Jeremy Jones going Deeper

We're psyched that snowboarder Jeremy Jones is part of our 2010 NEMO ambassador lineup. Adding him to our roster of amazing athletes almost puts the finishing touch on John's (NEMO's Director of Sales) list of bro crushes... all he needs is Dan Keith Malloy to show up at his door for dinner.

Jeremy is incredibly immersed in all aspects of snowboarding -- and has been from the very beginning of the sport. From making killer videos to developing some of the most advanced freeride boards in the market to being an advocate for the nonprofit Protect Our Winters (POW), he's doing it all. His newest film Deeper explores amazing backcountry snowboarding terrain in BC with Jonaven Moore. As Jeremy says, being there "is the best wide screen, hi-def TV you will ever watch." Read more about his trip report here. (pics via TGR)

-Connie

Edge Of Seven Volunteering

Hi Everyone - It's Tom, the Operations guy here at NEMO. For some reason this is the very first blog entry I've submitted despite it's 2+ year existence - apparently I've got some work to do.

To start off I wanted to share with you a very unique volunteering opportunity. A close friend of mine (Erin Guttenplan) has started an international non-profit volunteering organization called Edge Of Seven. The goal of EOS is to develop "projects that are sustainable, respond to genuine need, and require a minimal investment of funding and resources to bring much needed help to the far corners of the developing world." She and a group of volunteers are heading to rural Nepal this May to construct a school for the local families: Click Here to check out the full story.

She is speaking today about the Nepal project as well as other volunteering opportunities abroad at the REI in downtown Boston from 6:30-8 pm. If you happen to be in the area this evening and this is something that interests you please head over and lend an ear to this amazing volunteering organization - REI Presentation

If you're not local check out her blog Edge Of Seven to see how you can get involved.

Hope you get a chance to check this out - have a great day.

T.

Local Wildlife Part 3 Local Osprey

I am please to say that we have a pair of osprey just off the Nashua river as their nesting location a few miles from the office.  It was great to see this pair working so hard to construct their nest Wednesday morning when I was there with my camera. The best part about this is that I can drive right past here on my way to and from work to track the progress, with a  little luck we will see some baby Osprey soon! Stay Tuned. Last week I was shooting some nesting Blue Herons and was very happy to see this Great Horned Owl taking up residence in an old heron nest!
-Bill

On Press

Bill and I are excited to report that the 2010 Product Catalog is on press. We have spent the past couple of days up in Burlington, Vermont seeing first hand what goes into turning the final files that leave our studio into a beautiful printed and bound catalog. The catalog is being printed by Villanti & Sons, Printing, Inc., a small, family-owned, FSC Certified printing company with big capabilities. Villanti is one of only a few FSC Certified printers in the nation and to gain that status you have to meet high standards that show a commitment to being environmentally responsible. The process, the machines used, and the guys running the show are all pretty impressive. Every couple of hours a sheet (eight pages from our catalog fit on one sheet) is set up on the Heidelberg press. Several sheets are run through and to get the ink flowing then we pull one to inspect the color and density of the ink. This process is repeated periodically though the run to ensure consistency using an electronic color proofing viewer.

We’ve already seen the cover, which is now drying, and later today will be sent down to Massachusetts where a custom sculpted die will be crafted and then punched into it as an embossment. In the meantime, sheets are coming off the press and once dry they will be cut, trimmed, and transformed into the final catalog.  

If you are interested in getting one of these beauties fresh off the press, go to our catalog request section and we will get on right over to you.

-Erin and Bill

They're off! 114th Boston Marathon

The elite women just took off, the men are about to go next. Marathon Monday is one of the most inspirational events around, and not just because most New Englanders get a day off of work [picture courtesy of Lisa Poole, AP].

A few fun facts about the Boston Marathon, from the Boston Globe:

• This year's field has 26,728 participants. The first race, in 1897, had 18 competitors.
• The oldest competitor this year is 83-year-old Regina Tumidajewicz of Amsterdam, N.Y. She began running at the age of 54, and in nearly 30 years has competed in more than 700 road races, including more than 50 marathons.
•  18% of the total field are foreign entries. The US has the most participants, followed by Canada with 2,503 runners. There are 316 Brits, 217 Germans, 168 Mexicans, 163 Italians, 152 South Koreans, 146 Japanese, 119 French, and 103 Irish. 

 -Connie

Get Your Boulder On

If you're in the Columbus, OH area at the end of the month, check out Kinetic's Gravitational Stimulus 2 bouldering comp. Their last event, Crank 'O' Ween, drew top route setters and about 50 competitors. From beginner to advanced, M/F, 14 yrs. and up, Gravitational Stimulous is already drawing people from as far away as WV. Kinetic is located on the North Campus of Ohio State University. For more info, shoot them an email.

~Kate

Skip the Grand Canyon, Head to Black Canyon

If you need another reason to head out to our National Parks this year, fee-free week is coming up April 17-25, which means no entrance fees (there's another fee-free period later in September too).

As this article points out so well, why be one of the 26,542 people that visit Yellowstone on a typical July day, when that is more than twice the total number of visitors Michigan's Isle Royale National Park gets in a year?

If anyone can name every one of "America's Most Underrated National Parks" below (without cheating), I will give you a big thumbs up.

-Connie

99 pieces of rope in the seaweed…

NEMO’s traditional beach cleanup garnered two new participants this month. This was the first opportunity for me and Erin to join the NEMO team in making the NH shoreline a little bit cleaner. Going into it, I was skeptical of the difference the six of us would make. And while I carried around an industrial strength trash bag that looked like it could double as a body bag, it didn’t cross my mind it would come close to being filled.

Suffice to say, we ran out of trash bag space. In doing so, we accumulated roughly 145 pounds of refuse that had no business being on a beach. We picked up everything from 16 oz plastic cups to shotgun shells to discarded lobsterman gloves.


I did some quick math and here is the result: >145 lbs in a roughly ¼ mile stretch of beach. NH claims roughly 18 miles of coastline. If we make the assumption that the distribution of trash is more or less uniform along the coast, those 18 miles could be home to 10,440 lbs of trash.

The NH situation alone seems insurmountable, imagine the tonnage that has accumulated along the entire nation’s coastline. If you’re interested in pitching in on any NH coastline cleanups, contact info@blueoceansociety.com. Similarly, if you would like to be informed as to when the NEMO team will be doing a beach cleanup at Jenness Beach, feel free to reach out to any one of us and we’ll keep you in the loop.


-Mateyko

Longboarding fun, near and far

We keep giving shoutouts to our longboarding buddies over at Loaded. There are no apologies for that, especially if they keep putting out videos like this, that make us wish we had half (or any) of the skills they do.

Adam, Paul, and Aaron are doing another cross country longboarding trip -- this time to Morocco. The trip starts April 13th, and they will be updating their website during the trip as well as spot tracking their exact GPS coordinates every night. We are psyched to keep tabs and hope you will follow their adventures too.

-Connie