Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Book Recommendation and Grand Rapids Mountain Biking Rocks

This months book recommendation goes to James M. Tabor's  Blind Descent.  This was a really engrossing read about the subculture of deep cave exploration.  In a way it's a little like mountain climbing but only in the other direction.  It had some really interesting insights in how the human body reacts to being deep in the earth, with out natural light, for weeks.  We're talking miles deep, miles.  Some of the innovations and research that is going in with caves and exploration is helping everywhere from NASA to new drugs being developed from the microbes found deep in the earth.

It's a bit science, a bit adventure, a bit of a race between to superpowers, as one American and one Russian are competing to find the worlds deepest cave.  I have never had the desire to climb Everest or in this case explore Cheve (the deepest cave in North America), but I've always enjoyed reading about the insights and adventure that they inspire.

On another note, I just received my monthly Outside Magazine and was pleasantly surprised that Grand Rapids, MI was named as one of the 25 best towns to live for adventure sports.  Grand Rapids made it as the best Mountain Biking.  In 2004 IMBA rated MI as a B+.  The same as New Mexico, Alaska and a few others.  2004 was the last year they did such a ranking.  Alls I can say is way to go Grand Rapids, I plan to hit the trails this weekend.

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