Jared's Adventure Blog

Snowshoeing at Rainier 1/14/2012

2012-01-19T20:48:00.000-08:00

After trying on the 1st to go snowshoeing at Rainier we needed a redemption hike and warm fuzzy feeling hike at MRNP. Lauren and I went with our friend Alice and her husband (who were actually locked in the park during the fiasco on the 1st) to have some fun at MRNP! We had a good hike, but we didn't get the warm part of the fuzzy feeling.

We departed Longmire at around 10:30am at 34*F. It was still around 32 to 34*F when we reached the trail-head at Narada Falls. We started out on the trail through the trees to the Stevens Canyon road, after a little ways on the road, the wind picked up significantly, and the skies started to drop snow on us. All the drifting and falling snow coupled with large wind gusts gave us some nice unexpected and unwanted exfoliation of the face... We trudged on along the Stevens Canyon road until we got into the trees on the east end of Reflection Lake near the pass and dug in to cook some lunch. All the while it was feeling more and more cold outside.

After lunch we headed through the trees on the North side of Reflection Lake and cut over to the Mazama ridge route. By this time I was really starting to feel the cold and it was starting to get to my fingers in my old worn out gloves. I'm fairly new to the cross country travel portion of snow hiking during a drastic weather change. I'm used to hiking to snowboard, or hell just riding the lifts most days. During cooking lunch my hands got a little chilly and I had to rotate which fingers were in the finger holes and which were pulled out and being warmed by my palms as we started hiking again. At this point I kept checking up on Lauren to make sure she was ok, but apparently that nice down puffy I bought her for Christmas was definitely paying for itself on this trip and helped keep her warmer than I was after our lunch break. The uphill on the way to the saddle on Mazama ridge was welcomed and warmed me back up to toasty. We cut some corners on the way down from the ridge to stay better protected from the wind on the way back to the parking lot.

After getting back to the parking lot I noticed I had mini cornices forming on the lee side of my car... We looked at the thermometer when we got back as well and it had dropped to 19 degrees, no wonder it was so damn cold! The hike was supposed to be a nice easy hike, certainly not a character building experience. It went well, and we hope to hike with Alice and her husband again!

Big Eddy 1/7/2012

2012-01-15T17:48:00.000-08:00

The Big Eddy at ~4400cfs, and Kesley's first trip at higher water. It was my first opportunity to paddle in a new Stomper 90, and even though it was an easier river that I was safety boating for at high water, it was a blast to paddle! Easy to turn, holds a line pretty well, and plowed through whatever you lined it up to. I'm certainly looking forward to getting another chance to paddle a Stomper on something harder.

Ringing in the New Year on the Snow 1/1/2012

2012-01-02T14:56:00.000-08:00

We were planning on heading to the Glacier Vista trail at Rainier National Park for our New Year's snowshoe hike, but a few things got in the way. Makana showed up 2 hours late, then when we got to the check point at Longmire at 10:13am I decided to not just tell them I had chains in my Subaru. So as we were leaving at 10:20am to go rent chains, some guy ran the check point, and a very sad fiasco and a massive man hunt began after the guy shot the Ranger Margaret Anderson. As we were leaving with rented chains from Whittaker Mountaineering the shooting happened and while we were almost back to the park we had to get out of the way of a State Patrol officer speeding to the scene. I was thinking I was going to get in trouble for speeding at the time, but the officer came up on me so fast and blew right past. As we reached the gates of the park, we were turned away. On our way back to return the chains ambulance after ambulance and patrol car after patrol car blew past. Counting at over 8 of them by the time we got an alternative snowshoeing suggestion from Whittaker Mountaineering and purchased a map for the Mount Tahoma Ski Trails. As we headed to the turn off more police vehicles rushed by. All they told us at the gate was an incident happened on the road and the park is now closed. We were thinking a major car accident, maybe a mudslide, in the unlikely event an avalanche blew across the road (Avy danger was pretty low though). Certainly not anyone shooting one of the really nice Rainier Rangers.

Packed the night before.

So as all of this was happening we redirected our trip, even with the wonder of what was going on in the park. We drove out to the Mount Tahoma Trails system and began our hike. I had seen signs about this place and always wondered what was really out there. Apparently a lot of groomed and ungroomed trails. I'm not a huge fan of groom with snowshoes as I found out today, except when it's long steep inclines up logging roads!

We meandered up towards High Hut as our destination, and with a late start we were really only hopeing for a smidge of a view and a place to cook some stew to dip our biscuits into.

At the junction between High Hut and Snow Bowl Hut, we glanced at the map and realized that Snow Bowl Hut was half the elevation gain, but the same distance away. So we headed away from the grand views of Rainier at High Hut to find a nice place along the ridge to Snow Bowl Hut to sit down and cook up stew for Lauren and I.

We cooked up some stew and headed down a little after 3pm, forgetting how much quicker it was to head down a groomed track... So we could of actually made it out to Snow Bowl Hut, but safety, time management and group drive (Makana's friend was dead tired) to reach the Hut was factored in. We figured it would make it a more enjoyable hike overall for everyone if we returned short of a destination.

Lunch!

Sow Bowl Hut

We headed to the restaurant outside the park for dinner, but it was "closed due to a recent incident at the park." We really wanted to know, because cop cars were still flooding towards the park as we headed out towards Eatonville. After we finally got service Lauren was able to do a google search and found information as to what was going on.
Definitely a tragedy, and hopefully they find her killer in a timely manner.

Update, the murderer's body was found in a ditch nearby the next morning.

Nisqually River Mckenna to Yelm 12/29/2011

2011-12-30T08:46:00.001-08:00

Nisqually River
Mckenna to Yelm
class II-III
~2000cfs

How I love that slightly nervous feeling of not exactly knowing what's around the bend as you embark on a new adventure. I could live without the not knowing if you can see the wood in the river or not through with all the muddy water... Overall it was a fun adventure, nothing hard by any means, but I'll definitely go back for all the surfing now that I know what the river is like. Kahuna at 2000cfs had plenty of spots to play, and you could easily hike back up and play for a few hours.

So I have this list of random beginner runs I really want to explore, and this is the second river to check off. The Nisqually is a class II-III, really it's only a II+ overall with one class III. But there is wood here and there to be aware of, and at 2k there was some in play, but nothing a beginner can't avoid if you know a little bit of boat control and water reading.

After a few hiccups, we finally made it to the take-out around 11am to see a sign on the gate that appeared to say closes at 3pm, while down below it says 8pm... By far this was one of the easiest river take outs ever, you are greeted with a nice paved boat launch. So knowing that we had 7 miles to paddle with a few flat water stretches we took the gamble that we would be done in about 3 hours and parked the car down below. If we didn't park below it was a decent uphill hike to the gate that we didn't want to hike with gear for only some beginner fun. So we rushed down the road to the put-in and again greeted by a nice boat ramp with a grassy knoll alongside it to put on the river. After putting on we paddled the muddy water across the first ~mile of flat water to the first II+ rapid. From here on the river weaved between some nice class II for a few miles before the river took a sharp left and the easy lead in to Kahuna began. At the 2000cfs flow Kahuna was actually starting to look like a class III- rapid. After that there was a really short rapid, Little Kahuna, and then the river continues meandering through class II in a beautiful little canyon like setting before hitting another long stretch of mostly flat water before the takeout.

We made it with time to spare, shuttled cars and went on our way to deal with I-5 traffic back to Seattle. So here's the video now that you are tired of reading my ramblings!

Another Sky Run 12/27/2011

2011-12-27T21:47:00.000-08:00

Nothing major to write about again, it's the same river as always.

Fuzzy Top Hike 12/26/2011

2011-12-21T21:51:00.000-08:00

So Lauren and I meandered out to Capitol Forest for a really short hike and driving around exploring all the logging roads. Figured I'd share a few photos. Fuzzy top is a little hilltop with some older growth trees on it.

Gold Creek Pond Snowshoe 12/21/2011

2011-12-21T21:40:00.000-08:00

Lauren and I set out on a last minute adventure to the Snoqualmie Pass area for a couple hour intro to snowshoeing hike for Lauren. We swung through Sports Authority to rent Lauren a $10 pair of snowshoes, then REI for a snowpark pass and off we went.

So the directions were basically wander up the road a few hundred yards, and get off the road and meander through the valley. Well the snow base was really low with a crusty layer. We meandered up the road, through the trees and took a left at a road crossing and found the loop trail around Gold Creek Pond. The snow was so shallow that we could still see the summer trail signs. We meandered around from the actual snowshoe and skin path to wandering through the brush and trees all the way around the pond. It was a gorgeous sunny day, and a ton of fun!

Main Sky 12/18/2011

2011-12-20T09:14:00.000-08:00

Kesley's first run down some low water class III.

Main Sky 11/25/2011 at 6000cfs!

2011-11-27T11:36:00.001-08:00

We put in at Index on the N.F. Skykomish river and ran the really fun section that lies between Index and the confluence! Too bad I had a memory card error, and didn't get it corrected until I was portaging Boulder Drop... So here's the video from the Sky at 6000cfs!

11/11/11 Sky Run

2011-11-27T11:34:00.000-08:00

Main Sky run with a bunch of UKC officers, former officers and some friends, I finally decided to try Boulder Drop (IV), and made one not so great mistake and went for a swim!

Big Eddy

UKC Beginner Course

2011-11-27T11:32:00.000-08:00

The rivers went dry, and so we had a long training session on the Big Eddy.

Tieton River 9/17/2011

2011-11-27T11:30:00.000-08:00

Skagit River 9/3/2011

2011-11-27T11:29:00.000-08:00

UKC Trip 8/28/2011

2011-11-27T11:27:00.000-08:00

Main Sky 8/27/2011

2011-11-27T11:25:00.000-08:00

University Kayak Club Sky/Big Eddy trip 8/21/2011

2011-11-27T11:19:00.000-08:00

Main Sky section ~2000cfs

The beginner Big Eddy Section

Big Eddy 8/20/2011 at 2000cfs

2011-11-27T11:12:00.001-08:00

Exploring the Lower section of the Sultan River 8/20/2011 (Class II)

2011-11-27T11:09:00.000-08:00

Josh and I went to explore the class II section of the Sultan river that is listed in the Bennett book. It listed it as a good beginner training ground, I could definitely see it as a good first river as long as the levels aren't too high since it is dam released. Levels were at 1270 cfs.

Kayaking on the Skykomish River. Day 1, 8/19/2011

2011-08-21T20:13:00.000-07:00

Finals are over and I decided to begin a 3 day kayakathon... Day one Daril, Dan and I hit up the run below Boulder Drop to Split Rock and then continued on through the Big Eddy Section. Here's the 2 videos.

Boulder Drop to Split Rock

Railroad Bridge to Big Eddy.

WKC Trip, Big Eddy Section of the Skykomish River at 5000cfs

2011-07-27T14:19:00.000-07:00

WKC Trip, Big Eddy Section of the Skykomish River at 5000cfs

UKC Middle Middle Run on the Middle Fork Snoqualmie 7/15/2011

2011-07-27T13:55:00.000-07:00

UKC Middle Middle Run on the Middle Fork Snoqualmie 7/15/2011 at 1800cfs.

Middle Middle Section of the Middle Fork Snoqualmie Class III/IV 7/10/2011

2011-07-14T17:08:00.000-07:00

Epic barely even starts to describe Sunday's adventure. So, maybe I've been out of commission for a little while but I can still paddle with a bum knee thankfully. Sunday was a personal step-up for me. I got a "new" boat and took it out for it's first full section run on my first trip down the middle-middle. The new boat is a lot looser, easier to turn, and auto stern squirts on me in the rapids. Is this a bad thing, not a chance. The whole point of buying a used Wavesport EZG 50 was to start learning to run bigger rivers and learn to play at the same time. It was definitely a little eerie when the bow raises and the boat starts spinning on the tail while you are traversing through your first class III/IV rapids, but at least I know it should be easy to start learning how to intentionally stern squirt the boat.

Anyhow we took off from the upper put-in at the concrete bridge and paddled all the way to tanner. Here's the video and I hope you enjoy! :)

The point at which you know you are screwed, and praying you hit your roll so you don't have to swim...

Getting a little crooked.

High brace out for the save!

The Scene of the Crash... Crystal Mountain 6/12/2011

2011-06-21T21:35:00.000-07:00

So... The first weekend of my one week summer break I decided to go skiing instead of snowboarding with Morgan. Well come to find out the only lift from the base was the gondola to the top of the mountain with a cat track to a blue run to get to the beginner runs... Well, I ate shit on the cat track, twisted the hell out of my knee and I am now in recovery Mode... :( It appears to be a minor injury and I hope to be back on the river in a couple weeks, but I'm pretty sure I won't be diving for a couple months since I probably won't be able to carry doubles for a little while... :( I'll be testing the leg out on a rafting trip on the 4th of July weekend so we'll see how it goes.

SF Snoqualmie 5/19/2011 at 536cfs

2011-05-21T11:36:00.000-07:00

Josh and I hit the South Fork of the Snoqualmie from Twin Falls State Park to the 436th St. Bridge again. This is becoming one of my favorite beginner runs. It's action packed even at lower levels but there are some wood hazards to watch out for, but nothing major at the moment. The shallowness can be touble-some for rolling and being a newb. This run was my first swim since last November. Josh led us through a nice little hole and I made a few mistakes. I didn't lean forward and paddle like a mad-man so my nose dived and sucked under as I got off balance, and I didn't get a good hip snap in while I was bracing and the hole just sucked me over. Somehow my paddle caught a rock funny and I lost it while I was under so I didn't even get to try and roll out of it. So Sunday it's time to head to the pool and practice my roll, then off to the Club Stretch to start practicing my roll in moving water again. I honestly haven't practiced rolling since last fall...

We hiked up the trail a little bit and put-in on the sandy beach above the first set of rapids and headed on down the river. The Waskowitz Canyon is really what makes this run shine, before you reach the canyon it's pretty much a real easy float, but the canyon is what makes this trip really shine. The non-stop Class II/II+ action of boulder garden rapids is straight up awesome for a newb like me!

South Fork of the Snoqualmie River 5/14/2011

2011-05-14T21:07:00.000-07:00

Today I went on a WKC run of the Twin Falls to 436th St Bridge on the South Fork of the Snoqualmie River. It was a blast! and I'm definitely looking forward to running it at higher water levels.

The Club Stretch of the Middle Fork Snoqualmie 1990cfs 5/7/2011

2011-05-11T22:46:00.000-07:00

Went out with a few friends to kayak the Club Stretch of the Snoqualmie River at 1990cfs. This section of river is actually a lot more fun when the levels are higher! Still not too much action, but a lot better than the 1000cfs the week prior.

The whole group at the put-in.

Gloria and Reina paddling through waves with Barb and then me (a little dot far right) further down river.
Gloria paddling through a wave.
Barb paddling through the wave.
Me crashing through a wave.

Paddle, Paddle...

The video of the Club Stretch.

The video I edited for Josh of the Middle-Middle section just above the Club Stretch. We met them at the end of their run to continue down the river in the above video.

The Club Stretch of the Middle Fork Snoqualmie 4/29/2011

2011-05-11T22:43:00.000-07:00

Josh finally got me back on the waterv after 6 months of being land locked for a nice easy Class II section on the Middle Fork of the Snoqualmie River. It was a blast! I'm so glad to be back in the kayak. Kayaking is so addicting, all it took was another sampling and I can't get enough.

Boulder River Wilderness Day Hike 4/23/2011

2011-05-08T10:31:00.000-07:00

Lauren and I decided to head out on a short and easy adventure into the highly used Boulder River Wilderness to take in some beautiful waterfalls and river scenery. I promised her that our first hike would be an easy one, and it really couldn't have been easier.

As we pulled into the parking area we were passing cars along side the road for awhile before we actually reached the trail-head... We knew it would be busy, and luckily we were starting this trip later in the day so we were able to park right next to the trail-head.

We unloaded and headed down the old road bed until it turned into an actual trail. After a while we found some faint way trails that went cross country and eventually found there way to the river. It's amazing how the beauty of a river tucked away from civilization can just sweep you away with amazement.

This is a good representation of 90% of the trails grade all the way to the first 2 falls. Can we say flat.
After running around and climbing around on the banks of the Boulder River we headed back up the hill to the main trail and continued along the flat path to the first trickle of a waterfall. Near the first little cascade of water there is a trail that skirts down the hill and through the bushes to the river bank where we again headed down to take in the beauty.

After we were done taking pictures and eyeballing the rapids, and dreaming of playing on them in my kayak... We tried to connect along the river bank to the second and larger Boulder Falls. There is a way, but in the sense of keeping it an extremely easy hike as I promised, we opted to not take the bushwhacked trail that quickly shot up and down the hill side to get around a few cottage sized rocks along the embankment of the river to the falls.

Below Boulder Falls.
We headed back to the well defined trail that led back to the main trail and walked a few hundred feet to take in the beauty of the falls before heading to the base of the falls.

Lauren and Boulder Falls.

log jam up river from Boulder Falls.

Down stream of Boulder Falls.

Overall to get to the first 2 falls it is a super short and quick hike that can be done by just about anyone with two feet. Be forewarned this is a heavily used area and is not a place to go if you are expecting solitude.

Learning How to Ski After 11 years of Snowboarding 4/9/2011

2011-05-08T10:28:00.000-07:00

Morgan finally got me onto a set of skis and there is plenty of crash reel to go with the video! Enjoy!

Stevens Pass 3/23/2011

2011-03-24T10:10:00.000-07:00

We headed up to Stevens late in the day to enjoy a sunny and fairly empty day at the resort. We never had to stand in line for the lifts, food or anything. An awesome hard pack day filled with groomer cruising all day long. Off the groom was pretty choppy though...

Dive Monkey's 100th Dive! 3/24/2011

2011-03-05T10:47:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was Dive Monkey's 100th dive! I've been diving with him for the majority of his last 70 to 80 dives and it's been pretty awesome to watch how much he has improved over that time. His trim has improved 10 fold! His frog kick and turning kicks are fairly tuned now.

So last night we geared up at Cove 2 for his 100th dive and swam out to the buoy. While swimming out and scanning the surface of the water I saw a seal head pop up in the distance. Awesome, I've never dove with a seal that was a slight bit of a stalker before... and that set the precedence of the dive. We dropped down at the buoy, got to the bottom, did a buoyancy check and we were on our way to the I-beams. Viz was great! and then all of a sudden there was these eerie clouds of silt forming to the our right and left as we were being closed in on by something in the dark... Then the seal blasted in front of us, and continued to silt up our viz for the rest of the dive. After we took a 300-ish degree heading from the I-beams we hit up the little boat and started working our way through the log piles. About the second set of log piles we were treated to watching the seal attack and eat some fish as he used my HID light to hunt. We were noticing the lack of life out and Dive Monkey pointed out that all the fish were hiding under and between the logs from the seal. They were near motion less and looked dead, until you point a 35 watt HID in their face, then they tended to scoot away... We worked our way slowly up the boundary line and zig-zaged around until we were at our 10 foot stop with the prescribed PSI. Hung out for a second and surfaced. Overall the dive was awesome!

Max Depth: 105'
Dive Time: 48 minutes

Here is short video of the dive, it's not filmed with a professional camera or anything. Just a GoPro Hero HD in a Eye of Mine housing and a Light Monkey 35 watt HID with the beam adjusted to the most dispersed setting. With it set to spot all you see is a bright dot with a little bit of a halo... Enjoy the dive!

Lights for comparison
Princeton Tech Shockwave LED (400 lumens)
Light Monkey 35 Watt HID (3000 lumens)

Quotes from the post dive, "Diving with your dive light is like diving in HD." - Dive Monkey

Light Monkey 35 Watt HID Canister Light - Gear Highlight

2011-01-27T17:31:00.000-08:00

I've been needing a brighter dive light for awhile now since my present light is completely inadequate for signaling in the dark waters of the Puget Sound. So my present primary light is being retired to backup status. I'd do a side by side comparison of the new and old dive lights underwater, but I have a feeling you won't even be able to see the old one with the camera I use underwater. I'll see what I can do though when I dive this weekend. The Light Monkey 35 Watt HID is 25 times brighter than my current fixed beam 125 lumen UK SL3 light. With this new light having a 3000 lumen HID output and focusable beam. I should have no problems seeing under most conditions.

The other reason for buying the light is some of the training I plan on entering into this summer requires a remote canister light for operating reels and such, and I don't have time at the moment to finish assembling my other canister light. I'll do that when I'm out of school so that I have a backup can light for my dive buddies and when this light goes in for service. In my search for which canister light to purchase I found a very competitive price coupled with excellent and personalized customer service from Scott at Sound Aquatics in Kenmore. After the customer service I just received, and learning more about the diving out of Sound Aquatics, I would feel very confident to purchase from Scott again. The other bonus of this particular light is that I was needing to use 3lbs of lead to be neutral in the water at 10' with 500psi in the tanks and the light is negative 3lbs in the water. There goes the rest of the weight belt.

Manufacturers Specs:

Focusable Lighthead

Different design than other HID's with the main ballast in the canister with the ignitor in a small housing at the head

Switch is recessed into the lid for additional protection

Powered by a 20 Amp Li-Po Battery Providing 330 Mins.(5.5 hours) of Burntime

35 Watt HID with 3000 Lumen Output @ 6000 Kelvin

New Dry Lid is completely sealed providing protection from water intrusion due to a cut cord or switch boot

Battery Canister is completely sealed preventing water intrusion due to improperly latched lid or forgotten o-ring

Dry Weight 7 lbs.(3.2kg) 3 lbs(1.36 kg) Negitive

Recharge Time from Complete Discharge 12 hours

Universal Input Charger. US Input Cord Provided, UK and European Input Cord Available

Canister and Head Machined from Solid Rod Delrin

11.5"(291mm) Length, 3.5"(88mm) Diameter

The huge canister and goodman handle light head.
The "hear no evil, see no evil" monkey logo that Light Monkey uses. It's pretty big, but unlike most large HID can lights the ballast is in the can and not on the light head. So there is less bulkiness on the actual light head comparatively to other models.

Diving Edmonds Underwater Park 1/9/2010

2011-01-10T20:13:00.001-08:00

An awesome day diving at EUP. The current was a little funky, since we were late on the low tide window. We had a couple Cabazon fish charge us, and Eric tried dropping a golf ball on me... This trip Eric wore the camera, so I'm actually in it instead of behind the camera. Definitely a good day!

Snowshoeing at Rainier for the First Day of 2011!!!

2011-01-10T20:11:00.000-08:00

What an epic day! Conditions were excellent, and the company was unbelievable! The new snowshoes were great as well. :-)

Stevens Pass 12/29/2010

2011-01-10T20:10:00.000-08:00

An awesome day on the hill with Brian!

2 days at Stevens Pass 12/26-27/2010

2011-01-10T20:09:00.000-08:00

Stevens Pass 12/23/2010

2011-01-10T20:08:00.000-08:00

Fairly poor, lighting, and mediocre conditions. So there wasn't much of a video...

Stevens Pass 12/18/2010

2011-01-10T20:05:00.000-08:00

Stevens Pass 12/16/2010

2011-01-10T20:01:00.000-08:00

I'm playing catch up, I've been updating the facebook page, and forgetting to update the blog. :-)

Scuba Diving Alki Beach Cove 2 12/11/2010

2010-12-11T22:06:00.000-08:00

Eric and I escaped to Alki to test out my new Eye of Mine housing for the GoPro HD Helmet Camera. Overall it worked, but the deep dark Puget Sound and the little light sensor only works so well at 105' and 10' of horizontal visibility. Overall without any video lighting I think the setup will work for sharing my adventures with my family and friends.

Scuba Diving Alki Beach Cove 2 from Jared Cook on Vimeo.

Crystal Mountain 11/27/2010

2010-12-01T22:20:00.000-08:00

Another day on the hill before I have to buckle down and study hard for finals. Morgan took us up High Campbell for some powdery double diamond bliss, every time I've been to Crystal the High Campbell lift has always been broken or not turning. The traverse was a little hairy with all the rocks to attempt to dodge... Conditions overall were magnificant for this early in the season. I still got a lot of scratches in the base that I'll be p-texing this weekend. So here's the feature presentation.

The video is recorded in 960p at a 4:3 ratio. Double click on it to open it up and actually see the whole right edge of the movie... The next trip I'll record it in 1080p 16:9.

Crystal Mountain Opening Weekend 11/21/2010 and GoPro Hero HD Trial.

2010-11-21T22:46:00.000-08:00

Crystal Mountain opening weekend and my new GoPro HD Hero's first trial. I had some fogging issues, but I have desiccant anti-fog packets coming for the housing... Enjoy the film! I also misspelled Austin's name as Auston, instead of Austin. Sorry about that Austin. All the pictures except the ones that are noted as taken by me are taken by Austin.

Getting ready for the slopes.

Riding the trailer from the parking lot to the lodge.

Campbell Basin.
Talking to Victor before we head down the slopes.
Austin and I on top of Queens.

Austin rocking the lifted Subaru!

Snow Lake Trail Halloween 2010

2010-10-31T16:50:00.000-07:00

Some people celebrate Halloween with candy and costumes, but this year I decided to celebrate it with some much needed mountain therapy. After several months of Murphy's Law working against me, I needed an escape into the hills to let the brain reboot (multiple hard drive crashes, head gasket failure on the Soob's engine, crap-tastic tests, and the list is really long so I will spare you the details of all of my most recent fun). Sarah was able to get the day away, and we decided on a short jaunt to the pass above Snow Lake along with the side trail to the lake that is the headwaters of the South Fork of the Snoqualmie River.

We arrived at the trail-head this morning after driving through a torrential downpour... To our surprise the weather wasn't bad after we got out of the car. Actually by the time we left there was blue sky poking through the ominous looking clouds.

Sarah hiking up the trail.

Snow Lake

Labor Day Weekend and the White Salmon River

2010-09-07T22:25:00.000-07:00

I was invited by Luther and some friends to the lower reaches of the White Salmon River to learn to run whitewater in a kayak. After a few previous lake sessions in the hard shell kayaks I finally got to run some whitewater! Now I'm addicted... I found a decent priced boat, spray skirt, and paddle off of craigslist a matter of days later... We camped on the Oregon side of the Columbia River, and commuted over to the river. Day one consisted of some teaching proper eddying techniques and moving on a slight current at the mouth of the river on the Northwestern Lake. After the lessons on the slight current, we headed up to the lower section of the White Salmon and ran it twice. Day 2 Luther and Josh ran the middle section of the White Salmon and Luther and I ran the lower section one more time. Here's some video...

The lower section of the White Salmon.

Josh and Luther's run down the middle section of the White Salmon.

Cooking breakfast day one.

The Columbia River from camp.
Loading up and getting ready for kayaking.
Camp and loading up.
Definitely not what I'm used to cooking for camp breakfasts... Cooking day two's breakfast.
The new toy I bought within 48 hours of returning from the trip... I'm hooked... It's like snowboarding without the lift pass.

3 days, 50 miles on the Northern and Mother Mountain Loops at Mt. Rainier NP

2010-09-07T20:52:00.000-07:00

3 day trip consisting of 50+ miles, 14,729' of elevation gain, and 14,768' of elevation loss connecting the 2 major backpacking routes in the northern section of Mt. Rainier National Park.

Day 1

Berkley Park

Falls by the lower crossing of the West Fork of the White River
Windy Gap area.
Natural Bridge
Yellowstone Cliffs.
camp 1

Day 2

Lower Carbon River crossing.

Mowich Lake
The top of Seattle and Spray parks.

Day 3

Upper Carbon River bridge crossing.
Carbon Glacier
Mystic Lake

Overall the trip was brutal and my knees hated me, but the scenery and memories were priceless.

Grand Park, 8/1/2010

2010-08-30T18:56:00.000-07:00

So I'm a little behind on writing blogs, so I'll keep it simple and just post the movie.

Mt. Fremont MRNP 7/29/2010

2010-08-07T14:27:00.000-07:00

A group of friends and I headed out to the Mt. Fremont lookout in the Mount Rainier National Park. We didn't get to the trail-head until 5pm, and headed up the trail. It's amazing how quiet Sunrise is in the evening, the only people we saw were headed out and by half way to Frozen Lake we had the trail to ourselves for the rest of the evening.

Morgan, Billie and I at Sunrise.
Billie and Morgan coming across the last snow field left below Frozen Lake.
Berkley Park, Burroughs and Rainier.

Morgan and Billie on the way to the Fremont Lookout. If you look carefully it's on the far peak.
Grand Park in the distance. Which is another trip report I'm behind on...

Morgan taking pictures from the lookout.

More Rainier.
Looking back down the trail.

Marmot.

Back in Sunrise meadows as the sun is setting.

We got off the trail just before dusk and enjoyed the first part of the sunset before heading down the hill. Shortly past the White River camp we had to brake hard for the little black bear crossing the road in the night...

Eightmile Lake 7/25/2010

2010-07-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

Sunday I met up with Makana who I haven't seen in ages and headed out to the Eightmile Lake trail-head outside of Leavenworth. The trail was a moderate to easy incline with a few flat spots all the way to the Lake Caroline cut-off trail. There was plenty of water the whole route, and the views through the huge burn zone of 1994 were awesome. The Lake was stunningly large and appeared to be fairly deep with how the shore sloped off fast in some areas.

I cooked up some meals that I was taste testing for lunch. More with that in a separate blog post though, I will say they were very delicious. After lunch we headed back to the car and drove to Gustav's in Leavenworth for some Enchantment Ales and burgers.

The Map
Elevation Profile
Views through the great burn of 1994.
The Lake Caroline jct "sign"...
Makana freaking out about cell service! (actually she had the map on the phone, and we were debating lake Caroline.)
More views of the large fire of 1994.
Eightmile lake with Eightmile Mountain in the upper right corner.
The ominous peak looming over the lake.
Looking towards the outlet from the lunch break...
Me on a rock looking over the lake.
Makana and I along the lake.
More views through the burnt forest.
The view from Gustav's in Leavenworth.

Noble Knob 7/22/2010

2010-07-24T12:49:00.000-07:00

Thursday I headed out for some mountain views in the Central Cascades. I'm mixing up the trip report and this time I tried putting it in a video. That way Gary can catch up on his blog reading by watching it :p

Let me know the preferred format, video or written. If the video is no bueno, I won't go through the extra effort to put one together again. Comments, complaints or suggestion toward either the way the video is compiled or whether written or video is preferred can be posted here, or on the Facebook page, and is greatly encouraged.

Noble Knob, 7 miles round trip, and minimal elevation gain. If the clouds would have dissipated the views would have been awesome.

1st note about the video, at the start it says the wrong Forest Service RD number... I typed it in wrong and it's supposed to be RD 7174. That's what I get for editing video at midnight and not saving the raw data...

2nd note, if you click on it and open it from youtube, you'll get the whole viewing area... The embedding in the blog you lose part of the right side of the video...

Rainier trying to poke it's way through the clouds.
along the way
Mutton Mountain

Top of Noble Knob, 6011'.
Top of Noble Knob
On the way down.
Mutton Mountain.

Skyscraper Pass MRNP 7-15-2010

2010-07-16T11:05:00.000-07:00

Well the trip was going to be a little more ambitious, but I should of packed more of a lunch to cook, and the conditions really slowed progress down...

I headed up to Sourdough ridge from the Sunrise parking lot with the rest of the hoards of visitors. There was a few small patches of snow getting to the ridge, but nothing major and it was fairly compacted from the hoards of people heading up hill. From here I headed west across the ridge towards frozen lake. Overall the majority of the trail was snow free minus a few small snow patches. The largest snow patch was right before Frozen lake, and was so well worn in it was a breeze.

Mt. Rainier from the Sourdough Ridge trail.
looking north from Sourdough Ridge.
Almost to Frozen Lake from the Sourdough Ridge trail.
The largest snow patch when approaching Frozen Lake.
Frozen Lake

From Frozen Lake I headed up towards burroughs, and it wasn't long till I was slogging through snow following the earlier tracks. When I actually started on the side hill I ran into some very nice Volunteer Rangers and talked to one of the ladies about the trail ahead. Burrough's slope was very slushy, so it took a lot of kicks to get a good enough hold on the slope... So shortly after the 1st ranger I decided to turn around and head towards Skyscraper pass through the lower snowfields. Mt. Fremont I was hoping would become less crowded later in the evening...

On the Burroughs mountain trail between the 2 rangers. The lead ranger was marking where to cut, and the following ranger was cutting the path. I turned around here... Not to farther along you are traversing above the cliff bands, and the snow was really slippery and slushy on top.
Skyscraper Mountain and Pass from the Burroughs trail.

I headed through a lot of snow all the way to the jct to the Northern Loop trail. Here is where all recent tracks stopped and from this point on any side hill I had to kick in new footings, because they were all sloped out from the melting of the snow. This really slowed the upward progress to a slow crawl at points... The further out of Berkley Park you got, the more the snow became patchy instead of being consistent snow fields. Towards the top I saw a couple mountain goats and then before the last snow crossing I saw a huge herd of mountain goats below.

The snow walk through the Wonderland trail begins...
The 2 rangers up on Burroughs digging away.
Woo Hoo! A dry patch.
Looking down into Berkley park.
One of the several snowfields I had to kick steps into on the way up...
Fremont Lookout in the background.
Another snow free section on the way up!

The sketchy part of the last crossing for me was that it was steep, and a long snowfield if something went wrong. A little more than half of it was along the steep slope, then you had to climb straight up and over the rounded over cornice to get safely to the other side. All the footings were melted away, and I had to kick in new foot holds every step of the way... From the pass it was gorgeous views in every direction. I decided not to summit Skyscraper Mt. because I was low on food, and decided it was best to head straight back since I was hungry.

A mountain goat, one of many.
A video of a Huge herd of Mt. Goats migrating across the slope under Skyscraper Mountain.

The great views from Skyscraper Pass.

Semi-trip report and views from a couple parts of the trail.

On the way back I finally ran into the first person heading out that way, since I had been in complete solitude from the turn off to Skyscraper Mt. I meandered back to the junction by Fremont and Burroughs. From here to the car it was easy sailing and closer to 95% snow free.

Oddities on the Wonderland, shortly before the junction to Berkley Park Camp.
Sunrise's parking lot is nearly empty...
Sunrise's meadow.

Cost Effectivity for Camelback Cleaner vs. Chlorine Dioxide for Cleaning Water Bladders

2010-07-14T10:57:00.000-07:00

So the other day I was sitting at REI, looking at a new cleaning kit for the Platypus bladders. I was curious what all was entailed in the Camelback cleaning tabs, since I've always been tempted to buy some to "clean" my bladders. I always scrub them with soap and water, then allow them to air dry or use a MYOG drying system to dry them. When they get really funky because I didn't clean them right away after using some kind of sugared drink mix, I use a MicroPur ClO2 tablet and let it sit overnight to kill everything.

So peering over the label on the Camelback tablets, the main active ingredient is none other than ClO2 tablets repackaged... I grabbed a package of Micropur and compared ingredients... What do you know the only difference is Camelback doesn't tell the concentrations and percentages. Probably indicating that it is a weaker mix not suited for water purification. For $12.95 you get 7 Camelback cleaning tabs, while you can buy a package of 30 Micropur tablets for the exact same price. So overall if you are tempted to buy the overpriced ClO2, go ahead, but realize you can get the same cleaning tablet for a lot cheaper...

Carbon River Hike MRNP 7/11/2010

2010-07-11T20:14:00.000-07:00

Today Sarah and I met up in Enumclaw and headed out to the Carbon River entrance at Mt. Rainer National Park. A little background on the trail; you used to be able to drive around 4.5 miles to Ipsut Creek Campground, but in the major storms of 2006, the Carbon River jumped it's tracks and wiped out sections of the road. The park service has been looking for a way to close this road for years. This was their chance to shut down the easy access to the glacier for good. Due to some "environmental issues" they intend not to reopen the road. Instead they've set it up so that the rangers can drive ATV's up the trail... Personally I think this is a load of crap, if they are going to maintain the first section for ATV's they need to open up that section for regular public ATV use and cut a hiking trail to access the trail-head parallel to the trail or make it a multipurpose trail.

Any who, off my soap box and onto the trip report. We headed off from the start and walked the "ATV trail" to the Ipsut Creek campground. The destruction along the way was amazing, huge trees were taken down by the river, and large swaths of the road were missing in a couple sections of the trail.

A map of our route, according to Sarah's GPS it was 15.4 miles round trip.

The meandering "ATV" trail.
Mountain views, and the logs scattered across the Carbon River.
Can you spot the other side of the road?
The new Ipsut creek bed, ATV bridge and the old car bridge in the background over the old Ipsut creek bed.
The old Ipsut Creek bed.
After reaching the Ipsut C.G. we walked through to the normal entrance for the Jct. to the Wonderland trail that heads toward the Carbon Glacier. The trail finally lost sight of being an ATV trail and slowly started to climb. Shortly after starting on the trail we swung by Ipsut Falls to top off our water stores. Here the temperature dropped as we walked back towards the falls to a nice and cool temperature. Pictures were had, water was filled and we joined up with the main trail and headed to the Northern Loop trail crossing/Jct. At the junction we had some snacks, and discussed pressing on further, but decided that we should turn around. On the way back it was pretty much the same gently stroll in the park. We did make lunch at the Ipsut Creek CG and then headed back towards the car.

The old Carbon River Trailhead at Ipsut Creek camp.
An interesting pool that appeared to have glacier tilled water mixing with clear water.
The old power house at Ipsut Falls.
Me at Ipsut Falls.
The junction that we turned around at.
The view up river from the trail junction.
An avy shoot above the trail.
looking down the Carbon River towards the National Forest.
Hmmm... Just had to take this one, since this camp is now a backcountry camp and cars can't make it anymore...
Can you tell me what's wrong with this picture? (For those not familiar with backcountry camps in MRNP, that's a bear pole to store your food and scented items, here's a stepping stool little black bear...)
What a view looking towards the hills that the Northern Loop trail climbs through.

Overall it was a good mellow hike, and if you are looking for an easy/intro to backpacking camp, Ipsut Creek is your camp. It used to be a car camp, so it has a forest service restroom, and picnic tables. Bikes are also allowed as far as the camp as well. The 4.5 mile walk to the camp is nearly a flat walk all the way to Ipsut. So if you can walk in the mall for an hour or so you can make it to Ipsut and actually go somewhere with a view away from some of the citiots.

Freezer Bag Cooking's (www.trailcooking.com) Cran-Mac Carmel Bar Review

2010-07-10T15:37:00.000-07:00

I saw these posted by Sarah from FBC on their Facebook page along with several of the backpacking message forums. Since I first saw them I've been meaning to make some and give them a world, especially since my Cliff bars are starting to get really bland... It may have taken me awhile, but I finally made some to taste test.

The recipe can be found here
Cran-Mac Carmel Bars

Approximate cook time is less than 30 minutes.

Cutting the bars.
The bars wrapped in parchment paper and ready to be packed.

The recipe was really simple and fast to make. It was literally boil the liquid ingredients, then mix in the dry ingredients, and then spread them in a pan to harden. It couldn't have been any easier and I still don't know why it took me so long to try them out. I had a Costco size box of Honey Bunches of Oats laying around, so I measured out 13oz on my scale and used it for my choice of cereal.

Overall I am very pleased with the taste of these bars, they taste like candy (mind you there's lots of sugar) With the peanut butter, cereal and the doses of simple sugars these should complement my trail meals and snacks nicely. I definitely give them 2 thumbs up for taste flavor, and what seemed to be fairly filling as well. We'll see how filling they are after hiking mile after mile tomorrow.

WARNING!!! If you are trying to be a health nut on the trail and only eat 1200 calories a day these are not the bars for you, and in no way shape or form are they advertised as healthy food. If you are an avid hiker that likes to pump out the miles and needs the large amount of calories per day to keep knocking out the miles I can see these as a good complement to beef jerky and trail mixes for your constant trail-side snacking.

The Elwha River June 16th to 17th 2010 Olympic National Park

2010-06-17T20:55:00.000-07:00

Apparently my annual hiking season kickoff is the Elwha River trail (3rd year in a row) Which was a success! After a long battle with several trip cancellations since April due to school... I finally made it out onto the trail with some of the hikers from the local "Posse." This trip was so overdue it's not even funny... 2 sets of finals, and some serious life stressors... Depending on what map or sign you look at the mileage varies from 23.9 miles to 26 miles for the route we took. Beings that the Custom Correct maps are only made for the Olympic National Park and are supposed to be the most accurate on the ground measurements... Their map says we traveled ~25.5 miles along the route we took.

The maps are in sequential order from the parking lot to the destination beyond our camp at Elkhorn.

Elevation profiles are about as good as I can draw the above red line along the trail in TOPO. Which other than the actual on the ground distance being off as usual...

We started out around 10:30am at the Whiskey Bend TH, to access the Elwha River Trail with nearly cloudless blue skies! From the start the "everyone hike's their own hike mentality" kicked in... I tried to keep my speed in check and not get too far ahead (I of course made sure Steve and Richard were behind me), but the hours ahead were some of the most needed one foot in front of the other therapy and meditation that I've ever needed. Since I started hiking this type of meditation has never been able to be matched by any other sport or activity. You are essentially carrying your life, house, and survival on your back, while leaving any instant help or distractions far from the city.

Richard and Steve at the Trail-head.
Me at the trail-head.
Micheal's Cabin
Steve and Richard trekking along.
One of the first views of the towering Olympic mountains.

We made a quick stop at Micheal's Cabin along the way and then we pressed on towards Lilian River Camp for lunch. At about 4 miles in and roughly 12:30pm we took a lunch break at Lilian River's camp. I was lazy and packed a Subway sandwich for the first day's lunch... After lunch, the fun part of the trip begun... The undulating trail kicks uphill and stays at a consistent angle for a little over a mile. I took off ahead of the group to keep my consistent and grueling pace to Lilian's Pass. After I reached the pass I was welcomed with a 15 or so minute stretch break and a nice breeze to cool me off after the climb.

My pack laying on the Lilian River bridge.

Steve laughing at something with Richard on the Lilian River Bridge.

After the group hit the top we meandered down the next few miles to Mary Fall's camp where I topped off my platy with some river water before we pressed on. Just before Mary Fall's camp (7.5 miles or so along) is where the trail starts actually following along the river and finally starts to open up. We trekked on towards Canyon camp, where we found 4 or so weary hikers with over stuffed packs and carrying what appeared to be everything but their kitchen sink... These guys had only traveled a mile from their last camp and looked like they were going to die...

My gear laying at the high point of the trail.
Looking down the trail...

Steve crossing a bridge before Mary Falls.
One of the first real views of the Elwha.
After we passed the weary hikers we pushed the last mile to Elkhorn, where we found an empty meadow with all the pristine camp sites empty! So we took one of the sites near a makeshift fire pit and preceded to pitch camp. Steve and I passed around the idea of leaving the tarps in the packs and just cowboy camping, but some building dark clouds near the peaks above persuaded us to set the tarps up. We knew the weather report called for clearing through the night with nary a chance or showers... I threw down my pack, and started to attempt to stake down the tarp (super rocky ground) when a mouse ran out from under or near my pack... So began the jokes of how I picked the site over the mouse's home, and how I was going to have a nighttime visitor crawling all over me... The mouse came back several more times until I finally decided to hang my pack with my food so that I would hopefully deter my new found friend from visiting me in the middle of the night. Come to find out instead of packing my bug bivy I packed the actual bivy sack... So... Thankfully the bugs were almost non-existent, because there was no way in hell I was closing up inside a bivy sack on such a warm night with a 20 degree quilt...

The mystic forest wonderland ahead of us.
A small cascade right before Elkhorn meadows.
Crossing into the Elkhorn Meadows.
Camp from across the meadow.
The backcountry ranger station, that is manned during the summer months.
Camp looking towards the river.
My homemade tarp and bivy, along with my Golite quilt.
Tarp shot with a mountain view.

After setting up camp we hiked up the trail a ways to the horse camp and then back to camp. For the most part we only had one group of a Father, daughter and her boyfriend come by. They seemed to not be too thrilled about the meadow camp being taken and moved on after talking to Richard for a minute... Out of the blue, Steve looked over towards the backcountry ranger station and there was a bunch of half naked people stripping and doing pushups... What the hell... and then one ran across the meadow trying to wrap a towel around themselves as they ran... I understand taking a shower, but... yeah... Some people's children... 5 deer grazed through camp while we were prepping dinner. Some Margaritas were made and a little while later after some jokes everyone parted ways and headed to bed. I awoke several times to clear skies and stars so bright that I wish I would have forgone the tarp and just slept out in the sub alpine meadow. At least with the tarp I can just poke my head out and see whatever the heck I want.

Just north of the Meadows, looking towards the headwaters of the Elwha.

3 different cooking systems at work. Steve has the Caldera Cone, Richard has a canister stove and I was using a 0.5oz esbit stove.
The new cookpot/mug, with a Jared's deviated version of one of Sarah's recipes, which I left out several key ingredients during my last minute packing... The meal is usually so scrumptious and to die for after a long day of hiking, unless you don't have all the ingredients prepped and forget the rest home... At least I remembered the Parmesan Cheese!

One of the spikes that were grazing through camp.

The morning camp view.
One of the stream crossings on the way back after Mary Falls.

After the morning breakfast and coffee, we headed out down the trail that we came in on. Lunch was again taken at Lilian River, and we preceded to Micheal's Cabin where we took a sharp left and headed down to Humes Ranch. Here we ran into an infant fawn with it's mother. I've never seen such a small fawn in my life, it looked like the size of a little dog next to it's mother.

The doe and her fawn with Humes Ranch in the background.
After Humes Ranch we followed a bunch of trail re-routes since the river wiped the trail out in sections, until we reached the Goblin's Gate. Just before the Goblin's Gate we ran into some folks staring into the meadow on the other side of the river, come to find out it was a lone bear grazing. Finally my curse of never seeing a bear along the trail had ended! Hopefully I'll see more this summer.

Along the Elwha before the Goblin's Gate.
Wow, wow and wow... The whole entire river gets narrow-necked into a 10' to 15' wide slot canyon at the Goblin's Gate. Steve informed me that if I came back during the winter the water would be another 5 to 10 feet higher and splashing even higher against the cliffs... The shear force of the water was evident in the depressions and ripping currents in the canyon and the large back eddy of water trying to force it's way through the bottle-neck. After seeing the Goblin's Gate we headed up the unrelenting climb from the valley floor back up to the Elwha River trail, 500' of elevation gain in under 0.5 miles... After we reached the trail we headed back the last mile or so to the trail-head.

Above the Goblin's Gate.

A view from the back of how small the Goblin's Gate really is. That is a lot of water being forced into this slot canyon.

A few gear highlights, the new for 2010 Vasque Mindbender trail runners worked flawlessly. The new for this year 700mL backcountry.com Ti mug is the perfect size and will permanently replace my 475mL mug. I need to pick up a set of Dry-Ducks for a 6oz lighter rain jacket and I'll be bringing back a separate dry bag for my warming layers. That way I can keep them in a more convenient location in my pack. Otherwise it was an awesome trip and it was great to finally be back into the backcountry! I'm sure I missed a few things and when Steve finishes his trip report I will link it at the top of this blog post. One day down the road after I get done with school I want to get an Alpacka raft and hike it up 20 miles to packraft down this river and pull out just before the Goblin's Gate.

Lobster Shop Wall (Deadman's Wall) and Les Davis 6-4-2010

2010-06-05T11:23:00.000-07:00

Sonia had been mentioning for sometime now about taking me out to the Lobster Shop Wall. Today the tides were at a low exchange, and Sonia's tide predictions were right on the money so we didn't have any current at all. The dive started out with having such poor visibility in the first 15 to 20 feet of the water column that I was wondering if it was even worth heading down to a 100' + to not even be able to see anything. As we dipped below the mucky upper layer (which I couldn't even see to my fins...)the vis started to open up and continued to get better as we approached the wall. I've read about how in places this wall just drops off into a dark abyss well beyond 220'... Even knowing that as we approached the wall between 90' to 100' I couldn't help the initial eerie feeling as I looked down into certain blackness... Sonia motioned to me to keep an eye on my gauges since we could easily exceed the recreational dive limits here and along the wall we went. I kept directly behind her, and just below her so that I could also see what she was finding along the wall. Sonia has a knack for finding all the cool life along the way. With visibility probably reaching around 30'+ I was extremely stoked that my light had more of a limiting factor than anything else. As the no deco time wore down on the computers we headed up and over the wall to start slowly working our way up the steep embankment to the surface. Sonia and I each found a bottle along to the way to keep. We had lunch at a little cafe just a short drive from the waterfront.

Our dive profile for the Lobster Shop Wall.

Dive 2 was an exploration at Les Davis. We headed out to the tire reef (the boundary for scuba diving), which in places is more like random tire piles just a little further apart than what you can actually see... We meandered around the north end of the tire piles for awhile and Sonia found a bottle with an octo in it. It was fairly small, but was in for a ride... On the way in the current started to pull against us... When we got back to the car, Sonia decided on a nap instead of a 3rd dive so we called it a day.

Dive profile for the dive at Les Davis.

Tacoma Scuba Squad BBQ and Diving at Redondo Beach Along With Harper's Ferry Mini Golf Wreck Diving 5/30/2010

2010-05-30T20:57:00.000-07:00

Operation Homework Evasion was a success... 9am this morning I met up with Sonia and the Squad from Tacoma Scuba for a couple dives and a BBQ. The first dive Sonia and I went down to the bottle field in about 80 feet of water. Somehow we found out that we had a third wheel that we had never met tagging along... Nothing like getting followed and buddied up with someone that you've never debriefed on how the dive was going down, equipment carried and emergency procedures... Dive one was a little short at about 31 minutes, with a max depth of 83 feet, but we found some bones and Sonia found a couple bottles.

Dive profile for the 1st dive at Redondo.

Wally was at the wheel cooking away some excellent grub, and there were conversations galore. I forgot that I had my camera in the car, so no above water pics... After the first dive I decided that I needed to move my pressure gauge mount so that it could be seen more easily and I needed to move the waist belt buckle further to the right away from the crotch strap. Otherwise the hours of tedious fitting and forming the harness to fit it just right seemed to have paid off. I'm a poor college student, so I also made my own necklace for my octo, and it worked quite well. I modeled it after Bassman's necklace, and it does the job for now. I have bigger items to save for at the moment...

Dive 2 Sonia and I headed back out to the bottle field to try to find some more bottles, and the couple longer bones that came out of my pockets while bottle hunting. Viz was so-so and varied between 10 to 20 feet. The dive length was 47 minutes and a max depth of 84 feet. I found a couple worthless, but interesting to me bottles, and Sonia found a bunch of cooler bottles. After the dive I went and refilled my tanks, and then headed to meet up with Victor for a Dive at Harper's Ferry in Port Orchard. His 7th dive and first one in a long while.

Dive profile for the 2nd dive at Redondo.

Dive 3 at Harper's Ferry had a even crappier northwest visibility (around 10 feet maybe...) We dropped down at the end of the dock and followed the line due north to the main wreck. We poked around for awhile, turned around and headed back to the dock. Where the lady at the Espresso stand floated me a free coffee since they didn't take credit (I asked before ordering and she told me not to worry about it, it's on the house.). They'll have my business any time I'm out there! The dive was a max of 30 feet and about a 38 minute long dive (at about this point Victor had loss feeling in his hands, he was diving a wet suit...)

Dive Profile for the wreck at Harper's Ferry.

The Roo with the Harper's Ferry fishing pier in the background.
The Roo loaded with Victor's and my gear.
Looking over the dive site.

The front of the new to me and newly assembled backplate rig.
A pic of the back of the backplate rig with the single tank adapter and doubles wing. At almost 60% off of retail price, I found the discontinued wing on sale awhile back while trying to find a 7/8" manifold, and the fact I don't use the wing for buoyancy with singles (i use the dry suit), and I plan on doubling my 100's... It was a great purchase and works awesome for surface flotation! The only problem with the wing is that it has the 12" hose, which means it is supposed to be for a double redundancy or back up wing, but at the price my poor college student budget couldn't pass it up... So I need to buy the longer 16" corrugated hose... The Dive Rite Deluxe harness, crotch strap and tank cam buckles I got from Tacoma Scuba, along with the light and most things that I don't buy used. There's an awesome group of guys that work there and I strongly recommend Tacoma Scuba. The backplate and single tank adapter is a hammerhead without the handles and weighs just under 12lbs. Hopefully the next purchase on pay day is a longer hose for my primary regulator... Then I need to find a set of used doubles regulators, and buy a set of bands for the 100's...

Fee Free National Parks Days 2010

2010-05-21T09:02:00.000-07:00

For all of you who don't have a lifetime pass or purchase a yearly pass for the national parks... This year they are again offering several weekends free of charge to enter National Parks that normally charge. Not all of the National Parks charge, but in Washington 2 of the 3 do and it adds up. If you've never experienced Mt Rainier, or Olympic National Park here are the days you should. Just a drive through or short hike up some of the high mountain trails of these parks is fairly rewarding, heck I remember the first trip to the Carbon Glacier that I took as a child. So break out those trail runners, or boots and drag your kids away from the video games for the evening and enjoy a trip to the outdoors!

Anyways, here's the info.
http://www.nps.gov/findapark/feefreeparks.htm

April 17-25, 2010
(National Park Week)
June 5-6, 2010
August 14-15, 2010
September 25, 2010
(Public Lands Day)
November 11, 2010
(Veterans Day)

Learning How to Play Disc Golf

2010-04-30T20:20:00.000-07:00

So after a hectic 24 hours of serious confusion, Morgan invited me out to play disc golf with him and Sherrie out in Steilacoom. I needed to take a few hours off of the brain trying to analyze a lot of unorganized and confusing information that I still can not make heads from tails of. So I headed out with Morgan and Sherrie to learn this interesting sport. Golf is a sport I don't think I'll ever get into, but who would of known that Frisbee could be this serious and fun. Ok, so it's basically golf with high tech frisbees that are weighted and balanced for drivers, mid ranges, and putters. You toss the disc down a course through a maze of trees toward this steel netted cage all while hanging out with friends. I had fun and it's definitely a cheap sport to spend a few free hours with friends and to numb the mind. I'll get more pictures next time, for some reason my camera batteries died so I only have a couple pictures.

The Ranger and Redondo ~3/24/2010

2010-04-21T08:58:00.000-07:00

This dive was before the NWDC meeting, but I can't remember the exact date. Sonia and I headed up to Port Townsend to find the wreck of the Ranger. Which is a very shallow 70 to 80 foot long wooden vessel that sank in the harbor. The goal was also to dive the Comet wreck as well, but we decided to save it for another day and go join a group at Redondo for the 2nd and third dive instead.

Finding the Ranger, like any new dive site can be a little interesting. We were following directions from the Northwest Wreck Dives book, which were fairly good, except it would of been easier to find using the gps coordinates. There was one non-submerged piling and we started our search in a northerly direction from the exposed piling. While staying around 20 feet out from the submerged pilings near where the bottom slopes off steeply, we were able to see a row anemones highlighting the hull of the ship. We moved over the white line of anemones and descended to the ship. As the tide went out the visibility continued to drop. This wooden boat appears to be fairly fragile, so be careful if you decide to venture out to find it. There is one forward section that can be swam through, and a small amount of life. There is not a lot to write home about, but if it was dove at high tide it would be worth the trip. As the tide kept going out the vis definitely continued to diminish... After the dive we decided to post pone the other 2 dives in the area and shoot over to Redondo to dive with Kyle and Kelly.

Dive profile of the Ranger dive. The dive computer display on the picture is at the point of minimal no decompression time remaining.

Me next to the Ranger.

Sonia on the Ranger

A random crab.

At redondo, we joined up with Kyle and Kelly for 2 night dives. We saw a bunch of baby octos and had an excellent 2 more dives.

Both of Redondo's dive profiles are below. The dive computer display on the picture is at the point of minimal no decompression time remaining.
Dive 1

Dive 2

The many mini octos and stubby squid that we saw on the Redondo dives.
Stubby squid.

stubby squid

stubby squid

Octo
All photos courtesy of Sonia Brugger.

Stevens Pass Closing Day 4/18/2010

2010-04-19T10:45:00.000-07:00

Morgan, Sonia and I headed up to Stevens for the last day of the ski season. It was in the mid 50's, blue bird and slushy sliding all day. Morgan, the Mad Hatter of the day, had us wear some interesting hats for the day of celebration. There was some interesting costumes on the slopes as well, from Batman, to a mouse, to Uncle Sam with a banjo. Basically this is the day that everyone comes out of the woodwork.

So here' s a few pictures from the day. It was fairly epic for a spring day, great weather, good conditions and excellent company. Sonia made it down her first diamond run as well today! Just an awesome day overall.

One of the many beautiful views on the way up.
The Mad Hatter (Morgan) and the crazy hats he brought for us to wear.
Sonia and I with the crazy hats on.
The Mad Hatter half way down the backside of Stevens, and Sonia wondering what the hell I was taking pictures of :)
Mad Hatter on the lift on the Backside of Stevens.

Birthday Weekend Madness 4/10-11/2010

2010-04-15T20:18:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm not much of a birthday person since mine usually end up with a lot of people bailing and never telling me, but this year was different. I actually had the best birthday that I can recall!

Saturday started out bright and early in the morning at Redondo Beach in Des Moines/Federal Way. The surf was pretty rough for the entry and exit, and it only got worst on each consecutive dive. The plan was 3 dives at Redondo followed by dinner with friends and family, followed by a movie.

Dive one, Sonia guided us to all the small boats and we saw several Giant Pacific Octos. The dive was about an 80' max depth

The second dive we found what was left of the VW bug, the buoyancy course and the dome/ swing set with the hanging barbies... An average of depth of 45 FSW.

The third dive we went down to the bottle field past the small statue where Sonia found some hopefully animal bones... Max depth of around 90 FSW

Than there was dinner and a movie. On Sunday Sonia, Kyle and I did 2 - 1 hour long dives at Les Davis in Tacoma. I don't have any dive graphs this time because my computer cracked out and started constantly beeping at me... So it is on its way to Texas to get fixed by Cochran...

Dive Map
http://theperfectdive.com/media/maps/12.pdf

One of the dives at redondo.

Mike pretending to drive the VW in about 45 FSW.

Sonia and I sitting on the swing set

Some of the arm bones that Sonia found at the bottle field.

Northwest Dive Club Gathering Cove 2 Alki Beach 3/28/2010

2010-03-30T22:32:00.000-07:00

The NWDC had a small BBQ and dive trip at Cove 2 of Alki Beach in Seattle, WA. Met some really great people and dove with a couple different people, Sonia, Kyle and Roger as well. Sonia got some really great pictures of several Giant Pacific Octopus and there was a considerable amount of life. The first dive we dove down the NDZ buoy line to the logs around 93 feet and saw a lot of really interesting things to include the awesome picture that Sonia got of the GPO with it's eggs. Sonia and I turned around and slowly worked back up the line to the beach. The second dive we dropped down at the little white and red pop can buoy and worked our way down to the I-beams following the guy with the rebreather (I didn't catch his name). We then worked across the log piles at approximately a 300 degree heading and when we reached the NDZ buoy line we worked our way to the beach. The group than stopped for a deco stop, I guess the Uemis computers gathered some deco time while we were down below. With my Cochran I never hit deco, so I was wondering why we were still there after a 5 minute safety stop... Then I was caught off guard by getting regs handed off to me cause I was down to 400 to 450 psi, but I was at a loss of why we were still there... Took the air from Kyle, than from the rebreather guy who had a 40% slung AL80 cause we were still sitting there. Come to find out their computers put them into 10 minutes of deco time. The first dive they went about 10 feet deeper and were there for a little while longer so they had more N2 tissue loading, so that does come into play on the Deco time. The second factor is the Cochran doesn't average tissue loading in it's algorithm, it calculates everything as exact as possible, part of the reason my first computer was a Cochran Commander, and the replacement was Cochran EMC-16.

I finally got my PC software working for the dive computer that allows me to modify stuff in the computer and access dive events and the profiles. So even if there isn't any pictures I'll have something to post. These graphs are depth vs time (blue line) and Temperature vs depth and time (green line).

Dive 1

Dive 2

All pictures were taken by Sonia Brugger.

a GPO and it's eggs.

The Mass dehydration has begun... Hiking Season is Upon us in the NW.

2010-03-01T11:00:00.000-08:00

With El Nino bringing in high snow-levels in the Pacific Northwest, It's time to start prepping for early season backpacking trips! Last night I fired up the trusty Cabela's commercial dehydrator and started drying the first of several large loads of Staple backpacking foods. The staples are the main ingredients that I mix and match for making my backpacking meals and need around in mass quantity for the just in case there is a last minute dash out the door to a trail-head. Having a large store of dehydrated ground turkey, re-fried beans, chicken, chili, pasta and several other ingredients prepped and dryed lying around make it easy to throw several simple dinners together at a last minute dash to the trail head. The ground turkey by far is the most used ingredient in most all of my backpacking adventures. If you need a quick/light/cheap meal on the fly, grab a Lipton/Knorr pasta or rice meal, dump half a cup of turkey in and you have an instant dinner.

Last night I started off with shoving 12 cans of re-fried beans into the dehydrator, while tonight will consist of 12 cans of Costco chicken. Later this week will be 8 or so pounds of pasta, 10lbs or so of ground turkey and an arsenal of canned chili to follow. The beans can be used in anything from fluffing up a meal, to tacos, to cutting the chicken that I use for lightweight chicken wraps for trail side lunch. What are you doing to prep for hiking season?

What 12 cans of dried refried beans looks like.

Also a few things that are on order is a set of driducks and a 700mL Ti mug/cookpot from backcountry.com
I'll have a new mug highlight post as soon as the mug shows up and I can run some boil tests and install some measuring marks.

Scuba Diving, What I've been up to recently

2010-02-17T10:45:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been swamped with college course work, and haven't had the opportunity to get out snowboarding and hiking. I have though picked the sport of scuba diving back up. I haven't been in almost 4 years after being stationed in Arizona, partially due to the fact that all my gear was stolen. After 2 years of slowly shopping craigslist and recollecting my gear... I've finally started diving again. The nice thing about diving is that I'm surrounded by shore diving spots where I live. So all it takes is a couple hours of my time and I can run to a local dive spot and hop into the cool Puget Sound waters and enjoy the weightless feeling along with the exploration of the underwater world. All in a matter of hours, and it doesn't take up my whole day, so it leaves me with plenty of time to study. So by no means have I not been busy exploring, but I haven't had the time to make blog entries. Here's an overview of some of the more recent dives.

first dives in over 4 years.
Les Davis, Tacoma, WA
Off of Ruston Way in Tacoma there are several dive sites, this particular one is fairly benign to current but subjected to the mud outflows of the Puyallup River. Luckily the 6 or 7 dives I've got to do here have had fairly decent visibility of 20 to 40+ feet. Features here are alarge tractor tire, a small rubble pile in ~25 feet of water and a large rubble pile in 30 to 80 feet of water. The rubble pile consists of debris from the old narrows bridge.

Edmonds Underwater Park
What can I say, nothing but exploration. The crew up in Edmonds that maintains this wreak has everything from rubble, to old hwy 520 bridge pontoons, to tug boats, to small ships... All I can say is the 2 short dives we did here were not enough. Hence why we are going there for 3 dives on the weekend of my birthday.

Harper's Ferry, Port Orchard, WA
has 2 wrecks that are easy to navigate to with a guide line from the end of the Harper's Ferry Fishing Pier. One larger 40+ foot wreck and a small 10 to 15 foot little boat. It was an excellent dive with excellent 30+ feet of visibility.

and more Les Davis, Tacoma, WA

I'll try to keep up the blog updates at a consistent rate, but I'm diving a lot and swamped with school work. Hopefully by march when I start getting some more hiking in I'll get more time to post the blogs. Other blogs to watch out for is a DIY canister dive light. I'm working on building a remote canister dive light that will be putting out 500 to 600 lumen, and be powered by a remote canister attached to my bc, while the light will be attached to a goodman handle on my hand. Also a scuba gear list post.

All underwater pictures taken by Sonia Brugger.

Stevens Pass 12/17/2009

2009-12-18T10:21:00.000-08:00

After we hit highway 2 the most interesting thing started to happen, for once there was courteous drivers on highway 2... Generally when you run into people going under the speed limit, as soon as you hit a passing zone they finally find the right pedal and try to race you while you are trying to pass... Today nearly everyone turned their flashers on and actually used the turn outs and shoulders to safely allow us to pass! Novel concept, but I've never seen it happen more than once every so many years... We had 4 to 5 cars pull over and allow us to pass!

Sonia came up to the pass with us on this trip, and Stevens had a killer deal on the lessons, lift ticket, and rentals package. It was only $25! So Sonia took some lessons since she hadn't snowboarded for several years and Morgan and I headed to tye mill to play around in all the fresh powder. The Small brothers arrived at the pass and hit some more runs with us. At least until Morgan and I headed down to the base to meet back up with Sonia and get some lunch. I made too many burritos, and was stuffed...

2 videos of 2 tries at the same drop. The drop is adjacent to the PCT off of the Tye Mill chair.

Morgan on Hogsback

Oops, getting up after nose diving off a drop...

Sonia getting help up the hill from Morgan.

We headed up daisy and hit a couple runs with Sonia, and all I can say is wow! It has been forever since I have seen anyone hauling down the hill that fast in between crashes, and getting right back up after the brutal falls. We hit up hogs for a few runs and headed home early to attempt to get Morgan home in time to pick up his daughter. Overall it was an awesome day! Good company, excellent snow, and a fairly safe trip home.

Stevens Pass Burritos

2009-12-15T12:01:00.000-08:00

I've mentioned the big tasty burritos for awhile. The are super simple, and extremely filling.

Makes 2 servings, or 1 serving for a hungry hiker (2 large burritos).

Ingredients:
1 cup Taco Seasoned Dehydrated Turkey
~1/3 cup of instant rice
~1/3 cup dehydrated or store bought dried refried beans.
a few Taco Bell hot sauces to flavor to taste
2 Large burrito tortillas

Optional ingredients: (I haven't got around to trying these yet but they should work great)

dehydrated onions, tomatoes, cheese powders...

Directions:
At home:
Take 1 cup of dehydrated turkey and dump it into a 1 quart ziploc freezer bag. Add 1/3 cup of rice and 1/3 cup of dehydrated re-fried beans to the freezer bag.

Cooking:
Add about 2 cups of boiling water to the freezer bag and insulate in a freezer bag cozy or with some type of cloth that you won't have in your tent in bear country. Let the meal stand for 15 to 20 minutes in the cozy and than you can assemble your burritos.

Edit:
I finally tried them with just using my plain dehydrated turkey and adding the seasoning into the mix before adding the water to the freezer bag. It tastes the same, so no separate pre-seasoning is required if you already have dried meat lying around, just throw it in and add the desired amount of taco seasoning.

Also since this makes a very large and filling portion size, feel free to half it the first time you try it.

Stevens Pass, Winter Chills and Packed Groomers, December 6, 2009

2009-12-07T10:05:00.000-08:00

The day started off with a lot of odds and ends going wrong, like having to hike down 200 plus stairs and a 1/4 mile down the beach just to pound on Morgan's door to get him up. Then we finally got to Sultan and he realized that he left his shell jacket and seasons pass at home... So I was able to get a hold of a buddy in Snohomish and borrow a shell jacket.... The temperatures before wind chill were in the low teens, so a shell jacket with plenty of layers was essential.

We finally arrived after all the fiascos by about 11:30, mind you I arrived at Morgan's house by 6am and it is only a 2.5hour drive to Stevens from there... Luckily conditions were so-so and it wasn't a powder day, otherwise I would of left him cozy at home while I went and rode the powder. The day started in the mid teens with some serious gusts from east to west. I headed to the lodge and picked up a set of Skull Candy ear flaps for my helmet, Morgan grabbed a new pass and we were on the way to the chair lift. The runs were ice to firm packed snow off of the left side of Hogsback. We decided to try the backside first... and what a mistake. They hadn't groomed it in a couple weeks, so it was a solid sheet of ice, and off trail it was a lumpy wind blown ice mixture... When we finally got back to the ridge top, we rode down skid road on tye mill, and surprisingly it was firm, but not a solid sheet of ice. We rode Tye for awhile, than headed to the park to play around for awhile. This is where we were going to take a few videos, but since my camera has "tap control", which I normally turn off, since when you move it keeps turning the camera on... So my battery went dead at the start of recording a video in the park... So there isn't any pictures, but the trip was a success, and the conditions in the park and on trail off of Tye Mill were actually pretty good. When we left without the windchill it was barely 10 degrees now if you add in the 10 to 25 mph winds... It was freaking cold...

Crystal Mountain Opening Day November 11, 2009

2009-11-10T13:13:00.000-08:00

After hiking at Stevens on the 8th, I was really craving some lift service runs. So Wednesday was my Veteran's Day anyway, so I needed to celebrate and there was no school. We gathered a group and headed to Crystal Mountain for opening day... We were obviously not the only ones with a similar plan, almost all the lots were full in a few hours.

Morgan and I headed up to the top of the Forest Queen Express and and traversed across to get some powder turns. After we got to the bottom, it was time for some stretching and we waited for van and the group that came up in his car. I received a few rock scraps, but Morgan went for the core on his skis...

Me at the top of Forest Queen.
Morgan at the top of Forest Queen.
Van at the top of Forest Queen.
After Morgan hit a lone rock... If you look careful the rock he hit rolled down the hill and is skiers right of his right pole.
Van trying to sneak some beer.
Morgan and I drinking the pitcher at lunch.
Look at all the ants hiking up...
now if you look careful you can see the top of the other skin/boot track that zig-zags up the mountain. These people are crazy, I would of taken the zig-zag path so that I wouldn't die of physical exhaustion...
Drum roll... the reason why Crystal tracked out with in a couple runs...
Morgan above Green Valley.
The fog in the valley on the way down the mountain.

A couple days later I repaired Morgan's ski base to the best of my ability. There's some ruff spots but without a base grind I wouldn't be able to remove the roughness of the edge of the cuts in his base.

The damage...
Evidence of a dry base that needs a good waxing.
Post repair, prewax.
The same spot that was above showing how dry the base was, This is after a One Ball Jay All-Temp Graphite hot wax, buffing, structuring and corking the base, look at that shiny base.
The damaged area post repair and post wax. It's the best that could be done with out a base grind to smooth the damaged area more. The depth of the cut might or might not hold the ptex forever, but we'll see and it was a lot cheaper than a Level 3 base repair.

Stevens Pass, Knee Deep in Pow November 8th, 2009

2009-11-09T11:09:00.000-08:00

What a weekend... So I procrastinated some studying for the weekend and got some R&R/Masochistic hiking at Stevens Pass in to calm the soul. I'm all for difficult hikes just to get to anything my soul needs, and the pain in my legs from helping cut the boot pack up Big Chief in 30 inches or so of fresh snow is fairly evident.

The day started out in Lynnwood, and my cousin Zach and I dilly dallied our way out the door at 5:30am and slowly made our way to Stevens Pass. After a lot of stops on the way we finally were working our way up the pass. The roads were bare and wet most of the way, and since I was driving my "new to me" Subaru Forester I drove in the uncleared lane to see how the tires handled while cornering accelerating and braking, since the pass was a ghost town on the way up the mountain I could really test the braking. When we arrived at the parking lot the initial plan was to go to the PCT Trail head and hike the PCT across the resort to Tye mill, but the PCT parking lot had still not been plowed so we played in the snow! More vehicle handling tests, cause you can never be too prepared with the knowledge of knowing how your vehicle will handle in a slide or deeper snow. After having to dig out once... we finally went over to the main parking lot and just hiked the Big Chief run to the PCT... What a workout, even with snowshoes we were sinking past our knees up the nice grade. At about the jct to the PCT, which it was deep enough that if you didn't know where it was, good luck finding it. I decided there was no sense traversing to make a new boot back up Tye when there was already one being started on Big chief. So I continued up the hill in the boot pack and Zach stuck around to take a video of me coming down the mountain.

After taking the video, Zach started down the hill and I hiked back up for another run or 2. After the snowboarding I broke out the old trusty MSR Simmerlite and started melting snow to make the Burrito concoction that I've been working on. I promised awhile ago that I'd write a blog on it eventually, and now I will have to. I herby name them the "Stevens Pass Burritos". After adding the water to the bag with the mix in it, I wrapped the freezer bag in my fleece and stuffed it in my backpack to let it reconstitute. We melted a little more snow, and made some Hot Apple Cider to warm the soul. After making lunch we headed to the car and headed home. What an epic day for being so early in November! Bring on winter, cause my mind and soul needs an immersion into the deep powder of a winter wonderland!

Rivers a muck, Silvers a red, The Cascade River October 24th 2009

2009-11-04T11:15:00.000-08:00

So after a good week of not being able to fish during my weekends off of school... I headed up Highway 20 to the Cascade River with my Dad. The river still had decent visibility with a slight tinge, but since it was a fairly rocky base it does not get silted out like the lower Skagit, and the Stilly Rivers were. We fished for several hours and we saw a few silvers swimming in front of us as red as can be... After seeing no one catch anything worth wild for several hours, we moved down stream to try another spot. To no avail, the current was so strong near the outlet... So we checked out the egg hole, and as it was suspected initially it had fishermen lined on both sides of the hole... This is a small feeder river for the Skagit and it is not very wide...

Dad on the cascade early in the morning.

Dad on the river with fog rolling over the surrounding hills.
So we left and headed down the Skagit to try a few more spots and still to no avail. We didn't catch anything more than the sight of a lot of humpy salmon carcasses, Dad caught a caught a spent humpy and we saw some nearly dead humpies barely swimming along. After talking to a few more people the Skagit was blown out from the Sauk River to it's mouth... So we called it a day and headed home. On the way home through Darrington we were treated with a great view the snow dusted peak above Darrington and the views of the mud laden Sauk and Stilly Rivers...

Just south of Marblemount the fall colors were gleaming.
Dad on the Skagit River.
The view coming in through Darrington.

Stilly Salmon Fishing, The Coho That Escaped 10/10/2009

2009-11-03T10:29:00.000-08:00

The day started off early with me leaving my house at 4:30am to get all the way north before 6 am. We arrived on the river shortly after 7am as the sun was finishing rising. We were early enough to snag a good spot before the rest of the crowd showed up for the lovely shoulder to shoulder salmon fishing fiasco. In about 4 casts I had a humpy on the line, in another 4 or so casts the fun began. My first coho of the season was hooked, running and jumping like mad! This was the second salmon on my new Uglystick and was proving to be an excellent investment. I fought the fish for a good while, until it was finally tired enough that I could beach the fish on the bank. It was a beautifully silver Coho that was about 14lbs. We strung it up on the stringer to keep the fish alive while fishing for more. It's a general practice that we've been using for years to keep the meat fresh and gut them before we leave. We fished for hours and even though the crowds had thickened it was the only Coho that was caught on the beach. On the side that we were on there was 30+ fisherman, and than on the otherside one asshat decides to start fishing casting towards us. Mind you this is not the Skagit, let alone a wide river. I had been casting nearly all the way across the river all morning. So it was only a matter of time until Murphy's Law kicked in and the asshat caught one of our lines... I was the lucky one to get intertwined with his line... Some choice words were exchanged across the river, until he let his line out and untangled the line. Today was the day of catching things, I caught a Humpy, a Coho, the line across the river, the line to my right and left, a leaf, my hat that ways laying behind me, hell I even reeled in a rock that the hook found a hole in... After hours of fishing dad and I swapped places and I was near the stringer, for some odd reason I looked back to check on the fish, and at that moment I watched the crimp come loose and my fish starting to swim away. Instinctly I jumped after it (waders and all...), I narrowly missed the end of stringer, scooped water down my waiters, and rinsed water over my phone and wallet.... The day of fishing was now over and I was cold and wet... At least I got a picture as I was taking the hook out...

It's a bad picture, the angle makes my hand look huge... But it's the only one I got...

I will now be making a stronger stringer without any Chinese crimps... I'm thinking a metal stringer with a noose and a polypropylene rope extension. But I really don't want to bleed them and have them floating dead in the river to collect all of the contaminants in the belly...

Stilly Humpy Fishing 9/25/2009

2009-09-26T09:56:00.000-07:00

On Friday Dad and I sorted through some fishing gear I was given and we picked out some components that might work for an all around Salmon fishing setup. Granted the stuff was ancient equipment and we weren't expecting the rod to last, even on humpies... Dad greased up the reel to revive it's function, and we went to Hook Line and Sinker and got 150 yds of 20lb green braided line with 50 yds of 80lb Dacron backing installed onto the behemoth of a reel. We headed back to the same spot that we went to last time on the Stilly and started fishing. Cast 1... Bam! fish on. This ancient "steelhead" rod had nearly no backbone, and even the humpies were flexing the rod nearly to the grip... So the expectations of the rod lasting through the day was slowly declining. After hooking into about 4 humpies the rod seat fractured around the rod, which made the reel seem a little loose, but was as tight as it could get, so I kept fishing. After about hooking into 6 humpies, about one every half hour the sun was setting and we headed in, cause I had a long drive home. So now I'm in the market for an Ugly Stik, and will be headed down to Cabela's today to take a look at some rods, compare prices and see if they actually have the lures I use in stock.

Wood-gas stove for the BPL Trapper Mug, Part 3

2009-09-23T19:26:00.000-07:00

Today, instead of cleaning all day like I should have been doing... I decided to go test some hypothesizes I had on my wood burning stove. The main hypothesis I had was that it was starving for oxygen as the stove burned for longer periods of time. The reason for this thought was that initially the stove would burn fine, than after five minutes or so it would slowly die down and smolder. In the earlier stages say 5 to 10 minutes you could add some thin tinder and blow a little on the coals and it would flare back up. The longer that the stove burned for the harder it would become to "relight" the stove. This equated out to the complication of never getting my water to a boil. I also noticed that every so often the updraft would flare flames between the lid and the burn box. So I epoxied the 2 parts together hoping that it would permanently seal the 2 parts together.

Yesterday, I placed 4 small holes semi-equidistant from each other, approximately half way up the burn box. I also took a look at the outer can and decided to slightly boost the available air intake by removing the sections between the holes to make 4 semi-equidistant large intake holes with a regular sized hole in between each large hole.(think of it as forming a + sign of large holes, one large hole at the point of each plus sign.) The burn was a lot better after these modifications, but as the fire burned longer it would still become difficult to revive the flame if the fire died down to a smolder. After the burn I JB Welded the lid and the burn box together to help seal and eliminate the leak between the parts.

Today, I cut 2 grooves in between each of the 4 mid height burn holes at the base of the burn box. Hoping that this would help increase the flow of air to the base of the fire and ultimately increase the ability to revive the fire after I threw too much wood in the burn box, or after it just smoldered down to coals. After a trial run it proved to greatly help the fire rehabilitation after it died down. The fire barely took a breeze from my breath and the fire would self revive and flare back up. The fire was a lot more consistent and became a lot easier to keep a good flame going strong. Initially in order to keep the flame going I would have to be using paper thin sticks only. With the lower and midway holes I was able to start using pencil thick sticks to fuel the stove, which reduced the frequency of which I had to feed the stove, but it still needs a constant tending due to the small burn box. The JB weld was a waste though, since the fire exceeds the temperature rating of the JB weld and it started to bubble and eventually failed.

Don't mind my the dyslexia, I initially did not plan on making a video out of this... So I was supervising the cats, tending a fire, videoing and trying to think while talking with no preparation...

The mid height burn holes and the first slots for the lower vent holes.

Here you can see the elongated holes in the base of the stove, I have sticks abound broken and ready for starting the stove.

The stove loaded and you can see the fire starter on top of the wood stack and the little bridge above. Which will be ignited by the fire starter and drop down and ignite the rest of the wood. The twin wall design stoves operate with an updraft in the outer wall creating convection currents sucking the air into the outer wall, through the holes to fuel the fire. After much research and lots of trial runs this method has been the most effective at quickly starting and preheating the inner wall to start the convection currents on these small stoves.
Prepared for the burn.
Here is the final lower venting setup. If I were to make another one I would drill the vent holes in before I removed the can's base, since there is not enough structure to push against in order to drill the holes without the base of the can I just used the cut off wheel on my dremel to turn the slots into triangles.

After the video test run, I enlarged the holes near the base of the burn can and ran a burn without the pot. With the larger holes I was able to start using pinky width sticks after the fire was good and hot. Granted you still need to be mixing in a lot of small wiry sticks and pencil sized sticks with the larger sticks to keep the flame burning hot. Using the larger sticks though helped lower the amount of constant feeding that was required in the earlier prototypes, but it still needs constant tending and watching. I'm pretty happy with where this model has gone and I'm very glad that I kept with it and didn't give up. The only thing left to tinker with is the height of the pot stand and take the final weight measurements. The next major step is an actual field test along the trail at a cozy campsite after I'm tired from walking... Only then will I be able to tell if I want to keep this as a potential stove for fair weather to moderate weather trips where wood will be plentiful. We'll see how the field testing goes...

The present weight of the stove without a windscreen or pot support is 2.6 oz. So figure the final weight will be between 3.0 to 3.5 oz with a windscreen and pot support.

Warning! Playing with fire and tools can be dangerous! This post is for informational purposes only. Using any of these methods, or using a fire, a stove or tools can cause health hazards, injury or death!!! Use this information at your own risk.

Wood-gas Stove for the BPL Trapper mug Part 2

2009-09-22T09:26:00.001-07:00

The other week I got a few more minutes to play with the stove designs in an attempt to get them to work a little more efficiently. I'll be getting less time over the next few months since Fall quarter of college starts on the 28th of September.

I took Prototype 1 and shortened the outer can by 1" to get the bottom of the burn box a little closer to the base of the stove and to see how it performs with getting the hot coals closer to the actual fire. Since they fall through the grate as they become ash. I also revised the mesh on the bottom of the burn box as I had previously intended. I used a 1/2" wire fence mesh from Home Depot, which was also used to make the pot support. I was tempted to get the 1/4" mesh... but I went with the standard 1/2" mesh for weight and the fact that is what it appears most stove builders use for pot stands as well. After cutting the bottom of the outer can, without my hydraulic press was fairly hard to get the base of the can to press neatly onto the can. I dented the outer can and partially crushed it... I straightened it back out with a pair of pliers and turned the lid inside out and worked it back onto the bottom of the out can. With some help of the pliers I managed to get everything to fit fairly snug back together.

The next model revision (prototype 2.0) I made was to use the same standard sized peach/soup can and use a Campbell Tomato Soup can for the inner fire box. Figuring it would allow me to use the full depth of the peaches can, by giving me an extra 1/2" of length and a 1/2" wider for the fire box. I took a different approach to the holes on this stove. Instead of marking to drill every 1" and using a 1/2" drill bit, which was than augured out to be ~ a 3/4" hole as I used on the original can... I marked ever half inch and drilled a 3/8" hole which I augured out to ~ a 1/2" hole. I figured I'd try more holes at a smaller size... I used a similar procedure as part 1 to make the burn box and installed the wire mesh and put the stove together.

The 1" cut mark for the the first prototype.
The start of prototype 2.0
The soup can nested into the peach can.
The old burn box next to the new burn box.
The cheesy wire grate before replacement in ver. 1.0, and the wire grate in ver. 2.0
The stoves side by side.
Testing... The new design smoldered a lot and I could barely get it to even get a couple minutes of good burn time... Which has been a fairly consistent problem with both designs, yet it was definitely amplified with this model. Some of it might be my choice of wood, but I think these stoves are slightly suffocating due to the small amount of ventilation and their small burn box size. Which gets full and I can see where O2 movement could be a problem. I need to play with the oxygen delivery systems on the inner can first, I think I'll add a couple holes lower on the burn box to help fuel the fire mid can. Prototype 1.1 burned a lot better, but I still had trouble getting a consistent burn, granted it was a little better.

Trapper mug, stove 1.1, stove 2.0
Stove 2.0 with the new pot stand.

The next plan is to do a little more research, and play with the O2 delivery (add a few holes to the inner can at a little lower level, and maybe some mods to the outer can holes as well). I might also cut down the tomato can to fit into the shorter can as well. I'm not going to give up quite yet, but I might reroute my design to a larger stove if I can't figure out a way to get this stove to burn better. There might just not be enough distance between the walls on the second stove... But only tinkering and testing will tell... Nothing like smelling like a camp fire at the end of the day!

Warning! Playing with fire and tools can be dangerous! This post is for informational purposes only. Using any of these methods, or using a fire, a stove or tools can cause health hazards, injury or death!!! Use this information at your own risk.

A Lake Which Shall Remain Nameless, Solitude Within a National Park

2009-09-18T23:02:00.000-07:00

This lake by no means is a heavily visited lake and is the most solitude on a Friday that I have ever had at this particular park. The trail is an unofficial park trail in an unlikely place, and it is not maintained to any park standard. There is a steep but short ascent and descent to these beautiful lakes while being the shortest hike I've done all season. Friday we started out at an undisclosed location and hiked a short way to our cutoff trail and began the steep ascent to the pass along the ridge line. Here we dropped down at a fairly steep angle until we were the majority of the way into the basin where the trail started having a few more flat spots between elevation drops. Since this is a seldom used area, there is some bush whacking, downed trees and lots of faint way trails in every direction. So if you find this hike, as you approach the basin you might want to have a decent sense of direction, because as you reach the first lake there are faint side trails everywhere and there is no well defined path to the second lake or along side the lakes. The second lake is extremely shallow through most of the lake with several deeper swaths like where a current runs through during the snow melt, while the upper lake just drops off fast all around. I fished for a short while while Sarbar made some lunch. No fish were jumping and nothing was biting my dry fly. So as I came back for lunch and was eating... What decides to make a couple leaps and taunt me? Of course a couple fish... So I hurried in that general direction and casted out a few times when all of a sudden the wind picked up and my line went crazy mid cast and entangled itself... That ended my fishing day and we headed back up and out to the car since I needed to be back in time to show my car which was for sale.

Sarbar's blog post

The sunrise with a lovely side of traffic on Highway 16...

The peak near the pass we had to cross.
Sarbar on the way up.
A gorgeous view of a fading meadow.
Sarbar cresting the pass.
The hills above the lake basin.
Some of the first views of the meadows on the eastern side of the upper lake.
Craggy peaks above the upper lake. It resembles Crystal lakes in so many ways, other than the one campsite is tucked in the trees with no view and the lake drops off fast.
The shallower lower lake.
The shallower lower lake.
Me at the outlet of the upper lake.
Fly fishing at the upper lake, I really needed a float tube...

A glimpse of one of the most dominating peaks in the southend.
One last view of the upper lake on the way out. If you look hard on the far right of the picture you can see the hole in the trees where the lower lake is.
Sarbar and the basin's walls behind.
A sketchy section of trail with precarious and slippery alders strewn across the trail.

The Backway to Grand Park... When Things Go Wrong...

2009-09-17T13:28:00.000-07:00

So... You'd think this is going to be some grand trip report of alpine meadows and remote fly fishing along a quiet lake in the middle of nowhere... You'd be mistaken if you thought so, as was I... The plan was to hit up Grand Park at Mt Rainier NP via the back way through the Mt Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. Which is a shorter trail and encompasses a lot less mileage and elevation gain and loss. You also have to pass Lake Eleanor on the way in, which is a serene lake in a high subalpine setting. We were going to have lunch at Grand Park and then head back for an hour or 2 of fishing at lake Eleanor with some dinner. As we were mosying on down the logging road we finally reached a long section of up hill on a fairly steep grade not too far from the trailhead... When all of a sudden HD's Suburban just died... After some inspection the ECM-B fuse kept popping and without a wire diagram or tools we were S.O.L.. HD backed down the hill to the bridge below the climb, while Sarbar and I hiked up the logging road a ways to try and get a signal to make a call... I had to climb up the road's precarious embankment several times till I finally found a rock to perch on and get a faint signal to call out... After making a call out, we headed down the long downhill to the bottom of the hill where HD had safely gotten the truck down the hill.

The less precarious rock up the road embankment that I finally was able to get a call out on...

Huckleberry Creek down by where we left the truck...

Sarbar and HD roadwalking...

Jaws the local Hobo... Carrying the bread sack for lunch and wandering down the logging road.
We put a plan together to hike out and try to get the assistance of one of the police officers that we saw at the police convention alongside the logging road. There was 10+ Pierce County Sheriffs SUV's alongside the logging road to include 2 trailers for ATV's... We reached the odd ball assortment of police vehicles and sat around for a few minutes hoping that someone there could eventually give us a hand. We didn't go off looking in the woods for the police officers since who knows whether they had found a body, were searching for someone or were just doing some training. A few minutes went by and a lone sheriff came along the road... HD explained the situation and the sheriff was kind enough to tow the rig to the highway where Sarbar's AAA could tow his vehicle home. We found out that it was just a SAR's training mission that was going on with all the police cars.

HD getting pulled down the logging road by the police.

Finalizing the plans and this is where HD and I piled into the wrecker.

When we reached highway 410, we still did not have cell phone service, so we piled into the back of the sheriff's SUV who was kind enough to drive us down to the Greenwater General Store where we could use the pay phone. Sarbar called AAA, and we preceded to wait around for the tow truck... After the truck arrived, we parted with Sarbar and I got to ride without a seatbelt for 100 miles to Poulsbo, WA... Where HD's Suburban was dropped off at the shop. After the suburban was squared away HD drove me back to Purdy where my truck was parked and I headed home.
It was a long and adventurous day, where we had no idea something so crummy would end up so well.

Thank You Pierce County Sheriff Dept/University Place Police Dept!

Humpy Salmon Fishing on the Stilly 9/13/2009

2009-09-15T15:50:00.001-07:00

I was supposed to be out of the house on time to make it all the way north to my mom's house to go fishing with my dad on the Stilly. As usual, I got up on time and was ready, but something delayed me and I got behind on schedule. I checked the mail and my ipod headphone jack repair kit came in the mail so I had to perform a quick surgery on the ipod, which took all of 10 minutes... The kicker was someone let my cat Orion into the backyard. Orion has been sick and had a vet appointment for monday so I didn't want him playing in the backyard... So I had to go out in the backyard and chase him around to get him back in the house. After that I got breakfast and gas was on my way to go fishing. I arrived an hour late and we loaded my stuff up. Dad, Jess and I then headed out fishing on the Stilly. We got there and it was packed, the spots next to the faster moving water were full, so we had to head up stream and fish the slower current. I started out fly fishing for the first several hours. They weren't biting on any of the flies I casted out.

After 3 or so hours of not catching anything I switched over to my dad's spare gear setup and started fishing. Not long after the fishing started to pick up and we were landing Humpy Salmon left and right. We fished until dusk hoping to catch a couple of the slivers that were mixed in, but to no avail, we only caught humpies. We cleaned our catch and headed home. It was a long drive home and I didn't get there till nearly midnight.

Humpy Salmon #1.
Humpy Salmon #2

Hurricane Ridge Motorcycle Ride 9/12/2009

2009-09-15T15:33:00.000-07:00

Saturday I went with my Dad along with Dave and Nancy on a motorcycle trip to Hurricane Ridge for the day. The motorcycle I normal drive is down for now so I rode on the back of my Dad's Goldwing. We started off in the morning and headed up to Belfair to get breakfast. The first place we stopped didn't start serving food until 10 or 11 am, but the bar opened bright and early... When we were trying to leave another Goldwing pulled in and was chatting about the bikes. We crossed the street to the other diner which was open, and got bombarded by an old man who had owned an older Goldwing and was reliving old times. After breakfast we got on the road and headed up across the Hood Canal bridge towards Highway 101 in route to Port Angeles. It's a fairly scenic drive with great views to the mountains and several bays within the Puget Sound along the way. I don't think I've ever not been driving on this stretch of road so it was a very nice relief to rubber neck around and take in the view and get some pictures along the way.

Dave and Nancy in Sequim.

We stopped to take a look at the Olympic National Park visitor center on the way into the park. After the visitor center we headed off to enter the park and head up the road to Hurricane Ridge. Last year they repaved the road to Hurricane Ridge so it was smooth sailing after we reached the park boundry. We slowly winded our way up to the visitor center at the ridge.

At the park entrance.

After we arrived we walked around for awhile and than checked out the store and visitor center. On the way down we saw a dog tired deer slowly walking up alongside the road, it looked like it was about to keel over of a heart attack...

After we got down the highway we swung through Applebees for dinner and than we started the long drive home at dusk. The visor on the helmet I was using was tinted and it made it really hard to stay awake after eating so much good food.

Wood-gas Stove for the BPL Trapper Mug, Prototype 1 (mini-me1)

2009-09-11T18:15:00.000-07:00

So I've been eyeballing wood-gas stoves for awhile and even came across some great plans on BPL MYOG forums for a 5.5oz wood-gas stove. The problems for me was it was on the heavy side, materials weren't going to be cheap, and it suggested I buy some special tool from Harbor Freight. Granted the special tool would of made my job of tinkering easier and cleaner, but I didn't have the money or time to buy the extra expenditures. The other problem is that it wouldn't nest in my Trapper mug or a Tibetan Tiatanium 700ml mug, which is what I'm contemplating getting for longer trips. Therefore it would take up even more space in my preferred little pack. The thought of going on a long trip and not having to carry any fuel really intrigued me. I could start gathering sticks along the trail on the way into camp or wherever I was going to be cooking.

The project started with scouting out the cupboard for any combination of cans that might actually nest into the mug and would be able to be fit into each other to create the stove. I didn't really have a weight that I was shooting for with this project, but I wanted it to be light and functional. Since I haven't really played with wood-gas stoves I also didn't want to be out a lot of money if I didn't really like the idea.

I found a Hunt's Tomato Paste can and an Alberstson's Peaches can. They seemed to be about the right dimensions to work and the large can would nest into the Trapper mug. Did I know if the tomato paste container was really large enough for a burn box... nope... but that is what tinkering is all about, finding out what works and what doesn't. You have to try it to find out for sure.

The final weight is 2.5 oz. without the pot support. I haven't made one that is staying yet, so it could affect the actual final weight.

Cost:
A couple dollars worth of cans and some of your time if you already have tools lying around the house.

Materials Required:
2 nestable cans
A plan
A cutting tool (dremel or something that you can use)
Possibly some JB weld
A drill or some form of metal punch
A side cutting safety can opener

The Hunt's Tomato Paste can on top of the Albertson's Sliced Peach can. Here I traced out the small can onto the lid of the large can to mark the hole for cutting.
Here I cut off a lid off of each can. The lid that was removed from the large can do not discard! It was the one that the smaller can was traced onto and it will be reused.
I set the lid that was removed from the large can back onto the can and used a cutting wheel on a dremel to cut just inside of the line that was previously drawn onto the lid.
The center was then removed from the lid. Since we cut to the inside of the line we allowed room to trim the lid to form fit to the small can. You can discard the center piece that was cut out.
I than trimmed the left over portion of the lid ring from the small can's open side.
Using a small grinding adapter on a dremel I slowly smoothed out the cut from the large can's lid until it was just at the inside of the line I drew. Don't remove too much material, because you want a tight fit with the little can.
When you get the cut smoothed out to the line, start test fitting sliding the small can into the hole. At the first sign that it will fit very snugly slide the 2 pieces together. Remove the parts and drill the holes as stated below for the small can, than you can cut off the other lid remaining on the small can. At this point if you made the hole tight enough you don't really need to epoxy the 2 parts together. If you didn't take your time to make the hole tight you can use some JB weld or any other chemical that you feel safe with to bond the 2 parts together. I used JB weld even though mine was a very tight fit, but I got hasty and lit it way before the JB Weld was dry and it cracked, dried up and did not bond. I won't be re-bonding it because I made it such a tight fit.
I left out the cutting of the holes because that is what I will be playing with until I get this guy to burn well. Basically I found the largest size drill bit that I had, measured out 1" intervals along the top side of the small can just low enough to be just below the top of the small can. I used a punch to mark the holes and to keep the drill from wobbling. I started with a small bit and slowly stepped up the size until I finally reached the largest size. I did the same with the large can but moved the holes up from the bottom of the can so that 3/4 of each hole was above the base of the inner can. After the holes are drilled remove and discard the other lid on the small can. Than remove the bottom lid of the large can and keep it. The large can's lid will be used as a base to protect the ground from the fire and will make the stove self contained during the burn. Which will help reduce the chance of catching anything else on fire along the way.

First ignition.
A makeshift pot support, which will not be used in further testing. I need to get a wire mesh pot support that allows the air to flow a little. The closed off design helped stifle the flame at times.
The stove nested into the BPL Trapper mug.
All the parts disassembled after the hour burn. I didn't take a close up of the wire mesh that was put on the base of the small can to hold the wood inside the burn box. The reason for that is that it was a very makeshift assortment of metal fencing rods and it will not be in the final design. I'll be using the same wire mesh that the pot support will be made out of for the bottom of the small can.

Far left is the inner burning box, in the middle is the large outer can, on the right is the trapper mug and the base of the wood burning stove.
As stated previously this is prototype #1, I still need to play with the holes on the outer can to try and get a more efficient burn. I will be changing the makeshift pot support and the wire at the bottom of the burn can. I also noticed that the type of wood also made a large difference on how it burns. The small twigs don't seem to matter when burning through the bark, but the slightly larger sticks need to be stripped of bark. Another idea that I will be investigating is finding an aquarium tube and using it to help blow air into the fire when it starts to smolder or die down so that I'm not huffing in the smoke fumes. After a couple more burns and some more dialing in I'll post another thread on the revisions and further thoughts on the mini-me wood burning stove.

Warning! Playing with fire and tools can be dangerous! This post is for informational purposes only. Using any of these methods, or using a fire, a stove or tools can cause health hazards, injury or death!!! Use this information at your own risk.

Skibonkers 2009, South Center Mall in Tukwilla

2009-09-06T15:14:00.000-07:00

After thinking that I was not going to be able to make it to this great gear saving event, due to having a fairly bad illness... I cleared up miraculously mid event and went over to sneak some peeks at the deals that were being offered. As always at Skibonkers has some substantial savings on Ski and Snowboard gear up to 70% off name brand clothing, boards, board bags, goggles, boots, bindings, etc. Since last season I purchased a new board, bindings, pants, jacket and goggles... I didn't have a lot to directly look for this year except I am finally in the market for a helmet. 10 years of snowboarding and my family has been ragging on me to get one... Yet no one wanted to pay for one even though I told them you buy it, I'll wear it... Since I'm doing a lot of snowboarding by myself I figured I might as well get one to preserve my skull for the rescue.

There was a ton of deals on name brand gear. If it wasn't for the fact that I was spending the last of the borrowed money on my credit card, I would of looked harder at the super sales on the new boards and gear. After wandering for awhile I found the helmet table and found the Helmet I wanted in my size. It was a Smith Variant with fully adjustable venting and fit adjustment. I already looked around last season and this one was the ticket for comfort, it fit my Smith Turbo Fan goggles and Skull Candy makes headphone ear flaps for it. The Helmet was 27.5% off of retail price, which was cheaper than I could find it anywhere on the internet or locally in the correct size. If I wore a small or large I could of found it for less elsewhere. Word of warning if you decide to buy a Smith helmet measure your head first, because they run small in size. In most helmets I wear a Large, in these I fit a medium and swim in a large. I'll post a review or highlight of the helmet after playing with it for awhile and after I get the Skull Candy headset purchased and installed. Overall if you are looking for new gear the skibonkers sale is going on through Monday and they will be having an after sale on their site after the tent sale is over. Other notes from Skibonkers, Stevens Pass is extending their Season Pass and Advantage Card sale to mid October! So go get your passes and advantage card for the up and coming season at the lowest rates of the season. Stevens Pass has also not released copies of their new movie on hard disc yet, and this seasons Stevens Pass snowboard film might be a download only version... Lame...

NeoAir Mattress Repair Kit Overview

2009-09-02T11:23:00.000-07:00

If you didn't read the blog about the tear in my new fangled NeoAir mattress from the PCT section hike. Than you probably would not have known that I tore nearly a 1" gash in the mattress. Luckily Duct-Tape holds the world together, and it sealed the mattress for the remainder of the trip. When I was down at the PCT day celebration at Cascade Locks in Oregon, I was fortunate enough to get a free repair kit from the Therm-a-rest booth. So here is the repair and a semi-review of the simplicity of the actual patch kit.

The patch kit next to the NeoAir with a Duct-Tape patched hole. The patch kit comes with some "glue dots" which are unneeded in the repair of a NeoAir mattress.
The damage that was done with the Duct-Tape residue surrounding the tear.
The first real step for the NeoAir was to clean the area for the patch with a provided alcohol swab. If you did a trail-side repair with Duct-Tape, be prepared to scrub a little to get the residue removed.
The next major step was to install the patch. I did it like any other sticker I ever put on, Line it up as best as possible and roll the backing off to slowly while installing the patch. Just a note, the backing was a little difficult to remove with your fingernail, a razor blade might ease the initial removal of the backing.
There was an optional step which required placing a pot with boiling water on top of the patch for 10 minutes to help increase the adhesion of the patch. It is not required, but since this patch was being done at home so I was not counting every gram of fuel I performed this optional step. Previously I had read a in BPL's Member Only article on the NeoAir that when they did this step the patch slightly stuck to the pan when they were trying to remove it. Trying to avoid damaging the seal of the edge of the patch I opted to try laying down a piece of parchment paper between the pot and the patch. Which worked excellent and prevented any sticking of the patch to the parchment paper or the pot.
The finished patch.
Overall this patch kit was very simple to use at home, and I could see it being used fairly easily in the field as well. The last 2 patches, 2 alcohol swabs, Ziploc and direction packet, with the glue dots removed from the kit weighs .30 oz. So it is up to you to decide if you want to carry a redundancy in your essentials kit. Right now I've already placed a .5 oz roll of Duct-Tape in my essentials kit and the Duct-Tape held fairly well for the majority of the 4 night trip. It did leak a little throughout the night, but it was an acceptable amount of leakage for an emergency repair kit for my taste. A couple breaths at 3am firmed the mattress back up and I was happy, it's still more comfortable than my worn out home mattress or a closed cell foam pad. I definitely plan on using this kit for permanent repairs at home or maybe on very long hikes I would carry it, but for everything else there is Duct-Tape.

PCT Day, Cascade Locks Oregon

2009-09-01T10:24:00.000-07:00

Well, I was invited to head down to the Cascade Locks to go to the PCT Day put on by the Pacific Crest Trail Association. Dicentra, Sarbar and I headed down to the locks bright and early Saturday morning and when we arrived only a few thru's had shown up and it was still fairly dead. We sat around for a little while and than we got some lunch and came back to the event. I got to meet Tom and Tori for the first time, Dicentra's and Sarbar's friends who had been thru-hiking on the PCT, great people! After meeting them I was starting to get really tired again, so most of my day was just cat-napping on the grass of Thunder Island. They tapped the keg, I had a few beers and than we went to the PCT Pub I believe for dinner and than back to Thunder Island for the PCT video. Here is some pictures of the trip. I also received a complimentary repair kit for my NEOair from the Therm-a-rest booth so watch out for a NEOair repair post and patch kit review.

Hmm... no swimming but here's a later just in case you want to...
The Bridge of the Gods with the Cascade Locks.
The vendor tents early on in the day.
The paddle wheel boat.
The band from Portland.
The Bridge of the Gods
Dicentra hanging out with a bunch of Thru-hikers.
Napping the day away.
The Oregon side of the Columbia River.

Spray Park, Mt Rainier 8/26/2009

2009-08-26T20:28:00.000-07:00

Today I awoke, and headed out for a solo day hike at Mt. Rainier National Park. The plan was to head out to the Wonderland trail and take the alternate route to the top of Spray Park and swing by Spray Falls on the way up. Along with taking a couple side routes within Spray Park. I finally got to the trail head around 10am and was on the trail by 10:20 ish. The trail drops fairly quickly and than meanders up and down with a few good little climbs in between the trail head and the Spray Falls junction.

Shortly after the parking lot.

From here it's about .1 miles to the "viewing area" of the falls. I arrived at the viewing area and realized that I could only see half the falls... So I took charge and scoped some crossings and crossed the falls outlet creek... After the PCT section creek crossings just aren't a big deal. Granted this one had some slick rocks and some pole vaulting with my trekking poles included... But I still made it just fine. WOW! The view of the falls was a lot better upstream on the other side of the creek.

Spray Falls.
Spray Falls and I.
After the pictures I pulled out some snacks, crossed back over the stream and started powering up the climb into Spray Park. It was a slight wake up call about keeping a pace up steep hills... Rainier is no mid west park with gracefully climbing trails. The switchbacks are straight and to the point, they climb the hill! After passing some people on the way up, I took the first side trail to the headwaters of Spray Falls.

A stream alongside the trail during the switchbacks to Spray Park.
The first real hint of meadows. The headwaters of Spray Falls side trip is near this corner.

Wildflower shot looking back down the trail. When I got back to the main trail I quickly repassed the people that I passed on the climb and continued on to the next side trail where I wandered back for quite awhile and saw several tarns, tons of flowers, and some close ups of Observation Rock. When I returned to main trail I again passed the groups of people and took another side trail that kind of got iffy and all the tarns conflicted each other, but I wound up near the base of Eagle Cliffs and Observation Rock...

More stair steps... It's the one thing that drives me crazy about rainier...
More angles of Rainier.
A great wildflower plus Rainier shot.
Along the second side trail.
A marmot chilling in the meadows a few feet away.
The barren terrain up the 3rd side trip.
views from near Observation Rock.
About where I turned around below Observation Rock.
Looking across a tundra like terrain towards the Tacoma area.
When route finding on the side trail started to go to hell I headed back down to the main across a snowfield to where the trail started to head down hill into Seattle Park and the Carbon River drainage. At this point I turned around, taped my feet up and headed back down to the parking lot. Where again I passed the same crowd of people... On the last section I wound up running nearly a mile of it... I wound up picking up a fairly aggressive yellow jacket that was buzzing me and constantly trying to land on me to sting me... So I kept running ahead and sometimes I'd lose it for a few minutes, and sometimes it'd still be doing circles around me while I ran! Than after I thought that I had finally lost it, it would come back and I'd jet ahead again... Scary stuff! Especially since I'm deathly allergic to some kinds of bees... Granted I had an Epinephrine shot and benadryl with me, but I don't want to have to use them because it's never fun. I finally lost the bee just before I reached the Parking lot... I got back to the parking lot at roughly 3:20pm and headed home.

Snoqualmie Pass to Stevens Pass via the PCT Day 1of 5

2009-08-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

It started off as an early Sunday morning drive north to meet up with Dicentra. I got a late start out the door to head north to meet up with Dicentra, but made it to her house on time, yet we still got a late start to the trail head. Dicentra's husband dropped us off at the trail head at Snoqualmie Pass so that we could start our journey. The plan was to hike an average of 15 miles a day to cover the 75 mile journey to Stevens Pass. I was really hoping to get a lot more fishing in on the trip, but in retrospect I wish I would of left the fishing gear at home... I would of saved nearly a pound of weight and the cost of the 5 sacrificial flies I lost to the bush gods...

We got on the trail around 9 am and started moseying up the climb to Kendall's Catwalk.

Dicentra and I at the trail head.

A pretty cool looking peak surrounded in the fog on the way up.

Entering the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

We ran into this kind fellow Mr. Zip along the way up. He's hiked the whole Appalachian Trail and is segmenting the PCT 900 miles at a time, so that he isn't away from his wife near as long as he would be on a full thru hike. He had some awesome stories of his travels that were really motivating and after he passed us at Kendall's Catwalk, we'd be a couple miles behind him the whole way. Sadly we did not catch back up to him.

Dicentra in an opening on the way to the catwalk.

Some of the trail in the trees on the way up to the catwalk.
Me trekking along towards the catwalk.
One of the clear sections, with a lot of great views.

Where's Jared? Can you find me?

Just before the catwalk.
Red Mountain from the catwalk area.
Dicentra and I at the catwalk. Here we took a good long lunch and b.s.'d with the local day hikers. Talked to a couple people and a few previous Wonderland hikers. This was also the area that Mr. Zip passed us for the last time. From the catwalk we could see 90% of our route for the day, including the pass we had to cross to get to Parks Lake. As cool as it was to see the route as an all open traverse, it really made everything seem right there, but in reality it was so far away...

Heading towards Gravel and Ridge lakes.
Dicentra coming down into the Ridge Lake basin area.
Ridge Lake

Looking out and down the valley towards Cle-Elum above Joe Lake. The far right edge of this photo is the pass that we had to make it to in order to access the Parks Lake Basin. Just under the cliff bands is the traverse to the pass. An hour or so before we got to this spot we saw a Search and Rescue helocopter circling for a long time trying to get someone out of the area.
Taking a break for Salami and Cheese, and realizing that with the late start and the slower pace we'd be pushing into Parks Lake in the dark with our headlamps on...

Yeah... So we came around the corner and the trail shot straight up and turned into boulders. I won't even repeat what Dicentra said at this point...An interesting rock formation near Needle Gap area.
I was either taking pictures of something or trying to send a message out to say we are alive and well.
Shortly after this the sun was setting as we hit Chikiman Ridge above Parks Lake Basin. About halfway down we caught a stream and gathered some water. We rolled into camp under the cover of darkness with our headlamps blaring, while trying to find a suitable campsite. By this point Dicentra got sick, and was having a not so pleasant night. After we found camp I cooked dinner, setup the bivy and tied off the Ursacks to a tree and than I passed out. To be continued on day 2's page.