NOLS Blog
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
Photo by Kirk Rasmussen The Setting You are working on a Type 2 initial attack handcrew in the ...
Rothberg-Birdwhistel Expedition Fund: Panchachuli III Peak Climb
Team selfie. In May 2025, Bharat Bhushan, Prerna Dangi, and I took on a challenge to climb Panchachuli ...
Case Study: Non-Freezing Cold Injury on a Canoe Trip
The Setting You are leading an early-season canoe trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. It’s mid-May, and while the days are mild, the water is still very cold. Travel involves frequent portaging and wading in and out of the canoe to load and unload gear. Despite good effort, everyone’s feet have been wet…
Lou Gordon: Three Decades of Influence
Louise “Lou” Gordon’s office in the Wilderness Medicine wing of NOLS Headquarters is tucked into the perpendicular intersection of two banks of offices, in the center of the activity but quiet and a little reserved. Like Lou herself.
After more than 30 years, the last 6 1/2 as NOLS Wilderness Medicine’s Wilderness EMT Supervisor, Lou is cleaning and packing up her office in preparation for her retirement. Her last day is May 1.
Climate Medicine: Where Climate Change and Healthcare Meet
Springtime has arrived in the Northern Hemisphere. Trees and grasses are greening up, flowers are blooming, and birds have returned to greet the morning with song. As many of Earth’s residents head into boreal summer, they know to expect rising temperatures. But what does that heat mean for human health? What happens when infectious diseases…
Summer Travel Programs for Teens: Why Wilderness Expeditions Offer More Than a Passport Stamp
Most summer travel programs for teens promise adventure. A select few actually deliver it. There is a difference between traveling through a place and learning to move through it with skill and intention. That difference is worth understanding before you commit to any program, and before your teen boards a plane. This guide breaks down…
Staying Power
Shari Kearney didn’t just find a place at NOLS—as our longest serving female instructor, she has worked over 424 weeks in the field and influenced generations of students. Shari Kearney is checking on Three Peaks Ranch’s stable of horses, kept on pastures outside of Lander, Wyoming in the offseason. Each autumn, the horses—dozens of them—are…
Connection, Resilience, and Dal Bhat: Manaslu Circuit Alumni Trip 2025
In November 2025, five gentlemen, one lady, three guides, and three support staff met in Kathmandu in preparation for a two-week NOLS alumni trek on the Manaslu Circuit in Nepal. Although we were all strangers coming from different parts of the world, our shared excitement for setting foot in the Himalayas was palpable. During those…
RMFI: Staffer Travels to the NOLS 50th Anniversary Party
This month, on October 8th through 10th, the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) will celebrate its 50th Anniversary with an alumni reunion full of events and merry-making. The celebration will take place in Lander, Wyoming, the school’s home base. In attendance will be Liz Nichol, RMFI’s Office Manager, who completed her first NOLS course as a student in 1967
County 10: NOLS Celebrates 50 Years with 10th Mountain Division Living History Display
As part of the NOLS 50th Anniversary Celebration, the 10th Mountain Division is hosting a Living History Display featuring the uniforms and equipment that Paul Petzoldt, founder of NOLS, helped develop for the Army. The display includes mountaineering equipment, skis, sleeping bags, packs, climbing boots, and a display of military mountaineering medicine from that time.
AP: Lawsuit Dismissed Against Wilderness School in Hiker’s Death
A contract that a young man signed releasing a Wyoming-based wilderness training academy from liability before his death on a 2011 backpacking trip to India bars his survivors from suing for damages, a federal judge has ruled.
Hyperlite Mountain Gear: How to be Prepared with Less Gear
Andrew Altepeter fell in love with the outdoors at a young age after a transformational hike up to Knapsack Col in the Wind River Range. Pushed past his limits by his father, incredible views of the northwestern Wind River Range awed him. He was hooked. This passion stayed with him through four years at Whitman College, where he regularly participated in the school’s outdoor program. Next came work in the energy industry as a drill-site geologist, but still he managed to find time to adventure when not at work. However he soon moved on, taking an instructor course with the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS). There, he started to learn about lightweight hiking. “By summer of 2010 I had worked a few courses, and I was hooked,” he says. And five years later he shows no signs of slowing down. He says the chance to be an instructor has “provided an avenue to support transformational experiences for others” and helps him appreciate the importance of the wilderness. Plus it has given him the opportunity to hone his ultralight hiking skills and how he teaches these skills to others.
The Ultimate Recipe to Upgrade Your Campfire Cooking
Molly Herber, Staff Writer at the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) recommends a recipe that’ll knock the socks off any camper: backcountry pizza.
Op-ed: As Recreation Booms, Access to Public Lands Becomes More Crucial
My life has been connected with the outdoors, as an instructor for the National Outdoor Leadership School and now as the leader of a conservation organization.
The Kids Are All Right?
A Big City Mountaineers teen trip opens a window on some of the more daunting challenges of increasing youth diversity in the outdoors. By Corey Buhay
Summer Sunday: The Wyoming Winds
I wanted to go Lander, home of the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS), and to the Wind River Range, where the fishing was supposedly epic.
The Lander Valley Leadership Expedition Attracts Eight Inspiring Students
The Lander Valley Leadership Expedition has become a tradition for upcoming seniors at Lander Valley High School who elect to serve as 'Senior Mentors'.
So You Want To Be An Astronaut?
One of the toughest aspects of the training is NOLS Expeditionary Training. This involves the whole class roughing it out in the wilderness for 10 days.
Program Connects At-Risk Kids With Nature
The idea behind City Kids is to get kids out of these neighborhoods and into wilderness adventures that help them learn, grow and build skills.
Murie Center Honors Spirit of Conservation
Actor Harrison Ford received the 2016 Murie Spirit of Conservation Award, adding a wow factor to the event. NOLS Director John Gans also attended.
