership School’s (NOLS) 50th anniversary celebration.
Sketchfervor: WFR a.k.a. Wilderness First Responder
Wilderness First Responder course described with cartoons
Sports Guide: Forging New Paths
When Cole Medders signed up for the Spring Semester in the Rockies, he fulfilled a long-held desire to move out West and explore the wild. The course began in February with a winter camping excursion in Wyoming’s Absaroka Mountains. The group practiced backcountry skiing, avalanche rescue, and built igloos to take shelter from the elements, which Medders says was the highlight of his NOLS experience. “It felt like you were really surviving out there,” he says. “It got down to -20 or -30 degrees some nights and we were way out in the middle of nowhere in the mountains, just surviving this environment that people aren’t really supposed to be in. It’s very empowering.”
