Sunny Montgomery is a writer and editor for Chatter Magazine and Get Out Chattanooga. In 2018, she won third place in the Green Eyeshade Awards for her story covering autism in the outdoors. In addition to her magazine work, Sunny works on various digital products, and helped create and launch the popular newsletters Chattanooga Outdoor News and Good Day, Chattanooga! She is a member of the Society of Environmental Journalists, a certified Tennessee State Naturalist and an avid outdoorsperson. She moved to Chattanooga from central Kentucky in 2013, and most recently traded her suburban home for a small cabin, which she built with her partner, at the edge of Cherokee National Forest.
Elea Xylem begins each day at her vanity, made from a repurposed church alter, affixed with a lighted mirror.
by Sunny MontgomeryThis year marks the 50th anniversary of Tennessee's Natural Areas Preservation Act, passed in 1971.
by Sunny MontgomeryEquipped with whistles and flags, more than 100 paddlers arrive before sunrise to find their place among the buoys.
by Sunny MontgomeryGround puppy. Snot otter. Lasagna lizard.
by Sunny MontgomeryA person needs more than navigational skills or medical training to join a search-and-rescue team.
by Sunny MontgomeryFor most, competing in an Ironman triathlon would be a lifetime achievement.
by Sunny MontgomeryExtreme outdoorspeople belong to a unique tribe, banded together by a drive to conquer the world one climb, one ride, one paddle at a time.
by Sunny MontgomeryBIPOC-led initiatives are redefining who belongs in Chattanooga's outdoors community.
by Sunny MontgomeryChattanooga has a rich history of private schools, their legacies carried, in part, by the work of their respective headmasters — or, as they're more commonly called today, heads of school.
by Sunny MontgomeryWith its stocky blue body, oversized head and shaggy crest, the belted kingfisher is an iconic species found along waterways throughout North America.
by Sunny MontgomeryLast year, the pandemic opened up a chasm of new needs in the community — needs that local nonprofits could not fill. Not alone, anyway.
by Sunny MontgomeryMelissa Hickson is not a thrill-seeker.
by Sunny MontgomeryIf you still have a CD collection, don't totally understand Snapchat or have read Gary Paulsen's "Hatchet" more than once, you might be a "geriatric millennial."
by Sunny MontgomeryEditor's note: By the time you read this, our mass emergence of spring cicadas may have already come and gone.
by Sunny MontgomeryRami Ayoub was awestruck by the coral reef he discovered just past the shoreline in Mahahual, Mexico.
by Sunny MontgomeryWhen Robby Eskridge and Lindsey Hardesty met, they shared more than just a profession.
by Sunny MontgomeryRandy Whorton likes a challenge, whether he's organizing trail cleanups and races as director of Wild Trails or competing in ultramarathons.
by Sunny MontgomeryIn late January, Chattanooga's first-ever snowy owl was spotted perched on a home near Chickamauga Lake, hundreds of miles south of its typical range.
by Sunny MontgomeryAs host of Head of the Hooch, one of the world's largest regattas, Chattanooga is known by many as a rowing hotspot. Fewer people, however, may know that Chattanooga also fosters a dynamic indoor rowing scene — and is home to two of the world's leading competitors.
by Sunny MontgomeryIn 2017, musician Solange Knowles won a Grammy for "Cranes in the Sky," a soulful song which chronicles the artist's attempts to distract herself from pain.
by Sunny Montgomery