Monday, December 19, 2011

Highlights of 2011

The year is just about in the books and it was so full of change it made my head spin.  Lousy PHD programs took another one of my closest friends across the country.  So there was one less number to call for last minute trips which led to a lot of solo mountain bike rides and tamer outings.  I hit up the Honky Tonk Happy Hour after work on Fridays like it was my job and found a whole new family of Honky Tonkers.  When I needed a break from it all there was always the baseball diamond.  I went to more baseball games than I ever have in a single season in 2011, and had a winning streak that lasted until the final game I went to.  My record of attended White Sox games ended at 6-1.

Opportunity came knocking more than once, I climbed Camel Back Mountain at dawn outside of Phoenix, AZ.  There was more climbing with the Chicago Mountaineering Club, I went to Devils lake 3 times, my cousin invited me on a 4 day fishing trip to Lake Clinton (I still have never caught a fish) and took a trip out to Yosemite that really got my head right.   I saw the sun rise and set all over the country.  My GoPro Hero Helmet Camera became my favorite piece of gear.  I documented my morning commute, cross country mountain biking, rock climbing and anything else that caught my eye.  I saw some amazing art and some great rock shows.  

By the numbers I spent a total of 11 days sleeping with my head in the dirt, climbed 30 pitches with 5 days on the rock,  3 days of skiing, 0 powder days.   I was on a bike around 300 days this year with an estimated 5500 miles of pavement behind me. 7 White Sox games and 2 Cubs games.


The year started off with a blizzard that shut down the whole city.



Lake Michigan right after the blizzard.

This sunset photo took me so far from my back porch where it was taken.

A happy day with Dr. Vincent Pham who was bound for sunny California.

One of many Chicago White Sox winners including my first Opening Day.


A fog on the lakefront path.

Go Go White Sox.

My Go Pro helmet camera mounted on my touring bike.

May Arizona trip to visit with Chris and his wife Kassie. 

Top of Camel Back Mt. AZ.

The "L" ride home on the Orange Line.  The end of my AZ. trip.

Go Pro Rig on my MTB.
4th of July with Melissa. 
I took this picture after every White Sox winner it was my good luck charm.
Ozzie would leave the team come the season's end.

The Beer and Crew for Tour de Fat.
 I love it when the mountain culture comes to me.

The Bikes.

The Ballyhoo.

Devils lake.  One of many trips.

Brendan leading my first multi-pitch climb in Yosemite National Park.

Atop Tenaya Peak in Tuolomne Meadows in Yosemite National Park.

California Sunset.

Brendan and me atop Cathedral Peak.  It was bad ass.
The Honky Tonkers got out of the bar and went on the road to the Homer days Harvest Festival.

At summers end this sunset appeared over the Yorkville Days festival grounds.

A day a of hiking at Devils Lake Wisconsin.

I never quite saw the park like this before.





Magic Hour atop the East Bluff Trail.

Wisconsin Dells.
Best Halloween costume ever.  Aron Ralston anyone?


 
The best Thanksgiving turkey fry in all of Chicago had me keeping the beat into the night with Steve and Jonathan. 


I did a lot of living this year. Here's to next year's adventures.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Chicago Winter Survival Guide

Satellite view after last years blizzard.

Home sweet H.O.M.E.S.

Nowhere else in the world have I heard the weather described in finite terms.  In the middle west it is rampant.  The second that September comes around it is echoed through out the land, "Summer is gone"  It is said with the absolute certainty that it will never be back.  Ever.  I get it people are getting their minds set for a cold and brutal couple of months.  The winters here are survivable though and we make it to Summer every year.   I personally love Old Man Winter.  The year before I started biking in the winter though I had it tough.  Now I have my own set of helpful tips.

Number one: Hibernation is not an option.  I know too many Chicagoans that bury themselves under blankets and wait for their late February/early March trip to Arizona.  Get out in it.   Stay just as active as  in the summer months and you will change with the seasons.  I ride my bike all winter and besides the clothes I wear I don't notice much of a difference.  However clothing does matter.  The majority of my winter layers started out as inexpensive GI gear bought at an Army Navy surplus or handed down from servicemen friends and relatives.   Season by season I upgraded one piece to a sport specific article.  Now this is what gets me though most of what mother nature tosses at me.  Remember there's no bad weather only bad clothing.   Chicago's average wind chill is 24∘




A fleece lined wind breaker and jersey for temps down to 40∘.
Below 40∘ I add a base layer.

At 30∘and lower I add a fleece vest.

With shorts that convert to pants for the teens and below.  



A full length bib is under it all.


























Number Two:  Keep a rosy view.  What really gets to me is not the biting cold its the lack of sunshine.  Chicago gets and estimated 43% sunshine in the winter and it will get you down.  I've gone to extreme lengths to see the hope of sunshine.  Even woke up to see it at the horizon before it went into a cloud covered sky.  However even this is not the answer because sleep deprivation won't help you any either.  In comes eye wear.  I advocate protecting your peepers all the time.  Invest in some interchangeable sunglasses.  Mine not only have an amber lens but a rose colored one also.  Switching them in for the doom and gloom outside might just trick your brain enough to where you don't notice the gray so much.  And when it is too windy I bust out my ski goggles.  Go with a low tint and you will be able to wear them at night with the aid of street lights.
 


For my head I have a GI Issue insulated helmet liner.
The chin strap goes in the holes and under the chin.




The peripheral vision is unobstructed.  This thing is perfect.
Number Three: Fire and Friends.  Find your self a bar with a fireplace and invite your friends.  Support is crucial and there is something about a fire that makes things special.  One of my warming memories is going to a friends house for a dead of winter BBQ every Monday and eating in front of their wood burning stove.  It is something I've been meaning to recreate at my current locale.  Give yourself something to look forward to every week and you won't be counting down the days till Spring Training in Glendale.  So keep the grill out and for a list of pubs with fire places click here.

Finally keep a weathered eye here are some of my favorite weather sights with lakefront cams. NOAA and Midwest HazeCam.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Palos Single Track

I've been logging hours out in the Palos Forest Preserve Mountain Bike trail network lately.  I try to get to the Bullfrog Lake trail head by noon on Saturdays but the traffic getting out there is brutal.  I've even tried to go north take the tri-state toll way south to get there.  Any way I try it takes me 1.5 hours to get there.  I made a quick little video of the last time out there.  Now that I know what trails film better I'll try to spice the vids up with some jumps and technical moves.  Any how here it is I hope you dig it.

Monday, November 28, 2011

In the Midwest we Call that 'Building Charater'

I am a hopeless addict to The Dirtbag Diaries. It is a podcast devoted to telling campfire stories of climbing, hiking, biking, fishing and the like.  I stumbled upon it looking for audio documentaries about working for a former employer, Disney. Much to my surprise writer and creator of the 'Diaries' Fitz Cahall, had a story about mountain climbing for the Mouse. A climber myself I was immediately hooked. My fondness for the mountains and traveling bonded me to the site even more. A while back the story 'A Successful Life' aired, about a young woman who leaves the North West for an opportunity of a lifetime to work for National Geographic in our nation's capitol. The problem at hand: Washington D.C. does not have mountains. This theme should sound familiar to anyone who accidentally gazed upon a post of mine. It is a subject I struggle with often. I was born and raised on a suburban prairie just south of Chicago but every summer my parents would pack up the kids into their DIY camper van and take us to the mountains. For two weeks out of the year I was from Colorado. It was a most adventurous life, looking for snakes prior to hand placement while scrambling on rocks, hiking to mountain waterfalls and walking in ice cold snow melt streams.  Colorado would later become my home if only a season at a time and I took in as much mountain life as I could. When post college life became all too frustrating I went back to the prairie I knew so well and found solace reconnecting with family and friends. When I was making the decision to drop roots in the flatlands I wondered if I had grown apart from the dream or if I was giving up on the life that I had wanted for so long. In 'A Successful Life' the woman realizes her love for home outweighs her career aspirations. I empathize with her plight in many ways. One could look at my own affinity for the Midwest just as her's for the Northwest. I'm with her all the way until she starts dissing the opportunities DC has to offer. Hey, what ever happened to "This Land is Your Land".  I was raised on the song by folk legend Woody Guthrie.

This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me

The song is about so much more than the unity of people. Its about a relationship with the land too.  Be it East or West there is appreciation to be had, and wonder and excitement to be at awe with.  

The sun comes shining as I was strolling
The wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
The fog was lifting a voice come chanting
This land was made for you and me

She could have had an entirely different and just as rewarding experience in a new locale. Admittedly I get why she went back and it sounds like her heart was always back home. I just wish she could have gone back to Oregon with a soft spot for the East instead of being "stoked for 5 days" and comparing her remaining time in D.C. to the fun she wasn't having elsewhere.

The adventures had out west taught me how to love the land regardless of topography. When I started viewing my surroundings this way mountains became metaphors. My mountains are the headwinds pedaling into work in the morning, the winding single track along Thorn Creek, the sand dunes at the edge of Lake Michigan, the sandstone canyons of Shawnee National Forest and yes the zero elevation prairie in the back of my parents house. 

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Do It Right

"You're receiving this e-mail because you're at least kind of a badass." Read the first line of an email I received almost 4 years ago. It was quite possibly the greatest compliment I had ever been paid. It came from a guy whose Monday morning trip reports read like they should grace the pages of some glossy magazine. My friend Brendan was amassing a team to climb Mt. Shasta for charity. I sat on the steps of the north garden at work while on my lunch break and mulled over it. I'd be on the hook for a pretty steep fund-raising goal and I was still paying off my trip to New Zealand. It'll mean no ski trip this year. Plus a Glacial Summit was never a consideration of mine. I rattled off a handful of excuses to decline. My reply: "All of my summits have been with a snowboard on my back ya know. Needless to say I'm on the fence." I wasn't going. It was the first time I said "No" to an adventure. My inner Indiana Jones was screaming at me. Sometimes in life you get lucky and it comes back around again. I got in touch with Brendan this past July looking for an adventure. I had RAGBRAI in mind.  It turns out Brendan was on a major road trip and was in need of a climbing partner.  He pitched a trip to Banff National Park in BC, Canada. It was my first opportunity for some multi-pitch mountaineering.  You see when climbing in the midwest rarely does a rock climbing team have the opportunity to out climb the length of their rope and therefore my longest climb has only been close to 90 feet of vertical elevation. Brendan was talking 800 feet at the least, 'Would I run out of gas halfway up? I only know like 2 knots, I've never climbed with a pack on before, hell I've never climbed with anyone besides my brother'. The excuses came right back. This was certainly outside my comfort zone and I needed to blow through that so much more than I knew.

What intended to be a Canadian Rockies trip resulted in us turning around at the boarder and driving some 18 hours to Yosemite's Serra Nevada. I had been to Yosemite the first time 7 years ago. I was with my very pregnant sister and brother-in-law. We got the last campsite on the valley floor which was reserved for the mobility impaired. I guess my sister qualified. I had no idea what to expect. The park was majestic. Every turn revealed a sight so amazing that confining its majesty to a frame of film in my camera almost felt wrong. We hiked to Yosemite and Bridalveil Fall. All the while I felt there was something wild away from the view of a paved road and the visitor center that was I missing. Had a longer stay been in the cards I may have seen it then although never as I would this past August. Climbing then was nowhere near an aspiration of mine, and there were plenty of climbers walking around like badasses.  If you told me then that I would one day be part of the wildlife like they were I'd think you were the crazy one.



We roll up to a National Forest camp site outside of Yosemite around 11:00pm and bivy sacked under the stars. My thoughts immediately turned to John Muir. I was looking at the stars just as he did. A better bedtime story has never been told.  I fell asleep to to the sound of rushing water off in the distance. After a trip to town for some gear and a guide book we headed for Tuloumne Meadows Campground. With all campsites full, our names went on the waiting list. This is August in the country's most popular national park. I figured an alternate plan was in our future.  The trip had already taken a number of unexpected turns so of course it all worked out that we would stay for an entire week in Yosemite at the last minute.  After setting up camp Brendan got to the business of explaining what to expect when multi-pitch climbing.  Things like placing gear protection in the natural openings of the rock and how to remove stubborn nuts, chocks, and cams.  We went over a 3 point anchor and nonverbal communication for when we got out of earshot.   It was a lot to take in on top of the fact that time was of the essence, getting off the rock quickly was a priority.  With the tutorial finished we dined on some camp style chili mac and laid our heads in the dirt awaiting the alpine start in the morning.


Midway up Tenaya Peak
Nervous but confident for the climb I forgot my lunch at camp and Brendan graciously shared his chow and we bushwhacked to the base of the peak and began to climb.  Brendan led the climb and I followed cleaning up all the gear pitch by pitch.  Around the halfway point I relaxed and realized that I was on the side of a mountain, in Yosemite, exposed to the entire blue sky, looking down on Tenaya Lake.  I couldn't help but think of the people who gave the ambition to be there.  It was a moment I won't soon forget. 
Brendan and me on my first multi-pitch summit.

Me on the summit.

We were up there.
After an eight hour car to car excursion we jumped into the alpine lake and looked back at the peak that we had stood on hours earlier.  On the way back to camp we stopped at the general store and enjoyed ice cream on a stick while sitting on a curb, a genuine shared experience between friends to say the least.  The next day we climbed Pywiack Dome which is in eye shot of the road and we quickly amassed a crowd of spectators.  We finished at sunset and were lucky enough for the sky to put on a show for our cameras.  A rest day next had us wandering around a mountain town and the most amazing gas station I have ever been to.  For reals the Lee Vining Mobil with the Whoa Nelly Deli.  They had a bluegrass band playing while I ate Jambalaya.

Pywiack Dome mid climb.
Rappel off Pywiack with Cathedral Peak backdrop.
Our final climb would be Cathedral Peak just shy of 11,000 feet. The first ascent was achieved by none other than John Muir himself.  As Brendan said "and he climbed it in his Levis and a loaf of bread"  This climb got technical with a chimney that I knew the entire time was going to be tricky with a pack on my back.  With a bit of grunting and adrenaline I made it through without a major hiccup.   The summit had barely enough room for two people and Brendan said it was the funnest climb he had ever been on.  Then there was a dicey down climb and hike out on the John Muir Trail. After it was all said and done we had another 8 hour car to car day with the big pay off of ice cream on the curb another genuine experience and great people watching. 
Cathedral Peak
View from the summit.  Looking at Eichorn Pinnacle.

All my climbing gear would then go into my pack, camp would be broke and I would fly out of San Francisco and back to Chicago.  Public transportation took me back to my apartment around 11:00pm.  My pack was dumped to the floor relieving my body of an extra 50 pounds and I grabbed my Nalgene water bottle out of the netting on the side to fill it up with some Lake Michigan from the faucet.  The change in atmosphere hissed out of cap as I unscrewed it.  It was like a tiny bit of physical proof of the heights I came from.  I left a week earlier feeling nervous, excited, and a bit overwhelmed with life and came back with a wave of confidence that I was not expecting.   I grabbed my Devil's Lake climbing guidebook and began earmarking all the climbs that suddenly looked more appealing.     
 



Brendan is currently at 10,000 miles of nomadic road trip action.  He recently contributed a podcast to the Dirtbag Diaries about his summit of Mt. Shasta with his longtime friend and one of the most inspiring gentlemen that I have had the pleasure of meeting.  Do yourself a favor and listen to it here.