Crossing Australia – no weak link

When I pack for an overseas film shoot my first thought is ‘what can I pack that I don’t mind destroying?’. Usually I can expect the shoots to be in pretty extreme environments (think mountains/ deserts/ jungle). As a result I have an enormous drawer full of crapped-out clothing which include: a pair of combat trousers with more stitch marks than a rag doll, another pair which are gaffa-taped together and pretty much all of my shirts have holes in places there shouldn’t be holes. This is what I have worn on adventures for almost a decade – disposable clothing – because nothing tends to survive long in the field when you’re crawling through the dirt and dust, running up mountainsides, jumping in rivers and then sleeping in these same clothes.

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Outdoors Down Under

After winning best ‘Spirit of Adventure’ image in David Noton’s annual Chasing the Light photo competition, we asked winner Todd Stein to write about outdoor life Down Under.

The winning image, Milky Way over the Outback, was taken in July 2016 during a camping trip to Kooroorinya Falls Nature Reserve, south of Hughenden in Outback Queensland. We were the only campers, so the caretaker let us camp in this unused corrugated iron shack, which had a lovely fireplace just outside, where we did our cooking. My wife and children were already asleep when I noticed that the burnt down fire was just bright enough to illuminate the rusty shack. I took 6 vertical shots and stitched them on my computer to create this panorama.

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Protection in paradise

Paddling past Point Perpendicular

Reporting on adventure racing around the world takes me to some amazing places, and they often have extreme climates of one kind or another which are difficult to work in – but not always. For the 2016 Adventure Racing World Championship, I was in the Shoalhaven region of New South Wales in Australia and had to endure the bright sunshine, surf-washed white sand beaches and sub-tropical forests that the teams were racing through! 

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