The Neil

Work for/on the weekend

2011-04-03T13:21:00.004-06:00

So... I am working right now, for a job that pays me $10.10, and it just dumped around a foot and a half of fresh delicious snow outside. Something is wrong with me... sometimes I think that I am just to loyal.

On another note, I am undergoing a hiring process for another job (not profession based, just filler), and the amount of hoops needed to jump through is kinda giving me cause for concern. I had to go through a ~2 hour physical the other day, in which I found that my vision is 20/17 far sighted, and 20/13 nearsighted. That means I am a far superior individual.

Also, I applied for one of those landscape architecture joby things again. I am kind of excited about it. I imagine that the competition is gonna be something fierce, but I am highly qualified for it, and it gives my reason to get my hopes up. That is the first job in the year since I left Colorado that I have seen posted that I can actually apply for and be qualified for. Hopefully that is signs for good things ahead.

Don't Call it a Comeback...

2011-03-28T14:04:00.010-06:00

...I've been here for years.

So, I realized I haven't updated this for quite some time. I can think of a gazillion excuses, but the fact of the matter is, at the end of the day, it is what it is.

So here is where I am since the last post about Maine that happened in October. I did one more epic road trip, when I flew to Georgia and drove back to Utah with Becca in November.

We went down to Goblin Valley in December, and did a little hiking around.

Went snowshoeing a few times after that, and maybe even tried a little Nordic skiing.

Hiked up to Donut Falls a few times.

Hiked out to Diamond Fork Hot Springs.

Woke up after a late night working to do a Dawn Patrol with Chase.

I witnessed the remnants of the greatest snowman war our world has ever seen.

Visited and took my first known photos of the Great Salt Lake.

After a lot of prodding, finally was talked into hiking to the top of Antelope Island (Frary Peak).

While the annual Dude Fest Hut Trip was non-existent this year, I was still somehow able to organize a spontaneous Presidents Day weekend Yurt trip to the Snorkeling Elk Yurt, down near Beaver, UT.

This is what it looked like when we got there:

This is it with the ~2.5' of new snow that we got the next day.

This is the most epic photo of all time.

Becca getting rad, and her first taste of powder!

And last week I escorted the ol' girlfriend out to Georgia, and then up to North Carolina for a wedding and then back to the Georgia coast to visit her old stomping grounds.

Here is Becca battling her brother and dad in a little Mario Kart.

We also visited the Life and Science Museum. They let you pick out your own butterfly and then let you eat it. This was Becca's: Umm... just kidding, we didn't really eat those. Promise.

This is Becca's brother, Alex, kicking his own ass.

A little stroll on Jeckyll Island.
The Girl worked down here for a while.
It was kinda purty.

Way green, with some massive Live Oaks, and Old Man's Beard.

And a rope swing...

Then, once I got back, I escorted my mom out to Antelope Island so she can prove to me that she is tougher than I am by running a 50k (it actually was about 33 miles or something). Pretty hard core.

The sunrise over the northern Wasatch from the island (I don't see many sunrises, being a night person and all, so I have to document them when I see em).

This is my mom, at the start of the nearly 7 hour race.
All smiles, just like always!

Devin was out there running it too, so it was good to catch up, and reminisce about the Grand Canyon exactly a year ago.

Well, I am daring myself to write more of these. I'll see what I can do.

You stay classy, Salt Lake City. I am The Neil.

Maine

2010-11-15T23:19:00.006-07:00

Welcome to Maine:

So, about a month ago, I went up to Maine to see The Girl (a.k.a. Rebecca).

We watched some giant pumpkins in a parade:

Saw some lobster boats:

Saw some leaves change color:Rode bikes/drove around Acadia National Park.

Took some photos on top of mountains.
Kicked some ship.

Carved some pumpkins :

My pumpkin again, with my planning sketch.

Pretty much nailed it, per plans.

Got to experience a Nor-easter.
(Becca's house is a couple hundred ft behind me)

Walked around some tide pools:

I totally found all the crabs, and then she stole the big one for the picture.

We went apple picking at an orchard, but the apples had pretty much fallen, so it was apple pick-up.

And hiked up and down the beach and state park.

Hell, we even went to the LL Bean headquarters.

Maine was pretty rad. Who woulda thunk it!
Good times... Good times!

From the AK to the UT

2010-11-15T21:43:00.008-07:00

Needless to say, I've been slacking. A little.

About two months ago, I was in Alaska, working behind this bad boy slinging coffee:

And every once in a while (2-3 times a week) I would get this thing:

That is a picture of a couple seals, a rod and reel, a ships keel, and an electric eel dollar origami. Yep, the Real Deal. all courtesy of one of my coworkers.

I worked at this joint:

At the end of the season, I shaved a mustache:

I also picked up a second job guiding the Backcountry Jeep Safari:

If you squint hard enough, you can see Denali in the background.

And then, I drove home.
This is the bridge in Teslin, Yukon Territory, Canada:

This black bear wanted to eat my bike tires.

This is the pimpin ride that my friend and I drove:

A few sites from the Cassiar Highway:

And then a few shots from Jasper and Banff National Parks:

Yeah, it was quite a drive! I think right around 3200 miles, maybe. Way pretty. Great weather, and since that car got, like, a billion miles to the gallon, relatively cheap.

August... and everything Thereafter.

2010-09-10T22:20:00.007-06:00

So, the season is coming down to a close. Almost everything here in Denali closes next week sometime. The coffee shop closes on the 15th, and my new second job as a jeep safari guide ends the same day. I picked up that second job to close out the season, and have decided two full time jobs is a little much. Just a little.

So, without rambling on too much, here is what's gone on in the last month, in picture form.

Seward is Sa-weeeet.

My first AK breakfast burrito, WAY GOOD, courtesy of the Smoke Pit in Seward, which happens to be in an old train car.

Exit Glacier, Seward
Seward, from the other side of the bay.
Mt. Alice trail.

The Alaskan Mountain Range. Denali is the one in the clouds.
The view from one of my after work walks, only about 15 minutes from my cabin door.:
And Denali from the air.
The scenery from a heli flight:

The West Fork of the Susitna Glacier.I totally skipped a rock on that glacial pool.

Glacial jumping.

The beautiful Mt Deborah.
The colors starting to change.

Glaciers are Cool

2010-08-03T08:16:00.007-06:00

So are mountains, rivers, friends, and Alaska.

Its been hard updating the ol' blog without the internets in my cabin. But mainly that is just an excuse.

The last couple of weekends have been rad. I was privileged enough to be invited with Mandy and one of her friends on a little river trip. We used some inflatable kayaks and a pack raft to float ~15 miles of Brashkana Creek and the Upper Nenana River. The scenery was a'ight.

[Insert Super Mario Bros music here]

Then it was off to a week of work and then a backpack trip into Denali National Park. Chase had recommended an area, so I took his advice, found someone with the same days off as me, and we got after it.

This is pretty American... the highest peak in this here country... and the flag.

"And my wolfpack, it grew by one."

I am bigger than some bears.

But others are still bigger than me.

The campsite... at the edge of the Muldrow Glacier,
in perfect weather, with the peak of north peak of Denali visible.

The sunset was pretty rad... to say the least.

The blueberries and raspberries are out too... we picked these after work the other day:

Needless to say... I ate too many and got a little rumbly in the tumbly.

I also witnessed a cargo plane crash the other day... its a very, very weird feeling to see a plane fall out of the sky about a mile away.

OK... gotta run to work, its 6:55AM and I gots to supply Denali with caffeine. Keep on keepin on folks!

Sorta Kinda.

2010-07-17T17:01:00.006-06:00

Went camping, collected some scientific data...
My hypothesis checks out... sorta kinda pretty here.

Kinda Sorta.

2010-07-15T12:37:00.001-06:00

It's kinda sorta pretty here.

Kinda.

True that...

2010-06-23T23:19:00.002-06:00

To those who have struggled with them, the mountains reveal beauties that they will not disclose to those who make no effort. That is the reward the mountains give to effort. And it is because they have so much to give and give it so lavishly to those who will wrestle with them that men love the mountains and go back to them again and again. The mountains reserve their choice gifts for those who stand upon their summits.

-Sir Francis Younghusband

Kinda sounds a little like life itself...

Part-time Model

2010-06-11T01:20:00.004-06:00

I'm a part-time model. Kinda.

These are all from my very first photo shoot with chainlove.com

Leave inquiries for work in the comments section.

Truly Alaskan Adventure

2010-06-06T18:09:00.016-06:00

So, after slaving away equipping the greater Denali Park area with its fair share of caffeinated beverages, even the hardiest of souls (me) needs a day off. Yesterday was my day off.

Naturally I slept in.

Then, after that, I got to embark on an AMAZING Alaskan adventure.

Lets flash back a little, I got up here about a week before my job started, so there was a lot of down time... without money. I live right next to a private airstrip. An opportunity to clean some windows came up and I jumped at the chance. Well, I met this older guy, a pilot, retired custom home builder. We got along pretty well, and he told me about possibly going flying in his little plane to get some moose antlers. I thought it would be rad, but didn't really think it would come to fruition. Well, yesterday it did.

We had been trying to get out, but the weather was either windy or rainy after I got off work. Yesterday, the storm broke. I walked down the airstrip, we hopped aboard his little single engine plane, and embarked on this journey.

You see, he had spotted these antlers from his plane, there was a small gravel landing strip across from a river that is fed by a glacier (which is about 10 miles from the antlers).

We flew out, he showed me the location of the antlers from the plane, circled multiple times, so I could see where I needed to go, and then we landed on the strip. A backcountry landing strip is essentially as wide as a dirt road.

The plan was to land, then I would go and inflate this little boat that he had stashed out here the week before (when he tried to do this by himself), cross this river, retrieve the antlers, and paddle back across, and then fly out. When circling, I saw a second, smaller set of antlers not too far away that I thought would be easy to get.

He would give me a 45 minute head start, and then take off, and circle the antlers in the plane, should I have a hard time seeing them from the ground.

This is what the task would be...
I took this from the air on one of the circles so I could orient myself once on the ground.

Here is what it looked like, the plane is in the lower left corner.
The uninflated raft.

Once up to proper PSI... she was a hardy vessel.

The Solstice SunSkiff 350 at the put-in.

Let me tell you about this water crossing. A) The water is cold. B) it is moving fast. C) you had to lay on your stomach in the boat and paddle like that. D) all of the above.

The first of the antlers I found.

Everything went as planned for the first two antlers. I walked right to them. Then I started bushwhacking over to the others. Those turned out to be a little harder to find. Everything was COMPLETELY different on the ground. At that point Roger flew over, and dipped his wing and started to circle a spot about half a mile away... I was WAY off. I ran down there through the swampy/marshy/soggy Alaskan tundra, and after a few more passes of the plane, was able to find the third antler. With one more pass I found the fourth.

Now was the task I wasn't looking forward too. Getting the antlers to the boat, and back across the river.

After securing the antlers to the back of the boat, and testing it to make sure it was still buoyant under the antlers weight, I bellied up into the boat, shoved off, and rowed like crazy back across. The boat was actually a lot more stable with that extra weight in the back.

Me, with the full load of 4 antlers after successfully crossing back across the river.

Roger and the airplane, with the antlers.

Me with a surprise Diet Mountain Dew that Roger had in the plane.

The plane is small, so we had to strap the two big antlers outside by the gun.

Well, hope you enjoyed that... I sure as hell did.

Oh, and this is an aerial view of where I live, taken by me, from the plane when we took off.

3,721... N.B.D.

2010-05-28T18:39:00.012-06:00

So... I am going to try this... my internet has sucked as of late, and I just haven't had a lot of time to sit down and write this, and if all goes according to plan, upload some photos for ya.

I sat in a car for a long time. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,721 miles. I drove up with some cool cats by the name of Mandy and Chris. Mandy already posted about it here.

A) Salt Lake City

B) Bend, OR
C) Portland, OR
D) Olympia, WA
E) Quesnel, BC, Canada
F) Fort Nelson, British Columbia, Canada
G) Liard Hot Springs, British Columbia, Canada
H) Teslin, Yukon Territory, Canada
I) Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, Canada
J) Tok, AK
K) Mile 228.5 Parks Highway, Alaska

We did it in 7 days, and stopped by some rad places. We saw a wolf, buffalo, caribou, moose, black bears, grizzly bears, rams, mountains, snow, trees, rivers, check engine lights, hot springs, and non-caffienated Mountain Dew (seriously Canada...WTF!). Oh yeah, and despite what you have ever heard, those Canadians are some super nice folks.

Before... Excited!

The Portland Stop:
Canada:After... Still smiling!

Now I am in Alaska, it is beautiful. Amazingly beautiful. My 10 mile commute to work is probably the most scenic commute EVER!!! We are experiencing warmer and sunnier than usual days. It has been sunny and in the 70s for the last week. I work at a coffee shop, as a barista. It is rad. Both the coffee shop and being a barista.

I live in a little 8x10ish cabin. It is pretty cozy.

The above photo is about 15 minutes from my cabin.

The days are super long. I think that I used my headlamp 3 times when we first got here, but have not used it in weeks. The sunsets are around midnight right now, but it never really gets dark. I still wake up at 4am thinking I am late for work, cause it is so light outside.

I made Jeff King a latte the other day, he has won the Iditarod 4 times. I had an autographed photo of him on my wall when I was young.

I went on a hike a couple days ago and saw 4 bears, these two were just chilling and screwing around. They would run up this snow patch, and then roll/slide/fall down it, and then they would chase each other around.

No Big Deal.

One Swell of a Time.

2010-05-14T20:38:00.011-06:00

So, a lot has happened since we last talked, but time and internet access has been a little hard to come by. I sold my car, packed my shit, and moved it to Utah.

This is all my possessions.

Just in time to go on the planned Slot Canyon trip to Southern Utah. When I originally sent the feeler email out… I expected one car full, maybe two. What went down was one hell of a time in the desert, with as many as 15 people at one point.

Group Shot. minus Mike, Jamie and Anna.

Best campsite ever

Our coat of arms.

Dream catcher backpacks.

Canyons, buttes, and mountains.

We went on a pretty fun hike, down Baptist Canyon, and up Chute. A majority of our group had never got a taste of the slot thing, and the hikes dished out plenty of scrambling, a few rappels, and some fun times.

The next day, we hiked the lower Muddy River Gorge. Needless to say, it was gorgeous. A pretty mellow hike for the group, but still, much fun was had.

Most of the group made the drive back home that night, with the core group of 5 staying. Somehow, even after the large contingent of ‘The Family that likes to Dance’ left, a dance party of enormous proportions went down. Enormous proportions.

Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like me?

With one more hike left, the 5 of us embarked on Lower Eardly Canyon on Monday. It is a canyon that I have always wanted to do, so was highly looking forward to it. After the arduous slog up, and then down into the canyon, we were experienced with a technical, fun, cold trip through the canyon. We were right on the shoulder season for hiking this canyon, and some of us were lacking the recommended wet suits, and despite some shivering, made it out alive, and no worse for the wear.

Stay tuned for the soon-to-be-published version of my voyage northward to Alaska... which is where I am at this very moment.

A Swell Video

2010-05-02T23:51:00.001-06:00

I know I owe you some posts, a lot has been going on... and time has been of the essence, but here is a video of last weekend compliments of Chase.

Doppelgangers

2010-04-17T02:24:00.005-06:00

So, I just had a couple people tell me that I look like Joe Thornton, a center for the San Jose Sharks:

Which is funny, cause in Boulder, I usually get told I look like him:
He is Trey Anastasio of Phish.

This is what I typically look like:

What do you think? Opinions please.

P.S. Click on their names for their google image search pages.

P.S.S. I may be ~~drunk~~ intoxicated right now. (Let see you use strike through text while intoxicated.)

I can read

2010-04-16T00:48:00.004-06:00

Like a teasing woman the river dawdled, meandered, surprised them with new forms, new colors, delayed and delayed and delayed the expected union of the Grand, now marked on the maps as the Colorado, at that point which on all maps was frank guesswork. (Wallace Stegner, from Beyond the Hundredth Meridian - John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West.*

I've been reading quite a bit lately. I am on my second book about the Grand Canyon since being back. (Do you think it has made a mark on me?) The latest book is about Major John Wesley Powell, and the first voyage down the Green and Colorado River, which at the time (1869), was a huge unknown. Did I mention he had one arm?

Hut Video

2010-04-15T09:46:00.003-06:00

As always, Chase waved his magic wand and a hut video appeared:

El Grande - Part 2

2010-04-09T12:10:00.019-06:00

Part 1 is here.
[Neil's note: I broke up these two posts, into the two distinctive parts of the trip. We had a personnel change, 7 people hiking out, and 3 people hiking out, and while not one part of the trip was better or worse, they were just different.]

Day eight, (continued). We say our good byes to the 7 people hiking out. And start our wait for the 3 hiking in. It's about noon. I hike up the trail a little, and meet the three coming down. The three are in for an awakening. One gets to find out he is rowing one of the boats, gets to warm up on one small rapid, and then gets to row three 8s, that day! The other two get their introduction to rafting, Grand Canyon style, on one of the biggest white water days in the canyon.

We do our introductions, hop in the boats, and are off. I throw my trust into the new captain. We scout Horn Creek Rapid, our first 8 of the day. After the scout,we head out, three boats make it through, we're fourth. We hit the big wave sideways. The right tubes lift off the water. We both throw our bodies to the high side, and miraculously the raft sits back down, still right side up, and still two men in the boat.

Scouting Horn Creek Rapid

We enter the eddy, to wait for the other two boats. I see the other boats in the eddy start to row like mad to get out, and then I see what they are chasing, David's boat comes through upside down, both of the Davids are hanging on. That is also a first ever flip for Devin's dad, with well over 30 years of experience.

We're in position to watch the last boat come through. Sure enough it is upside down, with one guy already on top of it. Luckily the rapid pushed both the boats into an eddy. We flip em back over, and get on our way. We're running late, and decide to camp at the top of the next 8, instead of running it. We sit the groover up, with a perfect view of the rapid, "cause if that doesn't scare the shit out of you, I don't know what does".

Flipping the boats back over.

Granite Camp (mile 93.8)

Day Nine, because of a shortened day eight, today will be our biggest rapid day yet. We hit Granite Rapid (an 8) first thing in the morning. We were religiously putting on the water around 8, if not a little earlier for the last week. This morning, knowing we were going to get wet out of the gate, there was an unspoken knowledge that we were just going to take our time in the morning. We push off at 9 as the sun hits the boats, after scouting the rapid one last time. We all hit the line perfect, or close to it (Devin and Beth VERY nearly got dumped out of their boat).

Next up is Hermit Rapid, another 8, and also possibly one of the funnest rapids in the canyon. A giant roller coaster wave.Devin and Beth in Hermit Rapid

Shortly thereafter is Crystal Rapid (9). Because of water levels, the only run is on the right, barely skirting the HUGE hole that eats pieces of shit like us for breakfast. We all survive.Scouting Crystal Rapid

I get behind the oars, in the rapids, for the first time. I'm hooked. Why hadn't I learned this earlier?

In total, the day closes out with 15 rapids, most of which were ranked 5 or higher. Fun, fun day.

Day ten

I row from the start of the day. I am really hooked. We have a couple small rapids, and then are going to do a short hike. Some of our boats are pulled over. We head over there.

Turns out there is a backpacker that is asking for our help. His friend sprained his ankle. They are three days over-due, and out of food, and 35 miles from the nearest trailhead. We have a satellite phone, but they don't work so well in the canyon. We scrounge up some food, take some detailed notes, push on. We find out later that night, after finally getting a hold of one of their dads, that they got flown out by helicopter later that day.

We stop for our hike, to Elves Chasm. Ahhh-mazing! Little waterfalls and ferns and pools and frogs and awesomeness. The water is a little cold, but we swim non-the-less. It's still a ton warmer than the river.

Elves Chasm

Back on the boats, and we push on. We hook two boats together, take orders, and make sandwiches while floating. We hit our expected camp, and it sucks, so we keep going. The boats spread out.

One more rapid before the next camp, Fossil Rapid (a 5). I'm still behind the oars. It doesn't look bad, a big s-curve in the river, with the rapid lasting a good half mile. I hit the first wave, the 14' boat gets turned a little (pretty common), a lateral wave coming off the rock hits the boat and turns me a little more. I hit the next wave 'not-exactly straight', or... mostly sideways. Carter gets dumped out, and I follow, with the boat coming over shortly there after. I watch the boat come over, the handle of the oar hitting me squarely in the chest. I feel like a cartoon after getting punched, my body pushed deep into the water, arms and legs trailing it. I start to resurface, it starts to get light, and then darkness. I think the boat is over me, but I don't hit anything, and then just as quick, I get pulled back down, cartwheeling under the water. It starts to get light again. I really would like a breath of air at this point. My head pops up. Yes. I look down stream, the boat is about 30 yards away, Carter is even further to the left. I swim like mad to the right shore (the inside of the next S curve). I ALMOST make it, but don't. Close only counts in horse shoes and bocce ball. I get dragged over the rocks. Keeping your feet downstream is a good idea in theory, its a little hard in reality. I see a boat coming in. I get pulled out, just as my muscles were starting to cramp up from swimming a half a mile in water in the high 40s. My boats on shore. I watch my rain jacket surface, and then float around the corner to the next rapid, never to be seen again.

We pull up onto the beach, next to my boat. I'm a little worked. My upper left chest is super stiff, but all in all, I'm no worse for the wear. Carter pulls up in another boat, his swim to the left shore was a little more successful than mine. (I later find out, after the trip, that I had, in fact, dislocated a rib.)

We right the boat, check out this camp, and it sucks too. We push on a little more. I valiantly get back behind the oars, but give them back to Carter before the last rapid of the day (he was cold still from swimming and didn't want to get wet, I didn't really care, and was maybe just a little shaken up still).

We finally pull into a sweet camp, tie up the boats, drink a beer or three, and I break out my hidden booty in the form of a three pound bag of gummy bears. You know, since I flipped the boat and all, kind of a peace offering. More bocce it played, we break one of the balls in half, and fix it with epoxy and duct tape.

Randy's Rock Camp (mile 127.0)

Day eleven. We wake up, and somehow my boat, that I know was tied up, had come untied, and went from parked dead middle of the six boats, to one of the ends. Turns out the bow line had come undone from the boat, and it floated around the other boats through the night. We're lucky it didn't make it out of the eddy and into the current.

I'm back behind the oars, but pass up the chance to run a 6 out of the gate. P5, I know. I did get a 5 or two, and a couple smaller ones that day. We hit Deubendorff Rapid (an 8, and one of the more technical rapids on the river), I'm riding with Devin, and we hit, and nail the meatiest line. Good times.

Who has two thumbs and loves this trip?
This Guy!

Our boats in the narrows.

We pass the narrowest point of the canyon, 76 feet wide and ~100 feet deep. We hit camp right after that, across from Deer Creek Falls, a 186 foot waterfall coming out of what appears to be cliff, but in fact is a slot canyon.

We ferry across the river, with two of our boats, and go hike up to the top and back into the slot. Amazing views and awesome scenery. We hike to what is known as 'the patio', a large flat rock area, surrounded by cottonwoods and a bustling little creek. We swim in the creek a little, and lounge in the sun on the rocks.

Deer Creek Falls

Looking upriver from the top of Deer Creek Falls.
You can see the narrowest part of the river.
Deer Creek Canyon

The swimming hole in Deer Creek.

Deer Creek

Not a bad patio.

Day twelve, and I get to ride with David. He guided on this river 3-4 times, back in the early 70s. Those trips had motors, and huge boats, and they didn't need to scout the rapids. We hit the ONLY rapid that he can remember from those trips. The hole at Upset Rapid (5-6) as changed a little from back then, but was still way funky, you don't want to hit it.

It's one of the chillier days on the river. But, the clouds eventually burn off. We hike a short slot canyon mid day named Matkatamiba Canyon, or Matkat. A narrow slot with a clear stream running down it.

Matkat Canyon

We camp at Ledges, named for what it looks like, a bunch of Ledges in the rock. It has a sweet trickle waterfall that falls directly into the river. I kinda took a shower in it. I also go in search of what the guide book calls an 'agave roasting pit' somewhere above camp. I don't know what an 'agave roasting pit' is, so needless to say, I don't find it.

Ledges Camp (mile 152.1)

However, I am walking along, and hear this sound. At first, I think it is one of them wily desert big horn sheep things. I hear the same sound from multiple places, Oh geez... I'm getting ambushed. BUT... from the direction of the sound, there is nowhere for them to hide, without me seeing them. In my best stalking walk that my flip flops will allow, I creep closer, with my water-proof camera case hanging at the end of a sling, that if need be, can be fashioned into some sort of whipping weapon. I round a corner and 5 frogs, one of which is albino, jumps into a small pool of water, and the sound stops. I make my way back to camp, and notice everyone looking around for what the sound was. They think sheep, but don't believe me one bit that they are frogs. I get a half of an acknowledgment when the sound continues into the night, long after the sheep's bedtime.

Returning from the hike at Ledges.

Day thirteen and we get an early start so we can hike Havasu. I've always wanted to hike this canyon with it's magically blue waters and huge waterfalls juxtaposed against the desert backdrop. This is the hike I was looking forward to the most. The sky was a little threatening at the beginning of the day, not what you really want when going into a canyon known for flash flooding, especially when you can only see a small sliver of sky.

We hiked up, in, through, and around the creek for about 3 hours till we hit Beaver Falls. We didn't make it to the huge falls, but this pool would do. We sessioned a little 10-15 foot cliff jump into the pool of blue water, and then it was time to hike back to the boats, and on for the day.

The confluence of Havasu and the Colorado.

Beaver Falls

Clay's form.

My form.

Boom.

Day fourteen and all that anyone really is thinking about is Lava Falls Rapid, the most difficult, biggest, baddest rapid in the canyon. You can hear this rapid from about half a mile up canyon, where a big volcanic plug called Vulcan's Anvil towers 50 something feet out of the middle of the river. Everyone is pretty quiet or trying to hide their nervousness to hit Lava. We pull up to scout and there is another group there scouting too. When I see the rapid, I am pretty determined that there is no f-ing way anybody can make it through. Then the Canadians go, their boats are bigger than ours, and all their passengers walk around the rapid. They all make it.

Vulcan's Anvil

Scouting Lava Falls Rapid

Then, the first three of our boats decide to go. I'm in the third boat, pretty determined I am going to end up swimming at least part of this rapid. I pull an extra inch to inch and a half out of every strap on my life jacket, and make sure everything else is tied down. The first two boats, our biggest boats, disappear around the corner, I hear a yell of encouragement, but think to myself that there should be more yells if they made it. Carter and I finally push off. He's on the oars and I'm helping to get us lined up. I don't find the fate of our first boats till we are dropping in and see them right side up at the bottom in the eddy... We stand a chance. We hit the first wave, and somehow get straight for the second and get drilled. I do a glance back and don't see Carter, then take a longer look back and see that he was knocked onto the floor of the boat. He finds the oars just in time to straighten us out for the next wave. There is a large wave at the bottom that just builds and builds and then surges and then crashes down, total luck of the draw if it crashes on you. We hit the top of one wave, and I watch the surging wave crash in front of us, sighing relief that it won't crash on us. We made it. Amazingly.

Devin hitting the first lateral in Lava.
Yeah, there's someone on the front of that boat.

David takes a very technical left route and nails it. Clay gets washed out of the 5th boat, but finishes out the rapid hanging onto the front of the boat. The last boat goes, somehow stands on one side-tube without going over, it rights itself, and no one is in the boat. It hits the next wave and somehow someones back into the boat, with the other hanging off the front. They make it the rest of the way through, without one of their oars. Everyone's on Cloud 9 or 10... Hell, we turn it up to 11... everyone's on Cloud 11!

We float on down to our next camp at Whitmore Wash (mile 188.4). It's the hottest day on the river. A couple of us hike over to some petroglyphs and maybe a pictograph or two. Bathing in the cold river water, even in the heat of the day, is a little painful.

Flowering cacti.

Petroglyphs/pictographs at Whitmore Wash.

El scorpion.

Day fifteen, started a little later than usual, we got to sleep in a little, which was Awe-some. I didn't touch the oars once. It was mainly flat water. We spotted a can bobbing in an eddy, the river gave us a PBR this time. Graced with no head winds, we pushed all the way to camp by lunch. There were some old jars you could hike to, the Barton Jars , they sucked, one literally had a piece of shit in it, and the other had a fish skull. However, I did finally find my Native American agave roasting pit, well, it was a different one, but one non-the-less.

Indian Canyon Camp (mile 207.0)

F-in star gazing club.

Day sixteen and our last full day on the river. I get my own boat today, for the most part. I row Devin's boat, while he kayaks. We hit a couple 5s, and find a cool spot to cliff jump, way high. 32-34 feet, or something. We test the water with one of our spare oars, and didn't touch anything. Devin goes first, and claims he barely touched. I am a little sketched, but just run and jump, I hit at a slight angle and didn't touch anything. Cool.

I think I had my nose plugged for at least 5 seconds before I hit the water.

We pull into camp early again, and snag THE BEST bocce ball/whiffle ball campsite EVER (Upper 120 Mile camp). We also break out all the snacks and food that we haven't touched yet. PARADISE.

We play a game of Over/Under whiffle ball. You hit the ball, and then run as many circles around your own team as possible, while the other team fields the ball, runs to the pitchers area, lines up, and passes the ball first over head, and then between the legs through the line, once it gets to the end of the line, the batter is out, and gets as many points as he made complete circles around his own team. Pretty fun.

After what ended as a tie game, we started our grand finale bocce ball tournament, complete with brackets drawn in the sand and candy mascots. Matches to 7, Double elimination. We played till it was dark, with the championship game pushed into the next morning.

We grill the largest steaks you have seen, make blueberry and peach cobbler, and attempt to make a grease bomb. I also found out that the only way peeps are somewhat edible is if you roast them over the campfire, and then eat them... DELICIOUS. We opted not to burn our "burnables", deciding we can carry that much to the take out. We sit around the fire and talk about our highs and lows of the trip, its hard to remove yourself and think back about the last 17 days and pick a particular moment.

It's one of the nicest nights of the trip, with no wind, so everyone sleeps out on a giant mega tarp.

Last day/day seventeen. We float the six miles down to Diamond Creek, our pull out. We make it there and have our boats de-rigged and ready to go by 11. We are greeted with some of the greatest tourists ever. We wait till noon for the shuttle drivers to bring the trucks down, meanwhile eating more leftover snacks.

The second half group shot.

The second tourist we saw after the take out.
The first one was even better.

We drive the hour up the dirt road to the town of Peach Springs, and say good bye to the Utah Contingent. The Colorado Crew head east, some of us stop in Moab for the night, while the others push all the way home.

That first shower was nothing short of amazing.

I've been back for a little over a week now. I just did the laundry from the trip yesterday, I had to wash it twice to get the sand out. My feet are still dry as shit, but healing, my rib is pretty much back into place, and now the goal is to land a job for Alaska (I leave in 3 weeks!).

It is still tough to look back on a high and a low for the trip. I mean, I could have done without flipping a boat, but at the same time, it was a highly comedic situation that we laughed about A LOT! There were too many great moments to pick one out as a high, and it is a little hokey to say the whole trip was the high, but it was.

It was awesome to watch the moon go through almost a complete phase, just a sliver at the beginning, all the way to a full moon at the end. The Big Dipper and Orion danced around in the sky, and it was fun to see where they were each night. You get disoriented only going down the river, and think the right side of the river is north, and the left side south, only to look at a map or the stars and see that that river goes every which way it wants.

We had awesome weather. Mostly sunny for 17 days, with 2 chilly overcast days. The high temps ranged from about low sixties, to 87 at the takeout. The lows at night never got that cold, maybe mid forties. The river was cold, but because of Glen Canyon Dam(n), that doesn't really change. Our timing was IDEAL, as you can't put a motor in the canyon till April 1st, the day after we took out, so there were no commercial trips. Good times all around.

If you EVER need a tall lanky red head to join you for your trip down the Grand, I'm in. Seriously. I would drop everything to go, hell, I already did once, why not do it again!

El Grande - Part 1

2010-04-04T17:26:00.016-06:00

It's Friday, March 12th. My last day of work. I frantically grind out the last 7 hours of my only work obligations in my foreseeable future. My bags are packed, sitting at home. Its 3:30, and having mentally checked out earlier that day, I punch the ol' time clock one last time and say my goodbyes. I got bigger fish to fry... or canyons to raft, or something like that.

The weather is nice, I load my shit into the car, put on some flip flops (for the first time of the year), and head west. The 3 hour drive to Devin's passes uneventfully, except for the shit eatin' grin plastered to my face. It feels good to not be stressing over work. I get there around 9, after grabbing a bite to eat. Everyone is amped up, and packing and repacking the coolers, trailers, and dry bags. I shove all my shit into one big yellow dry bag. I'll be living out of this for damn near three weeks.

The next morning, like a kid on Christmas morning, we all get up at the ass crack of dawn (or slightly before). We hop into the loaded trucks, pick up the few remaining people, and hit the road for Lee's Ferry. The 8 hour drive takes us through southeastern Utah, and all her majestic glory: red rock, snow-capped mountains, monuments, desert and a brisk headwind, regardless of what direction we're driving.

We cross into Arizona, my first real visit to the state (short of standing on the 4 corners, and clipping the northwest corner on I-15). We pass through the Navajo Nation, through a dust storm. The wind is non relenting. The trucks pulling the trailers are sucking the gas, as am I with Mountain Dew and junk food. As we are getting close to Lee's Ferry, it starts to sprinkle, and then some snow flurries. Seriously?! Come on...

We pass through the town of Marble, mere minutes from the Lee's Ferry boat ramp, which will be our departing point on the 226 mile, 17 day rafting trip through the Grand Canyon on the mighty Colorado River. Our plan is to rig the boats, and camp out near the boat ramp. The sun had just went down, its pissing rain, and the wind is howling. We retreat back to Marble, to look for a warm room, and possibly a warm meal. We find both. We also go through some introductions, as there are a lot of new faces.

Day One
We return to the boat ramp very early Sunday morning, the 14th, wide-eyed and bushy-tailed. We rig the shit out of the boats, have our orientation with the very serious, and slightly less than funny ranger. Sorry ma'am, but a lot of us are strangers, and its early, jokes about bowel movement regularity isn't going to be a big hit.

Lee's Ferry Boat Ramp

Finally, we push off, a little later than we expected. We leave civilization as we know it behind. No more cars, phones, email, internets, weather reports, or flushing toilets. We hit the first rapid, a mere 5 on the Grand Canyon Rapid Rating scale of 1-10. It looks huge. Wow, the 10s must be monsterous. Its a little chilly. The water is even more so.

We pull in to camp, a little shorter than we wanted. We clumsily set up the kitchen, groover (an amo-can with a toilet seat), and our tents. Dinner is magical. Everyone is still getting warmed up to each other. We wake up, our boats are beached, the fluctuating water levels caused by Glen Canyon Dam have left us high and dry. We pack up camp, hoping to have the water level come back up. It doesn't. Lesson learned.

Day Two
We hit our first big rapid today, House Rock Rapid, a 7. We pull out to the left to scout. Four boats make it through. We're the fifth. We flip. Under the water is calm, and slow motion. I pop up to the surface, getting ready to hit the big wave. It looks huge from my perspective. After the wave, I turn around and swim to our upside-down boat. I hear the other two guys from the other side. Our other boats come out of the eddy to pull us to the shore. We flip the boat back. And shiver on the shore.

We're into the "Roaring Twenties", a fun stretch of rapids, packed one after the other. I am very nearly thrown out of the boat at Twenty Three Mile Rapid, also called Indian Dick Rapid. The rest of the day is fun and uneventful. A fun hike, and the nightly tradition of burning all of our 'burnables' close out the day. (burnables = anything that burns... plastic, paper, food, etc)

Now you see us:

Now you don't!

Even two days in, the task of setting up and taking down camp is flowing smoother. By the end of the trip, it is like a well oiled machine.

Shinumo Canyon Camp (Mile 29.5)

Day three, is mostly flat water, we are trying to grind out a long day, in order to have a lay-over day. We stop at the Redwall Cavern. John Wesley Powell estimated it could hold 50,000, but probably more like 10,000 realistically. We grind out the rest of the scenic miles, logging our daily trip record of 24 miles. The scenery was amazing, and the weather was great.

Redwall Cavern

I read it takes seven minutes to cool a beer to water temp.

The High Life.

Day four, layover day, and we get in our first real hike. Up to the Nankoweap Granaries, ancient grain storage 'bins', built high up at the base of the cliffs. We also try to filter some water. The spring runoff from the snow clearly visible from near the rim has made all the tributaries very silty. We get about 25 gallons, and call it good, not wanting to fry the filter so early in the trip.

The classic river photo from the granaries.

Lower Nankoweep Camp (Mile 53.5)

Layover day is also St. Patricks day. We celebrate. I try to spray Devin with a squirt gun. He throws me in the river. My second bath of the day, my camera's first. (Luckily, it worked later).

Day five takes us down the river to Carbon Canyon. We hike a sweet little side canyon. A wide, non-technical slot canyon with a little scrambling over rocks. There is a cool little stream of water meandering down the middle.

Carbon Canyon

Top of Carbon Canyon

Carbon Camp (Mile 65.1)

Day six and I run into a familiar face while on a short hike and scout at Unkar rapid, Jessica 's cousin Lindsay. Kinda funny running into someone I know, in the middle of the Grand Canyon, where only roughly 32 people a day start trips at this time of year. We get another short hike up a slot-ish type canyon. I also play bocce ball for the first time ever.

A Bud Light given to me by the River.

75 Mile Canyon

Bocce ball on the beach.

Day seven and we're back into some big rapids. Two of the guys get dump-trucked out of their boat at Hance Rapid, but are able to climb (like spider monkeys) back into the boat pretty quick. Another one of the guys dislocates his finger, badly, while scouting a rapid. That schist is slick. We have an EMT on the trip, and she resets it. We are within a day of Phantom Ranch, which has phones, rangers and medical help. The rest of the days rapids where fun, and with 6 of our crew hiking out the next day, the dislocated finger put a damper on the day.

Scouting Hance Rapid, the most technical in the canyon.

We camp right above Phantom Ranch, and send some people down with the injury to get it looked at. The guy with the dislocated finger is also one of our boatmen. Luckily, one of the guys coming in the next day has some experience. We have a fun night in camp, cause for 7, it is their last.

The Groover Tent.

Flag/Cape: That's how I roll.

Burnin' the "Burnables".

Cremation Camp (Mile 87.7)

Day eight and we float a mile to Phantom, and we fill the water, abuse the flush toilets, buy some ice for the coolers, and some pay too much for candy, while other's call home. We float another mile to Pipe Creek, the exchange point for the 3 hikers coming in, and the 7 going home. The 7 leaving are sad to go. The 3 coming in don't know what they are in store for, today is one of the biggest days, as far as rapids go.

(To be Continued)

Also, some of the above photos were taken by Devin's awesome boss, Shannon Murphy.

HADOOUKENN!

2010-04-03T18:45:00.003-06:00

Another Grand Canyon teaser shot.

I ninja kicked the rim of the Grand Canyon.

Good thing I had my nose plugged thirty something feet from the water.

El Grande

2010-03-31T20:27:00.001-06:00

I'm back.

Flushing toilets and showers ROCK!

As does the Grand Canyon.

ONE AND DONE....

2010-03-11T23:58:00.004-07:00

First, click HERE to play the song for my last day of work. What a long, strange trip it's been... or something.

Well, on to the next chapter...

Chances are I am going to be slammed tomorrow at work... And if you haven't been following closely enough to my Diabolical Plan... I leave for Devin's house tomorrow night, we drive to Lee's Ferry near Glen Canyon Dam, and we raft the Colorado River thru the Grand Canyon for the next 18ish days. So... chances are VERY likely that I will not be posting, answering emails, phone calls, or text messages till on or around the 1st of April.

When I get a little time in April, I will probably do:
A) A write-up on the Grand Canyon
B) A little post about my previous work experience with photos
C) Pack and move
D) Go on a canyon trip to So. UT
E) Go to AK

Feel free to add more things I should do in April in the comments.

Two...

2010-03-11T00:01:00.004-07:00

Yep, the end is near...
I'm getting a lot of paper cuts these days going thru old drawing sets.

Three...

2010-03-10T11:26:00.005-07:00

Right now, my mind looks something like this:Well put together, with just a slight bit of disorganization.
Such is life.
Three to go.
(Actually two and a half... but who's counting?

Three.five...

2010-03-09T13:32:00.002-07:00

Creepy...

I just found this feature on my camera phone... Weird.

Four...

2010-03-08T22:54:00.006-07:00

Four days left...Oh... and BTW... you probably shouldn't google image search "four" in public.
Good to know.

On a better note, John Denver could SHRED:

Another flashback of the hut trip, courtesy of Chase:

Five...

2010-03-07T21:46:00.002-07:00

Five days...
A haiku by me.

My name is Neil.
I've got five days left of work.
Counting the minutes.

Fortunes

2010-03-05T14:01:00.002-07:00

I ate four fortune cookies the other day. I know the picture sucks, but it'll have to do.
Cause I am in control of this blog.
They pretty much confirmed I have made the right decision.

Fortune 1: You will soon be crossing warm waters for a fun vacation.
That's right... leaving for the river (Grand Canyon) in one weeks time. The water will be a warm 45ish degrees when we put in. Nailed it.

Fortune 2: You will take a chance in the near future and win.
I already feel like I have won. 5 days, and 3 hours left of work... suckers!

Fortune 3: You will have good luck in personal affairs.
Fingers are crossed... rabbit's foot is in the pocket.

Fortune 4: You have an active mind and a keen imagination.
I like bright shinny things... and mountains.

The Trip Known as Hut-tacular Twenty Ten (oh10).

2010-03-03T11:44:00.020-07:00

This post is gonna be a long one, as it was purty, and I like mountains, and thus, I have lots of photos.

So last Thursday (the 25th), we embarked on the annual hut trip to the Treasure Mountain Hut, Deep inside the San Juan Mountains, (my favorite mountains... ever). The group was highly modified this year... maybe because of the economy, jobs, and/or loss of interest.
From left to right: Me (6th yr vet), Chase (4th yr), Quin (1st yr), Jentry (1st yr), Matt (1st yr), Scotty (3rd yr), and Jason (6th yr). Those most noticeably missing from the trip where Andrew, Jack, and Myke.

The San Juans had got somewhere between 36-48 inches of snow the weekend before the trip. That combined with nukin' winds, there had been a massive natural avalanche cycle. It was pretty impressive to say the least. Nearly every avy path we saw on the way had slid. We all knew we were going to have to be super careful.

This is the first path that we crossed.

Luckily, a snow cat had plowed thru this one. Unluckily, it stopped shortly after that. We had planned to take one snowmobile pulling a sled with a lot of food and gear. Yeah... we could only get that about half a mile from the parking area because of all the slide debris on the road.

Needless to say, we had to carry or pull ALL our food. Food that we thought was going to get pulled in. Heavy food. Like... a 7 pound ham, steaks for fajitas, 6 pounds of chicken, avocados, huge blocks of cheese, etc. Yeah... that sucked.

We still pulled the sled in... it took 4-5 people on the steep cross slopes.
Teamwork!
Lots of cool old mining stuff is everywhere in these mountains. Those miners were hard asses. If you ever get the chance you should take a look at Living (and dying) in Avalanche Country. It is about this area, and talks a lot of these miners, who often mined year round! I like the old bridge hanging in the bottom of this photo.

And the huge pile of avalanche debris in the gully on this one:
(which was a common site on the way in)

We finally started gaining some elevation, as the sun was starting to make its way down. It was slow going with a 60+ pound pack on.

Ironically, the temperature dropped dramatically very close to when we passed this sign:A storm also moved in and started snowing and blowing snow. We dropped the sled close to here, trying to make one last quick push to the hut. We would come back for it in the morning.

A complementary shot where I am pretending to enjoy having a heavy pack on.
We made it to the hut, thru the blizzard, after dark. Only to find that we did not have any propane to cook food. We cooked (slowly) on the wood-burning stove that night. Everyone was worked from the hike in.

But alas... we woke up to a bluebird day!

En route to go ski, we found the propane, hidden on the downhill side of the sauna, behind a snowdrift. That was a PERFECTLY logical place for it to be. (Please note the sarcasm)
Shortly after the above photo was taken, we triggered our first avalanche. (yeah, I said our 'first')

Below is the crown of said avalanche. You can see our tracks, and where we were standing when it started on the left of the photo. One of our group was further out, and grabbed onto a tree to avoid going for a ride. Bad news bears!

This is looking at a small debris pile that stopped early, before going over the next roll-over. (taken from the same spot as the crown photo above.)

It is hard to say, as I couldn't see the whole width of the crown, but we think it pulled out 200' wide, between 1-4 feet deep, and ran pretty much full track (800-1000 vertical feet).

Here is a shot from near the bottom of the slide, taken a day later.
The crown is evident at the top of the slope.

This is a photo, from the hut, of our tracks.
We were standing on the right, at the end of our tracks, kinda by the trees when it slid.

Well, after triggering that, we decided to use that as a learning experience, and to head back to the hut, and then go get the sled that we had abandoned the night before.

Well... after hiking from the hut, we took off our skins, and decided to ski a very mellow pitch to some trees, then to the road, to skier's right of another rollover. As the third skier went past the trees, he remotely triggered this slide, which propagated up and included the whole roll-over.

You can see the crown below, in the bottom center of the photo.

Two folks were standing in a safe area by the mining structures near the bottom of the slide. One was sort of filming from above on a rock, and then three of us were on the very right edge of that photo waiting to go.

The three of us standing above couldn't see the slide go, but heard/and felt the collapse. All three of us spun around, thinking that a slide was coming from above us. Once realizing nothing was coming for us, we looked back down hill, and saw the powder cloud of the slide. Chase relayed that all was safe. The three of us up top decided to head back to the hut to shovel everything out. While the other four would VERY carefully go down and retrieve the sled.

A nice little profile of the hut.

Rocking chairs, huts, scenery, and a good book...
Feeding time.

I seem to always gain more weight on these trips... this is why!

We all started getting cabin fever, so we went to a small peak that evening for something to do.

Setting sun... and rising moon.

Here is a view of the shitter.
(Please note that there is no door.)

That wasn't really a problem, as the view from the throne was about equivalent to this:L-E-G-E-N-D-A-R-Y!

Friday night, we had a Ping Pong tournament.

Won by The Ping Pong Wizard:

He was not a deaf, dumb, or blind kid, but he still played a mean ping pong ball.

Saturday, some of the group wanted to fashion some kind of bomb, to dislodge a cornice, and cause another avalanche. Of course it didn't work.

On the way back, four of us did a little snow pit practice, only to find that the snow was unstable. (Surprise!)

The same four decided to go check out the trees below the hut, thinking we would turn around if it got sketch at all. It didn't, and was actually pretty fun. Tons of little fun things to jump off of and what-nots.

The exploratory four consisted of green jackets, and me (gray jacket).
We went back and got everyone else for a second run. This is us after the run, skinnin' the skis, getting ready for the most horrible skin track ever.

This is Jason, and he approves this message... and view.

Say cheese!

Mmm.... this view would NEVER get old:

Here is part of the Treasure Mountain Mine remains. Pretty cool.

And then... the way home.

Sorry for a rather picture heavy post.
(Especially if it took, "like an hour to load, cause [your] computer blo-hoes!")

We only got 2 real runs in all trip, but still had a great time. Already counting the days till 2011, we're thinking somewhere in the Sawtooth range in Idaho.

On another note, only 1.5 weeks before work is over, and the Grand Canyon! Yay!

I know Han Solo

2010-03-02T10:58:00.000-07:00

Hut Teaser Videos

2010-03-01T20:24:00.002-07:00

Just got home from the Treasure Mountain Hut this afternoon, thought I would leave you two videos of what I had to look at for the last 4 days. It was rough.

This second one may have a little wind noise... adjust speakers accordingly.
And sorry for the labored breathing, the hut was at 12,000 feet. 12,000 feet.
Doing anything made me short of breath.

And so it begins...

2010-02-22T14:30:00.008-07:00

Well... Today is the day my friends... I launched my diabolical plan into motion... I officially put in my 3 week notice here at work. It was one of the hardest things I've ever done. (That's what she said.) But seriously... I've never quit before. Officially my last day will be March 12th.

"What's on tap?" you ask.

Well, starting this Thursday, I will be here for the annual mancation:

I will return bright and early next week, grind out the last two weeks of work, and then raft the Grand F-ing Canyon from March 14th-April 1st.
And from there, I have a month to get my shit together, move, and then...wait for it... wait for it...
Yep... gonna go to Alaska!
Denali to be exact.
You can read about my previous Alaska voyage in August of '008 here:
Preface: W.H.O.A.
Preview: An Appitizer. If you will...
Chapter 1: Welcome to Alaska!
Chapter 2: HOTLASKA
Chapter 3: Fresh Air and Farewells

If nothing else... you should read Chapter 2. I'm not trying to blow air up my own skirt, but that there is some of my best work.

Marble

2010-02-08T23:50:00.003-07:00

Well, I wanted to go on some sort of mini vacation the other day, so I rang up Devin and invited myself over to Carbondale for the weekend to catch up and hopefully do a little backcountry riding. Cruised over on Saturday, and stopped at Beaver Creek on the way.

The snow here in the CO has sucked a little this year. It was snowing pretty good at Beaver Creek, but I stayed mainly on the groomers. Somehow I timed my runs wrong and missed out on the fresh baked chocolate chip cookies that Beaver Creek prides itself on.

Finished off the rest of the drive, hung out with Dev and his family, had some burgers with some of their friends, and maybe drank a Mountain Dew and/or beer. I hadn't seen Devin's little boy Ethan for at least a year or so, he is a little over 3, and quite a bit bigger. I taught him to call Devin "Old Man".

We woke up at around 6:30 to eat some breakfast and head over to Marble, CO to see if we could get a run in. We had a pretty good group of 5. There was about 8-12 inches of light freshies, and surprisingly stable snow underneath.
We got us a fun little 2,500 foot north-northeast facing run. Face shots galore. Snowing the whole time. I think I could easily say that was the best run of the year so far. And to top it off, Elise (Devin's wife) had made a batch of her famous chocolate chip cookies while we were gone. Score!

Good times... just what the doctor ordered!

UGHHH!

2010-02-05T14:35:00.003-07:00

So, I have to write a report for work. Despite what you may believe as me liking to write, with this here blog and all... is that I HATE to write. Now, I don't mind writing about something I did, or making smart ass comments about something, or rambling on and on and on and on about some random bike race or delicious breakfast burrito; but put me in front of a computer and tell me to write some sort of formatted report, and BAM, the wind disappears from my sails.

I have somehow (don't ask me how) eeked out about 8 pages in this report, on this project that started somewhere around the middle of '008. How I remember that far back is amazing to me. I am at the point, and have been at this point since December, were I would like my boss to read and review this said report, cause I feel stuck, and don't know how to finish it. Do you think I would be able to get his attention long enough to read 8-10 pages? Which is really pushing it, cause I cheated and added purty pictures, like these:
Well, the answer is no... I can't get his attention. I get "Just write, it is easier to edit than to write from scratch." Now, I am no genius, but am I now asking him to edit what I have done? That is where I am confused.

To help defend myself, I have never done one of these reports, nor did I learn how to do one in school, and I think the last English/writing class I took was English 2010, in the fall of '98... yeah, that's right, IN THE 1900s! I asked for an example that I could review "We don't really have anything similar."

And he just told me, in the last 10 minutes "Tell them what you want to tell them, and then tell them what you told them." WTF does that even mean?

This was s'posed to be due today, no scratch that, before Christmas. Am I gonna finish it? Nope. Maybe Monday. Their meeting is Monday night. You know what Mr. Bossman also asked today? "Is anyone going to review that before you send it out?" And he wonders why I just laugh at some of the stuff he says now-a-days.

Better news, I am volunteering for the annual Boulder Mountainbike Alliance Banquet tonight. Which means I am going to be drinking free beer, Yay! Also... goin shredding with the Ol' Man Dev this weekend.

In other news, The Diabolical Plan is moving along nicely. Still to early to post the details on the internets, I do, however, ask those of you that I may have leaked it to, to act like Built to Spill and keep it a like secret.

Whoa.... gnarly!

2010-02-03T13:02:00.003-07:00

So... I've been wondering around lost for a while... still enjoying things, but bummed out a lot. In the last week, and more importantly today, I think I may have figured something out. I can't say what it is right now... but I think it is going to be rad! To the max!

P.S. Aren't you glad I posted something new so that creepy unicorn guy isn't the first thing you see anymore?

In Keeping with the Unicorn Theme

2010-01-24T15:13:00.002-07:00

Went to the mountains this weekend, and during an awesome party game utilizing slap bracelets and adult beverages that should for future reference be referred to as Dragon Fisting, well, somehow I used one of them Apple Phones and found this gem:

I also had a contest with someone with one of them there smart phones, in which we were talking about that old rollerblade movie. I told them I could find the name of the movie faster, so I texted Andrew. I totally won. Thanks Drew!

WWUD?

2010-01-20T14:18:00.005-07:00

I am pretty dang sure that this is what the internets were made for!Click on the photo to play for yourself.

I won't go into detail about how long it took me to get "Impale evil things".

The Treasure

2010-01-05T10:00:00.002-07:00

It's funny that pirates were always going around searching for treasure, and they never realized that the real treasure was the fond memories they were creating along the way.

I don't know who actually said this... but since it involves piracy, I don't need to give them credit.

Closing out the Year

2010-01-01T12:00:00.002-07:00

Well, I know this is making its appearance on the webs a little late, I am going to use the power of time travel to make it appear that it snuck in right before the new year. I am also going to use the Power of Miss Merriam Webster and make 'snuck' a proper word.

First off, I would like to say how hard of a life I've had being the cutest one in my family.
It is hard growing up with a younger sister (middle) who's a cry baby, and an older sister (far right) who is challenged enough that she can't even put her Care Bears shirt on the right way. Bless their hearts... I still love em to death though.

Well... my mom came into town the first weekend of December, just in time to watch my last cyclocross race of the year. And of course, it was snowy and cold, but way fun. Any race that has a drum line is cool in my books, and then if you get a course that the roadies complain is to technical, it makes it that much more fun (or funner).

I ran up some hills...

Then immediately rode down them...
Rode around in the circle-o-death until I got dizzy, made a hard turn, and then rode out.
And almost tripped over barriers. For a funny clip of bloopers from the race, you should click here.

The next morning, after some drunk speed scrabble at my sister's place (and my mom's introduction to an Irish car bomb), we woke up and went for a run.

She is retiring at the young age of 55 and thinking about moving to Boulder. She got a pine cone as a souvenir.
That same day I had a park grand opening. In the snow. I think it was 8 degrees... MAYBE.

But the neighborhood was out in full force.

They've been waiting on this park opening for a good 6 months, and thru a handful of blunders during construction, they FINALLY got their park.

You can tell its in Boulder because there are dogs helping to cut the ribbon.

My mom enjoyed what some people would call a slide, but in the biz, is referred to as a glider.

A few more ho-hum weeks went buy, I think one of which involved vodka infused gummy bears (trust me... not as cool as it sounds).

Sooner, rather than later, I found myself driving home to Utah for the holiday known as Christmas. Due to the current state of the economy, I would find myself with a whole week and a half off. Fine with me.

The holiday started off with Christmas itself. My mom and I did the whole presents, breakfast, dinner, and cookie making thing. It was fun.

Next up was Coed Yurt Trip '009. There was a string of last second flakes, but a core group of 7 made the trek up to the yurt...

Which, upon closer inspection, we found it was a brand new yurt!

It also now had a doorknob!

I also found out the next morning that they had moved the tarp structure that could be called an outhouse. One of these years I am not going to have to break trail to the office. At least this time, it wasn't dark and I wasn't in a hurry.

I think this may be the first trip ever, where it was a little sausage lite. For good measure, we brought more, in which Jason struggles to handle.

Jason shows us how to mash on the little strings, and how his jacket brings out the color of his eyes.

The snow could have been deeper, and the trip could have included Andrew and/or Jack (well, first and foremost we wanted Andrew along, Jack would have been an added bonus, like the shitty toy you get in a happy meal). Where was I, I kinda got distracted. Well, the group of 7, made do with what we had, and had a good time.

I really like this photo Anna took of me and Jason hiking for some reason.

She did well with the rest of the photos too.

Some people would like to hear that I made my first dedicated powder turns on my splitboard in ski mode on this trip. I was actually feeling super confident on the ol' two plankers, up until about half way out of the yurt. Whereas the low snow amounts made the ride out more of a derby than usual. Needless to say, I fell a couple times, swore a couple more times, and then switched the f-ers back to a snowboard and road the rest of the way out.

After a few late nights, Ol' Ma Nature made me a little surprise visit and left me some powder to plunder. Courtesy of my hero Jason, I had the opportunity to shred for 3 days at the wondrous UT ski areas of Snowbird and Brighton at a bare minimum of cost. Brighton would end up edging out the Bird for the fun factor, while the Bird narrowly pulled ahead on the last day in the powder department.

The highlight of the trip is when, on the first day of resort riding, Erica slammed her boot lace into the latch of the rear door on the Xterra. I am pretty sure she did it on purpose. That damn shoe lace nearly took the mighty SUV out of commission. I f-ed with it (the door) for a good 3-4 hours, we called a lock smith the next day and he f-ed with it for an hour or two, and on the third day, we took it to the dealership in which for $60 and 1.5 hours time, the 'techs' freed the door of the hell-ridden shoe lace at last. Yep... good times.

That was just in time to make it home, get all dolled up and head out to celebrate the New Year. What a time. I think that was the third year in a row that I celebrated the new year with sub-par DJing at the Urban Lounge. Regardless, much fun was had.

Utah tends to steal a little of my heart each and every time I go out there... Fun times are had, good friends are rad, new crushes are developed, old ones are rekindled, beer goes down like water (or tastes like it). It makes it hard to come back to Colorado sometimes, I'll say that much.

Till laters my friends... thanks for readin.

Funny Story

2009-12-10T13:07:00.001-07:00

So, this is going a little, to the flight home from the Thanksgiving trip to the DC to be exact, but I thought it was funny enough to tell. (I've actually been meaning to tell the story for a while.)

So, I flew on Southwest, out of the DC, to Chicago-Midway for a small layover. While in Chicago, I did the standard people watching procedure, which is mandatory at an airport. I also scanned the gate area of my flight, as everyone does, to see who I would be flying with.

As is completely natural, I picked out one person out of everyone that I would prefer NOT to sit by. He strolled up to the gate, I would say late 40s-early 50s, with his sunglasses on (remember, we are still inside), with a beer in his hand, and this hat on:

(Apparently there is a whole website devoted to white dudes in Kangol Hats)

Literally, it was a train wreck. I could not look away.

I thought I was in the clear, since I had an early boarding pass (Southwest boards 'first come-first serve' style), and I scored a front row seat. Usually this is a safe bet, because the overhead compartments fill up fast, and you can't have stuff by your feet, so by the time the middle seats are getting taken up, there is not room for bags above, so the people move to the back.

This however was NOT the case for Mr. Mid-Life McCrisis. He plopped right down in the middle seat.

The other lady in my row and I had even strategized how to prevent anyone from sitting next to us, and I suggested we both wear swine flu masks. Which I wish we would have had. Next time.

Oh well... I put my headphones in, and started reading some random story in Outside Magazine. A RANDOM STORY in there, NOT PERTAINING TO BIKES IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM. We are getting ready to taxi to take off, and he says, "Do you mountain bike?"

Oh shit, how did he know this? Seriously?!! I did a quick run through of my clothing and everything I had in my hands, and NOTHING suggested I mountain bike. I mumbled a "Yeah" in response. I know what you are saying... 'All I ever talk about is biking, why would I not want to talk to someone about biking?' Well, I just didn't, not with this guy at least. Hope I am not coming off as an elitist.

He asked the question I hate, "What kind of bike do you have?" You see... all this really is to a lot of people, is a way to say 'my bike is better than your bike'. A lot of folks do the standard, Lance has rode around France for a number for years and won a few races on a Trek, so Trek's are the greatest thing since ice cream.

I told him what I ride, and he tells me that I need to get a Moots. He has one, and it rocks. You see... Moots is a more-or-less custom frame builder out of Steamboat Springs, Colorado. I would love to ride a custom frame at some point or another, but at this point in my life, I can't shell out enough bills for a bike like that. But he bought his used in Chicago, "couldn't have got a better fit if [he] would have ordered it [himself]."

"You gotta get a Moots!"

He asks me what I do for work, and I return the question out of courtesy. He is in the 'eyeglass business', in a small Colorado town. (He then named all the designer brands he represents or whatever it is you do when you are in the 'eye glass' business.)

Well, at this point, we were at cruising altitude and I could turn back on my ipod. My savior.

Soon enough though, the flight attendant came around, wanting our drink order. He ordered a beer of some sorts, the flight attendant asked him for some type of credit card, and this my friends, is where his true colors shine through.

He pulls out a large wad of hundreds... yes, VERY LARGE, all hundreds!
It was maybe half to 3/4 the size of the above photo. But I estimate it was at least 10 grand. And then after he pulls the rubber band off of it, and thumbs through it, he says "What, you don't take cash?"

Something else I tell you.

He then pulls out his wallet, which was full of twenty's and try's to hand the flight attendant a 10.

She caught me shaking my head and gave me a knowing glance when Money Wad wasn't looking.

So, back to the ipod for a while. The guy was scaring me. He would sit there for a while, with his head in his hands, and then all of the sudden, jump up and try to use the bathroom in the front of the plane. He did that twice.

Then he disappeared into the back of the plane somewhere. This was a completely full flight. Not an empty seat. And I would turn around and couldn't see him anywhere. Weirdtown.

He finally are ready for our final approach, he retakes his seat, makes a comment that "That's a war we aren't going to win" in reference to the Afghanistan article I was reading in Outside. We land, and depart. Last word he says to me... "You gotta get a Moots." Yeah dude, whatever.

Thanksgiving 009

2009-12-03T18:14:00.007-07:00

Well, as most of you know that read this, last week was Thanksgiving. And, as some of you know that read this, a large contingent of Utah peeps used to go to The Nation's capital to celebrate it. Well, this year, everyone turned their P knob to 5 and bailed. All that is, except for me, and the those currently living in DC.

My journey started out early Thanksgiving morning. Everything went off without a hitch. Well, besides the part of the trip when I got on the plane, which I thought was headed to Chicago for a layover, but suddenly everyone was talking about going to St. Louis. I felt like that kid that walked into the wrong classroom on the first day at school. Turns out, Southwest just doesn't tell you that your plane is stopping somewhere, unless you actually have to get off the plane. In my case, I had to go to St. Louis, stay on the plane, and then take off again and go to Chicago. Sneaky sneaky. I wasn't complaining though, as you got a free drink per flight since it was Thanksgiving.
Needless to say, the rest went off without a hitch. I landed in DC, Andrew picked me up, and we cruised down to their hood.

When the time was right, we rode our bikes in the rain to the Pharmacy Bar for a more subdued version of last year. Yeah, if last year was the lion, then this year was the lamb. Completely different, but equally good.

Friday, we got our grub on. It entailed riding the bikes down to the DC Whole Foods, who ,I am pretty determined, is making an incredible effort to not inform the customer of an actual price on ANYTHING in the store.

Dinner was prepped, beer was drank, tables were set:Funny missionary photos were looked at,
Food was eaten, and needless to say,
Dr. Mario was played.
Saturday found us at the National Arboretum
You know, pushing our bikes across some grass,

Playing some frisbee while simultaneously kicking a soccer ball. Which we later we found out that fun was illegal in the arboretum.

Sunday woke up as a fantastically beautiful day. Catherine and I decided to ambitiously walk to the Farmers Market where Andrew was working. From there, we walked down the Rock Creek Parkway, past Watergate, past the Mall, past the White House, past ALL OF THE D.C. and then FINALLY to eat. I just mapped it, and it was plus or minus 6.91 miles. I think I consumed 2 coffees, one pack of gummy bears, and one Mountain Dew on the voyage. And I can honestly say that is the farthest I have knowingly walking in my Chuck Taylor's.

Here are some photos of from the journey:

Apparently you can't zombie run with scissor arms around the memorials.

I have always liked the FDR memorial.
He seemed like he had his shit together.
Monday rained, so we went and saw Pirate Radio. Good Stuff.
Then I flew home on Tuesday.

I forgot to mention that there was multiple Big Bear coffee/breakfast sandwich stops. My favorite was when Christy was workin it. There was also a small Big Bear Party, no dancing on the tables, but there was Big Bear Bombs performed.

Golden Cross

2009-11-22T17:54:00.010-07:00

Huh... Another 'Cross race on the blog... Weird.

This time in Golden. And as is S.O.P. this year, there was some mud involved.

This may be ONE of the reasons I love cyclocross.

Yeah, I pretty much always want to throw up during,
and immediately thereafter a race.

Highlight of the race was taking a beer hand-up from a friend and taking a huge chug, RIGHT in front of the Race Official, and watching him laugh.

P.S. Don't worry, there is only one more weekend left of racing.

Hipsters discussing Cyclocross

2009-11-17T12:59:00.000-07:00

Wednesday Worlds

2009-11-12T13:46:00.006-07:00

So, Wednesdays during cycling season, usually mean some kind of fun group hammerfest, often involving friends, the pain cave, crossed-eyes, two wheels, and fun. During the summer, it is the weekly short track racing on Wednesday evenings, during the fall, it is the Cyclocross rides in the mornings. The caliber of rider that resides, or passes through Boulder usually make these pretty highly competitive, intense, and fun, and as such it gets the designation as Wednesday Worlds.
This photo was recently stolen from THIS ARTICLE, at the beginning of this week's Wednesday Worlds. I happened to make it into both of the photos in the article. Yay!

The second photo is HERE, and aptly labeled as "Rubin' is racin'!" and if you know me... I like my rubbin'. Err... I mean racin'.

Big gulps, eh? Well... see ya later.

Eleven

2009-11-10T14:32:00.003-07:00

Never EVER give yourself the reason later in life to say: "It's unfortunate that youth is wasted on the young."
You hardly ever regret a road trip (or trip) you go on. But you ALWAYS regret the ones you don't go on.
The hardest things to acquire are the most rewarding. But, that's not to say that things that come easy shouldn't be appreciated.
Sometimes you need to slow down to really appreciate things. You would be amazed at how much more you see from the seat of your bike, rather than the seat of a car. And I guess along those same lines, on your own feet rather than on a bike (but what fun would that be).
Don't always accept what someone tells you as the truth.
Friends and family and bikes will be there in times of need, work won't.
When in doubt... Smile.
Getting all pissy when you are stressed isn't going to help solve the problem.
Sometimes it helps things to try and see things from the other's perspective. USUALLY they have some reason for their decision, although sometimes they're just dumb.
Remember that freedom and fun that you experienced when you discovered the bike when you were a child? Trust me, it's still there. (Yes, even when you are racing in a taped off course.)
Breathe!

The Dirty Thirty

2009-11-09T22:57:00.008-07:00

So, Saturday, November the 7th, was what some would call my birthday. My THIRTIETH birthday. This just in... I'm old.

And so it goes.

Well, I woke up to a beautiful sunny Colorado day, went to breakfast, and got my shit together to... yeah, you guessed it... head to the races. This race was at some private school, east of town, and thusly named Schoolyard Cross.

When I got out to the race, the pro men were racing, and the first dude I saw was COMPLETELY covered in mud. I was utterly dumbfounded. We hadn't got ANY weather since that 24" snow storm a week and a half before. Well, turns out they took a low spot on the course, and made a mud pit. And it just so happened the first guy I saw racing had wrecked in said mud pit. Pretty funny.

I paid my money, and got on the bike to do some recon on the mud pit. It wasn't too bad, more or less just a straight shot, but they kept putting more water on it between laps, so the conditions were unpredictable at best. The rest of the course was fun, fast, and twisty... just how I like it.

After a faster/sketchier than I'd like start (hopefully that's me just being a little gun shy from the wreck from last week, and not my age), we made it to the mud pit, when the dude in front of me decided to get into the fencing a little, and stop in the pit. Needless to say, I slid into him pretty hard. I stayed up, he didn't, proof below:

(I think I need to say photos courtesy of www.photo-cycle.com)

Well, I am glad I didn't get ejected into that dank mess. But I did lose about 20 places in the mix-up, and when you haven't really been training, at all, them there spots are hard to get back.

The cool thing about being 10-15 miles east of Boulder is the awesome back drop.

Needles to say I made some turns:
Jumped off, and then back on my bike a few times:

And really got pretty diiiiirrrrrtttttyyyy.

And guess what place I took.... Yep the big number THIRTY!
Coincidence... I don't think so!

Pretty good way to break in a completely new drive train...
Don't ya think?

Next, the plan was to hurry home, shower, and head out to the birthday dinner. Upon returning to mi casa, I discovered my awesome roommate had bought and hid 30 Mountain Dews. It was like Easter, but eleventy billion times better!

I've only found about 26 or 27 so far.

A big group of us went out for some eats and libations.
During which I was gifted this:
In case you can't read, its a Candy Corn Soda.
It tastes EXACTLY like Candy Corn Soda.

More drinks followed, which may or may not have been concocted using said Candy Corn Soda (thanks goes out to the accommodating bartenders). I think I had a Candy Corn Soda and Rum, a Candy Corn Soda shot, and a Candy Corn Soda and Vanilla Vodka. Good times were had!

Oh, and I almost forgot, I also was made aware of the fact that one of my friends whom I've rode with throughout the summer, played Vicki, the robot, on Small Wonder. No joke!

Hallo-weenie

2009-11-02T18:46:00.005-07:00

The Big Races were in town this weekend, and with a foot and a half of snow falling on Wednesday and Thursday, it looked like we were finally going to get some good 'cross weather. I only signed up for Saturday's race, which looked like it was going to be a mud bath, and despite the suns honest effort to dry everything out, the course did not disappoint. My luck, on the other hand, decided to take Halloween off.
Mere seconds after this photo was taken at the start of the race (I'm on the far right), one of them MFers in front of me took me out. It's funny looking at this photo and seeing how much room I have over there, and then to get pinched off on that same side moments later. Needless to say, I hit the tarmac at a brisk 24 mph (according to my little computer), and 4 or 9 guys hit in to me.

I scraped myself up, straightened my handlebars, fixed what a could of the bike, and set out for the group, about a minute back. My front wheel was bent, and was rubbing the whole time, but I still got to play in the mud.

The Pain Cave:

And then, mere seconds after this photo was taken:Catastrophe struck again.

I am pretty sure that is NOT what it is supposed to look like.
That was with 1/2 lap to go. Bummer.

Turned out to be an expensive Halloween.
Fun non-the-less though.

Guns Blazin'

2009-10-25T22:28:00.004-06:00

Epic. That describes what real 'cross racin should be like. For the second time this season, adverse conditions hit the area. Snow, cold, and plenty of mud and sand were dished out at the race. Unluckily the snow stopped, about 10 minutes before our race.

They did the call ups, and I got a decent second row position. The whistle goes off and I work up to about 6th or 7th when the race hits the mud. Sick of getting hit in the face with mud, I immediately attacked, still on the start stretch and picked off everyone but my buddy that was in first. We rode like that, till the sand run-up (which really really sucked), where, in a moment of glory, with all my guns blazin', I charged to the head of the pack to take a significant lead for the rest of the first lap. (See picture)

It was pretty rad.

Of course, the fast guys caught me, and I ended up somewhere around 12th, but with the conditions and the amount of fast guys out there... I'll take it.

I'll try to post more pics when/if I get them.

What an amazing way to spend a Sunday!

I'm on a bike

2009-10-12T11:43:00.008-06:00

This is the rocket fuel that lit up my engines to a 14th place finish yesterday in the Cat 3s at the 'cross race yesterday. Pretty stoked with that result based on my level of training, or lack thereof.

Towards the start, I'm in about 4th-5th, entering the sand for the second time.

It was a fun, greasy, cold endeaver. Even with the race starting at 3:45. Most of the race was on grass, still wet and snowy from our snow storm on Friday/Saturday. Made some of the corners 'interesting' to say the least. It's always fun to two wheel drift your bike thru the turns.

Hopefully I will find some photos on the internets so I can post. Hopefully they will show the gnarly bloody nose I had for half the race. The bloody nose was of course from a fight I got in with 18 hooligans, not from the cold, dry air. Promise. Update: found the included photos. No sweet bloody nose ones.

This hill damn near killed me EVERY lap.

Thanks again go to Jimmy and his Six Degrees to Slush flicker page. He is at most races and takes photos for everyone... for free! You don't get much cooler than that.

And now, enjoy this:

Thoughts on my Bike

2009-10-09T14:45:00.000-06:00

And so it begins...

2009-10-05T13:47:00.007-06:00

Well, the 'cross season kicked off for me this weekend. I doubled up this weekend in them Rocky Mountains (yeah, I took two pairs of gloves). The races were in Frisco, which sits at around 10,000 feet, and a couple miles away from Breckenridge.

(I'm the cross-eyed one in the middle)

I had decided to upgrade a class, from the fast class, to the faster class. And as such I thought it would be a wise decision to properly carbo load on friday night. Well, I'll just go ahead and put it out there, that a lot of beer and multiple shots is not the best way to do it... at least not for me.

We cruised up in style via the SG Sprinter Van, with yours truly in the captains seat.

My race on Saturday kicked off at 3:45. It hurt. Bad. I only threw up in my mouth once. I finished 29th out of 44 starters. I'll take it given the circumstances. I made 1 dollar from the beer can hand-up, so that was sweet. (Somebody was putting dollar bills on the top of beer cans next to the course so you could ride by, lean over and pick it up. It took me three laps, but I finally grabbed one!) After a decent nights rest at a hotel, we made our way over to day two, at the same location, but a different course. It was suggested that Sam and I, who were both supposed to race at 3:45, move into the Pro-open class, so we could race at 12:45 and go home earlier. It was decided an 45 minutes prior to race time that this would, in fact, be the case. I threw my jersey on, got about 15 minutes worth of warming up in, and proceeded to take last place. It was awesome. (there were 2 dudes that did not finish, so I guess I beat them)
I scored two dollars this time, heckled the crowd for not heckling last place, took a big gulp of PBR, and finished the race with my hands raised, containing a PBR, which made the race official laugh out loud (LOL).

As of now, I don't have any photographic evidence of day two, but will post when I get it. I may add a couple more photos of day one as they become available.

BOBCAT!!

2009-09-29T22:06:00.002-06:00

I am pretty damn certain, that I saw a f-ing BOBCAT on this evenings ride!!!! WAY RAD!!! Like... RAD-to-the-MAX. Obviously the above photo is not one I took, but yeah, pretty dang cool.

SSWC 09

2009-09-29T22:05:00.012-06:00

So... the much anticipated race write-up... Dun dun dun....

Well, where to begin... Back in about January, I sent in an entry to a race, along with a check for $30 bucks. The entry itself, was a sweet coloring contest which I colored in 2 minutes.
Well, a week and a half ago, that race went down. The race was known as SSWC 09, and the host city was that of Durango, ColoRADo.
You see, SSWC is the Singlespeed World Championships. The world championship part is a bit loose, as I am pretty sure the SS crowd is not sanctioned be anyone. You can read a good synopsis of the happenings of last years race by The Snob himself here or his report of this years race here.

Now, I will be honest, I had NEVER road a singlespeed mountain bike before that weekend. EVER. I didn't think I was going to be able to make it down, as I didn't have a bike, but a friend pulled thru in the 11th hour and loaned me his.

I made the drive over with one of the guys from the shop. It is a quick 6.5 hr jaunt thru some pretty scenery. Road work ain't so bad when it looks like this when you are stopped:
Well, we made it into Durango, just in time to go on the group ride to the Pre-party the night before the race. We rode thru the cemetery at the exact moment it started to lightening and thunder.
We arrived to the party site, at the mouth of some little canyon on the edge of town, complete with dirt jumps, beer, food, beer, tons of people, and, oh yeah, don't forget the security:
A little history for y'all. The fella on the yellow bike below is Greg Herbold, the first downhill mtb world champion. (arguably) The guy he is talking to is one of those responsible for the weekend.

I didn't get a lot of photos of the party as it was raining.
But I did happen to get a sweet photo of some kids bashing an old tv with sticks. Its times like these that I think the world is going to be alright.

Well... nevermind, cause it turns out the kids were zombies.

After the party, we went back to the car, and drove to our digs for the weekend. My buddy from the shop got an offer to stay at one of the shop's customer's house in town. It turned out to be WAY NICE. We're talking hot tub, huge patio, had food and coffee for us in the morning, everything! The fam was way cool too! Couldn't have asked for better hosts, and they were stoked to have some people stay with them. And we barely knew them. Way rad.

I woke up a little hung over, but no worse for the wear. We meandered down to the start area, and started to revel in the scene. I am bummed that I didn't have time to come up with a costume (I found out that I got a bike on Thursday after work, and we left Friday morning). But still had a good time checking out the costumes. There is something about dude bike racers, that if give the opportunity, will dress up like girls. (I am full heartedly included in this phenomena)

The lady with the dread beard on the pink bike is Jackie Phelan, she has raced mtn bikes for as long, if not longer than and dudes.

Well, people watching aside, it was about time to race. And with a 1,000, if not more, peeps on the start line, things were going to get cray-zzeee.

The Race
I didn't get any photos of the race, but I will say that it was probably the hardest, most technical, most fun, raddest race with the most spectators that I have EVER DONE. EVER.

We started off with a police escort out of town, where the real racing began. I was riding with the eventual women's winner and a penguin, amongst a couple hundred other folks. I dropped my chain once (I didn't think that was supposed to happen on a singlespeed), and had to fix it.

We proceeded for a while slogging along some singletrack in a long line, which then turned into a heinous 15 minute hike-a-bike, up one of the steepest trails I've been on. We looked like a long line of ants as far as the eye could see, both in front of, and behind.

Once towards the top, I was able to ride again. I was then awarded with the first 'feed' station, serving up hearty helpings of beer! I told myself before the race that I would take any food or beverage being passed out. I chugged the cup of beer, without stopping or spilling any, and got a HUGE cheer from the crowd.

Next up was the most technical trail I've ever raced on in umpteen years, known as Raiders Ridge. Here is a photo I stole from the intraweb of the trail:I had one awesome wreck, going uphill, where I pretty much just ran into a rock and body slammed into myself into another rock. It was rad. I rode with a pirate for this stretch, and for most of the rest of the race. I think I heard "Argh!" more than is humanly possible in a 2 hour period.

The race then crossed thru the start/finish area, where there was eleventy.5 billion people screeming. I missed the jello shot hand-up, I was bummed. Then it was on to the second loop of the course, which was fun smoother singletrack. Really fun trails. I got to another short steep hike-a-bike, and there were folks cooking bacon and handing out twinkies. I took one piece of bacon (it was actually 3, but they were all stuck together so it counted as one), shoved it in my mouth, grabbed a twinkie, and shoved half of that in there as well, and tried to start chewing and hiking at the same time. There was no way I could get the rest of the twinkie in there, so I threw it back at them. Seconds later, there was people with cheap whiskey shots, but my mouth was still to full of bacon and twinkie. Moments after that, there where folks with ice cold Tecate beer. I did grab one of these, and drank half the can, using it to help me chew the bacon/twinkie mix. It worked wonders! Seriously. From there, it was all downhill to the finish. Where I got another beer at the exact moment I crossed the line.

Here is the finish area:

The party was going off! Check out the amount of beer that was being consumed:
After the festivities were dying down, we made our way back to the digs for the weekend to shower and get ready for the real after party. Held at Ska Brewing. Some of the people rode bikes to it.I also saw someone getting stitches in the parking lot, on a massive 6 inch gash on his leg. Pretty hardcore. Out of respect, I didn't take a photo.

Some people also drove:

A painful basketball game also happened at the party. If you are ever given the chance to watch a bunch of fringe mtn bikers play basketball, or shove needles in your eye, I would reach for the needles if I were you.

That bball game was used as the selection for next years host city, between Italy and New Zealand. NZ won. (I know I listed 'countries' as 'host cities', those are just details.) I doubt I will make it down there, but it would be cool.

As a rating for the weekend, I would give it an 11. out of 10.

SSWC: Teaser

2009-09-21T10:13:00.003-06:00

Until I have time to do a proper write up from the weekend, here is a teaser:

and Mountain Flyer's write up here.

Pony-abunga

2009-09-02T16:30:00.008-06:00

So this last weekend, I found myself in the DC area. Plans were to hang out and do some beach camping. And drink some beer. And say some F words.

Catherine, formerly known from the Laramie/Jackson road trip, was planning on some beach camping out at Assategue Island. Claimed there would be ponies and pygmy deer. She failed to mention mosquito armies.

Well, Andrew was thinking about coming as well, but couldn't cause of work, so I wanted to do some serious stooping (the act of hanging out on his front stoop) at his place before they moved. We drank some beers and ordered the most expensive Indian food in any direction from the Potomac. One of the neighbors brought over some Brandy infused peaches or something, they were delicious.

Catherine and I then stole Andrew's car to head for the beach to meet up with some of her other friends. We arrived to some overcast weather, and then later a torrential downpour/hurricane, but for the majority of the weekend, it was pretty nice. 'Cept for all the mosquitoes in and around the camp.

This is Catherine and Julia being totally stoked for the ponies.
This is me being totally stoked for the ponies.

This is the dune separating the mosquito zone from the beach.

Sorry, no pictures of the pygmy deer, they were too cute and made me barf whenever I looked at em.

There was also a large surf advisory and a rip current warning. I think I got worked by no fewer than 8 waves. Good times.

My new favorite website: http://textsfromlastnight.com. LMAO (as the kids like to say these days)

Chain Mail, but in a good way

2009-08-24T17:17:00.002-06:00

So, I forgot that I had to post this. My Laramie Race experience was technically what Bob handmade me. I saw that as a purty good gift. I enjoyed it in a masochistic sorta way.

Here’s how it works. The first five people to leave a comment on this post will get something handmade from me. But in return, you have to make this same offer on your blog and make something for five other people.

If you want to play, copy the text below onto your blog and leave me a comment.

I make no guarantees that you will like what I make. Whatcha get is whatcha get.
What I create will be just for you, with love.
It’ll be done this year (2009).
I will not give you any clue what it’s going to be. It will be something made in the real world and not something cyber. It may be weird or beautiful. Or it may be monstrous and annoying. Heck, I might bake something for you and mail it to you. Who knows? Not you, that’s for sure!
I reserve the right to do something strange.
In return, all you need to do is post this text on your blog and make 5 things for the first 5 to respond to your blog post.
Send your mailing address - after I contact you.

I reserve the right to make you whatever I want. It will not be virtual, it will be an actual object.

I just threw up in my mouth a little

2009-08-24T13:22:00.005-06:00

I did this yesterday on the road bike.

Says the internet of our ride,

The Copper Triangle course is a spectacular 78-mile loop cresting three Colorado Mountain passes - Fremont Pass (elevation 11,318’), Tennessee Pass (elevation 10,424’) and Vail Pass (elevation 10,666’). The course passes three ski areas and is littered with historic mining outposts and camp Hale, the training ground for the famous 10th Mountain Division. The total elevation gain for the course is 5,981 ft.

We, being bike nerds, made some fun little competitions out of it, based on the Tour de France. I won the King of the Mountains competition by winning the 4th category climb at Battle Mountain with the most vicious of attacks (I seriously nearly threw up in my mouth, twice). I also won the HC (hors catagory or beyond classification) climb up Vail Pass. We usually try to beat everyone on the downhills on these rides, so oftentimes, my heart rate is almost as high going downhill as it is going up.

Nice way to finish a ride:

(Apparently my phone take some good pictures)

This ride may have been the punctuation mark at the end of my road biking season. I think it is time to convert the road bike to its true form, the Cyclocross bike. Tiss the season.

After the ride and the drive back, a bunch of us went to a bday bbq for one of the shop guys. I am stating this now, more party/bbq hanging out needs to happen in the garage, as opposed to the kitchen. That's just my opinion.

Sometimes

2009-08-18T23:04:00.002-06:00

Sometimes my room looks like this:

I was just cleaning up the folders on my desktop and found these photos from April. Just by taking a glance at what is laying there, it looks like at some point I was on a canyoneering trip, snowboarding, mountain biking, working, undressing, and not doing a whole lot of cleaning.
Good times.

Jackson (Wyoming Part 2)

2009-08-13T16:15:00.015-06:00

Part 1: Enduro and Change, is below. Go read.

Since it has been about two weeks, I am going to have to put on my special high tech goggle-izers to remember what happened.
Of course, that is NOT me in the picture, just the glasses I have. Or something.

So lets see, where did I leave off... I think we had just hiked in Vedauwoo, and were going to load up the car and head north, and a little west. Well, mostly west, and then a little north. We loaded up the car, and bid farewell to the honorary grandparents for the weekend, and then took off. We tried to find a burrito place, but the first one was closed (I didn't think burrito places closed on Sunday!), we finally found an authentico burrito place, complete with leather chairs and tables. We ate, and then began our journey west (and a little north).

This drive is the one I usually make by myself when in transit between home and... well...home. (Utah and Colorado) I usually do this by myself, and it is rather boring. I was curious to see if some decent company would help pass the time. Wyoming is pretty barren, being the least populated state and all. Well, we stopped at some of my favorite truck stops ever, and then headed north, along the Wind River Mountains (my first ever view of them, as the only time I have ever turned off and drove to Jackson has been at nighttime, I'll have to inspect closer, as they look rad).

This is one of Andrew's purchases at one of the truck stops.

Well, we arrived in Jackson, and proceeded to go out and find some food, and some beer. We found both. At the same place.

This is Andrew and I, taking Jackson Hole To The Max Dot Com.
With matching outfits. Cute.

One thing to consider when road tripping/vacationing with East Coasters is, because of different time zones or something, they want to go to bed super early and then wake up super early. It was totally harshing my mellow.

We did get a lot more done though, I guess.

On Monday morning, we ventured into Grand Teton National Park. Now, from what I've heard Here and Here, the French Trappers named these Les Grand Tetons, or The Magnificent Tits (or Teats). Sorry for my French... literally.

I did think they were pretty magnificent however.

We decided to do a little hike to the Bradley and Taggert Lakes. Again, we saw pretty scenery, photo taking ensued:

We found Bradley Lake:That water looked way to pristine and purty, so we got in it.

I am literally glowing in this video. That is how bright my future is!

Needless to say, when we got out, it wasn't pristine no more.

We also found Taggart Lake (funny how easy it is to find these lakes when you stay on the trail.)
We also swam in that one, but no photographic proof. Using Andrew's highly scientific wrist-top computer and the scientific method, we determined the water in Taggart was approximately 6 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than Bradley. That means a lot when your a dude.

Further on the hike, we pretended to be bears and climbed a dead tree.Actually, I don't think we were pretending we were bears,
I think we were just acting like we were 12.

Here is the group photo a tourist took of us.
Oh wait, the tourist never took a picture of us standing on the log, so I took it after I got my camera back.

This is the group photo the other tourist took of us.
"Us", as should be mentioned, in the Jackson post consists of:
From L-R: Neil, Catherine, Claire, and Andrew.

Quick recap, Catherine is Andrew's friend from DC, that needed a ride to Jackson for a wedding. Claire is one of her friends, also in Jackson for the wedding. Andrew and I were freeloading off of them and their cabin that they had rented.

Well, that night Andrew and I went and watched a movie, while the girls went to the Bachelorette party. After the movie, we met up with the Bachelorette party, right before the Bachelor party happened into the same bar. I am pretty sure all the dudes were wondering who we were, and probably thought we were the male strippers. Rad. Again, we ended up going to bed at like 11 o'clock cause of the East Coasters.

The next morning, my last in Jackson, Andrew and I headed out on a little mountain bike ride. I think the trails we rode were the Hagen and Putt Putt Trails. They were fun.

Unfortunately, even after trying to call into work to get another day off, this marked the end of my trip. Well, actually Andrew and I ate some pizza and had a beer, and that ended my trip. Besides the long drive home, which I did in almost exactly 8 hours. And yeah, story checks out, it was a lot more fun driving up there with decent company.

Total burrito count for me for the trip is as follows:

1 Breakfast Burrito
2 Regular Burritos
Pretty weak eh?
I tried for more, Wyoming just wasn't accommodating in that sense.

I've been told I should start a Burrito Blog, more than once. What is your (my loyal following) thoughts on this? It could be fun. And I think I can remember quite a few of the burrito joints I've been to over the years.

Enduro and Change (Wyoming Part 1)

2009-08-13T15:50:00.003-06:00

Long post warning. Grab a drink and buckle your seat belt, we're in for a ride.

Well... because of an extremely gracious Bob and his wife Lyna, I was able to toe the line last weekend (8-1-09, since this post is way late) for the Laramie Enduro. You'll remember from last year, that this is THE ONLY race in my fledgling 15ish year racing career that I have not finished. I had a skeleton in the closet.

So, originally I didn't think I was going to be able to race this year, as the race filled up in an amazing 9 days, catching a lot of folks off guard. I got on the wait list and kinda sat around with a thumb up my butt. About 2-3 weeks before the race, Bob mentioned that his wife had registered and was not going to be able to make it, and that I MIGHT be able to use her spot. Well, that 'might' turned into a reality, and the stage was set.

I was going into it a little caught off guard for a 72 mile mountain bike race, especially after stewing over it for a year. No worries that I had essentially only did about 6.5 hours of racing in May, followed by a smattering of 20-25 minute short track races through the summer. I felt that my other riding through the year would help out.

Through some stars aligning, I was also able to combine this trip with a little road trip with Andrew, and one of his DC friends, Catherine. Long story, but Catherine needed a ride to Laramie to visit her grandparents from the Denver Airport and then hopefully up to Jackson. Rental cars were a fortune. Andrew had just finished The Bar and needed a vacation and to visit his fam in Utah. Coincidentally, all this happened around my race in Laramie. So, with some careful planning, things worked out perfectly and the three of us were in route from DIA to Laramie, with foreboding clouds on the horizon. It started to rain pretty good (like cats and dogs, as some people say), for about an hours worth of the trip to Laramie, and then the rest of that night. I was pretty certain the course would hold up to the rain, so that wasn't really an issue. Andrew and I were going to camp, but instead sought refuge at Catherine's Grandparent's house.

Catherine's Grandpa makes these awesome ships,
the house was full of them.

Apart from being great model ship builders,
Fran and his wife Margaret were also AWESOME hosts!

Well, we hit the sack, and the alarm went off at 4:45. In the AM. That was early. I had been awoken in the middle of the night with a gratuitous random boob text message and knew that the day wasn't really going to get a whole lot better after that. Andrew and I got out to the course, it was a ripe 40 degrees out there. Pretty dang chilly. I frantically got my shit together, hopped on the bike for a 10 minute warm up to the porta-potty (or 'porta-pooper' in this case) and made my way to the start. The rain had made my disc brakes super loud, like crank it up to 11 loud. I made them as quiet as I haphazardly could, and thought that would be fine.

I said hey to some of the Utah crew on the start line, thanked Bob for the entry, he repeatedly asked for his money. It reminded me of this kid.

Well, the gun goes off, or in this case, they count backwards from 5, and we're off. It is a mad dash up a steep road hill to the single track, which is always a bottleneck. I go a little harder than I would like to get into the singletrack towards the front so I can ride my own pace. I could kinda tell then, that the legs didn't necessarily bring their "A" game to the race. Although I hoped that they would come around, as they sometimes do.

After a couple miles or so of singletrack, you pop out on a dirt road, and form little pacelines. I was struggling to stay on peoples wheels. Weird. We hit some more singletrack, some more dirt roads, and then I took a drink from my water bottle.

Now, a little back story. I grew up in Tooele, UT. I rode for years in areas that had free range cattle roaming around. In my youth, I developed a natural tendency to ALWAYS look at the top of the bottle before putting it into my mouth. After 5+ years of living in Boulder, I have abandoned the need to look at the bottle first, as the trails around here are lucky if they are allowed bikes on them, cows don't even stand a chance.

So I take a drink from my water bottle, and feel a foreign object on my lip. Now unless you just got off the short bus, I am pretty sure you know where I am going with this. I glance at the top of my bottle while I am putting it back in its cage, and sure 'nough, there's shit on it. I wipe my lip off with my glove. Yep, shit there too. I frantically wipe as all of it out. Rinse my mouth out with water from my camelback, try to sanitize the top of my water bottle, and then tried to eat a powergel to get rid of the taste in my mouth. All while riding/racing my bike. It was pretty fun. I've never had E-Coli in my mouth that I can remember.

The first part of the race as a little more forest service roads on it, and again, I am having a tough time trying to match the pace of some of the people around me. We pull into the first aid station, I stop and someone asks if I need anything, I hand him my water bottle to put some more energy drink in, and then say "You would tell me if I had cow shit on my face, right?" He laughs and then assures me I don't. "Good, cause that would be embarrassing."

I struggle to match pace for a couple more miles until we hit some singletrack. This is when I decided something wasn't entirely right, about 20 miles into the race. I get off the bike, pick up the rear end, and spin the tire, sure 'nuff, the rear brake is rubbing pretty bad. The tire spins a whole revolution and a half and then it would stop. Hmm... Well... that's not good. I adjusted it as best I could, and took off.
The rain had made the soil nice and moist and tacky. The course is usually has numerous stream, marsh, water crossings, and this year, they were a 'tad' bit deeper. I followed SLC Jen, and one of the top singlespeed girls into one particularly deep crossing. Luckily they were in front, and when the water was nearly waste deep on them, I could at least prepare myself a little.

The race is more or less a net downhill for the first half, and then mostly uphill for the last half. There are sections on that last half I would like to go ride when I was a little fresher. It was real fun singletrack, I was just a little drained.

During this 'low point' I hear someone coming up behind me. Then I hear "Neil, is that you?" It was one of my riding buddies from Utah State, circa 2000-2002ish. His name is Shawn Nield. I tried to hang with him for a while, but I just couldn't.

I had been dreading the "Headquarters" climb at the end of the race. Everyone talks about it, so I was not really all that stoked. I rolled into the 5th and final aid station, ate 2 gels, some Nut Roll, I think a Snickers, a boiled potato, some enduralyte capsules, got some beverage (which I had just ran out of on that last stretch, cause by now it was around 80 degrees), grabbed a handful of gels for my pocket and set out for that dreaded "6 miles of up, 2 miles of down" that they told me I had left. Headquarters was that "6 miles of up."

I don't know what everyone was talking about, it really wasn't that bad. I had just came around from my low point, and was feeling decent. I could figuratively "smell" the finish. And was stoked to be finishing my "arch nemesis" of races. One of my buddies from the shop caught up to me and we rode the last part together. You can see his shoulder in this photo.
The trail kept having these false summits, but I thought it was a fun trail. The last 2 miles of single track were dreamy. And then we bombed down a steep dirt road to the finish, where you could literally smell the finish, and all the food there. And beer.

I have a hard time drinking/eating after a race, but I am pretty sure I slaughtered about 3 pieces of pizza, some pasta salad stuff, some cookies, amongst other things. I also tried to drink some beer, it kinda worked.

I chatted it up with some of my friends from near and far about the battles out on course. And then I struggled to get my shoes off, there was so much mud and weeds jammed into a buckle, it was like a little adobe house factory up in there.

Finally, I hobbled back to the car, and Andrew and I headed back into Laramie. We were going to get cleaned up and then Catherine's grandparents wanted to have us eat dinner with them. We also had a beer with them (Margaret had scotch and water), it was fun. After that Catherine, Andrew, and I headed down to the Buckhorn Bar. They have everything that ever lived stuffed and on display in there. EVERYTHING. Like cows with two heads and stuff.

Unfortunately, I was a little tuckered out, and we called it an early night. We woke up the next morning to a bacon and pancake breakfast courtesy of Margaret. Then Andrew, Catherine, and I headed to Vedauwoo for some hiking. It's otherwise known as the "Land of the Earthborn Spirit." Sweet. It was actually pretty radical.

Here is Andrew saving a young picnic table from a falling boulder.

It was really purty, we took lots of photos.
Here is a little video for ya, courtesy of Catherine:
(beware, we were in some hurricane force winds, so it may be a lil loud)

Andrew did some sweet jumps.

Road trip crew.
Catherine didn't get the memo to wear a matching blue shirt.
Here is a what a shitty panorama of Vedauwoo looks like.

We had a climbing (running up in chacos) contest on this.

Catherine found a random staircase.

Now, lets see, where did we park the car?Oh, yeah, there it is.

From atop Vedauwoo, we could see this pyramid thing across the road (I-80).

Upon closer inspection, we found this.Apparently this is the high point of the ol' railroad, and a memorial for some dudes (brothers) that were instrumental in something to do with it. According to the sign, it is also:Who would have thunk that the finest memorial in 'merica was just hanging out in the middle of the south eastern part of Wyoming. huh...

Part 2 will follow shortly. promise.

OH HELL NO!!!

2009-08-13T09:31:00.006-06:00

I saw this today on the front page of the Wall Street Journal. Can you even fathom what this means? I can tell you one thing, I am not going to be a happy camper. I am running down to Target and Safeway after lunch to stock up on gummy worms/bears. Call you congressman (I don't know if that is who you should call, it just sounded like the right thing to say). More here.

p.s. There are posts in the works about my Laramie/Jackson trip a week ago, they may slide in underneath this one, I'll give you all the heads up.

Ching Ching

2009-08-12T22:31:00.002-06:00

After 15 years of racing bikes, this, my friends, is my first ever cash payout. You guys are looking at the 2009 CU Short Track Men's Bs Series Champion... OF THE WORLD!
1-2-3 Pop Bottles.