Time flies

A wee 14 month blog break. I'm almost halfway through my fifth year of teaching in Seattle, and winter break just began, giving me some time to check up on this blog and other things that have accumulated dust.

Oregon relationship petered out shortly after the last blog post. I still think about her every now and then, wondering what could have happened differently. Probably not much.

I joined a lifelong friend for a section on the Pacific Crest Trail this summer. He and another friend did the whole hike, from Mexico to Canada. I joined them in Central Oregon for 96 miles in 92 hours, or thereabouts. The pace was a little ridiculous, but the terrain wasn't too bad--mostly flat. We had a lot of time to talk on the trail, and the topic of relationships came up. He is married with no kids at the moment. We talked about what we look for in a partner, and he brought up something that I had never really considered. My things were pretty straightforward: good sense of humor, nice, attractive, smart, sporty (and I think in that order, for me).

He mentioned "an adventuresome spirit" is something that he really enjoys that his wife has. That kind of blew me away, because I hadn't considered that a trait, and it absolutely is, and a very important one at that.

Everyone has their own goals and values and priorities and all that. Right now I am up to my neck in teaching and coaching, and I am loving it. I'm loving it to the point that I don't really have time for a relationship, or at least the kind of relationship I'd like to have (where I can spend meaningful time with the person). I know the draw of a relationship will intensify with time, but regardless of how busy I am, I always like the idea of an adventure--whether it is a long travel, a quick bike ride around Greenlake, or a day hike. I think I'll always find time to fit those adventures in.

Summer Luvin'

Back in April I was excited for the approaching summer break, but was a little curious as to how I would spend two months without work or school obligations and stay somewhat productive (and not just turn into a 2009 version of Waffles). Fast forward a few months and I've now finished a summer cohort for science teachers which took up an entire month of my summer break. I've got one more month left, and I feel like I've spent more than enough time being productive--now I just get to kick back and enjoy myself with no qualms about being sloth-like.

I'm just finishing up my first full week of summer break, and here was my schedule for week 1:

Friday: Finish class at UW, lie around the house and play Fifa 2011 with housemate and a friend in town until we get called by another friend, saying he's at a mansion in Capitol Hill with his buddy and two Austrian girls in a hot tub, and that we should come over. We waffle on it for a bit, wondering why they would invite us over if they've already got themselves two Austrian girls and a mansion, but turns out there are other ladies over as well, and they want to get some gender equality going on. We're sold and stay up until 3am drinking in a hot tub that cascades down into a lap-sized pool, surrounded by girls in bikinis. A good start.

Saturday: Wake up in the p.m., go to a going away party for an ultimate friend of mine who is moving to Switzerland.

Sunday: Day of motorcycle riding up to Anacortes to visit Mount Erie and do some rock climbing.

Monday: wake up at noon, drive sister and her friend to the airport for their flight back home (she was visiting for a wedding and mom's bday). Go to trivia night and rock a few categories. Meet up with Brandon for his "acceptance to the Air Force" party at Die Bierstube, where many of his friends have already congregated and I witness about four boots passed around, Brandon starting and finishing three.

Tuesday: Sleep in, play lots of video games, then an ultimate frisbee game in the evening.

Wednesday: Sleep in, motorcycle up to parents' cabin near Darrington, begin the arduous task of killing weeds from their old garden. I have visions of grandeur of getting the garden up and running again, but the problem is my parents rarely visit the cabin anymore (due to some health concerns with pop), and whatever I plant this year will likely just die come winter. Getting it prepped for next year is a goal, though. So I spend about three hours bush-whacking my way through 8ft-tall weeds. I borrow a neighbor's weed whacker, which I promptly kill the string in about ten minutes on the tree-like weeds. I take a three-pronged hoe (without gloves) and begin hacking at the weeds, and quickly lose the three-pronged head into the dense mass of weeds. I continue to whack away at the weeds and actually knock the weeds down to shin-high using the baseball-bat like stick. It was a workout and a stress reliever, but I got some nasty blisters on my hands, which weren't helpful for...

Thursday: ...golf with Erin! I convinced her to take it easy on me this time, both due to her crushing me by 13 strokes last time, and the fact that my hands were all blistered up. We played best ball for the full 18, which I had never tried before, but was a lot of fun. Both shoot a tee shot, take the best tee shot and both shoot from there, rinse and repeat. We parred the first few holes and then tail-spinned a bit to finish the front side +9... I was hoping to shoot around even par, but somehow we managed to triple-bogey a hole when we both hit out of bounds tee shots and some poor subsequent shots on a par 3. We did better on the backside (+3?), making a few birdies and no triple bogeys, finishing with a 79 on a short par 67 course. No three putts between the two of us, thank god!

Friday #2: Packed for overnight backpacking trip to Goldmyer Hot Springs:



The picture only shows the two small pools outside of the cave, but the cave itself is amazing and goes back 25ft, where the initial flow is 117 degrees!

Made a two hour trip to the pool in Seattle with Erin to lounge in the sun before heading out backpacking with Andy and Leah. Nothing quite like lounging by the pool with a fellow teacher at 1pm on a Friday. She even snuck in a beer in a nalgene for me--a great friend.

Afterwards, I picked up Andy and Leah and we made our way out to the Goldmyer trailhead and hiked in the easy 4.5 miles (on a closed road) to the hot springs. I was content to spend the evening relaxing in an isolated hot springs in peace and quite, but two young ridiculously attractive ladies in bikinis joined Andy, Leah and I... rats. A fitting end to the first week.

Just before bed we walked out to the nearest bridge and stared up at the stars, and witnessed one of the coolest night skies I have ever seen. So many stars it was almost impossible to make out constellations, a handful of speedy shooting stars, and at one point I counted five different satellites moving across the sky simultaneously.

Photo Week 41: Cabin Adventure

Spent Saturday night up at parents' cabin, got in a nice waterfall hike on the way back to Seattle today!

Photo Week 35: Seven Lakes Basin Hike

A really amazing weekend. I highly suggest the Seven Lakes Basin for anyone who wants a hike that has it all. Wildlife, wild flowers, mountain peaks and ridges, lakes, waterfalls, glacier views, etc.

Photo Week 34: Denny Creek

Hiked a little ways up the Denny Creek trail today with a few friends. We only made it about two miles in, but did get to this fun little creek which used to be a river. We climbed up the rocky ex-river a few thousand feet before realizing the trail didn't go the way we were heading. We climbed up the side of a waterfall and saw kids trying to slide down the smooth wet rock on their keesters, which looked a bit painful.

Photo Week 33: Image Lake

Photo Week 28: Goat Lake

Just got back from a really fun weekend hike with Caitie and friends. The lake is gorgeous, the weather was great, and the bugs weren't bad. The only downside to the hike was I felt a cold coming on hiking up to the lake, which meant muscle soreness magnified. I slept that off Saturday afternoon, but then drank too much wine, tequila and moonshine Saturday night, leading to a miserable Sunday morning of hungoverdness.

Photo Week 24: Snowy Spider Meadows

Trail Work: Dungeness River

This weekend was my first time volunteering on a hiking trail. I've been using hiking trails in Washington since I was probably 2 or 3 years old, and I figure it is time to start giving back. The idea to volunteer last weekend came about at the end of March, when I spent 12 hours sitting on my ass, playing WoW and watching March Madness one lazy Saturday. At the end of that Saturday where I accomplished next to nothing, I signed up for this overnight trail work day in the beginning of May. I didn't realize it was Mother's Day weekend until a week prior... sorry Mom!

I woke up at 4:00am on Saturday morning, and was out of the house by 4:30am. I drove down around Tacoma, up through Gig Harbor and the trail head is just south of Sequim. I arrived at 8:00am for the 8:30am departure, which turned into a 9:00am departure when a few of the other volunteers arrived late due to a website time discrepancy. The view from the forest service road leading to the Dungeness Trail is amazing:



We had about a dozen people for the first day, and I was the youngest. There was a couple in probably their early 30s, and everyone else was 40+, most over 50 and retired. There was one other newbie, a 40-something mom who came out by herself for Mother's Day, to the bewilderment of her teenage boys. "You want to go out, sleep in the cold, with no bathroom, and work on trails for Mother's Day?!"

I wasn't really sure what to expect, this being my first time doing trail work. We each grabbed two tools from a nice arsenal:



The hike in to our work site was just over a mile, and I made the mistake of not wearing my work gloves--my hands were FREEZING by the time we got to the work site. I should have known better when I saw all of the frost on cars parked at the parking lot overnight. The crew leader had checked out the site on Tuesday and said the parking lot had snow all around the edges (which had melted away by the time we got there Saturday morning).

We spent about 30-45 minutes scoping out the washed out trail and options for a new trail. There were actually several different routes we could go, and the shared leadership was a really cool thing to be a part of. Some of the very experienced trail workers asked my opinion, and I had no idea, but said what I thought looked like a good route and then we would discuss the pros and cons of the different routes (and of course go with their expert opinion--but it was fun to at least talk about the different routes). We settled on a route that went way high up on the hill, mostly to avoid another wash out in the next few years. This meant more work, but work that will last longer.

My first problem to work on happened to be a patch of Devil's Club in the wettest part of our work site. I dove in and enacted vengeance on Devil's Club for all of the stings I've gotten over the years up at the cabin. Damn you Devil's Club!!

We broke for lunch, and in the afternoon I spent some of my time finishing the Devil's Club spot, then moved to working on clearing out the end of the trail of roots and rocks--filling in holes with rocks we dig out and generally leveling the trail as we go.

I was pooped when we got back to the parking lot and camp site. I took a picture of my boots from my work in the trenches, and then fell asleep in my tent as soon as my head hit my sweatshirt-converted pillow.



My nap ended in time for dinner, which was hamburgers provided by the crew leader. She also provided breakfast and two trail pass parking passes, which I can turn in for a year-long Northwest Forest Pass (hello hiking this summer!). We sat around the campfire for a few hours after dinner, telling stories and playing the game "What am I?" Kind of like 20 questions. We spent about 45 minutes trying to guess this one guy's "What Am I?" and eventually knew that he was a children's toy and that children play with his head and open up his head and there is more fun stuff inside...

Mr. Potatohead.

I slept like a rock. I really should have spent some time looking up at the stars, but I was running on about five hours of sleep and grubbing or moving rocks all day.

Sunday we decided to leave the muddy Devil's Club section of the trail alone, because the mud is up to your shins and it isn't going to dry out anytime soon. We did dig a trench, to flow water into one lane, which will hopefully drain out the section of water so volunteers can make the intended trail in the next trail work party. Instead of playing in the Devil's Club, we had some fun projects involving huge trees that had fallen in our new route.



Don brought a 6ft saw on Sunday, and I'll quickly describe the process. We scout the entire tree, which means climbing up the hillside a hundred feet to see if anything will happen if we cut where we are planning on cutting, and doing the same below our cutting spot. Sometimes the trees will fly up after cutting through it with a saw, depending on where other trees are applying pressure to the downed tree. This tree is relatively safe, because it is wedged between a few trees, and the base of it has already been cut for the old route, so not much pressure is being applied by the massive root section.

First step in the cutting process is to ax in a starting spot for the saw.



Two people then saw back and forth until the saw is fully into the tree by a few inches. Then someone hammers in wedges to the top of the cut, to make sure the saw can get out of the cut. When the wedges were placed into this first big tree we cut, I was told to get up on the saw and work with the other newbie to finish the cut. There is a dangerous side and a safe side to each tree cut, and I got the dangerous side. The footing was bad, and when the saw broke through, the tree would be coming my way. We struggled a bit to get started, but then we had a really good flow going and made quick work of the tree until the crew leader told us to stop and have Wayne finish off the cut from one side (which involves taking a handle off the saw and just letting him cut if from his side.



Four saw cuts from Wayne and the tree trunk fell to the ground, and a branch none of us saw whapped down right where I would have tried to escape to... I got lucky there! Everyone else was surprised by how close of a call that was, as usually the call to swap to a one-person saw is done much earlier, for safety reasons. Once the tree dropped, we had to make another cut. I got to sit out the first half again, but we swapped sides for the second half and I got to cut from the safe side, and also finish off the cut by one-manning the 6ft saw. They told me when I "hear the tree talking to me, get the saw out and go!" I heard the tree crack numerous times and got the saw out and got out of there, but nothing moved. They said they would have made fun of me if we were loggers, but since we're all just volunteers, they liked my cautiousness.



Eventually I one-manned through the entire tree and it just sat there. The wedges at the top, and the force from the lower part of the tree apparently held it up, so we had to kick it to the side to get it to thump down.

Lunch on Sunday was great. We completely lucked out on the weather this weekend, with just a slight drizzle on our way back to camp Saturday afternoon. The sun at lunch also attracted a butterfly, which seemed very comfortable both on me and my bagel:





After lunch we took a brief walk up the trial another 1000ft and came to a big land slide. I used the landslide to skid down to the river. I spotted a tree crossing the river and I thought it would be amazing to have a picture taken up there, but I'd never try to cross it.



Then on our way back Don gave it a shot, so I raced back to the beach spot to snap a photo, unknown to him!



Ballsy!

We spent the rest of the day cutting and moving more big trees, and finishing up tidying up the trail for hikers and horses. Our last project of the day had the entire team working together to push, pull, and man levers to get a big tree out of the middle of the trail and up over another downed tree.






Overall, an amazing weekend, and I look forward to volunteering again in the future on trails. It really is a lot of work, and we only worked on about 300ft of a 6 mile trail. Great weather for the weekend, great people, and we stopped early enough on Sunday that I even made it back to Seattle in time for dinner with Mom!

Ba-doop

This week was a lot of fun. Wednesday was a fun and productive day. I started out with a round of golf at Wayne, which has a great Monday/Wednesday morning deal of $14 for 18 holes. The backside is short, with four par-4's and five par 3's, which is one part of the cheap green fee.

I don't really consider this golfing prep for the Winter Gathering, but the more I hear about it, the more I want to make the trip down to Vegas. A spot at CK's place might seal the deal! We can toss the disc, it'll be grand. I think I was +17 over 14 holes, because I skipped a few holes on the backside to breeze past a clog of golfers. Averaging slightly over bogey for a round of golf is a great round for me, probably my best.

After golf, I visited five middle schools near where I'll be moving at the end of this week. I dropped off a substitute page with my picture and contact info, and a resume, and talked with a vice principal at one of the schools in regards to coaching opportunities. I was well-received at all of the schools, and I hope they'll call me up for subbing once the school year gets underway.

Wednesday night I threw a little shin-dig which involved six boxes of pizza and ended with me and three bikini-clad women in the hot tub trying to catch glimpses of the meteor shower through the clouds (we didn't have much luck). Good times.

Thursday was spent with Dr. Chako. First, we hiked Rattlesnake Ledge and had some good views, although a bit cloudy:



(Mt. Si, with the peak covered in clouds)

After our hike we hit Snoqualmie Casino and played some poker. I got reamed playing 4/8 and won one pot in an hour of 7-handed play, and I only won the blinds. Not only did I only win one hand, I had a lot of second-best hands, or best hands until the river, and then second-best hands. It was frustrating, and I am glad I set a stop-loss at $100 before I tilted the rest off.

I took a breather from poker and wandered the casino for a bit. The Snoqualmie Casino has a really nice setup, and as Dr. C pointed out, I think it is the first casino I've been in that has windows you can look out! The view is great north through the Snoqualmie Valley. I did a lap of the casino to see what games they spread, and I was looking for a Pai Gow table to waste some time at and hopefully not lose much money, and let Dr. C play more than just an hour of poker. I found a $3 blackjack table and played for about 20 minutes and only lost one hand. The dealer must have bust six times while I was there, and the whole table was loving it. I got out while I was ahead, and watched Dr. C go nuts on his last orbit at 3/5 no limit to just about double his stack.

We left the casino to get back to Seattle in time to play softball, but it started POURING when we reached Seattle, and we changed plans to racquetball instead. He whooped me in the first game, then I won the second game when he served to my forehand every point, then he won the third and fourth games handily. It is always fun playing with Dr. C, because I always learn a lot, and usually play up to him and get better--and then go whoop up on my friends the next week :)

This weekend was ECC/Spawnfest, a large ultimate frisbee tournament with some of the best teams in the world. One set of fields hosts teams from all across the world--Japan, Colombia and Australia were all teams I saw. At my set of fields were more local teams from Victoria to Portland. We went 3-1 on day 1, putting us in the bottom of the A pool. We lost our first game today to the #1 seed, and then lost our second game and headed back to Seattle.

Spider Meadows

If this post looks familiar, I did this same hike just under two years ago with my dad. This year, I intended to go up Friday and make it up to Lyman Lakes, but was ill on Friday. Instead, I made the trip up Sunday with a few friends for a long day hike. We ran into my original hiking buddies, Tom and Joe, on the way up the trail, and they thanked me for the recommendation!

The day hike turned out to be about a 13-mile hike, and we were all dog tired by the end of it. We recharged our batteries by stopping at Lake Wenatchee on the way back to Seattle for a beer and a swim.

Take Two

Well, I had intended to be gone all weekend backpacking, but I woke up yesterday morning at 4am with some pleasant explosive diarrhea and dry heaving. I think it had to do with a combination of the strenuous hike, eating berries on the hike, eating a roast beef sandwich bought at an IGA store, only drinking one nalgene of water for the entire day, and all that followed up with two strong gin and tonics.

I could barely move, and slept for 25 of 36 hours between Thursday night and this morning.

Joe and Tom continued on schedule, and I've commissioned a few friends to join me on what is now a day hike on Sunday instead of the planned two-night hike. Barring any other unforeseen obstacles, I'll be back at Spider Meadows around noon tomorrow, but probably won't have enough time to check out Lyman Lakes.

Gone Hikin'

I did a day hike today with Tyler and Wheezy, and I'll be hiking Spider Meadows and possibly Lyman Lakes until Sunday. Adios!

Spider Meadow

Spent yesterday and today hiking at Spider Meadow with Dad. It was cloudy yesterday, and rained on us a bit overnight, but today was gorgeous blue sky. I'm pooped!

Hiking With Dad (LONG)

(written two days ago where internet hasn't been invented yet)

Well, I’m either old… or I’m living the life. I’m currently freshly showered, sipping a Corona and sitting in a rocking chair on the second floor of the public Frenchglen Hotel in Frenchglen, OR. There is a window open behind me, and another window on the other side of the room blowing a nice breeze over my shoulders. I’ve got my laptop with no internet in front of me, and I’m trying to figure out where to begin.

I just finished a very good ‘family style’ dinner out on the deck. Along with Dad, there was a retired couple sitting across from us, and an 80 year old doctor who rode a motorcycle down from Portland. Frenchglen is in Southeast Oregon, so it is quite the drive from Portland. His motorcycle is parked out front, and it has a futuristic-looking side-car. Instead of a wife, he keeps a 10-gallon fuel tank in there for the long rides.

During our meal of rice, spinach and artichoke dip, chicken, rolls and salad, we all shared stories. The older couple (in their 60’s) had some really neat stories, including taking a train from Eugene, OR to Miami, FL. They went down the coast on the Starlight Express (I believe?) then took a train from Los Angeles to Miami. They stayed a few days in San Antonio, New Orleans, Miami—-then flew back to Eugene. Not bad! We had a good dinner, filled with laughs, and I wasn’t meant to feel too out of place, even though the rest of the table had a good 40 years on me.

I scooted out early from dinner and played with Ichi a bit. He’s had quite the day. I went and got Dad from the hotel this morning a few minutes earlier than scheduled, re-introduced him to Ichi, then the next thing Ichi knew, he was trapped in the Explorer with his grandpa! It was a pretty hot drive from Tahoe to Frenchglen, and Dad finally admitted at dinner that the thermometer in the Exploder hit 101 degrees somewhere in rural Nevada. Luckily for Ichi, he had air conditioning this trip! After the normal Ichi freak-out, he settled down, and at almost every stop along the way, he was curled up in a ball on Dad’s lap. Ichi is going to spend the night out in the Exploder tonight, but tomorrow night we have a hotel in Pendleton, OR that allows cats—-so he’ll get to come inside then.

I don’t feel too bad for Ichi though, because I was out in the 100 degree weather all day on my ninja. The drive today was about 400 miles, and it consisted of pretty much staring at the back of the Explorer for 8 hours. It wasn’t that bad though. Dad planned the route through Nevada and Eastern Oregon, and I agreed because I’ve really only drove I-5 from California to Seattle. Dad said he had some amazing country to show me, so I obliged to let him plan the trip.

His favorite part of today’s trip was about 30 miles north of Winnemucca, NV. We turned off of I-95 and took Hwy 140 through Denio to Frenchglen. At the turn off onto Hwy 140, there is a straight-stretch of road that must of lasted 30 miles, not a single turn. It felt like you could see forever, and there was not a single car in sight. You can go the entire drive from Sacramento to Seattle and never lose sight of another vehicle. Dad and I drove for a good 20-mile stretch without seeing another soul. The scenery was amazing, and even though there were ‘open ranges’ along the highway, it felt pretty safe to take my gaze off of the Exploder’s license plate and glance around. A couple things struck me on that long, straight-stretch. First, whoever had to build all those telephone poles along the highway must have had one helluva-long summer. There were telephone poles every hundred feet along the highway, and we sometimes crossed a different stretch of telephone poles heading perpendicular to the road. They stretched on as far as I could see… hundreds, maybe even thousands of telephone poles, out in the middle of nowhere. Power has to get from the Hoover Dam somehow, I guess—but damn if those telephone poles aren’t going to be obsolete in twenty years.

Since there weren’t any other cars or police cars within our miles of sight, I decided to pass Dad and punch the ninja up to 100 for a little giggle. I couldn’t think of a better, safer place to do it (although I was a bit worried about the ‘Open Range’). I crouched down and gave the bike lots of throttle, and it responded with a zoom. I hit 100 and decided that was enough for me. I checked my rear-view mirror and was surprised to see the Explorer so far behind. I popped in the clutch and let the bike coast for a good mile until Dad caught up. I moved back over to the left lane and let him pass me on the right side, as if we were rewinding the tape. Good times.

Other than the fun stretch between Winnemucca and Denio, the ride was a good endurance test. It was almost as long as the ride to Vegas in June, but it was a much easier ride, because I was following Dad. Going it alone is pretty tough, I wanted to stop more often on my ride down to Vegas than I did with Dad today. Some of that might have to do with the hike we just got through, and my patience and stamina are near an all-time high.

Speaking of hiking, the hike was amazing. Truly a once-in-a-lifetime hike. We had near-perfect weather. 70-75 degrees, blue skies, no lightning storms and no fire/smoke until the last day hiking out. We got incredibly lucky with the weather. You can pretty much rely on sunny weather for August in California, but camping at 10,000ft in rock bed, lightning storms are not your friend—and they are mighty frequent on sunny, August days. Also, if luck is not on your side, the months of planning a hike can quickly be for naught if a wildfire strikes.

On our last day, we saw a bit of smoke on the 5.6 mile hike out, but it didn’t seem too bad. It wasn’t until we got to the car and started driving back to Mammoth to pick up the Exploder, that we noticed how bad the smoke was. You could hardly see the mountains when we got back to Mammoth, and we knew the mountains were there, because we had seen them four days earlier on our entry into the Ansel Adams Wilderness.

The wilderness is aptly named, and it definitely rivals the Cascades. Some of the view we got were just incredible. We camped at Thousand Island Lake our second night, which sits at 9800ft. Mount Banner shades the lake in the afternoon, and it is 13,000ft high, standing just to the Southwest of the lake. Our hike up to Thousand Island Lake was a bit of a grind at 8.5 miles and probably around 2k elevation from Agnew Meadows—and I promptly stripped down to my shorts and hopped into Thousand Island Lake when we arrived. I could see the glacier which fed the lake, but that didn’t stop me! It actually wasn’t that bad, until Dad saw me getting out after diving in and said, “Mind doing that again for the camera?” I didn’t, but that second dive seemed much more brisk than the first!

From Thousand Island Lake, we climbed Island Pass, descended into a really nice valley with a picture-perfect stream. I got a few shots of Dick pumping water at the stream where we ate lunch. There were foot-long fish swimming around in the stream, lush grass, and the constant trickle of the stream to make you feel at home in the wilderness. That great feeling caught us a bit off-guard, because from the top of Island Pass, all we saw was a valley with trees, and we were all staring across the valley at Donoghue Pass, which we were going to climb the next day. If we had a bridge across the valley, we could have saved ourselves a few thousand feet of elevation, so every step down into the valley, we knew would be a step up the other side. The perfection in the valley got our minds off the hike back up though, and we made it to within 1000ft of Donoghue Pass and camped at over 10,000ft our third night on the trail. That third day was pretty rough, because it was spent at or above about 9800ft, and we did quite a bit of climbing.

Back to my all-time high in patience, climbing isn’t exactly my Dad’s forte. He makes his money with his long strides in the flat meadow. When the path gets steep, he shuts down into 1st gear and his long stride collapses into a literal toe-to-heel grunt up the hill. The steepest part of the entire 27-mile trail was about five hours into our first day. We had a 0.6 mile stretch that rose 600ft. That’s 1000ft/mile. We averaged 2h/mile. Two hours per mile. Not two miles per hour. It took us over an hour to hike 0.6 miles. I love my Dad, but that pace was a grind on my patience! It seemed to me, that if he just took bigger strides, he’d go at least two times faster—but I didn’t say anything. He knows his body well enough to know what pace he is comfortable with, and the fact that he is even doing a 27-mile hike at age 65 is a pretty impressive feat in and of itself. I feel very lucky to even have the opportunity to hike with my Dad when he is 65. I really doubt I’ll be doing any 27-mile hikes when I’m his age.

I tried my hardest to stay positive about his pace, and for the most part I think Sarr, Dick and I did a good job. It was difficult at times, because we all (including Dad) were very cognizant of the fact that Dad was the slowest out of the group, and we kept a pretty good attitude about it. It had me thinking a lot during the hike though… what is the best way to handle a situation like this, where there is one weak link. I plan on both teaching and coaching within the next few years, and I’m sure I’ll face this issue again in the future. You don’t want to hold everyone else back, but you also want to try your hardest to boost them up. A few times during our hike, Dick and Sarr would go ahead of us and find a spot for lunch, or a spot to camp once we got close to the campsite. That seemed to please them, but over dinner tonight in Frenchglen, Dad commented that sometimes on our hike Dick and Sarr would race ahead to a stream for a stop, but by the time Dad and I got there to rest, they’d be ready to go again, and Dad would get no rest! I guess another unique thing about our situation is that Dad is 65, and isn’t afraid to speak his mind, or request a rest stop. It probably meant more rests, but it also staved off any serious problems from occurring, because Dad knows his body and isn’t afraid to make us wait if he needs a rest. I can see the opposite of that having a very bad outcome in a classroom sense. If the kid isn’t willing to raise his or her hand and admit to not understanding, or get their parents to do their homework, or any other number of things, the problem is just going to get worse and worse.

OK, I’m getting a little off-track, but I would like to hear any advice about what to do when there is a weak link in a group. I think we did a good job, but I felt some of our tactics were either a little too childish, or just not right for the situation—but I was at a loss for how to handle the situation any better. We didn’t really have any way of making him go faster, so the hike was pretty much testing his speed and our patience. Dad also admitted after the hike that he felt rushed for most of the hike, but I don’t really think we could have accomplished the hike in the number of days we had allotted going any slower—so it was more a planning thing than anything else. He also likes hikes where you backpack in, then spend a few days without your pack going on day hikes and coming back to base camp every night—and this hike was definitely not that! All told, I think we all still had an unforgettable time, and it was the perfect way to cap off my six months in Tahoe. To make the matter a little less stressful, Dad and I had an amazing pace on the last morning, when we hiked out to the car. The trail was 5.6 miles of meadow, and Dick and Sarr gave us a little head start like they had become accustomed to—but they didn’t catch up! Dad was zooming in the flat, shaded meadow, and we had a great talk along the way. We got to a little junction of trails about 0.6 miles from the parking lot, and I left a false note for Dick and Sarr, saying we arrived there at 8:30am (when I left the note it was closer to 9am), and for them to move their butts! Dad and I waited around the corner for them, so we could all hike out to the car at once, and we had a good laugh… Dick said he’s going to frame the note.

After the four-nights of hiking food, which was actually amazingly good, we hit Burgers Restaurant, in Mammoth, CA. We all had ½ lb burgers, and three of us had chocolate shakes to go with our burgers. The food and shake were the objects of my desire for the last few days—but in hindsight, I have to say eating all that food wasn’t the smartest idea, because I think all of us were a bit sick after gorging ourselves. The freeze-dried meals we had on our hike were the best I’ve ever had. Our normal dinner consisted of chicken noodle or cream of chicken soup to start, an entrée of Beef Stew, Chicken Teriyaki, Beef Stroganoff and Lasagna, a vegetable dish of peas, green beans, corn and vegetable surprise (not our favorite), then we’d finish up with hot chocolate or apple cider. The portions were great too, not too big, not too small, just enough to fill you up. This was the ninth hike Sarr and Dick have done with Dad, and they have got dinner down pat (except for vegetable surprise!).

I drove Dad and I back to Tahoe after the burgers. I was driving because I lost a prop-bet during the hike. From our camp at 10,000ft, I guessed there would only be 201 of these awful stone-steps on our hike up to Donoghue Pass. Dad guessed 313 and there turned out to be 423… argh! I counted them all, and after we passed Dad’s 313 guess and still had quite a ways to go, we bet again—he picked 560 and I picked 500. I don’t think I actually won anything on that bet, nor did I win anything on our time bet from the same spot. I guessed 10:30am to the top and he guessed 10:45am—we got there at 10:15am. I need to work on my betting strategy.

Other than the meals and the prop-betting, another thing that made this hike so memorable was all the wildlife we saw along the way. In order from largest to smallest, we saw: horses, mules, a buck with a 9-point rack, a doe, a coyote, a golden hawk, a fawn, a red fox, a marmot, a different hawk, bunnies, dozens of different birds, plenty of squirrels and chipmonks, a caterpillar, big biting ants, horse flies and of course—mosquitoes. One of my best pictures yet is of a lady passing us on her horse, leading what looks like a few pack mules up the trail. The light through the trees hits the dust coming up, and it just looks pretty neat to me. I have a minute-long video of the buck, who was eating some grass across the river from us while we were on a siesta. The golden hawk was really neat, and was perched atop a dead tree at our 10,000ft camp, the doe and her fawn were seen at the very end of the hike near the ranger station. Dad got a picture of the fox. We saw a few different marmots, but the one I remember the most was the one we came across on our descent down the Yosemite-side of Donoghue Pass—it had just been bathing in the stream and its fur was all spiked up as it waddled to safety. The second hawk we saw was one of the coolest moments I’ve seen out in nature. We had just crossed a bridge and were entering a forest when we heard commotion up ahead. The hawk had dive-bombed a squirrel, and the squirrel dodged away at the last second and started climbing a tree. The hawk flew up after it, but the squirrel kept running around the diameter of the tree—and it could run fast enough to always be on the opposite side of the tree. The hawk was having a devil of a time trying to fly around the tree and get to the squirrel, and eventually gave up and perched itself on a branch of another tree, trying to spot the squirrel’s escape. The hawk was pissed that he missed that squirrel! I saw some bunnies in the grass just before Thousand Island Lake, but wasn’t able to get any pictures. Dad and I spent time bird-watching, but I wasn’t able to get any good shots. Shooting birds isn’t easy, especially when the terrain reminds you of Oregon Trail and you drift off, imagining a buffalo sliding into your field of vision, then quickly running back off-screen. It wouldn’t have mattered though, because I only could have dragged 200lbs back to the wagon.

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Mt. Tallac Hike

There is nothing quite like an unexpected gift.

I woke up a little late today, but in no real rush. Wednesdays I usually go to work from 1pm to 5pm, so waking up at 10am instead of an hour earlier really didn't change much for me today. I was contemplating hiking up Mt. Tallac, but didn't have enough time before work. I thought about hopping on WoW for a minute, but I knew that minute would quickly turn into two hours, and I'd be on my way to work--grumbling about a wasted morning.

I decided to head to the Mt. Tallac trail head, with the intent of hiking a few miles in to either Crystal or Cathedral lakes. I hiked about a mile in and decided to take a quick breather, and check my phone to see how much time I had before work. I was hoping I could make it to the lakes and back, but it was going to be close.

I grabbed my phone out of my backpack and turned it on. I wasn't really thinking about getting service, I was just interested in checking the time--but the phone came alive with 4 out of 5 bars, and quickly chimed that I had a voicemail message. I checked my voicemail, and it turned out to have two messages. I was expecting a call from Kristen about her and Conor's plans to come up this weekend, but I wasn't sure who the other call was.

It was Flo, from work. No doctors were coming in today, so if I didn't want to work, I didn't have to... Hallelujah! I got this big grin on my face, because I knew I could now take it slow, and also make it to the peak! The other call was from Kristen, and it turns out her, Conor, Barb and Roxie will all be carpooling up on Saturday--so that was more good news!

The first few miles to the lake were nice and shaded, and not too steep. There were a couple areas that had burned along the trail, apparently from ash falling in the Angora Fire at the beginning of July. A couple was swimming in Cathedral Lake when I arrived, so I decided to save my swim for the way back. The trail got a lot rougher past the lakes. There was hardly any shade (I didn't bring sun screen, just a big, floppy hat), and it was a steep, gravel-filled trail.

I zoomed past a few people hiking their way up (from the Bay area--not acclimatized to the 6-9k elevation of the hike), then I found a group of about six 12-15 year old girls, along with their two chaperones. Apparently they were waiting for one of the couples I passed, who were also chapperones. I passed the group, and then about two minutes later I hear voices behind me. Two of the girls were busting it up the trail behind me, and eventually passed me about ten minutes later.

I could hardly believe it. I mean, I'm not in shape or anything, but I am an athletic, 25-year-old male, with a very long stride. These two girls passed me like I was an 80-year-old man with a cane! Nothing like getting passed by girls half your age to make you feel old!

Back to the trail itself... if I hadn't already read up on it, and known that the first little peak you come to isn't the actual peak--I would have been very miffed. You climb this really tough section and make it to the top of what you can see from the bottom--only to find that you are on a wind-ripped plateau, with another two miles of trail ahead of you. The plateau had some amazing wild flowers though, so I wasn't too bummed--along with an amazing view. A hike up to there would be plenty good enough for me usually, but I needed to get a good pre-John Muir hike in, and I wanted to see what all the hype about "best view in Tahoe" was about.

I passed a "Mt. Tallac this way" marker, and started to get giddy. The two girls were probably already up at the peak, but the rest of the gaggle were well behind me, so at least I wasn't completely shamed on this trip.

Made it to the peak at right around 1:30pm, which made for a 2.5 hour hike up the mountain. Granted, I didn't stop too often, or lolly-gag, but that is a pretty good time for a 3200ft elevation gain, 5-mile hike. The view from the top was simply amazing. Towards Lake Tahoe, you could see nearly the entire lake, easily the best view I've seen of the lake. I did a 360 video from the tippy-top of the peak, and I could literally see a dozen different tiny lakes in the mountain range, which I had no idea existed. It was a very cool spot to be on a Wednesday afternoon :)

Two other ladies were up at the peak, and they had quite a chipmunk audience. There was one fat chipmunk, who was the most aggressive, and he would chase away the skinny chipmunks. The two ladies kept trying to get the skinny ones food, but the bully would get the morsel every time. Damn bullies.

It probably only took an hour and a half of hiking to get back down, but I stopped for 30 minutes at Cathedral Lake for a swim and to give my water-filter a test run before the John Muir hike.

I got back into town and went directly to the cheap Mexican place and ordered a burrito. I had water on the trip, but no food--so I was huuungry!

The hike was great--water filter worked like a charm, and my boots were near-perfect. The only gripe I have is that the laces kept getting caught in the opposite boot, which had me face-planting every hour or so. I'll have to find out a better way to get those damn things out of the way! My feet are a bit sore, but that is to be expected after my first 10-mile hike in years. Hopefully this hike will build up a bit of toughness in my feet, so the soreness doesn't come around for the big hike next week!

Pictures: (pretty much in order from what I described above)

Fallen Leaf Lake and Lake Tahoe


Burn-victim shrubs


Cathedral Lake


A higher shot of Fallen Leaf Lake and Lake Tahoe


Roughest Section


Purple? pretty wild flowers


Getting Close!


Made it!


On Top of the World!