You will have a hard time sitting still for this and that is a good thing. After watching some of these films you will be wanting to head outside to hike/bike/ski/mountain climb/surf/bike/travel. If you are a regular reader of this blog you will know I am really big on city stuff. I know that you don’t associate urban dwellers with the great outdoors – but that is far from the truth. I was forced to do some outdoors stuff as a kid – girl scout camp and cross country skiing were not my favorite activities. But in the past 15 years I have had the good fortune to travel to Alaska, Colorado and Hawaii and seeing the mountains and the sea makes you want to try all of these sports. The films presented as part of the Banff Mountain Film Festival are the next best thing to visiting these places, and sometimes even better. While I finally tried surfing I am still not sure if I am up for white water kayaking.
I have long been a fan of ski movies (I think this one –Warren Miller’s Fifty, while it may be seen as cliche by some skiiers, is a good place to start.) Even if you are not a hard core outdoors fan the Banff Film Festival is still a great set of films to watch.
Venture Outdoors – which is an awesome organization that I am happy to support (see my other blog posts on Venture Outdoors)- has been bringing the Banff Film Festival to Pittsburgh for a few years now. Venture Outdoors exists to help people get outside right here in beautiful Western, PA – with programming for all levels of expertise from “I don’t own hiking boots” to “I prefer to sleep in my sleeping bag on the living room floor because it feels like camping.”
So I hope you will consider attending the Banff Film Festival (details here – http://www.ventureoutdoors.org/banff.asp) while it is here in Pittsburgh on April 4th and 5th and check out some of the great activities that Venture Outdoors has planned for the spring and summer.
Here is an intro clip for this years Banff Mountain Film Festival
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gV6ThtY25Q[/youtube]
VO does rock for bringing this stuff to town. If it was not for groups like them, bike-pgh, the friends of the riverfront, the 3 rivers inline club, the explorers club, and about 50 other groups that we are blessed to have in the city it would be a much less cool place to live.
The things that these groups do for this city is a big reason why I love it here. Oh and Warren Miller’s film are awesome too! I’ve been a skier for a long time – I don’t think they’re cliche at all.