Nicole balances her days between advocacy work and shedding her skins on top of snowy mountains. Unceded Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla lands.
Photo by Whitney Whitehouse @whitwhitehouse

This profile was originally featured in our Spring 2024 Trail Break issue.

“Getting involved in public lands advocacy is empowering. Participating in comment periods, and writing your representatives: these actions go hand in hand with adventure.”

Nicole didn’t grow up skiing. Instead, she spent her childhood racing BMX. As an adult, quiet hiking trails and long backpacking trips brought her back outside. In 2015, Nicole founded Women Who Hike, a worldwide organization that empowers women on and off the trail.

Today, she’s added backcountry skiing to her long list of endeavors, complementing her work in outdoor advocacy with Outdoor Alliance, a coalition of national advocacy organizations that unites the voices of outdoor enthusiasts to conserve public lands. WWA is a founding member of Outdoor Alliance. Nicole works to help our communities get involved with local and national advocacy efforts led by OutdoorAlliance and the organization’s member groups.

Nicole says getting into the backcountry is “her thing” because it combines her love of hiking with skiing and moving slowly through the mountains. She says, “Advocacy, the process itself, is kind of like going backcountry skiing. If you’ve never been before, you don’t just show up by yourself. You take some time to learn about it. You get the equipment, you go with a friend who knows avalanche safety and how to navigate the terrain. At Outdoor Alliance, that’s what we do, we help navigate the landscape of conservation policy and the advocacy process.”