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This newsletter is brought to you by:

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Happy Valentine's Day!

We're not big on pageantry and commercial holidays, but we'd be remiss not to share the love with all you fine folks on this day of cards and chocolate. From our new print magazine and newsletter subscribers (thank you!) to all the website views and personal notes from inspired readers, Nikki and I are most definitely feeling the love these days 💘 Now that all that mushy stuff is out of the way, this newsletter is a doozy, so let's get to it!

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Woof Arted? 🐕‍🦺 You did!

We are excited to present the winners of our inaugural and horribly named dog photo contest. Congrats to our winners, and big thanks to everyone who sent in adorable photos of your favorite floofers - Nikki and I sincerely enjoyed looking through all of them.

First Place: Everett Mulkeen's precious portrait of Emma

Although Emma is the companion of local paddler and pottery maker Billy Brown, Everett couldn't resist sending in this shot of Emma striking a stoic pose against the beautiful backdrop of a classic West Virginia winter sky. Everett wins his choice of an item from our legendary Highland Outstores merch shop.

Second Place: David Clark's doggie duo with Udo vom Rinehaus

WV highlands resident David Clark most definitely takes the cake with both the funniest photo and the best dog name in the contest. Udo and David teamed up here to show the unbreakable bond and unconditional love between man and adorable beast. David is the lucky winner of a Bodacious Beanie.

Third Place: Lori Rizor's adorable Bella - Bellisima Indeed!

I mean, come on. How could you not immediately love Bella, a three-month old Lagotto Romagnolo? And how could you not love that this was taken on her first camping trip at Dolly Sods? According to Lori, Bella is the ultimate truffle hunter. Lori wins our world-famous sticker pack.

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We're officially carbon-neutral!

I am extremely proud to announce that Highland Outdoors is officially a carbon-neutral business certified by Aclymate, a new platform that helps small businesses calculate and offset their carbon footprint. This fulfills a major goal and promise to our readers from our spring 2020 magazine. Although it took a while to get there, we used the Aclymate platform's proven methods to calculate our carbon footprint from January 1, 2020 to present. We then browsed certified carbon-offset programs to purchase carbon credits and offset our footprint. Based on the recommendation of a friend who's an expert carbon auditor, I chose two reforestation projects - one in Kenya and one in Uganda - that pay subsistence farmers to plant native trees on their lands. Highland Outdoors is proud to be the 12th business to earn the Aclymate Climate Leader certification. If you're interested in making your business carbon-neutral, I encourage you to respond to this email and I will be more than happy to share information on my experience and connect you with the Alcymate team!

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Bike Bash WV ticket giveaway 🚵‍♂️

Bikes. Music. Camping. Beers. Food trucks. Friendship. What's not to love? Highland Outdoors is a mega-proud sponsor of the 2022 Bike Bash WV, a fantastic grassroots mountain bike festival curated and thrown by Jeff and Annie Simcoe, the trail gurus of the Big Bear Lake Trail Center in Preston County. As such, we are partnering up with Bike Bash WV to give one lucky winner two tickets to this year's event. The package includes two weekend event passes, two event t-shirts, on-site camping, and, of course, a bike party with your friends! To win, you must be a subscriber to our email newsletter. We'll choose a random winner on March 20 to honor the first day of spring. If you don't win, we still encourage everyone to come hang with us at the Bike Bash - you can't miss the orange Highland Outdoors tent!

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Look ma, we're on the radio - again!

Last newsletter, we shared Part 1 of our interview for the Best Virginia Podcast. Host and West Virginia native Jordan Mitchell does this solo project to document various slices of life, history, and culture in West Virginia. In Part 2, we discuss what West Virginia has to offer in the outdoors for people from all walks of life and encourage folks to get involved to make this a better place. We also talk a lot about disc golf, because, well, disc golf is awesome! Check out the episode HERE!

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Subscribe to the mag

You know the deal by now. If you're not a subscriber yet and would like to help us make Highland Outdoors a sustainable publication, please consider joining our 240 subscribers to support independent adventure journalism!

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Have you seen these yet?

The Joy of the Sufferfest Part 2

In January of 2011, a friend and I snowshoed to the top of Dolly Sods to build a snowcave and survive in it for two nights. It did not go well. This is my followup to Nikki's Joy of the Sufferfest piece from our summer 2021 issue.

The Shape of Snow

Discover the adventurous life and groundbreaking work of our late friend Eric Erbe, beautifully written by his wife Victoria Weeks. Eric was a leading microscopist who developed cutting-edge techniques to capture images of snow crystals. Check out more his photos and her work here.

Highland Profiles: Michael Williams

"Mr. Ballhooter" is a staple of the Snowshoe ski scene and a bonafide West Virginia celebrity. If you've skied at Snowshoe over the last twenty-some years, you've undoubtedly seen him bringing the good vibes while herding skiers in the notorious Ballhooter lift line.

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Stay tuned for our next installment, hitting your inbox on March 1. Until then, think snow!

Enjoy, and thanks for reading #westvirginiasoutdoormagazine!

Dylan Jones

Editor-in-Chief

Highland-Outdoors.com