Outdoors

Discover St. Clair • October 3 2024

Hiking Big Canoe Creek Preserve

Located just off of St. Clair County 9 in Springville, Big Canoe Creek Nature Preserve can make you forget you’re just a mile or two away from the highway’s busy intersection of U.S. 11  in the middle of town.
As you drive along the winding, two-lane road covered with trees, you can already feel the temperature drop, even on this hot-as-molten-lava day in mid-August.

Lake Life 24/7 • August 1 2024

Turtle Time!

]It’s Friday night in early June, and a group of parents and their children are wandering through the boggy marsh on the banks of Logan Martin. With flashlights guiding their way, the group follows the lead of Grover Brown, an assistant professor from the Department of Biology at Jacksonville State University.

villagelivingonline.com • November 3 2023

Mountain Brook teen sails in prestigious regatta in Italy

A Mountain Brook teen had the experience of a lifetime during the summer of 2023, competing in one of the world's most prestigious sailing competitions.

Darby Smith, a senior at Mountain Brook High School, is a competitive sailor who is more at home testing his abilities on the water than on an athletic field or basketball court.

"I really like how it's more mental than other sports. It's not like basketball or football, where you have to like to play through physical pain or something," Smith

villagelivingonline.com • September 2 2023

Trailblazers: Mountain Brook mountain biking team creating a legacy on two wheels

He may not realize it, but long-time Mountain Brook resident and Mountain Brook Elementary School fifth grade teacher Bill Andrews is a trailblazer. Literally and figuratively.

An avid cyclist and an active member of Birmingham’s mountain biking community, Andrews has been a constant sight on two wheels around town over the last two decades.

Andrews is accustomed to a challenge, having ridden and raced on some of the toughest terrain and courses throughout the region. However, from a mountain

280Living.com • July 3 2023

42nd Peavine Falls Run scheduled for July 4

It’s time to lace up your patriotic running shoes as the Peavine Falls Run, a scenic 8.2-mile run through Oak Mountain State Park, will mark its 42nd edition on July 4.

One of the five events on the Birmingham Track Club calendar, the Peavine Falls Run has taken place on every Independence Day since 1980 — with the exception of 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic — and has become a midsummer tradition for many in the Birmingham running community.

The race starts bright and early at 7 a.m. and is

Lake Life 24/7 • October 24 2022

Up the creek … with a paddleboard – LakeLife 24/7 Magazine

“Paddleboards are like a surfboard. Nose at the front, tail at the back. The most stable part is the middle of the board where the handle is at, so that’s where you’ll stand up.”

Discover St. Clair • October 6 2022

Kayaking Big Canoe

We’re standing on the bank looking out onto the Big Canoe Creek checking out the water levels. It’s Saturday, shortly after noon, right around the time the morning Yak Tha Creek tour of Big Canoe Creek would be ending for the day.
Today, however, they had to cancel due to the water levels being too low, an issue the small Ashville-based company has faced all summer long.

Alabama Alive • May 18 2019

BullRiding

Despite broken bones and head injuries, Alabama cowboys can't get enough of the 8-second adrenaline rush.

Alabama Alive! • May 11 2019

Humminbird

Since the mid-1970s a small device manufactured in the picareque town of Eufala has put fish all over the globe on notice - the world's fishermen are coming to get you.

Discover St. Clair • February 6 2019

St. Clair Outdoors

The promise of another spring is just around the corner. Time to shake off the fog of winter, as well as the handful of pounds many gained waiting for the wet, cold and gray misery of winter to finally come to an end. Spring is a time to put the remote control down, shut off the cell phone, get outdoors, learn a new skill, and, most

Good Grit Magazine • December 17 2018

The Right to Bear Hugs

In the fall of 2001, Jim Hardy, an avid outdoorsman, was high above the ground perched in a tree stand on his family's farm when the structure gave way. Jim, then a 24-year-old student at Auburn University and in the prime of his life, fell 22 feet to the earth below,

Discover St. Clair • April 5 2018

Gone Fishing

Few things in life are as secretive as people who fish often. Seriously, getting a fisherman – or fisherwoman – to give their closely-guarded secrets is like trying to track the whereabouts of Jimmy Hoffa. However, in this issue of Discover St. Clair, a handful of local fishing experts are divulging their secret fishing holes on Logan Martin, Henry Neely and the Coosa River for the first time in recorded history (may be an exaggeration, if only slight one).

LongLeaf Style • January 7 2018

Gun Smoke and Quail Feathers

Many Alabama outdoorsmen remember a time when getting a group of guys together on the weekend for a day of quail hunting was as normal as breathing.

Thicket • January 7 2018

Good Hunting

The Alabama Quail Trail works to preserve native quail habitat and the tradition of quail hunting.

Discover St. Clair • December 14 2017

The Ponderosa

Feature story on The Ponderosa, a private hunting lodge owned by a handful of friends from Pell City, Alabama. Published in Discover St. Cla...

Birmingham Magazine • December 13 2017

Get Your Rear in Gear: A local running group focuses on long-distance trail runs

Tanya Sylvan was an avid hiker and backpacker before she moved to Birmingham. But she discovered her new athletic love, trail running, thanks to a group of runners and social...

Discover St. Clair • February 13 2013

Tricky Fishing

Springtime in St. Clair County: fresh air, blue skies, green grass and, of course, fishing — lots and lots of fishing. By the time the ol’ groundhog’s predictions have taken...

Discover St. Clair • August 9 2012

A Day at the Rodeo

The sun beats down on a stretch of gravel road and grass near Odenville as two men sit on some wooden bleachers next to a structure they hope will become the best unkept secret in St. Clair County.

Discover St. Clair • March 1 2012

Pure Flight

St. Clair residents revel in the thrill of hang gliding.

Discover St. Clair • August 4 2011

Catfish Noodling

The following activities are illegal or prohibited in the State of Alabama: Bear wrestling matches, to chain an alligator to a fire hydrant, to wear a fake mustache that causes...