Archive for October, 2008

On Sunday morning we moved slowly. Mark’s aunt and uncle from Portland were down visiting for the weekend, and it was nice to spend time with them. We all went out to a nice, long lunch in the afternoon, and then headed up to Smith Rock late in the day.

Mark was completely shocked when we pulled up to the huge volcanic extrusion in the middle of the Oregon desert. In his mind, we were going to climb in Oregon, which was a quiet place, covered in pine trees. He imagined sport climbing to be more like the Needles in South Dakota. Instead, we were faced with one giant rock, crawling with people all over it. From the trail, we could see nearly 100 people hiking and climbing on the cold, shady side of the rock.

Once we hiked over to the sunny side, we were confronted with the CROWD. There were people everywhere. People climbing routes, set every 4ft, along the wall for the next mile or more. It was loud, and crazy, with babies crying and dogs barking. Mark’s parents stayed down near the river and we hiked up to the wall looking for a moderate or two to get on.

It was fun to talk to the climbers at the base of the crag. I don’t mind a crowded belay station, especially when everybody is friendly and having fun. On Sunday, we kept quizzing people as to what they were climbing as we hiked down the wall. I’d ask “Hey, do you know what this route is?” And the response, over and over again, was “I dunno. Go ask that guy…” or “I dunno. It’s a 9, I think. Or something.”

Eventually we made it over to the Peanut, and Mark roped up to lead Hop On Pop (5.8). It was a great route for the afternoon. Long, fun, knobby, thin, balance-y, my kind of route. Mark was officially freaked out by this time, finding the rock to be a conglomeration of cemented pebbles, and not the usual solid-feeling volcanic rock we’ve climbed on. He also forgot all of his climbing pants, and was leading in blue jeans. He took his time, tested every pebble before pulling on it, and got a good redpoint. He came down happy to have it over-with.

Bruce worked his way up, and found the climbing to be slightly tougher than his last trip out to Joshua Tree. I climbed the route, and loved it desperately. I moved the TR to Peanut Brittle (5.8) for the second climb of the afternoon, and then took a quick lap on the very nice climb. Bruce seconded and Mark cleaned the route. By the end of the afternoon, we were all feeling much more comfortable with the knobbies and pebbles that cover the slabs of Smith.

The sunset seemed to come early again, and we headed out of the park looking for dinner. After tasty brats on the grill at the condos, Mark and I soaked in a hot tub and finished off a near-perfect day of vacation. Yeah, life can be really good.

Mark’s parents got very lucky this spring, and managed to get their hands on two (yes TWO) condos in Bend, OR, for a week of vacation this October. Mark and I were completely excited to finally have a chance to visit the Pacific North West, and to get in some climbing at the legendary Smith Rock.

So, we packed and planned. With our climbing gear, flying would be very expensive. The easiest, and cheapest way out was to simply drive the Prius, and hope the 1000 miles went by quickly. We planned to camp along the way, and try to get out to Oregon as fast as possible.

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On Friday after work, we dropped off Liv at D-Liz’s house (her vacation home) and headed northwest into Wyoming. Even though we are still on daylight-savings time, the sunset came early, and we found ourselves driving across the inky dark desert of Wyoming just west of Laramie. We ended up camping for the night at a KOA set directly next to the interstate in Rawlins.

We set up the tent in the pitch dark, and Mark woke up at 6am, in the pitch dark. He made coffee and set up the tent heater for me. I woke up because my head got hot and the tent smelled like bagels. We had camp broken down and were on the road before sunrise on Saturday – around 7am.

The drive across the western states was beautiful and long and boring and lovely. We saw mountains and deserts, waterfalls and rivers, the Great Salt Lake, the Oregon Trail, and a lot of road. We didn’t stop much – we didn’t have to, really. And we rolled our tired but happy selves into Bend (and then Sunriver, where the condos were) at about 8:30p local time Saturday night. We spent $75 on gas in the Prius and $20 on camping. Not too bad for a long day on the road!

As mentioned in a previous post, I won a cool watch as a semi-finalist in the Timex Return to the Outdoors contest. After getting many requests to see the aforementioned essay, I finally got a copy back from the people at the website. Here it is!

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“I’m STUCK!” I scream out to anybody who is listening. I can hear my friends laugh out loud and then begin yelling encouragement back to me. The situation does not seem as funny to me. I’m wedged in the teeth of a giant crack in a granite boulder that is, quite literally, older than dirt. My right hand is wedged deep in the darkness before me, and the crystals of the granite are slowly, excruciatingly, tearing the skin on the back of my hand. My left hand is braced against the edge of the rock in front of me, pressing my shoulder and back into the sharp crystalline rock on all sides. My feet kick helplessly as I try to find some way to move. Up or down, it doesn’t matter at this point, I just need to move. I wiggle my knee into the crack and flex my thigh, the muscles expand and bite into the rock on either side. Or maybe the rock is biting me. It gives me enough purchase to slowly ooze up another 6 inches, and reposition for the next move.

I am climbing a wide crack in Vedauwoo, Wyoming, and it is one of my favorite things to do! The rock is old, and it knows better than me. I am little, and the mountain is big. When I finally make it to the top of the crack, and then the top of the rock, I am exhausted in all ways. I sit on top of the rock, bleeding a little, feeling the wind on my face, and feeling utterly content. On all sides of me are huge rock formations. The wind is howling through the aspens below, making them glitter in the sun. I can see a hawk gliding overhead and a herd of antelope grazing on the plain to my south. The air smells like dust, rock, sagebrush and sweat. My friends are chattering a hundred feet below me. And I am truly happy. Vedauwoo is a wild and special place. It is secluded and exposed at the same time. The climbing is painful and exhilarating. The wind blows and I feel full of life. I will come back to this place again and again. I hope to return often for the rest of my life, bringing family, new friends, and eventually my own children and their children. My house may not be in that wild valley, but it is my home.

We’ve had two icky weekends in a row, and busy, busy weeks between them. Last weekend, D-Liz mentioned they were heading to the rock gym, and Mark and I considered climbing indoors for the first time in years. We ended up going along and getting a week of free membership at Miramont North to see if we could work indoor climbing into our schedules.

The gym is an interesting one, with a whole fitness center (ie cardio, weight-lifting, yoga classes, basketball courts, etc) and a giant, very nice rock wall on one side.

I think the week was successful. We didn’t horribly embarrass ourselves while climbing the overhanging jug-fests that cover the walls. Mark did fall off of a 5.7 towards the end of our second day, which was hilarious. Yesterday, I tried bouldering by myself in the afternoon, and I remembered the problems I have had with bouldering in the past.

I’ve always said I’m not good at bouldering, which is true. I’m not super strong, and that is immediately apparent when I boulder. Plus I’m afraid of falling, which isn’t the best when you don’t have a rope. Finally, though, I don’t know the “rules” for bouldering. There are certain conventions and etiquette that boulderers all seem to know, and I’m left feeling a little confused and out-of-sorts. For instance:

1. I understand that between problems you’re supposed to sit on the floor and stare intently at the wall. How long, exactly should you sit on the floor? How far away from your problem should you sit? I mean, should I camp out directly below it or can I sit back in the corner? Can I do something other than stare at the wall? Like read or do homework?

2. It seems to be ok to watch other boulderers when you’re in a group, but creepy if you’re the only one there. Why is that?

3. How do you keep iPod earbuds in your ears after jumping down from the top of the boulder?

4. How long should you keep trying a problem until you decide to give up and move on? I’m a big fan of the “Well, didn’t get it on my third try, let’s try something else…” school, but it seems like more serious boulderers will work much harder on finishing one specific sequence.

5. How long is a normal bouldering “session”? I was there for an hour yesterday and felt like I got a great workout. But there were people sitting around staring at the wall that were there when I got there and still there when I left. Maybe they’re meditating? Would I do better if I spent more time there? Am I getting any benefit from only an hour of bouldering or do I need to spend several hours in order to climb the awesome routes?

So, that’s my adventure for the week. I asked a girl at the gym some of these questions and she seemed upset at first that I had disrupted her staring at the wall (I guess that’s not polite) and then laughed at my suggestion that I could do homework between problems. Mark, also, has no clue about these things. I suppose I’ll just have to learn in time. Unless there are awesome boulderers out there who would like to let a n00b in on the secret?

I know Mark isn’t going to like this one as much, but I really enjoy staring into the forest on my computer monitor. As usual, I’ve saved the image as a few different sizes for the most common screen resolutions. Feel free to down load the one that works for you by clicking on the link to the correct size below the image! Enjoy!

1024 x 768, 1440 x 900, 1600 x 1200, 1680 x 1050, 2560 x 1600

So, just wanted to drop a quick note about life around here the last few days. The first exciting thing that’s happened for us is the arrival of our freezer beef! This fall, we went in with three other families and bought a whole cow from a local ranch. The cow was entirely grass fed and finished, and grew up within 100 miles of our house. The processor is even very local. Yesterday afternoon, Liz brought home #4977, and last night we thanked her for her sacrifice and divided the 300 pounds of beef among the families.

Liz has a lovely blessing and gratitude post up on her blog, along with a few pictures. She echo’s the feeling we all have about receiving the gift of food from this innocent animal. I wish I could be so eloquent.

(This is obvious stealing of one of Doug and Liz’s pictures, because I didn’t bring my camera last night)

Also, a few weeks ago, my short story was chosen as a semi-finalist in the Timex Return to the Outdoors contest. While I didn’t win an exciting vacation to anywhere, I did win a Timex Expedition watch, and it came in the mail yesterday. I think this is a darn cool award. The watch is huge, way too big for my little wrists, but I intend to wear it around happily on our next adventures. It has the usual date and time functions, with some obscenely huge number of lap splits and several congruent countdown timers. It also has a BAROMETER AND A THERMOMETER. Which is just freakin’ sweet.

So, this is an image of upper level stratus over the desert in Southern California from last November (2007). While the large scale flow could be approximated as two dimensional, the mountains and conflicting air masses in the region add in three dimensional turbulence. In class today, we had a lovely derivation of energy cascades in three-dimensional turbulent flows, and I was reminded of a poem we learned in my first year of grad school.

Big whirls have little whirls
that feed on their velocity,
and little whirls have lesser whirls,
and so on, to viscosity!

– L. F. Richardson (1922)

So my goal in the next week or so is to make a photo of three dimensional turbulence and energy cascades. It might take a while. The forecast is for generally laminar flow the next few days.

I know, I know. I’m a huge nerd.

The weather is changing. The nights are cooling off. The patterns are shifting. Our weekdays are sunny, warm and beautiful. Our weekends have been rainy and gross. So, Mark and I decided to take a short break from climbing and search out some of the best fall colors in Colorado. We ended up on the West White Pine Mountain trail, early on a Saturday morning.

There’s about a ba-jillion amazing photos from the day in the gallery!

I know, I know, Dylan’s awesome GeoMashups plugin will make the same cool google maps of my gps data as the one I just stuck in here. But I’ve been to lazy to upgrade, I’m sorry. It’s on the list for this upcoming rainy weekend, I promise!

So, for our hike, we headed about an hour west of town, up and down some winding remote canyons, and eventually found our way to this trailhead. We have hiked this trail (to the summit) before, and I knew the aspens would be fantastic. In fact, they were totally amazing.

It’s October in Colorado, and hunting season is in full swing. I knew this trail was remote and had easy access by 4wd vehicles, so we brought bright colored clothing for the whole family to make sure we were visible to any hunters in the area. Liv had to deal with wearing one of Mark’s red shirts for the day. It made her look completely goofy, and she got comments all day long. But she didn’t get shot at! On our way home, we stopped at Jax and bought her a hunter’s orange vest.

We hiked up to the pass, meandering through aspen groves, pine forests, and open prairies along the way. Our GPS track looks a bit like confused moose wandering up the side of the mountain. On this trip, we didn’t hike to the summit of either peak, though. The aspens were our goal, and they petered out just below the saddle.

When we got home, I had almost 400 shots of yellow aspens on my camera! So, it’s going to take a while for me to get all of my favorites up on the site. But, I think there’s enough here now to show it was a fantastic day, and a really amazingly beautiful hike.