The Beautiful Old Barn

When we drove by this beautiful old barn, I snapped a few drive by shots. I mentioned to Nathan that it was one of those things that I would love to take 20 pictures of. So he went back. And I took 20 pictures of it.



I really love old barns like this one. They are so classic. They have so many stories to tell. I remembered my own stories of being in barns. I remembered the smell of hay that goes along with being in a barn. I remembered how scratchy that hay feels on bare summer feet and legs. Nice memories go along with barns.





Truth be told, after I took my 20 shots, I then took 23 more.



I could have easily taken 43 more.



Living the life in sunny Florida.



A PS to this post. My MIL recently sent some beautiful pictures like these and told us that my FIL had wanted to take pictures of old building and make a book with them. She said perhaps I could pick up that project. I think it's very likely that I will do just that!

Big Bend :: Rio Grande Village

After spending five nights in the Chisos Basin Campground, I moved to Rio Grande Village on the southeast side of the park and at a much lower elevation. It is a journey of only a few miles, yet the hills and valleys have a different look and feel to them. It seemed hotter during the day though the temperatures posted on the bulletin board belied the fact. Nights weren't quite so cold either.

I was enthralled by the cactus with the reddish needles.

And by these tiny flowers. These plants were perhaps 8 inches high, but the flower itself was only about one-half to three-quarters of an inch across.



The evening of my first night in the Village, I found my “spot” where I went each evening and several mornings to watch the sun set and rise. It was a short trail behind the campground, perhaps a mile in length, that took you to a hill overlooking the Village area. It is where I got my first glimpse of the Rio Grande and of the little village of Boquillas, across the river in Mexico.

Rio Grande Village from “my” hill. The Cottonwood trees were a welcome relief to the eyes. It was wonderful to see green again! And the shade they provided was greatly appreciated.

Sunset over the Rio Grande.

A Day in Stoney Clove

Ice climbing sure is fun.



I have very little experience doing it. On New Year's Day I went up to the Catskills with A for what would be only my third time trying it. I don't own any ice tools, crampons or appropriate boots, so I arranged to rent what I needed from Rock and Snow in New Paltz.



The forecast looked good as the day approached. It had been quite cold for weeks and the websites were reporting that many lines were in good condition. But then on New Year's Eve I started to get worried. Suddenly it was in the forties, in the city and up in the Catskills. The overnight low as turned into was above freezing. And the projected high for our climbing day had crept up all the way to 47. My last few rock climbing trips up to the Gunks in were on colder days than this! I thought we might be wasting our time heading up there looking for ice. But A thought it would take a few days for the ice to melt, so we decided to go for it despite the warm temperatures.



At Rock and Snow they gave me a pair of leashless Black Diamond Vipers. I had never climbed using leashless tools, so I asked if they had any leashes (the kind that attach to your wrist) for me. Instead, saying "leashes are overrated," the guy behind the counter gave me a spinner leash (which is more like a tether, attached to the harness, so the tools aren't lost if you drop them). Then headvised us to look for shady walls, and we were on our own.



My partner A has led a ton of ice over the years, but neverhere in theEast. He was interested in some grade 3 or 4 climbs just to get his bearings. We set out for the Stoney Clove area, since there are so many different options there. A was thinking we should check out the Little Black Dike (4-), which he felt he could comfortably lead, and while the dike ison the West (i.e., sunny) side of the road we thought it might still be in the shade given its corner location.



Upon arriving at the parking area, we got geared up and started back up the road to the top of the hill and the climbs. But as wewalked we got the sense that the climbs on the sunny, West side of the road might not be the best idea on this particular day. The climbs on that side were baking in the sun, and not long after we began walking wecould hearthe constant sound of large chunks of ice breaking off and smashing on the scree below.We werestill on the road, near the top of the hill, whenwe decided to just head up to some East side climbs and see if the ice seemed more solid in the shade.



We scrambled up through what seemed like an endless pile of loose choss to get up to the ice. Given the heavy snow that had fallen in the areajust afterChristmas, I was surprised that there wasn't more snow on the ground. In places the snow was quite thick over the sticks and rocks, making it much easier to work your way upward, but there was lots of territory with no snow cover at all, and these uncovered patches were kind of miserable to work through. Even though the approach was probably over within ten minutes, it seemed far longer.



Once we arrived at the nearest attractive wall of ice, we roped up and had a nice enough time. I'm still not exactly sure where we ended up. In retrospect, using Molitoris' guidebook, Ithink we climbed on the unnamed flows of ice mentioned in the book between the East Side Corner and the East Crag Pillar. We took a look at at least three different walls of ice, all of which had some nice steep flows, none of which were very tall. The ice was reasonably fat and in the warm temperatures it was really very plastic. Good sticks were easy to get.



This was my first time belaying a leader who placed screws in the ice.As I watchedA leading it almost seemed sane to me. At a couple different walls, A led up one route and then set a toprope from which we could try a few different lines. Cleaning the screwswas simple enough. The idea of relying on them while climbing on lead... now that's a different thing. It's something I'd have to consider after more than three tries at ice climbing, when I have more certainty about when my sticks are good and my feet are solid.



I started out a little shaky with the ice climbing technique; my last attempt was two years ago. On our firstpitch I found the feet really tenuous and my arms started to tire quickly. After A gave me some pointers on lowering my heels so that all four front points of the crampons were engaged with the ice, my footwork improved dramatically. I didn't take a single fall all day, althoughmy feet didfail mea couple times, leaving me hanging by my arms. In one spectacular sequence both of my feet skidded out and at the same time my glasses fell off my face. Somehow I managed to catch the glasses on my knee while hanging on with my arms. Then Igot one foot back on the ice while I kept the glasses balanced on my other bent knee,so thatthen I could let go of one axe, pick the glasses up off my leg and put them back on my head. All without weighting the rope.



In a lessheroic moment later in the day, I managed to put one of mytools right through one of my ropes. The rope wasn't severed but the pick definitely penetrated to the other side. Since we were climbing with 9mm doubles, I wasn't worried that I wouldn't be held in a fall,so I just finished the pitch and then rapped using the other rope. I wish I'd used my (limited) knowledge of knots; I could have tied the damaged portion of the rope into an alpine butterfly knot, taking it out of the system. But I didn't think of it. Now I either have to chop about ten feet off of the end of both ropes (to keep my doubles even), or buy a new pair.



I loved the BD Viper tools. Going leashless didn't seem like a big adjustment at all once I was out on the ice. I felt really confident using them all day. They felt good in my hands, very natural, and I never came remotely close to dropping one. I'm strongly considering buying a pair, since they're on the cheaper end of the market for ice tools and I don't mind aluminum.



Apart from my idiotic attempt to destroy one of my climbing ropes, there was one negative aspect to the day: the wetness. Because it was so warm, water was constantly running off the climbs. I was wearing clothes I've happily climbed ice in before, in much colder temperatures. I had a base layer, a fleece, and a thin water-resistant shell. I had two pairs of gloves. But it turned out none of these items was up to the wetness, and by the afternoon my shell was useless, and both pairs of gloves were soaked. I was wet all over and I started to shiver uncontrollably. We could have squeezed in another climb but I begged off and we headed back to New Paltz to return my rented gear. We grabbed a bite at the P & G and I shivered all through dinner.



I'm sure I'm making the day sound miserable but really it was a pretty nice time! The best moment for me was when we climbed a very fragile-looking column, which you can see on the left side of the photo above. It wasn't picked out at all but I was able to find several placementsin depressions in the column that did not require a potentially damaging swing of the axe.When I combined the gentlepick work withsome delicatefootsteps Iwas able to ascend the thing withoutdestroying it, a happy surprise. It gave me hope for an alpine climbing future that I might have, if I actuallymanage to ice climb a bit more often than once every two years.

Usnea strigosa

We see this lichen here all the time, only usually without quite so many things on it. The technical name for the things is apothecia. If that's exciting to you, you may want to look here for related technical terms. I spent way too much time there, following links and trying to figure out what was meant when they said something was shaped like a skittle. The candy or a British bowling pin?

Anyway, I finally identified the lichen: Bushy beard lichen; Old man’s beard; Usnea strigosa.

I haven't found a good southern or eastern North American lichen identification site. I was lucky and happened on a page that told me that this "is the only Southern Usnea with large, pale, terminal apothecia."¹

The Ohio Moss and Lichen Association has some good photos, including this one that shows what Usnea strigosa more commonly looks like. But there's no key. Let me know if you find a good lichen site.

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¹If you could actually get the pdf file to come up, it might be useful. I had to make do with the hodge-podge cached html version.

Ice is coming...time to start thinking about technique.

Photo courtesy of:http://www.alpineexposures.com/



Every fall I start thinking about ice climbing again, what I learned last year, and what I find are the important things I want to work on this year and the kind of climbing I most enjoy.



Over and over again for the last half dozen years I think the ability to use one tool in the most effective manner is the most importantadvantage with the newest ice tools. Some tools allow you to take advantage of that opportunity better than others.



But no matter the style of tool, being able to easily match hands on an ice tool and make the lest amount of placements per foot of vertical gain is what we are looking for and what is really important.



The fewer the placements the betteryour endurance. The more positions you can use on your tool the more your strengthwill last, short or long term. That will happen on vertical ice or less than as well.



The more you move your hands around and use them in slightly differing manners the warmer your hands will generally stay.



These are videos I have posted previous. But if you haven't seen them it is worth taking a close look at how the climbers in each use their tools. Both the videos are getting dated now for gear but the climbing techniques shown are not. Hopefully you'll get some new ideas of your own from what you see.









and another example here:



http://www.tvmountain.com/video/alpinisme/6769-goulotte-lara-toun-grand-capucin.html







I like havingoptions!

Hyak ..

What a difference a week makes. Although not in temperatures. (Telemetry shows the temp at Hyak today never exceeded 8°F during the time we were there.)

Julie and I headed to Hyak for a skin/ski trip. Snoqualmie has not yet opened Hyak or Alpental, due to "lack of snow." While it was adequate for skiing, it was probably not suitable for commercial skiing. A few more feet should hide the remaining conifer tops and all the alder. We decided on this location due to the 'short' drive, and moderate to high avalanche danger. Also, there was a "deadly" storm scheduled to hit later in the day, and we wanted to be home before that.

There were quite a few people out with the same idea. But, not as many as I saw last week at the Silver Basin. There was about a dozen or so "backcountry" skiers there. Probably a half dozen Nordic skiers and a few snowshoers. (Or is that slowshoers?)

The idea was to skin under the Keechelus Chair and then figure out what made sense for the descent. Under the chair was somewhat skied out, but it was the obvious line. There was a nice skin track on the way up, and we had no issues arriving at the top. At least that is what I thought. Julie lagged behind a bit, but I believed it to be because this was her first skin since the spring. When she arrived at the top, she explained that her back was bothering her and she was unsure about how the descent would affect it.

After some mulling about, we decided to descend under the chair. (The way we came up.) Julie was interested in attempting some powder as she did not have great success last season with deep powder. I too was interested, as my ski day last Sunday was less than ideal. We took our time on the way down with a couple of stops for Julie to reattach her ski. Near the bottom, we took the cat track as it didn't have as many alder branches sticking through it. (It didn't have any actually.) It was an alright run.

It was now 10:45am. Due to her back, Julie did not feel up to another run. I negotiated with her that I would head up and be back to the car by noon. To my surprise, I was able to skin all the way to the top and have a nice run back down in time to leave the parking lot at 11:55am. The second run was really nice for me. I was able to link turns and build some speed. I crashed once and arrived back at the car with snow pouring out of my clothes. I skied well.

(Photo by Julie Labrecque)
My photos are here.

A Spring Walk

Last week was really nice so we drove up to Jemez Creek and went for a walk.