The Get Outside Friday | Reads of The Week

The 25 Essential Books for the Well-Read Explorer | Outside Online | Occupy your off-season with the successes, failures, and bemusements of fellow adventurers.

Hey, we're with you. Given half a chance, we'd much rather hit the road than the armchair. Nothing can replace the intensity of authentic experience. Yet experience needs shape and wisdom and behind every great adventure are the stories that inspired it. We read before we go; and after we arrive, free and clear in far-flung terrain and edgy places, we invariably find echoes of the voices that led us there.

Paleo Poor: Your Guide to the Grocery Store |Whole9 | We’ve heard it a million times – how can I afford to eat like this?  (“Like this” meaning “Whole30®” or a general Paleo diet.)   We can’t argue the fact that it’s cheaper to eat a McDonald’s value meal than to craft your own healthy healthy dish by hand… but then again, diabetes medication is pretty expensive too.  We’re not here to argue for all of the reasons you should eat better.  If you’re reading our site, you already know that, and are trying to do something about it.  We’re also not going to get on one of our favorite soapboxes, called, “You just spent $5 on a latte, and that’s not even food.”   Ultimately, it all comes down to making healthy eating a top financial priority, but there are plenty of ways you can make your current food budget work a little harder.

Lessons From The 1910 Race To The South Pole | Art of Manliness | In 1910, two explorers began their quests to become the first men to ever set foot upon the southernmost point on earth.

It was the “Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration,” and the South Pole represented one of the last unexplored areas on earth. Robert Falcon Scott hoped to claim the bottom of the world for England; Roald Amundsen wished to plant the Norwegian flag there on behalf of his countrymen.

Despite their common goal, the two adventurers’ approaches to their expeditions were quite different—as were the end results. Amundsen reached the South Pole first and returned home on a trip that was relatively smooth and straightforward. Scott arrived at 90 Degrees South only to experience the crushing disappointment of seeing one of Amundsen’s flags flapping in the wind. He would never make it back; he and his four companions died of starvation, exhaustion, and exposure as they attempted to make the 700 mile return trip to their base camp.

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