Innholdsfortegnelse for Summer 2012 i Overland Journal

Pros: •  Lightweight and compact• Excellent low-light performance• Intuitive onscreen menus• Price point Cons: •  Lacks hot shoe and viewfinder• Short battery life• No comprehensive hard copy manual• Front adjustment wheel awkward The Canon S100 is clearly a pocket hero. Weighing in at a tad over 6 ounces, and dimensionally about the size of a deck of playing cards, it is the only slip-in-your-front-pocket camera in the review. I wasn’t sure what to expect, as most of the like-sized cameras I’ve used in the past provided less than desirable results. Read on. The onscreen menus are handed down from Canon’s G1 X and are very intuitive in nature. The “set” button on the back brings up the menu, and the up/down and right/left toggles guide you through adjustments to white balance, bracketing, frame rate, the auto…

With stiff fingers, I fumbled at the zipper of my backpack as a sharp gust of wind slipped around the hood of my jacket and across my neck, gripping my senses and sending a tremor down my spine. To the east, deep hues of indigo permeated the pre-dawn sky, transitioning to light blue and then yellowish orange as it kissed the horizon. It was cold, in the low 20s I would guess, and the shallow water-filled depression before me supported a thin sheet of ice, which cast a blurred reflection of a distant sandstone sculpture. I retrieved a camera from my pack and fitted it to my tripod. To my left was Jack Dykinga, one of the most accomplished nature photographers in the country. To my right, Jeff Foott, cinematographer…

Innovative Disaster Response If your heart has ever gone out to disaster victims, yet you didn’t know how to help, Team Rubicon (TR) may be your savior. TR presents an effective approach to disaster relief by uniting veterans and medical professionals, and deploying them around the world at a moment’s notice.Team members have worked in Haiti, Burma, Sudan, Kenya, Pakistan, and provided assistance after the recent tornadoes in the U.S. Midwest. “Veterans have skills that are directly applicable to disaster relief, specifically exhibiting their leadership, emergency medicine, and mobilization expertise during a disaster,” says William McNulty, Vice-president and co-founder of Team Rubicon USA. If you can’t break away at a moment’s notice, TR welcomes monetary donations (all donations during deployment go directly to field operations), and they are always in…

Overland travel tends to lead us to some of the most fascinating places, often providing a continual stream of amazing sights; sights that are, at times, darn near impossible to put into words. Sure, a wonderful yarn of adventure, spun by a master weaver of tales, can create a tapestry of epic proportions. But sadly, not all of us have the gift of gab. Thank goodness for cameras. Everyone surely knows the adage, a picture is worth a 1,000 words. Oh, if it was just that simple... In reality, it usually goes something like this: when confronted by an indescribably beautiful sight, we dig around until we manage to excavate the camera from wherever we last tossed it. We then dutifully point it in the general direction of the eye-candy…

Bruce Dorn Bruce Dorn, DGA, began his photographic career as a still photographer for Condé Nast Publishing and Time/ Life in the early 70s. After a segue from fashion and photojournalism into advertising work, Bruce added commercial filmmaking to his resume in the early 80s. Bruce’s television commercial campaigns have earned him multiple Clios, Mobius, Addy, and Art Directors Club awards, as well as a Bronze Lion from Cannes. Bruce is a Canon Explorer of Light, a Western Digital Creative Master, a Tiffen Image-Maker, and a Corel Painter Master. In 1984, Bruce was inducted into the Directors Guild of America. Steve Larsen Steve Larsen is a freelance moto-journalist living in Arizona. Larsen’s work regularly appears in Motorcycle Consumer News and Rider Magazine. He is an accomplished motorcycle rider, and is…

ioSafe Rugged Portable $250 I’ve owned at least a dozen portable hard drives, all of which I handled with the care of a brain surgeon at the operating table. The MILSPEC ioSafe billet aluminum Rugged Portable (titanium is also available) may be the last. It is crush resistant to 2,500 pounds, submersible to 10 feet for three days (diesel or aircraft fuel for one hour), and features fully-suspended, six-axis shock protection. Data recovery service is included for one year, it will function at altitudes of 30,000 feet, and your data will survive a freefall of up to 10 feet. The unit measures 3.9x5.7x1.0 inches, is available in 500GB or 1TB capacities, and yes, that is my truck parked on top of my 500GB unit. (CC) iosafe.com, 888-984-6723 Snow Peak SnowMiner…

If you ever wondered to what elevation you could ride a motorcycle, the guys on the Husaberg Adventure Team have just provided the answer. On March 18, 2012, at 2:30 p.m., Walter J. Colebatch (U.K.), Barton Churchill (U.S.), and Lukas Matzinger (Austria) set a new world record for elevation reached by motorcycle. Riding, pushing, and carrying a Husaberg FE 570, the trio reached a height of 20,869 feet, besting the previous record by 400 feet. The record was achieved on the slopes of 22,615-foot-high Ojos del Salado, “Eyes of Salt,” Chile. The site was chosen for its relatively mild gradients, and because it was the location of two previous 4WD elevation records. The team did their high-altitude training in the Alps and U.S., and expedition leader Churchill said, “The biggest…

Pros: •  Interchangeable manual-zoom lens• Hot shoe mount• Robust construction• Excellent image quality Cons: •  Viewfinder at additional cost• ISO performance less than expected• Fixed LCD Based on its metal construction, function, and interchangeable lens features, the Panasonic GX1 is another camera that will appeal to DSLR users. It embodies the concept of a micro 4/3 camera. The basic controls are very intuitive in nature. In 60 seconds, without referencing the manual, I was able to set aperture, shutter speed, and exposure compensation, in aperture priority, shutter priority, and manual modes. A thumb-operated rear dial is used for this. Push buttons on the back clearly mark AF/ AE, ISO, capture rate, and white balance. The manual zoom allows for immediate and minute adjustments with your left hand, without taking your index finger off the trigger.…

Daunting. Dangerous. Divine. The Dakar Rally is to dirt riders what The Vatican is to Catholics, what Hollywood is to movie fans, or the Grand Ole Opry is to country music lovers. It’s the Daytona 500 superimposed on the World Cup, and lasting as long as the Tour de France. To reach any respectable finishing position requires the physical conditioning of a triathlete and the endurance of a marathon runner; assuming said athletes could run consecutive races—thirteen to be precise—at up to 4,572 meters elevation and with only a single rest day. Insert a dual-sport motorcycle into the equation, and you will need to add superb navigational prowess and technical riding skills to your repertoire. Enter the Dakar Rally. Talk to any off-pavement rider long enough, and the Dakar Rally…

The Long Time Coming A decade ago, Marc Noonan spent his time in British pubs with friends, dreaming about traveling the world. During the following eight years he came to the realization that his wanderlust would need greater meaning than just doing a cool trip. The greater meaning would be The Long Time Coming, a fund-raising campaign for Central American charities and schools that work with neglected and disadvantaged children. Noonan said, “I spent some of my first years in foster homes and orphanages…I’m hoping I can have a positive effect…to give them the potential and opportunities that were given to me.” Marc is hoping to raise £110,000 ($175,000), and will be working with selected charities (he is currently in Belize), as he rides his quad towards South America. Follow…

You may not have a client or fat expense account, but that doesn’t mean you can’t work like a pro. Give yourself an assignment, work within a time frame, and your results will quickly improve. Here are a couple of assignment ideas to consider: 1 Be the Lens Try an extended session of shooting exclusively at the extreme ends of your zoom. Start by spending a few hours shooting with your zoom set at its widest angle. Work at the lens’ minimum focusing distance and see how it behaves. Once you’ve got the hang of pre-visualizing how the wide-angle setting sees the world, zoom out to full telephoto and do the exercise again. 2 See the Light Spend a lengthy session shooting interesting subjects with the sun directly behind you.…

For some individuals, nothing is more routine than shaving. Skipping the daily ritual in pursuit of the illustrious five o’clock shadow is but one joy experienced by over-landers fortunate enough to escape for extended holiday. Some travelers derive personal pleasure from each passing mile’s accumulating layer of road grit and facial stubble, looking and smelling ever more the furry likes of Ponce de Leon and Ferdinand Magellan. Alas, these hirsute and poorly groomed explorers should be cut some slack. After all, they endured weeks of bad chow, mutinous comrades, tropical disease, and risk of death…all in the name of exploration. Fortunately, as scientific and navigational methods became more refined, so did the grooming habits of buccaneers and explorers. What was once the rugged look of the professional explorer, magically morphed…

American policemen must be born with Ray-Ban sunglasses attached to their ears. A cap is glued to their head at all times, their uniform is spotless, and their shoes full-gloss. This is what we know from watching American television shows. Other observations, or major rules of conduct we learned, also from the TV, are to stay in your car when pulled over by the police, keeping your hands visible and on the steering wheel. Always be courteous, and address officials with sir, madam, or officer. We came as simple-minded travelers, and we came in peace. Perhaps my husband Joerg and I were unprepared for what to expect when roving the United States in our own camper for six months. Visiting the New World is always an adventure for Europeans, but…

Rucksacks, over the centuries, have been highly varied and very necessary tools for humans on the go. For hunters carrying large game, military troops hauling ammunition, or Andean mountaineers, rucksacks are a staple piece of kit. I am one of those travelers. My primary backpack has a patch from each of the countries it has accompanied me to. Friends say it looks like it has been drug behind a motorcycle down a Latin American dirt road. Well, it has. Being a lesser-quality imported pack, it is worse for wear, regardless of usage. I recently began a quest for the ultimate backpack, one that will last long enough to hand down to my children. I found exactly what I was looking for at Red Oxx. And, it is made in the…

ExOfficio is a household name to anyone who loves the great outdoors, casting a trout line, or loading up their rig for an adventure in the backcountry. But it wasn’t always so. In 1987, ExOfficio (then called De Sar Inc.) was no more than two guys with a dream, and a rented garage space. The dream was to create durable high-quality clothing for fishermen. Their first item was the “Baja,” a combination of ventilated fishing vest and dress shirt. The Baja became a classic piece of kit for thousands of fishing, outdoor, and overland aficionados. ExOfficio capitalized on the Baja momentum to move to a proper facility and in the process, develop hundreds of additional products. A few of ExOfficio’s industry-leading innovations have been high-performance convertible clothing, UV protective and…

Who among us is fortunate enough to have avoided nausea after rapid ascent to high altitude, vomiting and diarrhea shortly after eating undercooked local cuisine, or a morning headache upon awakening to a campsite devoid of coffee? Most overland travelers find such occasional nuisances worth the risk and assume these symptoms are likely due to acute mountain sickness, food poisoning, and caffeine withdrawals. After all, don’t they come with the territory, and who wants to be known as a complainer? However evident the cause of these symptoms may be, are you sure they might not be the effect of something altogether different? Could they be early symptoms of a less conspicuous but more lethal problem lurking under your camper or your vintage overland vehicle? Carbon monoxide is ever present when…

Serves: 2 | Cook time: 20-25 minutes Equipment: BBQ grill, small sauce pan, fine mesh strainer 2 salmon fillets 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar 1/2 cup tamari 1 clove garlic, chopped Mixed greens Seasonal vegetables (for salad and grilling) 1 cup cooked brown rice (optional) Prep the grill by brushing a thin coat of oil on the cooking surface to prevent sticking. If using gas, preheat to a medium heat. If using charcoal, be sure the coals are bright hot with subsided flames, and at least a medium temperature. While the grill is heating, prepare the reduction. In a small saucepan over medium/low heat, add the balsamic vinegar, tamari, and chopped garlic. Bring to a light simmer while stirring regularly and reduce to 50 percent of original volume. Remove from heat…