Read Audubon and Outdoor Photographer Offline Legally w/o Charge!

Background, Year 6

Sounds to good to be true. Read two top magazines offline legally without charge. What if I told you that with just minor setup and configuration time invested by you, my reader, in addition to these magazines you could legally and without charge also read magazines such as:

  • Arizona Highways
  • Cosmopolitan!  🙂
  • Life
  • National Geographic
  • The Economist
  • And hundreds more!

It’s true, and all you need is your public library card. As I am getting ready for my Norwegian bicycle adventure I am loading up on magazines and Kindle books on my tablet. When I have free moments on the plane and while bike touring, I will have lots of reading options.

A few days ago I received notification that the latest issues of both Audubon and Outdoor Photographer were now available. Yup, one of the configuration options using the service RBdigital is to be notified by email whenever a new edition is available. Thus, I don’t even have to look for content, magazines which I specifically requested come to me automatically. If one enjoys reading lots of titles, the cost savings potential is HUGE. As noted, the only cost to me is having my local public library card. Here is Minnesota, I know both the Duluth Public Library and the Hennepin County Library (Minneapolis) have online magazines available via RBdigital.

Either via your library’s web site, or with a visit to the physical library (ask the reference librarian for help) you can easily get set up.

Finally, the magazine’s format (remember, one may download and read offline) looks 100% identical to the print version. Here are some images from my own tablet as I checked out both of these magazines.

Note: I posted on this topic a few years ago. All those much more detailed instructions still work. The only difference is the new name of the company, RBdigital. Off to Norway!

All the screenshots in this blog post are from my Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 Android Tablet. The experience would be and look almost identical on an iPad.

I am notified via eMail about new issues

I am redirected to my account on the library’s web site and complete the process

Here are a couple of images from my post back in 2015 … I was reading BirdWatching.

Ma and Pa Merlin at Sunrise (video)

Year 6

Ma and Pa Merlin were trying their best to ignore the call of the their hungry kids just after sunrise this morning! If you are a parent, you understand. Children DEMAND their breakfast immediately upon waking! Sleeping in is NOT an option. Both parents started hunting shortly after I took the video included with this post.

Over the past ten days or so, I have known there had to be a pair of Merlins nesting somewhere near the mouth of the Lester River. I had seen then hunting on multiple occasions. Yesterday while out on my daily bike ride I heard the chicks twice at the same location (out and back ride up Scenic 61). This morning I returned and found the family.

Merlins Greeting the Morning Sun

Watching Something Fly Overhead (a Bald Eagle?)

Merlins Starting to Hunt

Individual Portraits

The Merlins of Lester River (video)

Norwegian Arctic Islands Tour

Background, Year 6

Where do folks who live in northern Minnesota near Frostbite Falls where temperatures drop to -40F in the winter (not including chill factor) go on their summer vacation? Obviously the Arctic! Three years ago my wife, Molly, and I traveled to Tromso above the Norwegian Arctic Circle to enjoy some cross-country skiing and Northern Lights. We loved the area, and vowed to come back sometime when it was warmer.

That sometime has arrived, and in one week we travel to Tromso. For the first time we are not touring 100% self-supported. Due to the lack of accommodations and the fact at age 63 I do not wish to sleep on the ground every night in a tent, our tour combines a locally provided self-guided tour from Tromso down through the Lofoten Islands, followed by four additional days on a route near Bodo designed by me. Using the local tour option allows us to bunk out in private fisherman’s cabins.

The other difference is for this trip we are renting bicycles. When we toured in Scotland TSA messed up my bicycle at the airport. In the private security area unbeknownst to me they very poorly unpacked, inspected and repacked my bicycle. Upon arriving in Scotland I discovered a TSA Inspection Notice inside my bike box. I decided given the cost and hassle to getting our own bikes to Norway, we could live with rented bicycles for 18 days. Our tour ends with four days on the Hurtigruten Norwegian Coastal Ferry over the top of Norway to Kirkenes near the Russian border.

As a fyi … posts will be fewer and farther between over the next 2.5 months. I will be spending most of this time bicycle touring in Norway and then the United States. I will definitely both “bird and bike”, posting when I have time plus a decent web connection. Finally, we have some friends staying in our home. Thus, I do not mind letting people know we are out of town.

In some other cycling news, Molly was just published yesterday in Adventure Cycling (the national magazine for touring cyclists). Read her article …