Chet Garner

Chet Garner, Host of "The Daytripper" on PBS Chet was born, raised, and lives in Texas. He currently resides in Austin, but considers everything from the coast to Big Bend home. After spending three years as an attorney and staring longingly out his high-rise window, Chet decided it was time to follow his dreams and spread the message of adventure to others trapped inside the daily grind. Armed with nothing more than a camera and passion, Chet created "The Daytripper," a PBS travel show about all the outdoors, culture, and experiences that are only a day trip away, showing folks that life-changing adventure is much closer and more accessible than they ever dreamed. Chet can often be found hiking, camping, mountain biking, jumping into swimming holes, and exploring every nook and cranny of God's green earth with his wife and two kids.

16May

Lake Mineral Wells State Park in Texas

By Chet Garner

I recently took a trip to Texas’s Lake Mineral Wells State Park to film some climbing for an upcoming episode of The Daytripper . The park is top rope only, but happens in a really unique place called “Penitentiary Hollow” surrounded by 20-40 foot walls of conglomerate sandstone. Local legend says it got its name from a time when law enforcement used to hold prisoners down inside the hollow. The walls were too steep for prisoners to climb so all police had to do was place a single guard at the entrance and nobody was getting out.

It was also my first chance to try out my new Catalyst pack:

Tags: Athlete, chet garner, climbing, texas

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06Apr

The Waterfalls of Texas

By Chet Garner

To most, winter sports consist of skiing, snowboarding, ice climbing, and snowshoeing. However, in Texas its hard to partake in these “winter” sports when there isn’t so much as a single icicle or snowflake in sight. In Texas, our “winter” sports look identical to our “summer” sports only with more fleece. Since our lakes are still liquid and our waterfalls still flowing, I decided to spend some time on a kayak and visit the waterfalls of Lake Buchanan.

The day was overcast and honestly pretty drab. However, as soon as we turned into the rocky cove, we spotted five adolescent bald eagles and one fully mature eagle flying above the falls. It’s a little known fact that bald eagles actually spend their winter months in the Texas Hill Country building nests and training up their young. This was my first time to see a bald eagle in the wild and it was pretty amazing. The eagles soon flew off leaving us alone to paddle around underneath these amazing spring-fed falls.

When you are kayaking in the winter, it’s not advisable to get in the water. However, the opportunity to kayak underneath a flowing waterfall was too good to pass up. I just had to move extra fast.