Lots of stuff came over the transom since yesterday’s update. Let’s check it out:

Those “Our Hike” gals are up to Day 12. I’m noticing they aren’t exactly purists about camping their way across America at this point — quite a few sleepovers at the homes of generous friends so far, but I have a feeling that after they hit, say, Kansas, they’ll have all the camping they could ever want. Gets pretty lonesome on that prairie.

Gambolin’ Man headed up to Cache Creek for a nice hill climb to warm him up for confrontations with one-armed casino bandits.

Constant Trek notes that the Sahara Desert is a bad place to attempt to quit smoking.

WildeBeat has the last word (we hope!) on the Outdoor Retailers Expo in Salt Lake City. Rebecca of Calipidder.com fame makes another appearance and the proprietor of backpackgeartest.org notes that he’s got way more gear than he’s got testers to check it out.

Speaking of gear, SteepAndCheep.com has a nifty trail chair at 50 percent off (UPDATE: It’s sold out.); HikerDeals notes that the big retailers have clearance sales going (posting because I just got 60 bucks off on a new pair of snowshoes from backcountry.com )

Speaking of snow sports, GoBlog has a video showing how to find someone buried in an avalanche. Oh, and here’s welcome news: certain GoreTex chemicals may cause cancer. Swell.

Over in the UK, Andy of Must Be This Way laments the dodgy business practices of major gear retailers that do business in the British Isles.

Finally, Dan Mitchell offers yet more interesting links from sfgate.com.