Pelicans & Tasty Eyeballs

Since my last entry I acquired a kayak and helped open a store front for Nina's bakery.

My motivations behind getting a kayak were exercise and as a way to "get away from it all" without having to drive long distances. It's a kind of substitute for mountain biking in Corvallis's hills and forests. A kayak seemed like the ideal solution for Texas City. The city is bordered by bodies of water to the north and east. North of town is Moses Lake and Dollar Bay. Although they have two names it's really just one body of water, which I generically refer to as Moses Lake. Moses Lake is a saltwater bay which extends into a marshy bayou to the west. Eastward the lake is bounded by a levee which protects the city from flooding. The levee has a floodgate which serves as a gateway into the much larger Galveston Bay. Galveston Bay extends northward 50 miles inland towards Houston and empties into the Gulf of Mexico on its south side. Galveston Bay forms the eastern boundary of the city. The city's petrochemical port is along the bay, towards the south.

I've never owned a kayak, although I've rented one on a few occasions. My main criteria was price and the ability to haul the kayak inside the Buffalo. I ended up buying a basic 10 foot model. It has the word "Pelican" on it so that's what I've taken to calling it. So far I've mostly paddled it in Moses Lake. My first trip was a lesson on the effects of the wind on a small watercraft. The windier it is the more choppy the water becomes. (I know, it seems obvious, but like many things it's not something you think much about until it effects you personally.) In such a small craft the wave action is a major consideration. Heading crosswind in high wind is most exciting, since it tends to induce rolling. So far I've managed to prevent myself from tipping over, but I've gotten pretty wet on a couple of occasions. I found getting through the floodgate to also be a bit challenging. When the tide is coming in or going out the flow through the floodgate is substantial. Standing waves form on the outgoing side. You have to paddle hard and focus on staying parallel to the flow if you're going against the tide. The marshy bayou at the west end of Moses Lake has the best wildlife, mostly various types of birds. I've seen a few flamingos there. I'm planning on taking one more trip into Moses Lake before I start exploring the Galveston Bay shoreline.

The weather has been pretty nice lately. When I first arrived it was still rather hot compared to what I'm used to. The mosquitoes were still out in force. Since then the weather has taken a decidedly fall-like turn. Most days it's clear and sunny. Warm in the middle of the day, but not hot. The mosquitoes have abated. There's the occasional thunderstorm, but they roll through pretty quickly. It's a welcome change from the seemingly endless days of cold misty rain which I associate with Corvallis for much of the year.

Other than that I've mostly been helping Nina out with the bakery. The display case arrived about a week and a half ago. We had to remove the front door and partially disassemble the case to get it into the building. It's a nice case, especially considering that it's used. Opening day was last Friday, the day before Halloween. The case was stocked with cakeballs, cupcakes, cookies, and brownies. The brownies (which were a special diabetic friendly recipe Nina came up with) were the first to go. The cakeballs have also been popular. Nina and her two employees made some that looked like eyeballs, which were pretty cool looking. Overall the first two days exceeded expectations in terms of display case sales, so it was encouraging.

Nina consistently hears from the bakery's customers that they didn't know the place existed. One said she found the place when she got lost. So, a series of promotions are planned for the next few weeks. First up next week is a free cupcake / cakeball day that's being advertised in the local paper. Then there's an event called Taste of the Town. We're also to making a float (in the form of a giant cupcake) for a city parade in early December. Lastly, we're signing up as a vendor at Dickens On The Strand, a Victorian festival held in Galveston. Between that and the normal orders for custom cakes the bakery will be pretty busy.

Nina and I have continued running. She's broken her record for longest continuous run a few times now. Her record now stands at 30 minutes. In a couple of weeks we'll be running a 5k. The aspirational goal is to run the entire distance. I saw my brother Jose and his two kids on Halloween. The Blur has been relegated to commuting duties, as the nearest hills are a few hours drive. My mom has been busy sorting through my clothes, unceremoniously tossing anything which she deems too worn to keep wearing and replacing it with something she considers more appropriate. I suspect my old North Face climbing t-shirt was one of her victims. Her eyes got pretty big when I answered her question "When was the last time you washed your backpack" with "I've never washed my backpack." Nina talked me into filling out a contestant application for the TV show Survivor. One of the questions on the form was "Which previous contestant do you most identify with." My answer was none, since I haven't owned a TV in years and I've never watched the show.

Hope all is well wherever you are. Here's a few photos.

Back On The Bayou

It's been a few days now since I arrived in Texas City. After leaving Yosemite I headed east, crossing Nevada, southern Utah, then cutting the southwestern corner of Colorado before heading south and then east into the Texas panhandle. After stopping in Dallas to look at some equipment for my youngest sister Nina I headed south towards Houston and eventually Texas City on the gulf coast.

I pretty much drove straight through until I arrived in Colorado, where I visited Mesa Verde. Mesa Verde is a series of canyons cut into table top mountains. The area is known for it's abandoned pre European cliff dwellings. The national park service operates tours of the dwellings. I spent a day taking the tours before leaving. I was hoping to do some backpacking while there but the park service doesn't allow it. The dwellings are similar to ones that I came across in Arizona during El Viaje #1, but larger. They're located under overhanging rock, so they're well preserved. The prevailing theory is that they were abandoned because of climate change.

I still wanted to get another backpacking trip in before leaving the mountains. I found a wilderness area in northwestern New Mexico called Ojitos which was near my route, so I stopped there for a few days. After exploring the canyons and mesas (including another outing without food) I left the mountains for the flat lands.

I've been pretty busy since arriving, mostly helping Nina with the bakery. She's been wanting to open up a store front for a while now (so far she's been operating on a bake to order basis) but hasn't had the time get everything together. After visiting multiple vendors I found a good used display case which is now on order. We're also upgrading the signage in preparation. Just this morning we settled on final design for the building's sign. The store front should be ready by the end of this month. Nina's given me a couple of lessons in baking and cake decoration. I'm not a natural at it. Fortunately she just hired another employee, who does have a talent for it.

I've lined up some tastings later this week with a few venues in Galveston, a nearby resort town. One of the venues is the San Luis, which is the premier resort on Galveston Island. Hopefully it'll go well and drum up additional business.

Nina's done a great job with the customers and her products. All the customers I've spoken to have been impressed with her work. "Bad ass" is a description I've heard uttered on more than one occasion. I think she's got her recipes and decoration techniques down pat. She'd probably disagree with my assessment, but that's why she's good at it.

There are a series of operational issues that we're working to address as well. In HP wafer fab parlance, rework rates are high. Pans end up with too much or too little batter, ingredient quantities are miscalculated when they are scaled, and ingredients sometimes run out in the middle of a recipe. It all leads to inefficiencies, both in terms of time and ingredient usage. The solution we're implementing is a combination of characterization (figure out exactly how much batter you need for each combination of recipe and pan) and tool development. The idea with the tool is that you input the pan size and recipes, then it calculates the ingredient quantities for you based on a database of recipes and the characterization data. The tool will also output how much batter to put into each of the different pans based on the characterization data. Hopefully it'll cut down on the waste. We're starting out with her two most popular recipes and proceeding from there. If it works out I'll eventually add a supplies management component. Since the tool will know how much ingredients are being used it should be able to track the amount remaining in inventory and raise a flag when quantities are low so that orders can be placed for additional ingredients.

I started running again since arriving. My leg still hurts a bit but I'm managing to keep up with Nina. She picked up running after she was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes earlier this year. With a change in diet and exercise she's lost 40 pounds so far. She had stopped running for a couple of weeks but is back at it again. We're hoping to break her record for longest continuous run later this week.

Other than that I've been hanging out with my nieces and nephew, my friend Elmo, and enjoying my mom's home cooked meals. I haven't seen my brother Jose yet. At some point I'd like to get a kayak and take it out on the bay. Since there aren't any hills here I need to find some other way to get my thrills.

Photos from the most recent leg of El Viaje are posted here. The photo at the top is the inside of kiva, a type of underground dwelling which the Mesa Verde residents used for their religious rituals.

Bears and Pigs

Just left Yosemite. I entered Yosemite via the eastern entrance. Most visitors enter the park via Yosemite Valley, which is a western entrance. Yosemite Valley is the most visited part of the park, but it's only about 5% of the total park area. My plan was to backpack across the park from the eastern entrance to Yosemite Valley, then take a couple of days to see the valley's sights. I picked up my bear resistant container and a wilderness permit at one of the park offices. I immediately named my container "the pig" since it was heavy and I was going to eat it's contents. I filled it with a week's worth of food and started walking.

My first impression of Yosemite was that it gets a lot of visitors. Even on a weekday in the backcountry of the park you can come across a lot of people. Many trails look heavily used. If you're on a popular backcountry trail you may be sharing the good campsites with 100 other people. Supposedly I was visiting during the off season, so it must be even more crowded during the peak summer season. The closer I got to the valley the more people I saw. These were day hikers who had entered the park via the Yosemite Valley entrance. At some point I started feeling like I was in Los Angeles. I remember seeing guys that looked like gangsters from south central LA hiking up a beautiful canyon with a tall waterfall. It felt even more like LA when I got to valley floor and hopped on the free park bus. It looked and felt like a city bus, but people were dressed a little differently than you would see in a city bus. I remember hearing that Yosemite had begun offering the free bus service within the valley to combat smog from visitor's vehicles which was ruining the views. Since I had left the Buffalo at the east entrance, and my feet were tired, the bus service proved handy for my explorations of the valley.

The valley itself is a dramatic landscape of thousand foot cliffs, waterfalls, big trees, and beautiful meadows. I didn't even try to take photos that would do justice to the place. It seemed like a futile endeavor. The first day I used the bus to visit various parts of the valley. I learned at the visitor's center that the word "Yosemite" means "Those who kill." I wondered who or what "those" referred to and who they killed. The second day I rented a bike (which seemed to have become a popular way to travel in the valley) and day hiked a bit. That afternoon, while packing up, I saw a bear. I was in the backpacker's camp in the valley at the time. My belongings were sitting on picnic a table. I had just put the pig in my backpack. When I first saw the bear he was some distance away, but moving in my direction. I managed to get a couple of photos of him before my brain became too occupied with other matters. I was standing between the bear and the picnic table. I was surprised at how close he got to me before stopping and staring at me. It was close enough for me to see how big he was and to notice his long dagger like claws. I quickly realized that he could do a lot of damage to me. I wasn't sure what I should do, so I swung around to the other side of the table. The bear was now on the opposite side of the table from me. He started moving towards my orange snack bag on one end of the table. I quickly snatched it from right in front of him, then retreated a bit in case he tried to attack me. The bear then went for the backpack. He pushed it over and started looking for a way to get to the pig. I didn't want him to destroy my pack, but I still wasn't sure what to do. Fortunately there was another guy in the camp behind me. I asked him if he knew what I should do. He said to spread out my arms and make loud noises while moving closer. So that's what I did. It started to work, then the guy behind me joined in, and it worked even better. The bear gave out a loud snort then ran off into the forest. The pack had suffered only minor scratches and a wet spot where the bear's snot had landed. Later I learned that these bears can weigh up to 350 pounds and lift three times their own weight.

Having survived the bear encounter, I made my way to the bus stop. I was planning on taking a regional bus back to the east entrance of the park. It was something like $8 for the two hour trip. I got back to the Buffalo late. After a good night's sleep I decided to head out for another trip into the Yosemite backcountry. This time I was going to do some cross-country hiking in less popular areas of the park. I decided to do this trip thin. I didn't bring any food at all, which also meant I had no need for a stove, fuel, bear canister, or cookware. It saved a lot of weight. I headed off again. It had gotten colder and cloudier. Up to this point I'd had clear sunny skies every day. There were less people, and when I headed cross-country there were no people. I spent a couple of days checking out high alpine lakes. There were many of them at the higher elevations. On what became my last day out it started snowing. I had found a wonderful shelter underneath a huge boulder that was near a good water source. Staying dry and warm were not going to be a problem. Even with no food I could easily stay out for many days. However, hanging out under a boulder for a whole day or more didn't seem terribly entertaining, so I headed down. By the time I got back to the Buffalo it had gotten nastier and I was glad I hadn't stayed out longer. Soon enough I was making my way across the sunny, dry deserts of Nevada.

Right now I'm in southwestern Utah, a couple of hours northeast of Las Vegas. My plans are to continue east through southern Utah, eventually crossing into southwestern Colorado. While there I'm planning on visiting Mesa Verde National Park. I just spoke at length with my younger sister Nina and decided that I should expedite my trip a bit. Potentially I could arrive at Texas City in a week or so.

Photos from the Yosemite leg of the trip are here. Unfortunately I forgot to bring the camera on my second outing in Yosemite.

Searching For Yoda And A "Bear Resistant Container"

The last couple of weeks seem to have been filled with send offs and visits with people I know from living in Oregon. It was great to see everyone before leaving for a while, and I enjoyed all the send offs. The Willamette River float was especially memorable. Amongst other things, the boat got dumped, Matt got sick, and I got to play around with a beautifully made staff that I received from one of my older sisters.

After leaving Corvallis I headed up towards The Dalles. Ann and her family were having a get together over a long weekend. I had been invited. They had rented a house along the Columbia River, which separates Oregon from Washington. The house was really nice. More of a property really. The property was well manicured, had a main house, two guest houses, a boat house, and even a small private beach. It was right on the river. Ann's nephews, Henry and Owen, had come along. I watched Star Wars V with them. Later we went for hikes in the gorge, looking for a Jedi master named Yoda. We visited waterfalls along the gorge on the first day. On the second day we took a tour of the orchard country just south of Hood River, followed by a visit to Timberline Lodge on Mt Hood. After saying bye to everyone I headed south into central Oregon along the east side of the Cascades.

While driving through, I stopped to visit Cliff near Bend. We had arranged to hang out for a few days, but I wasn't sure what we were going to do. At some point I decided I'd just do whatever Cliff wanted to do and see what happens. In GW Bush parlance, Cliff was the decider. Cliff's idea was to climb Mt Thielsen, one of the Oregon Cascades crags, over the course of two or three days. I'd never climbed Thielsen and it's always fun to spend a night or two out in a wilderness area, so I was all for it. Cliff made a good decision by putting me in charge of deciding what technical gear to bring. I brought a full rope, a set of nuts, some draws, and some slings. I was sure it would be overkill given the route description, but Cliff was still a bit new to this stuff and I'd hate to get him hurt. We set out in the early afternoon. Our plan was to hike in until we got tired or found a good place to camp. By the time we got to the base of the route we realized we hadn't brought enough water. We had hoped to find a creek or a melting snowfield, but had seen nothing at all. We only had a liter left between the two of us. The nearest guaranteed water we knew of (Diamond Lake) was four miles away and pretty far down. After a good amount of discussion we changed the trip objective to something that involved spending the night at Diamond Lake. Down we went. We set up camp some time after 9:00. The next morning we filled up on water and headed back to Cliff's truck, taking trails near the road and sometimes bushwhacking. On our second night we car camped at Miller Lake, a high lake east and a bit north of Thielsen. We then headed back to Cliff's house (also a pretty nice place). I spent one night there then left in the morning.

After driving all day yesterday I find myself in Bridgeport, California looking for a "bear resistant container." Bridgeport is on the east side of the Sierra Nevadas close to the Nevada border. I should be less than an hour's drive from Yosemite, my next destination. I'm planning on some backpacking and hiking while I'm there. Apparently you're required to carry anything that a bear might like in one of these containers if you're going to be in the Yosemite backcountry.

Here's a link to some photos. The photo at the top is from Miller Lake. I was fascinated by the dance of the light on the rocks.

Buffaloes and Cowboys in the Wallowas

I've got a few more days of work left before I leave Corvallis. I finished up with the house and the renters have moved in. I took advantage of the empty house to fix a few things and replace the dishwasher. While I was at it I took the Buffalo to the shop to get a few problems looked at. They found a number of problems (worn out CV joints, holes in the exhaust system) beyond what I was aware of. The input valve for the propane tank had also failed, which resulted in a leak when you tried to fill the tank. Ann was with me when I tried to fill it once. She refused to get in the van when I tried to start it (I don't blame her) for fear of an explosion. I started it up with Ann standing some distance away and drove it down the block and back. Having seen that I hadn't blown myself up I picked up Ann and we proceeded on our way.

The Buffalo's parked at Ann's house until I leave. It's a little less loaded up than El Viaje #1. No ice axe or crampons since I'm not planning on doing anything that involves glaciers. I'll be bringing less clothes too. Clothes are bulky and I learned from El Viaje #1 that the only reason I care about clean clothes is because other people do. I'm also leaving the frying pan since I almost never used it except as a cover for the pot.

After finishing with the house Ann and I took a trip out to the Wallowas in northeastern Oregon. On the way there the Buffalo died suddenly in central Oregon. I got it to restart with the engine cover off and noticed that one of the belts wasn't turning. The belt in question drove the alternator and water pump, both of which are rather important parts. After loosening the belt and trying to turn the water pump and alternator pulley by hand I diagnosed the problem as a seized alternator. It would need to be replaced. Having driven many miles in a 22 year old vehicle I've come to expect these sort of things. The Water Buffalo is a slow, cantankerous, old beast which sometimes refuses to work. It could die at any time, possibly in the middle of nowhere. Half the reason I carry a bike on longer trips is in case I need to abandon the Buffalo at some point. I've learned that, for more than one reason, you shouldn't be in a hurry if you're riding on a buffalo. When these things happen you can get upset, angry, worried, feel sorry for yourself, etc, but it seems like a pointless thing to do. So, I skipped through all of it, pretty much instantaneously in this case. Patience and acceptance are lessons the Buffalo is good at teaching.

Having thus accepted my circumstances, I started thinking about how to remedy the situation. The nearest town was Prineville. We were pretty close, no more than 15 miles. It was mostly flat or downhill. I could coast the downhills, shutting the engine down to keep it from overheating (no water pump) and draining the battery (no alternator). On the flats I'd need to start the engine. If it began to get too hot I'd just stop and let the engine cool. Turning on the heaters could help. If the battery died I could wire the auxiliary battery in parallel. I was confident I could make it back to Prineville without having to call a tow truck. That's when it hit me. I realized I was thinking like I did when I was high school, when I had junky cars and no money. I remembered that I now had auto insurance, and that it covered towing. I had credit cards to pay for stuff. Time seemed more important now. All of this flashed through my mind within the space of a few seconds after having realized what the problem with the Buffalo was.

We had broken down next to a road construction site. I walked over to one of the workers and asked if he had the phone number to a towing service in Prineville. He did. Even better, we still had cell phone coverage. A few hours and a few hundred dollars later we were on our way again.

So much for that. Later I wondered if calling the tow truck was worthwhile. My scheme to get back to Prineville without one seemed like it could work, and may have even taken less time. After some thought I decided that what I should have done was to call the tow truck, but then immediately start working on implementing my scheme. Unless, that is, I felt lazy, which I've now concluded was the real reason I called the tow truck.

On to the Wallowas. The Wallowas are Oregon's second highest mountain range. Unlike the Cascades (the highest range in Oregon), they're not glaciated, nor are they of volcanic origin. I'd been in the Wallowas once before. During that trip it had snowed on July 4th. Supposedly there's some good alpine rock in the Wallowas, but if I were going to drive this far to go climbing I'd go to the North Cascades instead. Our plan was to do a three day, two night tour of an alpine lake basin located in the interior of the range. The distance was 27 miles, plus whatever we added on for short side trips. The hike starts at the end of a glacier carved valley. We headed directly up the main valley before gaining a high plateau, which housed the lakes. All the lakes were idyllic. Pretty scenery, critters of all sizes running around loose, cold streams, and blooming flowers turning meadows into tapestries of color. I couldn't help but go for a dip in a couple of the lakes and shower myself in a waterfall. It was a popular area for backpackers, fishermen, hunters, and horse riders. The lake basin can be reached from many routes.

Just as we were about to arrive at our last camp I met three men on horseback. They were heading out from the lake we were heading towards. Each one had a beer can in their hand. They were a bit lost, but they didn't seem to be too concerned about it. Ann and I helped them figure out how to get to their destination. It turns out they were about to make a wrong turn. They had six horses between the three of them. A couple of the horses had large Igloo coolers mounted on either side of them. They offered us some beers in return for helping them. They were from near by. Two of them were dressed the part of cowboys, with oilskin coats and cowboy hats. The third guy was dressed like a boat captain. He had a sailor hat on and more of a nautical theme to him. All three looked pretty happy. We chatted for a bit. At one point I asked how many beers they had brought with them. Eight cases one guy said. That's about 200 beers. We said our goodbyes, wished each other well, and headed our own ways. Later I wished I had taken a photo of them.

Afterwards I couldn't help thinking that all along I've been doing these trips the wrong way. We say we take fat trips, but that's nothing compared to the kind of trip a pack animal enables. Chris was on to something when he brought up the idea of bringing live chickens on our Sisters trip. I know goats can be trained to carry stuff, and I've always wanted a goat for other reasons. Seems like a good place to get started with pack animals.

That's it for now. Photos from the Wallowas trip are here. The photo at the top is of Glacier Lake. It was the nicest lake we visited.

Three Sisters

I decided to start posting to this blog again. It seems appropriate since I'm seven working days away from my second leave of absence from HP. For now I'm on a three week vacation. The vacation started with a four day, three night trip into Oregon's Three Sisters Wilderness. The plan was to backpack into an alpine environment, climb a peak or two, and tool around on a glacier. The usual suspects came, along with Cliff (who I hadn't seen in about a year), and Julius. We were six in total.

We started with a several mile hike, mostly along a maintained trail. Where a stream crossed the trail we turned west, more or less following the stream to it's source, the Hayden Glacier. Somewhere below the glacier in a pretty meadow strewn with alpine flowers and glacier fed streams we found our first camp site. After dumping our camp supplies four of us headed up to the glacier. The boys found a good crevasse to descend. My leg hurt so I didn't partake. After heading back down to camp my leg was hurting pretty good. I dipped it into an ice cold stream next to camp and it instantly felt much better.

We had decided to make this a slow and fat trip. Amongst other things, this means that we have plenty of good food. We had a couple of Indian entrees this first night. I also tried grilling some Mexican style corn on the cob (yes, I had hauled corn ears several miles and a few thousand vertical feet, along with mayonnaise, chili powder, and a lime). Everything was great. After meeting Cliff the next morning we packed everything up and headed towards the glacier. Our objective was the high ridge between Middle and North Sister. Climbing the glacier was a piece of cake. It was relatively low angle and the surface was soft. Upon reaching the ridge we found some good camp sites. We set up camp and relaxed a bit. Our next goal was to climb Middle Sister. Middle Sister is the fifth highest peak in Oregon. I had climbed it a few times before. The summit is just over ten thousand feet. It's an easy climb but looks intimidating from the ridge where we'd set up camp. We were already at an elevation of 9000 ft, so we didn't really have much further to go. After saying bye to Julius (he needed to be at work the next day) the rest of us started up. In no time were were on the summit. We stayed on the summit for a long time before heading back to camp. After a meal of salmon, couscous, and more Mexican style corn on the cob, it started getting dark.

We were spending the night in a pretty special place. The ridge we were on separates Western Oregon from Central Oregon. You can see the better part of the state from there, and on a clear day you can see parts of Washington and California as well. Needless to say the views are spectacular. We figured that every other person in the state of Oregon would be spending the night somewhere below us. The night sky was also pretty amazing. There were so many stars, and you could see the structure of the Milky Way Galaxy in the sky. I felt grateful for being able to reach the ridge and stay there for a night. It was something I'd been wanting to do for a while.

The next morning Matt, Chris and Tim ran up and down Middle Sister again. Meanwhile Cliff and I headed north along to the ridge to get a better look at North Sister. North Sister is the fourth highest peak in the state. I've attempted it once (in winter) but have never reached the summit. We had talked about attempting it on this trip, but the conditions weren't appealing (it's easier and safer when covered with snow), and I was a bit concerned about how my leg would hold up. After regrouping with the rest of the guys we broke camp and headed back down the glacier. Matt and Chris were on the hunt for some crevasses to climb. After a couple of false starts they found a huge one, probably the biggest any of us have seen in Oregon. On one side the crevasse opened up into a view of Broken Top. On the other side it was covered with a snow bridge, looking like the inside of a gothic cathedral sculpted from ice.

I decided to attempt this one. A shock of pain ran up my right leg every time I kicked the crampons into the ice, so I decided once was enough. After a little convincing (he'd never climbed ice prior to this) Cliff also took a shot at the ice. He did really well and was glad to have tried it. The boys were up for more and went looking for another hole in the ice to wear themselves out on. Meanwhile, since I wasn't going to ice climb any more, I headed down to find a camp site for our final night out. Our last camp was in the trees next to the same stream we'd followed up to the glacier. The water was roaring and cold. It was a great spot to wash up after being out for three days. Dinner was beef stew, chili, and macaroni. Matt, Chris, and I burned some more energy scrambling up a bluff of rock near by. I fell asleep early. The next morning we hiked out and drove home.

I think it's safe to say that everyone enjoyed the trip. We all forgot about the rest of the world for a few days. For me at least, these trips are a reminder that you really don't need much. I also enjoy seeing nature's processes at work. Since you're gaining a lot of elevation you get to see a lot of different environments, and how they interact with each other. The high mountains squeeze water (often in the form of snow) from the moist air moving in from the Pacific. The snow accumulates into glaciers. In the dry summer season the glaciers melt, bringing water to all the living things below. After the living things take the water they need, the water returns to the ocean and the whole cycle starts over. At the same time the glaciers are pulled down the mountain by gravity, grinding away at the underlying rock. The water rushing out of the glacier further pulverizes the rock, and transports it downstream, turning it into soil for the trees and plants below. Eventually the soil, like the water, will also be recycled, and may return in the form of a mountain to start the process again. The sun provides energy, and together with the water, soil, and air, everything the plants and trees need to grow is delivered. In a very real sense the living things owe their existence to the rock and ice. There's a harmony and patience to it all which often seems absent from the human world. Probably it's one of the reasons I like to take these trips.

For the next ten days or so I'll be working on getting my house ready for the renters, and preparing for the drive to Texas. After that Ann and I are going to take a short excursion over Labor Day weekend. Then I'm back to work for two weeks before my leave officially starts.

My favorite photos from the trip are here. The photo at the top is from one of the streams near our first camp site. This particular stream was especially verdant. In the background behind the stream is South Sister.

Last Blast

The last month of my leave has passed and I'll be returning to work tomorrow. During the first half of the month I was getting my house back in order and dealing with some issues we ran into with the commercial site we were going to buy for the bakery.

I've pretty much finished moving in. I decided to take the approach of only moving stuff from the garage (where I stored everything during my absence) into the house when I needed it. Most of the furniture is in the house now. What's left in the garage seems to be mostly clothes and kitchen utensils. I've gotten more used to living in a house again, although I still often sleep outside in the back yard. I've noticed that some of the neighborhood cats like to hang out there in the evenings.

The renters took pretty good care of the house, especially considering that they were three male college students. They cleaned it really well. There was some damage, but it's mostly minor and mainly falls into the category of normal wear and tear. They left a few valuables. Three bottles of liquor, a lawn mower, and three truck wheels with tires mounted, amongst other things. I recently sold the truck wheels on Craig's list.

After I settled in I had some people over for dinner on a Sunday night. The main dish was chile verde with Spanish rice and fresh made tortillas. If you enjoy good Mexican food you should try the chile verde. It's really good, and cheap too. I fed about 16 people for maybe $15. The recipe I used can be found here.

During the first half of July we ran into some issues with the property we were buying for the bakery. We found out that the place used to be a gas station many years ago. Also, people who used to work there said that they sometimes smelled fumes. I became concerned about the potential for an environmental clean up liability. The roof wasn't in as good a shape as we were lead to believe. Enough inconsistencies between what the seller told us and what we were discovering came up that I decided to exercise an exit clause in the contract. Many thanks to Nina, Jesse, and Elmo for their due diligence on the property and looking out in my best interest. They helped convinced me to exercise the exit clause. There's still an issue with the deposit refund that the seller has not budged on. It's not a large amount of money but I've already talked to a lawyer about it and it could end up in small claims court.

The good news is that my sister quickly found another property, which is better in many ways than the one we were going to buy. It's located in a higher traffic area, the property is larger, it's substantially cheaper than the other location, the layout is more conducive to a bakery, it's closer to my sister's house, and it's being sold directly by the owner. I just signed the closing papers today. We'll be doing some facilities work and equipment installs during August. Then we'll need to get it permitted as a bakery. We're expecting it to become operational towards the end of August, so we're planning a grand opening for September. I'll be glad when it's all done and we can focus more on operations and growth.

During the latter half of July I took a week long excursion into the Mt Jefferson Wilderness Area. This was my last opportunity to get out for an extended period before I started working again. I was alone during the first half of my outing, backpacking and day hiking on the north and west sides of the wilderness. Amongst other places I visited Jefferson Park, a beautiful alpine meadow at the northern base of Mt Jefferson. I've often recognized photos and videos from Jefferson Park in various advertisements. It looked like the last day of winter was yesterday here. The lakes and trails were still mostly covered with snow. The views of the north side of Mt Jefferson were as impressive as I remember. It's still hard for me to believe that I'd gone up it years ago during a climb. The wildflowers were out in many of the places I walked through, adding to the beauty of the wilderness. I was reminded during the outing how easy it is to take water for granted if you spend a lot of time in the Pacific Northwest. It's all over the place here, to the point that the locals often complain about it. After various trips into the desert over the past year I keep thinking better to have too much water than too little. Of course, I may not feel that way after the wet season starts again.

On the fourth night of my Jefferson Wilderness trip I met El Chino, the NavUnit, and Frankie Five Angels (F5A) at the Pamelia Lake trailhead. Our plan was to climb Mt Jefferson, the centerpiece of the wilderness area. Mt Jefferson (or Jeff, as we often call it) is the second highest peak in Oregon. It's considered the most difficult of the major Oregon peaks. Relative to Oregon's other mountains, the approaches are long and start low. All of the routes to the summit also have some technical element to them. Despite multiple serious attempts none of us had ever made the summit. The NavUnit's planning and logistics module had put together a tight plan to maximize likelyhood of success, but there are always elements which are beyond human control. After spending the night at the trailhead we started up. The first day involved hiking, bushwhacking, and scrambling to a point above treeline. The goal was to get to at least 7800 ft. 7.5 hours and 4700 vertical feet later we were at a nice site on the southwest ridge of Jefferson. It had a great view south, right down the Pacific crest towards other major peaks. We set up stoves and began melting snow soon after our arrival. In keeping with the "slow and fat" tradition we had plenty of delicious food. The NavUnit's logistics module had wisely put El Chino in charge of the food. The seemingly endless Italian subs and homemade beef jerky kept us fed for most of the first day. For dinner we sampled shrimp jumblaya and beef stew with avocadoes and pita bread. We threw in some cheese just because we had so much of it. For dessert we had chocolate chip cookies. The crew discovered that an empty half avocado skin makes an excellent biodegrable bowl. I'm sure it's become a day of legend for the critters that scowered the area afterwards looking for flaunt (food we'd dropped). Compared to what's normally there to eat (rocks and ice, as far as I could tell) our flaunt must have been like manna from heaven. After eating dinner we went to bed.

We woke up at 2:00 AM the next morning to a clear sky and still air. It seemed warmer than it had been when we went to bed. Despite the warm air the snow was hard as concrete. The moon was bright enough that I often had my headlamp turned off. Conditions were ideal. After a few hours of scrambling up various forms of junk rock we reached the first technical section: a steep, exposed traverse under a rotten rock pinnacle. Conditions again fell in our favor, as the traverse was covered with frozen snow. The NavUnit found the best line higher up on the snowfield and we crossed with little incident (aside from El Chino's crampon coming off). A little more traversing and we were at the base of the final summit pinnacle. From there we climbed bare rock, mostly without active use of the rope. F5A, with the angels backing him up, lead a short belayed section on exposed technical rock. Two minutes later we were sunning ourselves on the summit. There was a wide grin on everyone's face. The climb had been something of a memorial for a coworker and friend of ours who's name also happened to be Jeff, but spelled Geoff. El Chino left Geoff's work badge on the summit, and added his name to ours on the summit register. After downclimbing and rappelling the summit pinnacle we crossed the still frozen snowfield. As soon as we finished crossing sunshine reached the snowfield. On a previous attempt I'd crossed the same snowfield later in the day after it had been softened by the sun. It much less intimidating this time around when it was frozen. We continued downwards. Upon reaching our camp we relaxed and ate for a while, then packed and headed back to the trailhead. It was about 6:30 PM when I got there. The NavUnit had to head back out and search for El Chino, who had made a wrong turn on a hiking trail. After saying goodbye I hopped into the Buffalo and sped off for home.

The Mt Jefferson climb seemed, in many ways, like the most appropriate way to spend the last weekend of my leave. I'm really happy that we all finally managed to get to the summit. Judging by the entries in the summit register visits are rare, in keeping with Jeff's reputation. Everything seemed to fall into place just right to enable our names to be added. Despite all the weight on my back (climbing gear is heavy) I felt pretty good during most of the climb. The bushwhacking section of the descent and the long boulder / scree field traverse we did as part of the descent were my least favorite parts. Still, I've felt much worse during other climbs, and considering what we'd done I felt pretty good. My feet weren't mangled at all (which is more than I can say for some of my climbing partners), and in a couple of days I'd mostly recovered. I also didn't wind up unable to walk or in a hospital, like Matt did after his 100 mile race (see Matt's Big Blog). I was pretty fat really.

The Water Buffalo's overheating problem seems to have been cured (or at least sufficiently mitigated to enable me to drive it long distances) by my tightening of a hose clamp. I have had to use the old trick of turning on the heater a few times when it was running hot. Luckily there's a heater both up front and in the back, so together they add substantial engine cooling capacity. I keep meaning to check the radiator fan. It seems like I used to be able to hear it when it was running, and I never hear it anymore. Since the heater trick works pretty well I may never get to it. On the way back from a bike ride with Ann the Buffalo died on the highway and refused to restart. It turns out to have run out of gas. The gas gauge doesn't work and I'd been driving it so little that I'd forgotten when I last refueled it.

Tomorrow's my first day back at work. I don't know what I'll be doing yet, as I'm returning in the middle of a reorganization. I showed up at the HP cafeteria a couple of weeks ago to have lunch with a coworker. Several other coworkers showed up at the table. I told them stories from my trip. Their reactions were pretty varied, but they all seemed entertained.

Photos from the Mt Jefferson excursion (including the climb) are here. The photo at the top is from Jefferson Park looking south across a lake towards the north side of Mt Jefferson.

By the way, I added a "Favorite Quotes & Sayings" and "Links" section off to the right of the El Viaje's main text. I don't know who most of the quotes or sayings are attributed to.