It’s alive!
Peaks and Penguins, that is. And hopefully you and me both! 🙂
For those of you who are new to this newsletter, I’d like to say a big thank you and extend a heartfelt welcome. I’m so stoked that you found this little corner of the internet and liked it enough to say so. You are awesome!
And for those of you who have been here a while, thank you, too. Thanks for sticking around although it has been a minute since I sent out an email update. I’m grateful to you for your support and stoke on travel/running/South Korea/stories: you are super!
Despite the relative quiet in your inbox, things have been busy here in the land of Peaks and Penguins!
On the home front, we moved to Hawai’i at the start of the summer! We have been loving our new HI life and doing lots of exploring, both on our island and its neighbors. Alas, I have yet to write anything about that…
If you’ve been here a bit, you know that’s about par for the course: I take my time with stories and work on them pretty whimsically (read: not necessarily in time order).
However, there is a lot of fun new stuff to read and explore!
I lived in Thailand for a few months recently, and have written about some of the fun that was had. There are races: three of them! Thailand by UTMB kicked things off, then Kent and I ran the zero edition of Ultra-Trail Phuket, and finally we wrapped things up with a bucket list race at Ultra-Trail Koh Chang. I also have details on wilderness walking in the provinces and why the west is wonderful; a love song to Thai islands plus a glimpse into what life is really like living in Bangkok.
I’ve also been adding to the California treasure trove: including the tale of one epic, off-the-books 100k ultra, plus my experience working for Parks and Rec in the summer of 2021.
For more in the USA, I added another race: the secret one we did in April 2021 – Zion Ultras!
There’s also new entries to the Covid Chronicles. If you’d have told me in March 2020 that I would still be writing these, I’d probably have thrown in the towel. It’s a good thing that no one mentioned that to me at the time. Anyways, recommended reading includes Career, interrupted (the sequel to All the work we did not do). If you’ve ever wanted a peek behind the scenes at the work I do in daylight, this is it! Or rather, the complete lack of work to be had for me…but I’ll save that story for ya in the two links above. There’s also the one where I wonder why I haven’t gotten covid (and thank my lucky stars, too). There’s an incredibly long overdue award-a-thon for 2021 as well.
If you’re here for the sole purpose of exploring South Korea top to bottom, I’ve good news for you: this is where we shine! There’s areas devoted to national parks and provincial parks both, plus a section to help you on your very own 100 summits mission. But wait, there’s more! You can also bike-pack Seoul to Busan, or walk all the way around Jeju! There is so, so much to enjoy in that small country. Please say hello on your adventures; I miss it terribly.
And if you’re into elsewheres – stay tuned: I am going to be diving deep into the archives to bring you new (old) stories from some of our favorite summits and animal-spotting adventures, up next!
That’s all for now, friends! As always, if you’d like to be in touch directly, you can always email me: peaksandpenguins@gmail.com. I do respond, with helpful tips if I have them, and am always down to chat trails or travel. Thanks for reading and have an outstanding day. Happy trails!
