You either get it or you don't...

As Decemberrolls by I have the urge to get back out on some ice, snow and into the alpine. But it hasn't always been that way. At one point I stopped alpine and ice climbing because so many friends had died doing it. I just didn't have the metal strength to continue in the game.



Too many good friends and relationships were gone like dry wood in a bonfire.

I turned to warm stone to keep my passion alive. And while I have almost none of those physical skills remaining today the mental strength gathered on hard rock now allows me to go back into the alpine or back to work in my shop on those off days when I would really prefer not to.



Tsunami, 5.11b R/X



But it has taken years and a lot of additional support to be where I am at now and be comfortable in my own skin.



Some of us go climbing to find out just how strong we are. And it generally has little to do with how many pull ups you can manage.



Rock climbing is a previous gift that now allows me to climb again in the alpine. But any form of climbing, work or sportcan be your path. Any activity where you choose to test yourself, checkers or may be just getting out of bed can be more than enough.



Hard rock climbing really has little to do physically with winter alpine climbing. But you either get the idea and stylebehind climbs like the B-Y and Tsunami or you don't.



The video is great. Enjoy!









The Bachar Yerian 5.11c R/X from cole gibson on Vimeo.

Ice Arch Sunrise

This winter has been quite productive when it comes to having interesting ice formations to photograph, much more so than last winter. December and January had plenty of very cold days which meant that there was quite a bit of ice both along the shore and floating around in various places on Lake Superior. Near the end of January we had a wind storm that came up and blew a lot of this ice onto the Minnesota shoreline of the lake. Just north of Grand Marais was one area in particular where the ice had been jammed into many fascinating forms along the beaches. The wave action not only resulted in the packing of the ice along the shoreline, but also contributed to the hollowing out of the ice from underneath in several places. Several ice arches were formed as the waves continued to work at the ice from below.
The arch shown in this image was the most photogenic arch that I found. On the morning I made this image I was photographing the shoreline with my friend Paul. It was a very calm morning which was a stark contrast to the previous days which had made all these ice formations possible. Paul and I set up our tripods and started making images of the arch. We had only taken about 5 or 6 images each when we heard a cracking sound. Both of us were in the process of moving our tripods to set up a different shot when we heard the cracking. We both looked up just as the arch collapsed into the water. Needless to say, this scene was a lot less interesting to photograph after the arch fell. Thankfully we each got a few images before it was gone! This image was made at 8:03 AM using my Canon EF 17-40mm lens. Shutter speed was 1/15, aperture f16, ISO 100.

Second Thoughts on First Impressions

It was one month and one day ago that I mused about my first impressions of the Fujitusu ScanSnap S300 document scanner. To say that it has exceeded my expectations would be a gross understatement.

The above print screen from the ScanSnap manager shows that 8,335 pages have been scanned!

In just one month.

Only one paper jam. Only one sheet of paper got "scrunched up" a bit because of it. No real damage done. Impressive, indeed.

2.1 gigabytes of data generated in 1,363 files of varying sizes, ranging from 1 to 200 pages per file.

Confession time. I've been scanning the "easy" stuff first! The stuff that is already somewhat organized. Also a five-volume set of books on the Berlin family - soft-cover, spiral bound. Easy enough to remove the binding without causing damage. They aren't listed in the online catalog of the Allen County Public Library so the books will be donated to them. Maybe someone else can get some use out of them. And several other books that will be passed on to other researchers. I certainly don't want to get into any trouble over copyright issues, so to put that issue to rest, the scanned copies are strictly for my own use, they won't be given to or shared with anyone else, except perhaps for a few pages.

The scanning is amazingly quick. I'm using the laptop computer to do the scanning since it is newer, faster, and has USB-2 capability. The output is quite acceptable but, to state the obvious, the quality of the output is dependent upon the quality of the pages being scanned. Just think of the adage "Garbage In - Garbage Out" which is true with most things! On average, it takes about half as long to generate the searchable pdf file as it does to scan the documents (i.e., an hour of scanning will take about half-an-hour to make the files searchable). If the pages are double sided text it will take twice as long to make them searchable.

The software that comes with the ScanSnap creates the searchable pdf files without the need to have the full version of Adobe Acrobat. If you have pages with very small type or with the older style fonts (think old newspapers) the software doesn't do that great a job with the OCR but I've been impressed with how well it does overall. The software also allows you to add or remove pages from a pdf file (if it was created by the software) so you can scan in small batches and then combine those into one file. I'm not sure how much data the scanner will store in memory so if I'm scanning a large number of pages I usually do a maximum of about 30 pages to one file. After all the pages for that particular document are scanned, I merge them into one file, then delete the small files. It's really not as complicated as it sounds.

To make some space for the scanned stuff, I had to spend a couple of days cleaning up the hard drive of my desktop computer. Basically I created an Archive folder on my laptop and on the external drives used for backups and moved a lot of older files to that folder. They are still accessible to me, just not on the desktop computer.

Well, I still have lots of files left to scan, though there are now some "blank spots" on the shelves! Progress is being made... and, believe it or not, it really isn't that tedious. One advantage to having the files digitized is that, in most cases, the information is easier to read. Another is if the pdf files are made searchable then the text can be copied and pasted into a word document or into my genealogy database, saving on some typing.

If you are thinking about digitizing your genea-documents, I highly recommend this little scanner. It is a bit pricey for a scanner, but in my opinion, well worth the money! It won't replace your flatbed scanner for scanning photographs since that isn't what it is meant to do. But it does what it was designed to do - scan documents - and does it very well.

Umbilicals...something to think about and it aint good.

Photo courtey of http://colinhaley.blogspot.com/





Like may of us I suspect, I have thought that factory umbilical attachments were best done in a steel or aluminum "loop" that could be directly clipped with your umbilical biner of choice. Having climbed a bunch on Cobras, the newest Fusions, new Ergos and Nomics (old and new) and the original Quark I am rethinking that idea.



photo courtesy of http://colinhaley.blogspot.com/



I really rely on my umbilicals. As much as they are a moving belay for me I also have come to rely on them to retain my tools while climbing leashless. On the occasions I do climb without umbilicals I am very careful to watch where my tools are all the time and that they are securely placed. And I don't worry about my partners kicking or bumping them off the climb. May be I should be more concernedall the time..







I've notice that those that don't choose to use umbilicals aren't always very careful on where they leave their own tools. To the point of a couple of winters ago wepicked up several sets of tools left behind simply because the climbers who owned the tool forgot them at a rap station or even just left them on the ground at the base of a climb. (hard to blame that on umbilicals I guess :) Or just as bad, set them somewhere they could easily be knocked off (by the owner,their partner or rock and ice fall) at a belay station.







But the issue that just became readily apparent to me is clipping carabiners to a metal umbilical attachment points has a huge disadvantage. That is, the wire gate biners tripping themselves open and dropping the tools in use. You can't just ignore where the tool is and what is happening when it is a metal to metal contact between umbilical and tool. None of the carabiner based umbilicals have any advantage here..."no matter how strong the the binergate is" as one manufacturer's rep told me.







Rope tie on points won't solve the entire issue. But they will help make the umbilical biners less likely to pop off the tool. Tonight, as good as the BD tool design work is, I added perlon loops to both my Fusions and Cobras all the while negating the full strength metal attachment pointson both tools. The reason?I'd rather have a less than full strength umbilical attachment point than loosea tool because the umbilical biner ever so easily snapped off the tool by accident.





photo courtesy of http://www.alpineexposures.com/pages/chamonix-conditions





Pays to always think and rethink your own systems.

Owachomo Bridge, Newspaper Rock, Goosenecks State Park

Staying in Blanding, Utah tonight. After a day filled with sunshine, spotty rain, occasional snow showers, and some pretty good dust storms (not to mention some REALLY cool clouds throughout the day), I caught a nice sunset over Owachomo Bridge at Natural Bridges National Monument. Was hoping to photograph some stars over the same bridge, but it was too cloudy.



Some other highlights from today: Stopped by Newspaper Rock in Canyonlands National Park, an amazing rock which has probably the highest concentration of petroglyphs of any single rock in the Southwest. I also drove through some intense rain today, followed by some amazing skies as the storm broke up. As I drove North from Monument Valley I took a quick side trip to Goosenecks State Park to photograph the sky above the bends in the San Juan River.

Chiricahua National Monument

If you should happen to be driving along Interstate 10 in southeast Arizona, you need to turn south onto highway 186 in Wilcox. Your destination is a little over 30 miles through the desert, uphill. It is the same terrain you have been driving through from Texas and New Mexico and you're wondering why or how this will be any different. But when you reach the little road that takes you into a canyon, you enter a different world. A delightful, surprising one.

There was green grass. And trees. Not just the little scrub bushes but real trees. And it was cool. And there was a stream with flowing water. Of course, it was early spring. There had been a lot of snow during the winter and it was melting. The first time in many years that there had actually been water flowing in Bonita Creek, according to one of the Park Rangers.

This fascinating place is Chiricahua National Monument. I had never heard of it until I saw a sign on the Interstate. I'm so glad that I took that road. The campground was pleasant with some sun making its way through the trees. It was refreshing to return to after several hours of hiking the trails, which were created by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s.

My Campsite.

The Erickson/Riggs home at Faraway Ranch, Bonita Canyon.
In 1887, this remote canyon became the home of Neil and Emma Erickson. Swedish emigrants, they met at Fort Craig, New Mexico. He was a sergeant in the Army and she was a a maid and companion to the Colonel's wife. Neil was often away from home, working, and Emma tended to the children and the ranch. In 1903 he became a forest ranger, which took him further away from Bonita Canyon. In 1917, the eldest daughter, Lillian, began inviting guests to the ranch and it became the getaway destination. Her husband, Ed Riggs, became foreman of a CCC Camp and helped build the trails used by visitors today. They did an amazing job on the trails. Faraway Ranch is now a part of Chiricahua National Monument.

Beyond Bonita Canyon are the mountains. The trails wind through the incredible rock formations – pillars and balancing rocks galore! It is a wondrous place, indeed.

Argonaut Peak

The climbing season would not be complete without a trip to the Stuart Range. It was hot out, so the icy water in Ingalls Creek felt pretty good. We camped right beside the creek.






The group breaking out above the tree line.






There was snow and running water on the south side.






We went most of the way up the south side together, then split up and assaulted the summit from different routes.






Jason starting up the NW Arete.



Part of our group on the summit.

Mark and Nicholas.
Mt. Stuart in the background.

Dave and Andrew

Doug and Jason

Kyle

Alta Vista Snow Pit

Howdy Everyone!

This week's snow pit is from the east side of Alta Vista and features the massive amount of new snow that we received during last week's storm cycle.

As you can see from the pit graph, there is small sun crust at the surface (that made for bad skiing) and below that is a 105 cm layer of cold, new snow. This layer has settled about 5" and continues to stabilize. Below this layer there are a number of complex ice crust layers that were observed just below the surface in the Feb. 9th snow pit near The Castle in the Tatoosh Range. These layers remain a source of instability and are acting as release surfaces for the deep slab avalanches that have been occurring in Washington.




Stability tests from the Alta Vista snow pit did not indicate deep instability. The compression, extended column, and the Rutschblock tests had failures either near the surface or did not fail. However, as noted by NWAC, even as the snowpack stabilizes there are still persistent weak layers, and localized areas throughout the region are experiencing large, slab releases.

The forecast is showing another series of fronts that are expected to cross the Northwest through the end of the weekend, bringing significant new snow accumulation. Cautious route finding is encouraged if traveling in the backcountry.

Behind closed doors

Looking Out

I an in the short tunnel looking out at Lee.

Joshua Tree National Park

It was on March 17th that I arrived at Joshua Tree National Park in Southern California, seeking some warmer weather. I wasn't disappointed though a few of the nights were a bit on the chilly side. Coming in on the southern side off of Interstate 10, east of Indio, I entered the park just as the visitor center was closing. The Cottonwood Spring Campground was just down the road a ways and it was there that I spent the night.

The next morning I stopped at the visitor center to get a map of the park and information on some of the trails. Half a mile from the campground was the trail to Cottonwood Spring. It was an easy walk along a gravely path and dry sandy stream. Arriving at the stream, there was simply a sign identifying the place where the Spring had been. Rather anti-climatic but it was a nice walk; the sun was shining and there was a nice breeze.

There were several other trails in the area but the southern part of the park, to me at least, wasn't all that interesting. So I hit the road and headed north where the Joshua Trees and the Jumbo Rocks were located.

Along the way there were a few things to see – the Cholla Garden and Ocotillo Forest.

The Cholla Garden was planted by Mother Nature. You do see the Cholla in other areas of the park but usually just a few hanging out together. Here in the garden they grow in abundance.

The cholla also have incredibly sharp, hooked needles that are difficult and painful to extract if you happen to get one stuck on you. I was very, very careful walking through that garden!

The Ocotillo are interesting also. They can get quite tall, this one was about 15 feet high. Much of the year it looks like a bunch of spiny dead sticks. But after it rains, the Ocotillo is covered with very small leaves. Like other deciduous trees, the Ocotillo loses it's leaves but not due to the changes in the season. Rather, for the Ocotillo, the leaves fall when there is no water. The long stems are often used for fencing material and for walking sticks.

The bright red flowers of the Ocotillo appear on the tips of the stems in spring and summer.

A “tube” of Ocotillo flowers.

A Monster at Sunset...

One evening I drove up to Massai Point (6,883 feet above sea level and one of the highest points in Chiricahua National Monument) for the sunset and played with some shots of one of the stone formations...

The glowing “eye” sure made it look creepy.

But the glowing mouth was really weird.

Walking off into the sunset...

Sure doesn't look the same in the light of day!

'Twas another glorious sunset!

Wind & Sand

It is so dry here. We are in a heck of a drought as are several of the other southwestern states. The wind blows and the sand creeps into the house through each and every little crack. You might think you have the best windows made but find out there is not any window that seals well enought to keep this dust out. There are brush fires everywhere. New Mexico, Texas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arizona that I am sure of. Tornados are just as bad like in Iowa and Wisconsin. These photos don't show the wind and dirt that well, but they are kind of blurry due to the blowing sand. The first one is after a windy day when the sand is blown like little waves.

Rusted Truck

Near the log cabin area at the edge of the meadow we found the remains of an old truck, probably an old Model T. Near it was one of it's tires. When we first went into the canyon many years ago there were several old trucks and wagons and many have been taken out by either the forest service or visitors to the area.

Red Vase

I think that this red vase may be depression glass or carnival glass. Other than that I know nothing about it.