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Biking, Fly Fishing, Summer

The Refinement of the Rad: Why Sun Valley is the Best Place to Learn

Like many other ski towns, Sun Valley boasts a high expert-per-capita ratio when it comes to all things outdoor recreation. Walk into any given bar to encounter three ski movie stars, one insta famous rock climber, and a handful of Olympic gold medalists. The defining factor of Sun Valley locals, however, is that most folks are not all that pretentious about their expertise. Take this example. One of my friends came to town without knowing how to ski. On his first day on the mountain, a new acquaintance offered to teach him some tricks and proceeded to spend the entire day helping him pizza and french fry down Baldy’s most mellow slopes. A week later, my friend attended a local showing of a ski movie only to discover footage of his humble instructor smashing graceful lines on the world’s tallest peaks. “I had no idea he was a professional skier,” my buddy told me. “I can’t believe I spent eight hours snow plowing with a professional skier.” Like I said, as ratios go, we have a high expert per capita, low ego per expert. But what about us non-experts? What about our egos? When I first came to Sun Valley, …

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Fly Fishing, Spring, Winter

Rites of Spring – Stalking Steelhead

Idaho is a landlocked state but what few realize is that it’s connected via one of the longest river systems in the US to the Pacific Ocean.  For millennia, a certain species of traveler, the steelhead trout, has migrated through this river corridor, the Salmon, from the mountains of central Idaho to the ocean and back again.   And a mere hour drive from Sun Valley lies the headwaters of the Salmon River, the origin of the steelhead run. Set amidst the awe-inspiring Sawtooth Mountains, these freestone waters play host to spawning spring steelhead.