Boulder Adventure Film fest

Thursday and Saturday I saw several films from the Adventure Film festival. Tickets were $10 each day, and it was money well spent.

Thursday I saw 3 films about climbing; one about Mike Bearzi's last climb called Via Bearzi, one about summitting K7 called Ice, Anarchy, and the Pursuit of Madness and finally a film called Shaking the Bear which was about the first ascent climb (of the same name) in Zion National Park. Bruce Miller (a Boulder resident and Mike Bearzi's climbing partner) spoke after the first film. Chris Alstrin came up from Colorado Springs to comment on his film, the third. The first two made me want to book a flight to Kathmandu ("baby steps, dude, baby steps...") and the third made me re-realize that multi-pitch crack climbers are flat out insane (I would literally be leaving a yellow wet trail all the way up).

Saturday I went to the Patagonia store and saw Weather We Change about climate change and its affect on the winter sports industry. After the film, Alison Gannett (see also her Ambassador profile) presented her slides about how we all can reduce our carbon footprint, and I was convinced that for Christmas this year I'm just going to ask for folks to offset my yearly carbon output.

Seeing these films, if nothing else, gave me a greater appreciation for Boulder. The fact that this and other similar film fests show in few other places except Boulder is a selling point, but more so is that there is something exciting about knowing the dude in front of you at the grocery store who hasn't shaved or showered in 2 weeks may just be recovering from a recent epic climb of a huge peak in the Himalayas. If I continue to live in the Front Range for a while, I don't want to live more than a few miles from Boulder. It's a very unique town in that regard and I'm thankful every day to be here.