The Joy (and Agony) of Skiing, Surfing, and Climbing in the Dead of Night, with Chris Benchetler

Outside Podcast

Wilderness, Sports

4.3 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 10 March 2026

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Outdoor folks love to push themselves to go farther, faster, higher, etc., and there’s a good reason for it: When you climb a big mountain or finish that half marathon or ski that steep run, it can translate into a confidence that makes hard things in the rest of our lives seem less daunting. But most of us are just as—or maybe more—familiar with the feeling of talking ourselves out of big goals, because they seem too complicated or scary to pull off. When that happens, we’d all do well to listen to skier and artist Chris Benchetler. Chris’s latest film, “Mountains of the Moon”, literally stretched the boundaries of what’s possible in adventure filmmaking. The movie was shot almost entirely at night, often in sub-zero, rugged backcountry terrain where massive lighting installations were built to paint the darkness and capture the athletes in their one-of-a-kind glowing skeleton suits (did we mention all the music is from the Grateful Dead?). It’s astonishing that the film even got made, but Chris has built a career and a life based on a simple principal: don’t avoid doing the hard thing just because it’s hard.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode of The Outside Podcast is brought to you by Reno Tahoe.
0:05.6	Seated in the high eastern Sierra foothills and the idyllic Truckee River Valley is the biggest
0:11.2	little city in the world. You probably know Reno for its world famous casinos, electric art scene,
0:16.7	and delicious restaurants. But did you know that Reno has bonkers access to stellar outdoor adventures?
0:23.6	Yes, sir, Rob.
0:24.8	The drive from Reno to North Lake Tahoe is less than an hour.
0:28.2	So all sorts of fun in the Sierra Nevada is super duper close.
0:32.9	I'm talking skiing and snowboarding, paddleboarding, hiking, fishing.
0:36.9	You want to? They got it.
0:38.5	It's pretty easy to pull off any adventure du jour in Reno since it boasts a four-season climate
0:43.9	and 300 annual days of sunshine.
0:47.4	You want urban excitement plus outdoor fun?
0:50.1	Reno Tahoe's got you covered.
0:52.8	Discover no limits at visit renotahoe.com.
1:02.3	This is the outside podcast with Paddyo.
1:09.9	I couldn't have created this without support.
1:15.1	I'm very open and collaborative,
1:17.1	but I would say that was closer to a band than anything,
1:21.1	and the dead are riffing off of each other,
1:23.9	and when everything's connected and in rhythm,
1:26.4	is when the magic happens. And my direction was so
1:30.0	at a 30,000 foot view was so hard for them and so confusing because it wasn't like, here's our shot
	...

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