I made it into Climbing magazine! (AK coming soon)

It isn't as amazing as it sounds, but it was a real surprise when I saw my name there. I sent a letter to the editor telling them about a new campground fee at the previously free Skull Hollow CG on BLM land and it was published. I really didnt think they'd just publish it verbatim, but whatever. I guess thats what happens in letters to the editors, huh.

I am withholding the post on our Alaska adventure until I get all my photos organized (700+), but check back for that soon. It should be up by the end of the coming week (when Col and I go down to the Sierras for some more vacation time.

Here's a teaser:

huge roof .14.c/d

fun to watch

Passages

RIP Micah Dash, Johnny Copp, Wade Johnson.
A really good Johnny Copp Film
What happened

I don't know them personally, but in the various climbing films and articles I've seen over the years, these three guys were all amazing people and climbers. Every loss in the climbing community feels like it was a close friend.

TED

I have started watching a lot of TED. TED is an organization of great minds who come together each year and give 10-20 minute talks or performances on any number of different subjects. The speakers are all selected because they have some very forward and PRACTICAL ideas. I guess I shouldn't just say ideas, because many of the subjects are showing a business model, or creation that has already been successful in the real world. The talks are all free on the web (thank goodness because it is a $6,000 per person club if you want to be there in person!). There's also a good number of musical performances too. Check it out! You wont regret it.

on the river

Colleen and I are camped out on the Willamette this morning and we chose a most interesting campsite with lots of entertainment. We have an industrious and well fed beaver going back and forth 10 ft in front of our feet. There were 10 students who passed in 2 orc rafts at 9:45 last night with no shirts (it was cold then) or camping supplies. By far the most random is a boiling cauldron or water. Yup. There is a huge gush of water shooting up from the sand bar and then heading upriver in a slightly separate channel from the river. It doesn't look like the water is coming from a pipe, and the boil is a little higher in elevation on the sandbar than the river. Weird.
I guess I could also mention that we are on the river because we are paddling from Eugene to Corvallis for the weekend. I think we could have done the trip in a day but we kinda just wanted to take it easy and camp. The upper streches were a little speedy at times (for a 17 ft long kayak anyway...) and surprisingly clear (who'd have guessed the water below Eugene looked drinkable!). Once we got to about a half way point, several tributaries turned the river into the green lazy thing we know in Corvallis.

Col relaxing on our beach. Easiest camp spot ever.
The beaver buddy we shared the beach with
had to test out the underwater function on the camera
Snacktime on the water
Colleen just cruisin along in the perfect weather.



People pay good money to do the things we do. How lucky are we...!

granite, oh blessed granite!

Climbing is my thing and this weekend I got to do my thing. I started the weekend with the homies from the bay area who were driving up to sasquatch festival. It was great to talk about old times and watch them flail on the climbing wall. We roadtripped up to the 'squatch festival for the evening and got lost and found several times amongst the 20,000 or so tent campers there. I felt kinda old running around all the teenieboppers there, but whateva. I know I rock in my old age. After unsuccessfully trying to get scott laid several times, we quit and went to bed. Logan and Melvin were kind enough to pick me up the next morning on the way to Leavenworth so off to climbing it was! I tell ya, pulling into a granite wonderland like that is just magical. Gets my heart going every time. The original plan was to get on serpentine arte IV 5.8 on dragontail peak, but that was very snowed in so We played for two days on the pearly gates wall near snow creek wall. There I got my MUCH needed crack fix. In two days we threw up everything worth doing, with the highlight for me being a redpoint of a 10.c roof finger crack. Just heaven. Granite is granite is just so soft and cuddly to climb on compared to so much else (jtree excluded). I didn't have to tape up once the whole time in Lworth. Oh, and there were some mtn goats cruising. Around that were very very friendly and provided some very nice photo ops. I think they are the snow creek wall goats who came down due to the raptor nesting on outer space ( no climbers means no climber handouts and pee to lick up). Oh, and icicle creek was a raging river, with about 5 miles of massive constant class V+ water.
We rounded out Sunday evening with some minigolf, but not before HOT Rainier Beer from the car, chips and queso, and another twelver of can beer in the parking lot. Winning the round, Logan and I tied about ten under Greg and Dev. At about the 5th hole of golf when all the brews were kicking in, I heard the best line from the weekend: "So uh, who's driving home?!?"
For monday we drove partway home then stopped at Tieton for some basalt column cragging. I would compare Tieton to trout creek, only with more broken colums and a but more jagged in spots. And a ton more routes. I would call the ratings there a little stiffer than leavenworth or smith, but a little softer as the grade gets harder. Definitely going to have to go back there again for a weekend or two. My favorite lead of the weekend, the 10.c finger crack.

Plastic

and, in light of the latest fanatical coverage of the newest threat to humanity, I give you this:

Adventure report

This won't be that last time I ignore my blog for a month or so, but Sorry. Ok, with that said, heres the adventure report for April. I got out to smith a few weeks ago with an eastcoaster who moved out to Newport last year. Pretty normal guy(for being from Boston). Our goal was to climb 2000 vertical feet in a day, but we only got half because of the absolutely epic winds. 40+ mph gusts on a 6 pitch 5.8 X ridge climb is sketchy as hell. We bailed on that and spent the evening eating Cody's freshly slaughtered, apple fed beef in his wood stove heated 20x20 canvas tent, while it rained, froze, and then snowed outside. If that aint camping, I dont know what is.

Two weekends ago, I organized an OMC trip up Shasta. That went about as well as a mountaineering trip could possibly go. we had temps in the mid 80s during the day, with a nice freeze at night. We split into two groups of 4, with the skiiers going up west face via hidden valley and my group climbing Caseval ridge on the southwest side of the mountain. Greg and I climbed Avy Gulch two years ago, and I must say, Caseval is head and shoulders above AG. It begins at 7000 ft or so, climbs up to 9600 and there it levels out and follows a half mile of steep traversing on snow slopes. Then you gain elevation quickly up one of two gullys next to the ridge (we opted to downclimb and ascend the east face for a short time to avoid a large cornice on top of the west gully). From that bench at 11700 or so you get back into cruising up rock bands and snow slopes for another thousand feet. A final band of red rock is encountered with a narrow snow ramp with tons of exposure, then we hopped onto misery hill for the final summit approach. Total time to summit from bivy at 9500 was just over 7 hours. The glissade down Avy Gulch covered about 2000 ft in 5 minutes. Fun! Oh, and when we talked to everyone back in the parking lot, we found out that Celene didn't handle the thin air so well and puked 5 times above 14,000 ft. but she topped out anyway, so you go girl!

This most recent weekend, We had a party at our place on friday night, then I went with Greg to Smith for the day, then I went up to see Colleen's parents new house in Camas. They overlook the gorge, and have an absolutely amazing house. Want!
I am kinda glad I didnt bring my camera to smith, because Greg and I both had an absoulutely terrible day at smith; one of the worst. It has been a really long time since I didn't enjoy climbing, but this was one of those days. We climbed two laps each on Herasy first thing and turned our arms to jello for the rest of the day, making everything else we climbed scary and unpleasant. bummer dood! Col and I rounded out the weekend with a paddle on the lovely little Lacamas Lake near her folk's house. I was pleasantly surprised by the wildlife that was able to exist there among the zillions of boaters and fishermen. We watched ospreys catch fish litterally right in front of fishermen, and then watched a big bald eagle swoop in and chase the ospreys until they dropped the fish so he could get it. This happened 30 ft over our heads, and we got to watch the bald eagle eat the fish on a tree branch from about 20 ft away. Just a really nice remainder of the weekend to compensate for the crappy day of climbing.

Teabag the President!

The conservatives are getting rather irate now! Dear god what will they think of next!
Teabagging conservatives everywhere!