McKenzie River Trail

About 7 of us and a couple of energetic dogs rode the McKenzie river trail in its entirety this past Sunday. Along its length, one will see some of the bluest water you've seen, several incredible waterfalls and more log bridges than you can shake a stick at. A single speeder has to spin at about 250 rpm during the last half, and that takes it out of you after 30 or so miles. It's normally 27 miles but none of us had been on the trail recently and we took a few wrong turns. On top of that we got rained on, almost lost a dog and got scraped up in the lava rock section as well. Yep, pretty much a great day on a bike.

Greg leading the pack after the first few miles

You just have to stop at the Blue Pool. The entire river comes up from underground and heads downstream.

Mt. Mcloughlin

Also a few weeks back, my fit parents came up from California to climb Mt Mcloughlin with my brother and I. Perched at 9,495 feet, the summit is gained by hiking the steep trail to the top. It's one of the nicer summits I've had the pleasure of sitting on. Continuing the trend from Mt. Washington earlier this summer, there was nothing but sunshine and hardly a breeze up on top. Sadly that trend came to and end when I got blown off of North sister last weekend (more on that later). All in all it was a great way to spend the day. There were some other old farts attempting the summit that day, but my Ma and Pa smoked 'em to the top. Here are a few pictures

The summit within sight

Mom conked out on top

Timbo: there was a bit of a cliff behind him

The parents about to gain the summit

Tim, remeniscent of this painting

One of the Best Rides in Oregon

A bunch of us bums with several thousand dollar steeds rode the North Umpqua River Trail a few weeks ago. It is arguably one of the best trails I've ridden. The weekend served as a goodbye party for fellow mt. biker Fred, who is setting up shop as a history teacher over in Salida, Colorado. Anyhow, I snapped a pic of many people in spandex and an expensive collection of bikes just before a ride below the dread and tear section of the trail.

How to Climb at Smith in the Summer

Climbing at Smith Rocks in the summertime takes some careful planning, a good strategy and some very persuasive talk to get people to go belay you on your "proj" in 90+ degree heat. Or, that is... it usually does. Famed "get a bunch of people to go climbing" expert Richard Burton managed to get several of us out there last weekend. To get the most out of a hot, dusty day, you need a bit of luck; such as not getting stuck behind a party of 12 on monkey face like Greg, Inga, Kristin and I did. But most of it comes down to planning. You need to:

1. Rise early to avoid the heat- well... that's tough when you drink a lot of wine and climb with Tim "rise at the crack o' noon" Gradek
   
2. Climb in the shade- rope-de-dope block and northern point: check
   
3. Take a siesta during the hot afternoon- Below is a pic I shamelessly stole from new climbing buddy Rick. Man I love steelhead falls (sucks they took out the zipline though)
   
4. Climb well into the evening- check

One word of caution though kids. Be careful doing kneebars or you might end up with something like this:

Bear Necessities

I thought I'd take a little time to talk about the aforementioned bear take out menu. The first day in Yosemite for Inga, Kristin and myself was largely devoid of climbing. We spent most of the day scrambling around on the Talus all dehydrated and looking for some 5.5 pinnacle that we never found. Can you believe I'm headed back? Yes the rock at Yosemite is that good Anyways, earlier that day when we were setting up at Camp 4, we had, as the ranger told us, dutifully removed all food related objects from my parent's station wagon...or so we thought. A few days prior, one of my coolest relatives had given me some soft, sweet smelling cranberry quickbread that I stowed in my day pack for a special occasion. Turns out the special occasion was for the bear, who we think sniffed the orange juice spilled on the car door and thought," Oooooh I think I'll see what behind door number 2!" The broken window only ended up costing about 50$, and you actually can get a fine if you leave food in your car. So the lesson is just don't leave food in your car, ever.

The scene of the crime. We were parked between this car that was completely covered in tiles on the left and another one with more stickers than I've ever seen. An alternate theory as to why the bear chose our car was that it looked "normal."

Actual bear print. Radiocarbon dating and DNA evidence place the burglar in the Camp 4 region.

I just had to get the girls to pose with their thumbs up for this ubiquitous sign.

Oregon Trail

My recent adventures have all seemed to revolve around finding my way back to the Willamette valley. The Norwegians and I were at certain points of our trip a couple hundred miles from both Canada and Mexico. We traveled through suffocating heat, vicious mosquitoes, bear attacks and were forced to eat brown cheese in our quest to find our way back to Oregon. I couldn't help but be reminded of the old Oregon Trail game for the Apple II. Granted, our axle didn't break and none of us died of dysentery, but the similarities can't be denied. OK OK so they can. The pioneers wouldn't have crossed Nevada twice on purpose, and they probably did a bit less climbing than us. But in honor of me hunting 2568 pounds of bison meat in second grade, here goes nothing. Let's do the numbers:

Number of windows smashed by bears (Sorry Mom): 1



Number of Cranberry Quick bread loafs eaten by said bears (sorry Auntie): 1

Approximate number of hangs per climb by Jake in Yosemite: 24.37

Odds that a pair of Norwegians would be freezing and wet in a desert in Utah during the Summer: 2000 to 1


Number of Rock Types pulled on: 7 (Granite, sandstone, tuff, basalt, andesite, dacite and whatever the rest of that crap on Mt. Washington is)

Average number of times per day the word "boring" was uttered: 38.72

Hottest Temperature Seen: 117 degrees Fahrenheit (47.2 degrees C)

Coldest Temperature Seen: No data

Time needed for the "novelty" of Nevada to wear off: 16.32 minutes

Amount of times Greg peed in the Willamette river: 4397

Amount of Coronas consumed on top of multipitch sport routes: 4



Gallons of sunscreen applied by fair-skinned Norwegians: 2.3


Number of poses Tim did for the camera: fabulously many



Net number of Ice creams promised as wager material: a buttload

and.......

Number of amazing pictures and memories that will last a lifetime: ∞








more to come later... but you knew that already. Happy summer!

Ok it's been forever

I realize dear readers, all 2 of you, that this has been my longest hiatus from Blog posting in the history of this blog's existance. But it's going to have to wait a little longer. Putting up pictures on the blog is difficult when you are driving 2000+ miles with a couple of hardcore Norwegians and an American hybrid corporate lackey/badass climber. It is also difficult when you are fending off hungry bears from your Aunt's quick bread in Yosemite, poaching campsites in Bishop, swimming in "Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" water in Zion NP, dodging Waves at the Lost Rocks, tubing on the Willamette, sweating at Smith Rocks, climbing Coprolite-esque rock on Mt Washington (and enjoying the hot tube!), bailing on the sharp end of the rope in Leavenworth and riding behind too many dudes with spandex on the N. Umpqua river trail. I suppose none of the above qualifies as a legitimate excuse but here's to trying. It's summer people! Get out and make yourself some adventures before it starts raining again (which in Oregon can last up to 14 months per year).

It was one hell of a trip. I'll be the first to admit that. I was pretty road weary afterwards. And every thursday when the weekend starts rolling around I promise myself that I'll be "taking it easy..." or "laying low." It never happens. This particular weekend I'm going to go climb Mt. McGloughlin with my parents, who are wild stallions for being able to even attempt such a feat at their advanced age (just kidding Mom). I'll get around to posting copious pics in the following weeks, but you can check out Greg's and Inga's excellent entries if you get the chance.


"Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from a lack of good judgment. "
~Barry LePatner