Joe and Kelly Ryan
A father-daughter story
by Sam Demas
Joe Ryan built his huts to provide people an affordable backcountry journey to enjoy nature, to learn outdoor skills, and to benefit with health and healing. A generation later his vision is a reality — beyond what he had imagined — and continues to evolve in partnership with his daughter Kelly Ryan.
By Ben Dodge, Executive Director, Tenth Mountain Division Hut System
[Editors note: Many hut systems struggle with clunky online reservations systems. Tenth Mountain Division Huts designed their own and have successfully upgraded it to handle online reservations. Thanks to Ben for this first piece in a series of “Operational Notes” to share hut management practices and innovations. — Sam Demas]
Tenth Mountain Division Huts decided in late 2013 to add the capability to book hut trips online, in addition to booking by phone. This decision was based on feedback received from hut visitors who stated their preference to book online because they were familiar and comfortable with online commerce, and to book anytime they wanted including evenings and weekends.
More hut-to-hut hiking in USA?
Part 1: Benefits
By Sam Demas, hut2hut.info
Lets have a national conversation about huts
Americans love to hike their 167,00 miles of trails located on federal and state lands. We are building new trails to meet demand, and trail use is projected to continue increasing. But how do Americans feel about placing hut systems on some fraction of their trails? How do we feel as a nation about hut-to-hut hiking, skiing and biking? No one knows. It’s worth talking about.
By Lis Nielsen, President European Ramblers Association (ERA-EWV-FERP)
Walking is a very popular and growing pastime worldwide. Europe is no exception! All over Europe more and more people tie their bootlaces and set out during their holidays and leisure time to discover a variety of natural beauties on foot. Indeed, Europe offers thousands of kilometers of amazing trails enjoyed by the locals and tourists alike.
By David Hooke, Vershire, Vermont
[Editors note: To me, this story demonstrates how an excited group of young people can inspire others to join them in establishing an extensive trail and cabin system. The Dartmouth Outdoor Club (DOC) was an expression of the amazing conservation movement in the USA in the early 20th century. This outbreak of environmental fervor — led by John Muir, Theodore Roosevelt, Gifford Pinchot and many others — inspired the development of the National Parks System of the U.S. and fostered greater environmental activism and consciousness in the U.S. population. This conservation movement also inspired a large-scale collegiate Outing Club movement that started at Dartmouth. In one generation the DOC developed a system of over 35 huts on trails leading from the Connecticut River in Hanover, N.H. into the heart of the White Mountains. I am grateful to David Hooke, author of Reaching That Peak: 75 Years of the Dartmouth Outing Club (1987), for kindly agreeing to write a brief summary of the origins and development of this collegiate cabin and trail system. — Sam Demas]
Dartmouth College, in Hanover New Hampshire, was a successful but quiet and remote outpost of North American higher education by the first decade of the 1900s. All-male from its founding in 1769, the college of 1909 was a lonely, even unhealthy place. Fall and spring dances were the only times that women were invited on campus; as result, winter was dismal, characterized buy “stuffy rooms, hot stoves, card games and general sluggishness resulting from lack of exercise.” Students and faculty alike were bored and looking for new possibilities.
How many huts exist and where are they?
We are experimenting with a modest project: Hut Systems Map of North and South America. Our map initiative is just one of many. We hope to coordinate our work with that of some of the growing number of hut mapping and listing projects worldwide. Some are focused on a particular state, region or nation, while others global in scope. Following are some initial examples to provide a sense of the range. We will add others as we learn about them.
A few people around the nation know a great deal about how hut systems operate. But in the U.S. there is very little written about how hut systems are designed, built, and operated. Almost nothing is known about the economics and demographics of hut systems. And, other than the Colorado Hut and Yurt Alliance, there are no formal mechanisms for information exchange among those who do know. This will need to change if we are to learn from each other, develop “best practices” and ensure that hut systems are operating optimally for their clients, for their owners, and for environmental protection.
h2h aims to stimulate activity in filling this gap in the nation’s knowledge base by publishing “operational profiles”. We are at the beginning of this process and have three so far:
In response to several tragic deaths from exposure and subsequent concern for hiker safety, the the AMC started building huts and shelters in 1888 and celebrated the 125th anniversary it’s hut system in 2013. Carter Notch Hut, built in 1914, celebrated its Centennial last year.
After the first AMC hut, Madison Springs, proved popular with hikers, AMC member Harvey Newton Shepard, who had studied European hut systems, recommended:
….a few additional huts be constructed, with good paths thereto, so that uninteresting walk of three to seven days may be made without the encumbrance of the carrying of blankets or provisions…… this is the kind of public work in which the Club should engage.
h2h is a work in progress, but we’ve finally launched! The website is a call to community, information exchange, research, debate, and discussion. It will be successful to the extent readers join the conversation!
With 21 posts, articles and news items, this first “issue” of HutMag provides a sense of what we are about. We’ll continue to publish new content monthly for the next few years and see where it leads. Our other primary section is Operational Profiles.
Twenty-three members of the Colorado Hut & Yurt Alliance met in Crested Butte on April 3 to discuss a range of issues of common interest. Following is an abstract of the minutes of the meeting: