life after travelling

jacks canyon again

2010-02-17T15:36:00.000-08:00

Before we sent Mary on her way back to the Midwest we had to go back to one of our favorite climbing places, Jacks Canyon, about 30 miles S of Winslow AZ. It was a lot hotter this time around, so we spent a lot of the days chasing the shade but fantastic climbing.

family portrait- you'll see this one on the x-mas cards

Baxter and Goonie best of chums, when they're sleeping

Michael leading Genesis, super fun 10d

Carefully, carefully now...

This was an 11b? with some fun sideways moves

A scary little visitor, Goonie spotted this lovely rattler right next to our van- Luckily Goonie listened when we called him away from that intriguing noise

Family portrait number 2

Just hanging out...I'm so funny

Game face

Game face number 2

Sorry Mary, Baxter is not impressed

Crack climbing and leading a 10, no big deal

Well, can't be shown up by the little sis you know

And Goonie looks on...

Finally...more of the end...

2010-01-18T23:17:00.000-08:00

After our fill of Easter candy we hung out and around Tucson for a few days

Free camping spot outside of Tucson, it was nice cause it was so close to town- but not so nice cause it was so close to town.

Look there are oranges everywhere- we couldn't figure out why no one was eating these from the trees, until we grabbed a handful from a bank parking lot. As Mike drove the get-away van he popped open the orange and shoved half of it into his mouth. Very juicy, VERY Sour, Very funny.

Cactus filled hillside- We were attempting to find a climbing area- long pretty hike, lots of neat rocks, no climbing areas to be found.

The red rocks of Sedona AZ

So the first time we took Goonie to a body of water he jumped in with reckless abandon. We thought, looks like we've got a water dog...This is what happened the next time...

A quick stop in Oak Creek Canyon, the Atlantis area. It was here where I had one of my scariest climbing falls. We were on a climb that apparently hadn't been climbed very often. While I was going up to the 3rd clip, my right hand hold broke...and then my left hand hold broke and suddenly I was falling backwards through the air, and still falling, and umm still falling... (there was some yelling and obscenities involved at this point) and then finally the rope went taught, and I was about 2 inches above the ground. (There was some blubbering and crying involved at this point). I made my way back up to the 2nd clip grabbed our gear and carefully down-climbed and got out of there.

We showed up in Flagstaff to pick up our mountain bikes that were being sent to a bike shop there. While we were waiting we got in some climbing and met the friendliest dog. Both Goonie and Baxter had a blast. We named him Big Dog.

As you can see, Baxter was pretty focused on one thing...

The New Bikes

Look at all those pine trees. The view from our campspot in Flagstaff right by the trail

More to come soon...

Finally....The end...well sort of

2010-01-17T08:16:00.000-08:00

A quick sum up of the last couple months of the trip- After Las Cruces NM and trying out our first multipitch climb we decided to check out a climbing area in Southern Arizona called Isle of You. The name made it real interesting to try to ask about directions, Isle....OF...You. The place was fantastic- although the climbing was pretty tricky cause it was on granite. All in all great weather, great clouds, and great sunsets.

Itty bitty Emilie taking in the sunset on top of a long climb called pay day.

Even ittier bittier Michael. I think this is on a 10 called Stone Woman.

Mary making her way up Kit kat- the picture doesn't really show how much she's shaking. Not because she's terrified of the climb but because only a few minutes earlier I nearly squashed her with a giant boulder as I was coming down from the top. She was letting me down from the climb, my toe bumped a loose rock, and this boulder the size of our dog came tumbling down the cliff. Luckily, Mary had the wherewithal to move out of the way and still hold on to me. Thanks Mary!

Mike on what I think is a 9+ thingamajig-Are you catching the theme here- the wall is called Sweet Rock. Some of our other favorites were pop rocks and hot tamale.

Mike and Mary thought I was crazy when I was saying there are colors in the clouds, but now I've got proof.

Mike and Goonie heading home to the van

The moon lit up the whole campsite, and reflected very nicely off the hood of Mary's car- I mean a giant lake in the desert

After we had our fill at Isle of you we decided to head towards Tuscon, we didn't want to be anywhere too crowded since it was Easter weekend, but we wanted to be close to a city so we could fly in and get all the good sales on the Easter candy the next day. We found a place that was quiet, and filled with cows, but had a really nice sunset/clouds combo.

The dogs thought it was great that there were cattle running about and spent most of a day trying to herd them out of our campsite. Here Mary is trying to herd the dogs back to us.

I guess we're not very good at this updating thing

2009-06-25T09:34:00.000-07:00

Just a quick little update in case anyone is still checking this.

We are back in St. Louis- came back to the midwest for my sisters highschool graduation

We found a house for sale in St. Louis that we really liked, and was pretty darn cheap cause it was a "handymans special"

We bought the house in St. Louis, and are currently fixing it up- just replaced the garage roof

And we're getting married at the end of August!

So there's the update- I'll post more pictures from the rest of the trip when I get a chance, but right now we have been a little wrapped up in other things.

By the way if anyone knows of jobs that are hiring in the St. Louis area, please send them our way-

It's weird to be back in the real world- but don't worry we plan on it being a temporary stay. Hopefully we'll fix up the house sell it or rent it in a couple of years, make a whole big bunch of money and be able to travel all over again. Hopefully...

Our new house!

Up and up and up Las Cruces 3/27- 4/1

2009-05-08T13:01:00.000-07:00

After leaving white sands we headed west through New Mexico and stopped in the city of Las Cruces. There we did the normal boring city things; laundry, library, and food buying- which is where we found out that this city contains a supermarket, and the supermarket contains some tortillas, that were probably some of the best I've ever eaten. After gorging ourselves on warm tortillas we were on our way again and stopped at a climbing area just outside of town called the rough and ready hills. The climbs were pretty fun, so we stuck around for a couple days.

Goonie had something he wanted to show me

Good climbing, quiet camping, and pretty sunset

what more could you ask for?

After talking with a group of people from the area, we found out that there was a relatively easy multi-pitch sport climbing area nearby. We decided it was time we gave it a try. Multi-pitch climbing is when you climb up and then belay from a set of anchors on the wall to get your second person up, and then they belay you from those anchors and so on...

On the way up to checkerboard mountain

A very serious moment

This is looking back at the car from where we started the climb after the hike up- you can just barely see the van in the middle of the picture

Mary about to start and lead the first pitch

Where are they going? and why can't I come too?

The first set of anchors- Mary and Michael went up and I stayed down with the dogs

Sometimes you forget how spiky and dangerous the desert can be

and then you get a reminder

Making there way up, both Mike and Mary are about in the center of the picture, it was a big hunk of rock- probably 400-500 feet tall, and we climbed to the top of it. It was a pretty cool feeling

When Mike and I went up we left Goonie with Mary; neither of them were too happy about this since Goonie kept running around trying to climb up the rock and barking continuously and very shrilly...awww say the parents, rotten brat says the babysitter

Looking down from the 3rd pitch, Michael was belaying me and that dark dot is Mary

Michael at the top

Looking at the other side from the top of the mountain

We made it

Looking down from whence we had come

As you may notice, those shadows are pretty long, we had about 45 minutes before dark, and a long way to repel, and a really long walk back to the car

Stepping off the end of the world

Almost down...

We managed to get off the rock before it got dark, but had to pick our way back to the car without flashlights with only that sliver of moon to guide us. We lost the trail practically immediately and there were cacti everywhere, and of course I was wearing sandals. Luckily after a couple of minutes of simply heading down the hill, over boulders and hoping we weren't about to stab ourselves on anything too painful, we met back up with the trail, and made it back to camp; cold and hungry, but safe.

White Sands March 25th-26th

2009-04-13T14:43:00.000-07:00

Finally we had arrived. It is such a beautiful surreal place, and the dogs absolutely loved it. We took tons of pictures, so enjoy...

Dunes and mountains

Wind swept gypsum white sand, so soft and cool to the touch, and doesn't even grit in the teeth

Baxter was ready to go wandering

There isn't a campground in white sands. The only way you're allowed to spend the night is if you backpack in. Our site was 0.9 miles in, but the dogs probably went more like 5 miles going up and down and all over the dunes.

Silhouette of Goonie-pie (just a word of warning at least half of the pictures are of the dogs)

and Bax "lone-ranger" max wanders on...

sunset

The dogs were a little excited, even grandpa Baxter, who can get a little grumpy when it's close to bed time

Mary, Michael, and Goonie enjoying a sunset dune jump

Good Morning, sunrise from the tent. Goonie did great in our little 2 person tent. I think it was a good thing he had worn himself out so much.

Morning Dunes

Long shadowed dogs

The view of camp from our dune

Pretty dunes- the early morning was one of the best times, before the wind picked up. The wind blowing all that sand around hurt, and we all had to wear sunglasses just to keep the sand out of our eyes.

and on...

The dogs playing in the sand

Us playing in the sand

Michael takes credit for getting the picture, I take credit for being the only one brave enough to try a flip

It's a love pounce right?

Hi-ya

awwww

Little Emilie, big shadow

Clever comments...? Anyone?

It was a little on the windy side for ol' gramps

Siblings

Frisbee in the dunes

Did the lone ranger finally find a place to settle down? Tune in next tim to see if Bax Max wanders on

Bird...plane...mighty ninja Emilie

and thats all I have to say about that

White Mesa and Box Canyon March 15th - 20th

2009-04-07T14:13:00.000-07:00

After an uneventful drive from St. Louis, Baxter and I made it safely to White Mesa, NM.

Baxter wasted no time getting down to business, as he hopped right out of the driver’s window when he saw Michael. He hardly had any time to greet him, though, as Goonie came bounding over, too.

After lots of sniffs, tail wags, and a few snarls, they were officially introduced and Baxter took to wandering. Bax-“Lone Ranger”-Max took it upon himself to round up the horses before heading out on a hike with his new, sometimes annoying, little brother Goonie.

Emilie and Goonie

Neat tree on a hike

Brothers on their morning hike

We stayed there just one night before a morning hike and heading out to The Box Canyon near Socorro, NM.

We got into The Box late on the 16^th and started climbing the following morning.

A group of 6^thgraders were climbing on the closest area, so we hiked a few minutes to a nice wall and climbed there for the afternoon. We met a local climber who told us about all the other climbs in the area, so we spent the next afternoon at Major Wall climbing.

On the 19th we climbed on the top rope wall and finished up the morning of the 20^th. After meeting lots of friendly climbers who suggested places to go, we decided on the Enchanted Tower next and we were off...

Enchanted Tower March 20th-24th

2009-04-07T13:37:00.000-07:00

The Enchanted Tower area, was about 60 miles west of Box Canyon, and not really on the way to anywhere. But we were really glad we decided to check it out. It is definitely one of the top climbing places we have been to, and I think might be the most scenic one yet. Great scenery, free camping, good people, and really fun climbing.

The Tower from camp

Bax "lone ranger" Max wanders on...

Michael climbing on mother goose wall

Mary doing her first clean- it's really scary to untie yourself up there

Goonie is wondering what she is up to

I'm about to head up the tower on a 5.11, the hardest climb we've tried so far

Goonie taking himself for a walk

A dog's eye view- that's little Emilie on the top

It was a really fun climb, definitely challenging, but very rewarding too.

Mary on top of the tower

She survived, and apparently is rather excited

Michael on his way up

Michael on his way down

I got to go up one more time to get all our gear back, I was pretty darn tired by the end

On the way down- I was trying to be cool like Michael, but didn't quite have the courage to flip all the way upside down.

Goonie being a cutie-pie

On a climb called ooey-gooey, it was hard to hang on because it was so overhung

Back at camp

After 3 hard days of climbing we decided to move on. Our decision was made even easier to when we woke up on the 4th day and it was barely over 30 degrees. Mary's poor hands nearly fell off taking down her tent.

We headed back into Socorro for some library time and spent the night in Box Canyon again. This time we were not the only campers. There was another very friendly talkative older lady named Vicki who was camping out of her van with her 12 year old dog. She told us that she would keep an eye out for any problems, and if she saw anything she would honk the horn 3 times, if it was once, she just bumped it.

Thankfully no honks awoke us, and after a long discussion with Vicki about...well just about everything the next morning, we were headed towards white sands.

Goonie: Monster, and Cutie Pie all in a 4-legged package

2009-03-24T13:08:00.000-07:00

We had decided it was time. Mary was coming out to visit soon, and she was going to be bringing a dog, and once you have one around, you might as well have two. Not to mention mountain biking is a whole lot more fun when you have a third party to share it with. So we got Goonie. We picked him up at an Albuquerque animal shelter. It was soooo hard to chose just one, but this guy was for us. He's about 7 or 8 months old with never-ending energy and a rather tiresome habit of trying to gnaw off your arm. But he'll grow out of that right?

My new home

We stopped at the store to get some dog provisions- the frisbee was his water bowl. That's about the 7th time he had knocked it over in the last half hour.

mmm rawhide!

We took him to White Mesa to see how he was going to do off the leash and on the trails and everything. We were pretty excited that he seemed pretty excited to be with us.

Mighty Goonie

The moon rising over the mountains. White Mesa is definitely still one of our favorite places. Both for riding and great scenery.

He's a fast little bugger

awwwww

Goonie's first mountain bike ride

He did great. We decided it was best to keep him between the two of us so we could keep an eye on him, and he really seemed to like it. However, if he gets in front of the front rider there is a little bit of trouble, cause he then stops to check on how everyone is coming along...right in front of your tire. But we'll work on that too.

Unfortunately it will have to be a while before we can work on more mountain bike training. The day after this ride, we were out hiking with the Goon, came back and our bikes were gone! They had been locked to the rack on the van, and both bikes and locks had entirely disappeared. We couldn't believe it. It felt like a bad dream, but they were no where to be found.

Luckily, we do have insurance, and after a lot of discussion with the insurance folks it looks like both bikes are going to be fully covered. But it still really stinks, I would much rather have my old bike back then get a new one- but at least we're not completely out.

And then the next day it snowed. Goonie loved it- but it made driving out on the soup of a road a real chore. Mike wasn't sure if he was steering or not the whole time, but finally we made it the 4 miles out back to the highway.

Snow! snow snow snow snow

After talking to the police we were lucky enough to hook up with someone we had met at the trail. He put us up for the night in Albuquerque. And Goonie and his dog Chiquita had a blast together.

Moab and beyond March 2nd-9th

2009-03-14T15:00:00.000-07:00

Finally we had arrived in warm weather. Moab was perfect. Great weather, and empty, there were so few people there. Our first few days we rode a trail called Klondike bluffs and baby steps. At the end you could hike into Arches national park. Great views and fun riding.

This is looking into Arches

The clouds were showing off to compete with all the cool rocks

The baby steps trail was mostly singletrack. With all sorts of narrow, curvy technical fun stuff.

This was one of our favorite parts, the trail was very cleverly constructed to go right under this giant mushroom rock.

And there were dino prints too, just right along the trail.

After a few days of riding we decided to let ourselves heal a little bit. We went to a place called wallstreet, where there are these giant cliffs right along the road, and did some rock climbing instead. There wasn't too much in our ability level that we could climb, but what was there was lots of fun.

Hanging out on wallstreet

Big cliff and beautiful blue sky

Itty bitty Emilie

We spent the week camping about 12 miles outside of Moab, on Willow Springs Road. We had a nice pull-off to ourselves and had some great sunset views.

While we were climbing, we noticed another couple there with a very cute dog, and they had mountain bikes on top of there car. We got to talking and decided to go riding together the next day. We did Porcupine Rim, the mountain bike ride of all mountain bike rides, and had a blast.

On the way up

The spectacular view from the top

Everybody at the top: us, Matt and Leigh, and Troy a guy who hooked up with us from Salt lake City (we left Tucker-the dog-in the car)

On the way down

and down...

Matt doing a crazy cool jump

We thought we'd be all full of sunshine and hot weather, but I guess they get storms in the desert too. The scenery was beautiful in a whole new way.

The day after the storm Matt, Leigh, Tucker, and the two of us decided to do slickrock; the other quintessential mountain bike ride of Moab.

One of the many ups- that dog is fast

Tucker and Mike cresting the slickrock

Once again, fantastic scenery

After a great week in Moab, we decided it was time to move on. We decided to do a quick trip through Arches National Park on our way to Albuquerque. Which of course was beautiful.

For all the geologists out there: the Moab fault

I believe this is called Wilson arch, just right along the highway

We also stopped by Mesa Verde National Park, but we didn't get too far up the road. It's 20 miles one way to get to the top and the cliff dwellings, and we were tired of driving all day into the wind, so we didn't make it all the way to the top. The scenery was pretty anyway.

Great clouds as we travelled through New Mexico

Shiprock in the distance

Now the main reason we had up and decided to drive off to Albuquerque was that we had decided it was time for us to get a dog. He is an absolutely adorable fuzzy crazy critter...more (lots more, we can't stop taking pictures of the beast) to come soon.

Driving South

2009-03-07T11:44:00.000-08:00

After arriving in Seattle, we were very happy to note that the van started- yay!
But not so happy to note that it needed nearly 900$ of repairs, according to the place we took it to for an oil change- boo!

We called around a few places, and found someplace that could replace a cv boot for much cheaper, so after an evening camped out in a residential neighborhood, and 200$ for a couple of cv boots, we were out of there, out of the constant rain, and gloom that we had flown into. Unfortunately to go south, you had to go up. And when you go up, rain becomes snow. We ended up in a complete white out, and stopped about 20 miles out of Seattle.

At Least it was pretty in the morning

Driving through the snow during the day was a lot easier than at night. Although we did have a close call at Snoqualmie pass, where we decided to try to get gas- at a ski resort. What we didn't realize was as soon as we got of the exit the roads were covered in ice. The vanagon doesn't like ice. Especially when you have to go up hill and turn at the same time- we started sliding sideways, the car in the other lane kept getting closer- Luckily Mike was able to stop us in time, but we were now in the middle of the road, sideways. Some nice friendly snow plow guy, put some dirt under our tires and sent us on our way.

Snoqualmie Pass

One of the negatives of leaving the van in wet and rainy Washington for so long, was that everything was wet and rainy, so everything molded.

Our poor pop-top roof - on the inside

The next days were spent doing a lot of driving. We did a little bit of riding in Kennewick Washington, but it really wasn't very fun- wet and kind of boring. Somewhere along the way, to be honest right now I can't even remember the state, we passed over this great gorge, that was only like 50 feet wide. It was neat cause you didn't see it coming at all.

Big Gorge

Finally when we got into Utah, after Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, it started to warm up a bit.

Driving through Salt Lake City, no wonder they had the Olympics there, look at all those mountains

We decided if the weather was going to cooperate we might as well do a little climbing. We stopped in a little town called Helper UT. Although we were slightly fearful for our lives, some strange looking folks live in Helper, the climbing was pretty good.

and the scenery was fantastic

Next up- adventures in Moab...

Living in the Arctic

2009-03-03T15:19:00.000-08:00

Mike and I spent Christmas up in Dubuque.

Merry Christmas

While we were there we figured we might as well tackle a couple of remodeling projects. First came the hallway

Before- we got a little anxious and started pulling wallpaper before we took the picture

After

Along with remodeling, we figured if we are in the Arctic, we might as well entertain ourselves with an Arctic sport.

So we picked up hockey. Mike was much better at it than I, but we had a really good time. Even in the 6 degree weather. We convinced Nyssa to come out and play with us a couple times

Unfortunately this is how it usually ended up

Not that I fared much better, if you notice the amount of snow that I'm wearing

Attempt 1: As part of playing hockey we decided we needed to master the hockey stop- notice Nyssa's jump

Attempt 2: Only slightly more successful, my mom joined in on this one

The final remodeling project was the music room

Before

After

We've decided to get back out on the road- the van was feeling lonely, so we flew out to Seattle on Feb 24th- details of the continuing adventure coming soon...

Working in St. Louis

2009-01-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

We decided to make ourselves useful during our stay so we got to work. Emilie applied at several different places in the neighborhood and scored 2 jobs: Highway 66 Roadhouse & Kitchen and Mcdonalds. While I did some work around my parents house finishing 3 rooms: The garage, the downstairs hallway, and last but not least my room.
Only picture I could find before I started clearing the garage out. Hard to even walk in there. Before I cleared, washed, tuckpointed and finally painted.

Clearing out the hallway closet was scary.

Notice the beautiful tile floor.

Almost ready to get started.

Theres hardwood floor under there somewhere.

Ahhh done.

Nice and clean

Beautiful eh.

My room after patching all the cracks.

Before.

After

My new office.

Notice the new fan.

Yay all done.

Made that old floor nice and shiny.

Getting back into the working world was more difficult than I thought it would be. McDonalds and Roadhouse were the only places that would take me. I didn't want to go anywhere too serious since it was only going to be a month. Seeing how I never had worked in food service before it was a real eye opening experience. I never realized what a stressful place McDonalds is. That's one of the first things I learned, mainly because my manager was reminding me every chance she had.

And working at a restaurant really wasn't too bad. I certainly learned a lot more about alcoholic beverages, I had no idea there were that many kinds of...well everything. I also found out the key to a good tip night is working a buffet. If you happen to be in St. Louis I would recommend the pan fried chicken, and please tip kindly.

Climbing all over the place

2008-11-26T20:11:00.001-08:00

While we were in Arkansas we figured we might as well take advantage of the good weather and do some climbing we went back to Jamestown crag, and rappelled down to give Mary some more practice.

All the way down there?

ummmmm....

Graceful as a pig in a blanket

Return of crouching Mary

Sun was setting, and we were climbing away

We ended up staying a little late, it was strange to climb at night, and even stranger to belay from the top.

The next day we came back and brought Baxter with us, we also met two very friendly walking sticks

Baxter keeping an eye on things

Mary way up there

Then we decided that we should go climb in southern Illinois at Jackson Falls, Mary and Baxter came along for some of it.

Baxter the super climbing dog

Mary showing her confidence and mad skills, doing her first lead climb!

No big deal for Mary

Another night climb, this time with lights- the weather was perfect, and it was so much fun.

Alright enough play time, it was time to start another project...

And then there was one...Oct1st-4th

2008-10-25T15:49:00.001-07:00

After a long hiatus it is time to bring things up to date- I'm just running a month behind...

Oct 1st: Got Amber back to Seattle and safely on her way. Now I just had to figure out what to do with myself for the next couple days, since I would be flying back to the Midwest, but not until the 4th. I started heading toward Mt. Rainier and stopped in Auburn WA to look up some trail info at the library. I had to do it the old fashion way and look in books since Mike had the computer with him, so i grabbed a couple Washington mountain biking books and started hand copying away. After getting 3 good trails into my notebook I went back out to the car, where I found there to be no more basil. I had set our basil plant in front of the van to get some sun, and an hour later when I came back it had vanished, there was only a little dirt smudge where it had once sat- Someone stole my basil!!!

I couldn't believe it, I was really bummed, especially since I had planned on using some of it that night for dinner. I figured the best thing to do was to leave Auburn behind me and head on to Mt Rainier. If only it was that easy, I think it took me about 45 minutes to get out of this stupid town. All of a sudden the whole state was driving through, and it always seemed that whatever direction I wanted to go, was the way I couldn't go. Finally after a whole load of toil, I was out of there on the open road again. Things went fairly smoothly from that despite getting lost one more time. (It's amazing how much more difficult driving is when you're by yourself with no one else to check the map.)

Finally I could see it

Mt Rainier

My big head blocking Mt Rainier, with the vanagon behind

I finished off the day by driving around and finding the trail I wanted to ride the next day, and of course finding a nice place to camp by myself in the big scary forest.

This is what I found, I have to admit I was pretty nervous to be alone at first, and I did hear a few noises I'm sure I wouldn't have noticed normally, but I just made dinner and read a book and everything was fine.

I probably would have slept even better if it hadn't been for little nibbling noises that I kept hearing in the car- I thought we had left our rodent problems at Bacon Creek, apparently not.

Oct 2nd: The next morning I got up and got ready to ride, hoping that the clouds would just stay cloudy and not rainy. I made sure to bundle up with lots of layers just in case. So the book at the library described this ride as a 23 mile loop, but with 10.2 of it being on a road. I figured that didn't sound like much fun, so I decided to create my own loop. I parked in the empty lot, and hoped that no one was going to happen by that would check to see if I had filled out my permit (since I hadn't).

I started off on what seemed like a great trail. Lots of roots and rocks and very piney- it smelled great. Then I started up 6.6 miles up, but I figured it has to be better than the road right? Well, it's hard to say- I don't think this is really a biking trail. Of the 37 switchbacks I made 2. And I like switchbacks, they are usually my favorite part of a ride. I started counting them to pass the time I was spending walking my bike. It was still really pretty, just unbelievable impossible on a bike, and then I came to the ladder. It was technically a staircase, but the steepness leads it to be more accurately described as a ladder. Trust me I was huffing and puffing a bit once I got my bike to the top of that. Then things started to improve, it wasn't exactly flowy, but getting a lot closer to flowy, and then I started to get some views.

Like this- not me, but that was where I was, and what I saw

It was about this time I started thinking about all those stories of the people who go on these solo adventures and don't tell anyone where they are going...and then something horrible happens...and no one knows where to look for them..... and how it's the middle of the week, and I'm the only car in the lot....I made sure not to get too close to the edge.

Then I got to the top and got to go down the other side, and that was fun. I made 12 of the 22 switchbacks going that way, so I started to feel at least a little better about myself.

3.5 hours and about 14 miles after I started I was back at the van and off to see if I could find another trail for tomorrow. The problem was that Crystal Mountain trail did not seem to exist, I could find Crystal Mountain Resort just fine, but no trail. I finally gave up and just found a place to camp and figured I'd find it in the morning.

That night more nibble nibble, more run about and keep Emilie up.

Oct 3rd: So I went to sleep to the sounds of mouse nibbles and woke up to the sounds of this guy

standing on the rear view mirror and tapping on the windshield. (Not my picture).

Along with my steller jay alarm clock, there was another kind of tapping on the van, it was raining, and did not look like it was gonna give up any time soon. Not the best time to go on a 15 mile ride into the unknown. So I decided to go explore Mt Rainier National Park instead.

That dark lump in the middle of the picture is a black bear- yeah I know, stunning picture, but a bear picture is still a bear picture.

I decided it was a time for a hike, so I loaded on all my rain gear, and hit the very wet trail

All the colors were changing

The trail was neat with lots of amazing views, and then suddenly everything changed.

This was right in front of the paradise-stevens glacier.

At this point I turned around and headed back. I could have made a loop out of it, but I figured I was soggy enough. Once back I changed into nice warm dry clothes, and continued my circuit through the park.

This was my view of Mt Rainier

This was supposed to be my view of Mt Rainier

Foggy but pretty

That night I drove back to Tacoma and stayed with Beth and Dave. That is, after I stopped by Wal-mart and picked up some humane mousetraps for my little friend.

Oct 4th: Unfortunately my cleverly planted traps were empty, with the peanut butter sandwich still in place (sigh). I couldn't worry about it any more for it was time to get to the airport. Elizabeth was kind enough to take me and let us leave the van there.

My route had me change planes in Vegas, I'm pretty sure it will be the only time I'm every in Vegas, what a weird place!

Look, Vegas, pyramid and all!

Michael and Mary were waiting in Little Rock AR when I arrived with Joey and Baxter in tow. Next, on to more Arkansas adventures.

Big adventure in Amberland

2008-10-14T16:17:00.000-07:00

After climbing and a good nights rest, Amber and I were in charge of getting Mike and Elizabeth to the airport. They were flying back to St. Louis to be with the family because their mom was having surgery (the surgery went well, and she is currently recovering great). This was gonna leave Amber and myself on our own for a couple days, and most importantly meant I was gonna get to drive some- YAY!

We decided that since we were still pretty close, and because it had been one of the greatest places we had been, to head back to Bacon Creek. Home of the best tubing in the world. We had a blast and did just about everything you could think of. Sight seeing, mushroom looking at, hiking, tubing of course, and even a little wave train riding- that's right, that wave train.

This was about the most we saw of the actual city of Seattle, well that and the airport of course

On our way out of town

Bacon creek was just as scenic as the last time, and it was actually sunny this time around.

This view was just a little ways down from our campsite

One of the days we decided to go into North Cascades NP and do a hike for part of the day. We found one pretty close on the map that didn't look too long. We found the road leading up to the Thorton Lake trail at about noon. That was when our trouble began. Now you have to take into account two things with this story. First I don't drive the vanagon very often, and second this wonderful beast of ours has all of 67 horsepower. So we start up this gravel road that is supposed to take us to a trail head, and I'm having a little bit of trouble. The road isn't full so much of pot holes but giant dirt wave-train mounds. I have to keep the speed up to go up the hill, but I have to keep the speed slow so that our heads don't hit the roof going over the continuous line of speed bumps (I'm hoping Mike doesn't read this part of the blog). Finally we got to a point where I needed to put it into first to get up the next hill...and we were already in first- we decided this would be a good time to pull over and just walk the rest of it. After a quick lunch we were headed up the road at about 1pm.

Well we figured we had to be pretty close since we had been driving for a while, so we just kept walking and walking. Finally about an hour and a ridiculous amount of elevation gain later we arrived at the trail head-yay. This was when we found out that this short trail was actually 5 miles one way, we were thinking 5 miles total oops. But at this point we had already walked forever on the road, so we decided to go for it.

One of the many forms of moss we saw along the way- this one kind of reminds me of hair standing on end

View from near the top

Amber being Amber-no one else can do the bunny nose quite like she can

Finally we got to the lake, and it was beautiful

So we decided to take a quick dip- it was very refreshing =very cold, but nice too

and the water was super clear

Sun bathing or stomach crunches? You decide

So we had made it to the top, now we just had to get down, with an hour worth of daylight. Yikes! It had taken us about 3 hours to cover the 5 miles. Our only hope was that it would be descending the whole time. So we collected ourselves and literally took off at a run down the trail. Well I was jogging, Amber was doing this crazy power walk thing and leaving me in her dust.

Almost dark, but almost down

Somehow huffing and puffing and stumbling along we managed to make it back to the trail head in 1 hour. It was still light enough that we could read the sign at the trail head, and soon that too had faded into darkness. But at least we were off the trail now, and just had to walk on the road in the pitch black. Finally with a complete lack of depth perception, we saw those beautiful round eyes of the van glimmering at us through the darkness.

And then of course how could forget the main event- the creek

and the tubing

Amber donned Mikes helmet and life jacket and bravely tackled the rapids

You can tell this one is me because of the lovely pink life jacket and the constant scream

Amber trying to go hands free...for a little bit

And the all time favorite we tackled the river together

We had a really good time, and even went down some unexplored huge rapids

The day before we left the creek I had decided to have another look at the wave train that I had once been so happy to miss out on my kayak. I decided what the heck, I'm in an inner tube- I'm invincible!

It was the best tubing I had ever done. The waves were so big they dropped me down and everywhere I looked all I could see was water, then it threw me up to the next wave and the roller coaster continued. And somehow I manged to stay on the tube for the whole thing. In fact it was one of the smoothest rides I'd ever had- Amazing! Amber filmed the adventure although she also had the job of saving my life if anything went awry, see how responsible we are.

Of course what trip to bacon creek would be complete without a little mouse for company. Our little 4 legged eating machine friend returned once again. I thought there was a chance that the first time was just a fluke, but I think it's safe to say the mouse remembered us good and well. The first night I didn't even hear him, but the second night the little monster made sure his presence was known. Next morning a whole bag of trail mix and the m&ms were gone. Apparently this mice didn't like the raisins.

To break up the drive and so that Amber could see the ocean we headed back towards Seattle and stayed at Deception Pass State Park. I'm sure it was very pretty, but as soon as we left Bacon Creek things got rainy and foggy. So it was kinda difficult to say. Of course it was pretty in it's own mysterious fog enveloped way.

You can call me a dork if you want to, I really like the different textures in this picture

Amber Adventure was a thumbs up all around

Seattle and beyond Sept 24th-27th

2008-10-13T16:36:00.000-07:00

Searching for a real bed and a hot shower we showed up on Mike's sister, Elizabeth's doorstep in Tacoma Washington. She and her family have just recently moved into a really nice house right on the Puget Sound.A sampling of the view from the house

One of the days we went down to the sound with Patrick and Katie. Mike was trying to teach Katie how to skip rocks, and Patric was having a really good time burying things and then digging them back up. Oh yeah, we saw some seals too. Every now and then you would see a head pop up and then disappear again.

Then we watched a pretty sunset and headed back to the house.

One of the reasons we wanted to stay near Seattle was that Amber was flying in to visit us. We picked her up at the airport on Sat (the 27th). From there we headed out of the city to let Amber have a taste of outside climbing. About 45 minutes later and without too much difficulty we found the place we were looking for. Then we wandered around in the woods for another half hour or so, and managed to actually end up where we were hoping. Not bad considering the directions didn't mention anything about the tromp through the woods. Then we started climbing

This was a neat climb called tunnel of love, where you actually climb through a hole created by a chokestone. The only problem was that the whole bottom part of the climb was really wet, which made it a lot less fun.

Amber stemming like a pro

The wall we were on was called interstate- and unfortunately that was what you heard a lot of, it was a pretty view anyway though.

It has become Mike's new favorite pastime to make a whistling alien noise- action shown here

That's a loooong way down

Safely back on the ground

I think Amber summed it up best when she described the climbing as a "horizon expanding experience". We had a really good time and even found our way back to the car without trouble.

We drove back to Tacoma to spend the night at Elizabeths and made a very yummy pizza for dinner.

The Ocean Sept 23rd-34th

2008-10-10T11:57:00.001-07:00

Before leaving our free campground behind us, we decided that we should check out the Sul Duc river tube style

The water was a little chilly...

After the morning dip, we were on our way to the ocean. Passing through the rest of Olympic we made our way to Ruby Beach. It was a really neat beach, with all these little islands called sea stacks. It was very reminiscent of the movie Goonies.

I was trying hard to get to that island, it looked so close

but I couldn't quite make it although maybe I should have just gone for it, my knees got all wet anyway.

We were hoping to camp right on the beach, but the closed campground we found, was actually closed and the not closed campground was 14$. So we had to retreat further inland and find a nice free campground that we had to ourselves. Although the river wasn't nearly as nice as a few others we had seen, it was nice enough.

The next morning we planned to head back to the beach, but woke up to rain all day long. We decided that it was time to revisit civilization.

Olympic Sept 19th-23rd

2008-10-09T13:35:00.000-07:00

After leaving the North Cascades and Bacon Creek we continued to travel west toward the coast. Right around sunset we got to the sound. Not really truly the ocean, but pretty darn close.

To cut out some time and gas money we decided to take the ferry over to Port Townsend. It was dark, so we didn't get to see too much, but it was neat anyway.

The next day we went through Port Angeles and were keeping an eye out for a bike shop. We found one on the main street and went in to so if we could find some good rides in the area. These guys made us want to move there. They talked about the really good riding, and how when they're not riding they'll ride there kayaks on the surf, and if the surf isn't good then they'll just go rock climbing. It sounded about perfect.

Unfortunately the riding that we found wasn't all that great , probably partially due to the fact we were almost run over by a couple of motorcycles, and then on top of it the trail had some very ugly clear cut sections.

That night we stayed near salt creek, and checked out the tide pools in the morning

Tide pools

For the rest of the day we decided to go find Olympic hot springs. It's about a 2.5 mile hike one way, and there are these really nice rock pools, the perfect temperature for dipping. There was also a very not hot-spring fed river near by. So after a nice soak, we jumped in the cold river too.

The waterfall before the cool dip

Enjoying the natural hot tub

That night it rained a lot, we got up and decided to try another trail in the area. Mt Muller was fantastic. After 3 loong miles up through pine forest we got to spectacular views. The only problem was that we had gained so much elevation and it was so windy that by the time we got to the top we were freezing. We had to boogie the next 9 miles shivering the whole way. All said, I would definitely like to ride it again sometime, maybe when the weather is a little warmer and less wet.

One of the many amazing views. That's looking back into Olympic NP, I think it's crescent lake.

And the way down, which was a blast

We got down just in time for sunset

After the ride, we headed down the road to a campground that was closed, but still open- meaning free. It was a neat place, especially so considering we had the place all to ourselves. It was so green and so full of life, including giant slugs, I took a ton of pictures. Some of which are below.

The only problem with Bacon Creek

2008-10-09T11:24:00.000-07:00

So here we were at the most beautiful place I had ever seen. We had a nice dinner over the fire and were getting ready to turn in for the night, oblivious to the events that were about to change our lives forever.

We folded out the bed, crawled into our sleeping bags and started drifitng to the sound of water tumbing along the rocks. Right as I was on the brink of sleep, Michael exclaims
"Emilie, EMILIE"
"what"
"There was a mouse on my back, there was something on my back"
"WHAT? no you had to be imagining it"
"No, I felt something, was that you"
In a sleepy groggy tone "No, I don't know what you're talking about"
Comforted by my own ignorance I got ready to drift back to sleep- things calmed down, silence rolled in, until.... schmme shcmme schmee scratch scratch boing boing thump thump thump thump crinkle crinkle....

We both sat straight up in bed, grabbed our flashlights and beamed them around the car- nothing. Now I was on patrol, if there was a vermin in our bedroom I knew it was going to be a long night. Comforted by the fact that I was now on gaurd, Michael fell asleep, the little butt. He woke up 15 min later with me hunched over the food staring in every direction trying to spot the intruder. It was at this point I realized I couldn't take it.

I told him I was moving to the tent (we had set it up and put our bags in it earlier).
He said "no, no, I think he's gone, I'm sure it's fine just stay here"
"No, I can't I'm really tired and I know I won't be able to sleep at all"
"Just stay, it will be fine"
"No, I can't, I'm going" and I gathered up my sleeping bag, and pillow and ran to the tent.
I threw all the bags out and crawled in, ready finally for a quiet night.

About 5 minutes later I hear koosh-scwek, as the van door opens, then "hey let me in, I can't sleep in there with that thing alone"

So the mouse won- he kicked us out of our house, and had the whole place to himself, so in the morning, this is what we came back to...

The little monster got into everything. Among the list of the damaged included a package of cookies, 2 tortillas, and brownies that Vince had made while we in Bozeman. Not to mentioned he just pooped everywhere. In the cupboard, in all of our dishes, and then made a nest out of the toilet paper. This was war.

We stuck all the food into the big kayaking tupperware box we have and put it on top of the car. Then Mike contraped his finest invention yet- the perfect mouse trap. Large empty gallon jug of juice, with crumbled up cookie from the first attack- the hope was the little guy would crawl in to get to the cookie and wouldn't be able to get himself out at which point we would spring forward grab our trap and take it far far away ( of course this design only works under the assumption that there is only 1mouse...).

So we had a wonderful day, and once again settled in for the night. About 15 minutes after everything got quiet, about the time that Mike and I thought maybe the little monster had just run off, we hear... schmme shcmme schmee scratch scratch boing boing thump thump thump thump crinkle crinkle...

Lights go back on to search lights, and we are on patrol. And then- there he is, doing laps on the carpet- up above the trap....we hold our breath...he steps out onto the bottle...we lean forward... his nose goes in, front legs...and then....nothing he turns around and runs up one of the seats. Frustrated we sit back to watch the show. The little guy was running all over the place. We'd see him go in front of the drivers seat, and then suddenly he would pop out from behind the rear seat. And then once again nothing. We looked at each other trying to decide what to do.

Then out of the corner of my eye, I see 2 beady eyes peering over the top of the bed, he crawled up and started heading toward Michael. We both scream and shoot back, and he jumps off the bed in a panic and disappears again.

It was about this time that Mike decides he can't take it anymore.

"I'm going to the tent, come with me"

"no, no, I think it's fine, maybe we scared him off"

the look- "I don't think we scared him off"

"but I'm tired, lets just stay here"

"we won't sleep at all if we stay here"

"alright you're right, lets go to the tent"

So that's what we did, again. The mouse had won, again. Then, to add insult to injury we checked our trap in the morning, and the little monster had pooped all over the edge of the rim, and in the Lid- the nerve!

That next morning we had decided it was time to move on, and were sad to leave the perfect campsite, but very happy to leave our mouse problem behind us. We're pretty sure they or it had found a path in from the outside, and were just hanging out with us in the evening and then going back to there little holes for the daytime.

So we left with the bitter score being Mouse 2, Us 0.

This is just a side note, doesn't have a thing to do with mice- but we also saw some huuuge slugs around the site- this is one of them- they were really neat to watch.

Bacon Creek and the Skagit September17th-19th

2008-09-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

Driving through North Cascades National Park we found ourselves looking at the Skagit river quite a bit, and pulled over at a boat launch. Mike left me and the kayaks in search for a take out down the river. He pulled over to look at a particularly white looking area, and debated for a very long time if we should try it, or if we should get out before hand. Thankfully, he decided to err on the side of sanity and we stopped before the biggest continuous wave train I have ever seen.

I can't think of anything witty to say about this picture, but I think it's pretty funny anyway

It looks so pretty and calm right here, but even in the calm spots the water was really moving-It made me dizzy to look down while we were zooming along, especially since the water was so clear and you could see all the way to the bottom.

The scenery was really nice along the way

And here is the famous wave train- we were actually trying to decide if we should try it (I almost just parked the vanagon right after this, and wasn't' going to tell Emilie, leaving it for a nice surprise at the end.) After we took out we went by and got this view from the road. At a closer look, the waves were the size of me, so maybe it was a good thing I chickened out.

A very good thing

After the river we decided to try to find a place to camp for the night. Driving along we saw a sign for Bacon Creek Road. It was a gravel road in the national forest, always a good sign for free camping. And sure enough, about 2 miles down, we came to out best site yet. It's hard to describe how amazing it was- so I'll just let the pictures do it...

And then there was the creek- I wasn't expecting much from a place named Bacon Creek, but it was amazing.

So of course, when you have crystal clear water, multiple rapids and 60 degree weather, what choice do you have but to tube down it? We were hooked as soon as we tried it- and ended up spending the better part of 2 days floating and screaming down.

Notice my death grip on the rope, this was the first time we actually stayed in the tube going down together, so I was pretty excited.

Oh yeah, and we found a couple of blackberries right along the road- we had them with everything. Blackberry pancakes, blackberry oatmeal, blackberry cereal....mmmmm

September 9th-16th Kayaking, biking, bears, climbing, and sleeping at trailheads

2008-09-24T18:21:00.000-07:00

September 9th: After spending the night at some kinda scary looking lake in West Glacier we were ready to have another exciting day. We got up decently early for us and were ready to hit the river. We dropped off the boats and myself, and Mike drove back into town to the take out, and then hitchhiked back the 7 miles.

We thought we were going to be in for a relaxing float for the first 3 miles or so we had to paddle and everything, but the water was so clear and so deep and the scenery so neat we didn't mind at all. And then out of nowhere, we turned the bend and heard the crash of water and knew we were in for it. We both got through the first couple of rapids. Exhilarated we pushed on, me bravely leading the way (by bravely I mean whimpering the whole time). Sure enough we hit a tricky spot and the water violently grabbed the back end of my kayak and flipped me over like I was nothing more than a leaf. Well even though I had practiced my roll when we got in the water, I wasn't able to pull it off in the panic and had to bail...again (sigh). My consolation was that Mike said it was one of the funniest things he's seen in a while... just you wait I thought to myself.

So I dumped out my boat and we headed off again, and the rapids just kept coming, and they were not joking around. I was still leading the way until a particularly roaring rapid. (It's bizarre, being so close to the water you can't really see what you are coming up to...you can just hear it). Well this one sent a particularly vicious whimper out of me and a plea for Michael to go first. So finally he comes to the front shouting "Watch out, Here I come to save the day!" And then immediately goes down the first drop and flips over. Now I would be lying to say that I wasn't at least a tiny bit happy when this turn of events happened. But then he didn't pop back up like usual, as I went over the lip of the drop I saw his little head pop up and then go back under. Meanwhile I just realized that I had gotten myself into a hole, and if i didn't start paddling I would soon be facing the same fate. So with three hard paddle strokes I was free of the hole and cascading down the rest of the rapid, and Mike was still under. Finally he pops up next to his boat, he had to bail to, and once again I would be lying to say that I did not have at least a little smile on my face at this. We make our way over to a rocky shore to regroup. Of course by now his kayak is full of water and he's holding on to it so it doesn't simply take itself down the river without him. This predicament made it somewhat difficult to simply pull over. He perched himself onto a rock holding on for dear life to his boat which simply wanted to take it's very full heavy body downstream. Finally he's able to get out of the water, and this is when he realizes that his paddle which we so cleverly tied on to the boat is missing. The rope had snapped. So he sends me out looking for it, hoping I can catch it before it's too late. So I take the next 2 sets of rapids by myself, which were no small potatoes mind you, but no paddle. So I pull over, wondering what the heck we're gonna do now.

Luckily 2 rafts were following us down the river, and although they didn't find the paddle they did offer to take Mike and his kayak down the rest of the river. They were very friendly, and we were very lucky. The only problem was that when the 2nd boat tried to pull Mike's kayak along the river it flipped over and filled with water, so the guide decided to just pull it onto the raft instead...still full of water. This would be a difficult task no matter what, but these rafts are equipped with screws which the guide not so gently pulled the boat right over. I know it's terrible to complain about people helping you, and I still have no idea what we would have done it they hadn't come along....But there are now two giant Deep scratches in the bottom of Mike's boat...just very eh. Oh and and top of the sorrow of losing the paddle, Mike also had a t-shirt in his kayak which was never accounted for either- and it was clean!

But anyway, I ended up just following the rafts down the river, and there was no more flipping, although a couple pretty good rapids left. Meanwhile Mike is sitting in the raft listening to the boring people talk about jobs and fishing and stuff as I'm getting thrown around all over the place and fighting for my life, he was a little on the jealous side.

The rafts were taking out at the same spot we were, so they dropped us off and bid us farewell. Overall it was still a really fun run, but Mike was not in the best of moods for the rest of the night. Although he realized it could have been much worse, but it was still really frustrating. We figure that the paddle got stuck where he flipped and that's why we never found it. When he tried to use it to flip it hit the bottom and then he lost his grip- this is all very confusing and adrenaline pumping when you are under water and running out of air. To make matters worse, he wasn't able to bail right away. When he tried to reach the loop to release the skirt the water was pushing him into the ground and he couldn't reach it for quite a while, but finally he managed to pop out. We do have an extra paddle, (Mike's boat came with 2) so we are not out there, at least not until we lose another one.

Just so you get an idea of the river these are a couple of pictures from rafting companies doing the middle fork of the Flathead, same river, same stretch and everything.

One of these days we are gonna have to figure out a way to get pictures of us kayaking, but none yet.

Sept 10th-12th:Moving out of the Glacier area, we decided to find some biking. We stopped in at Glacier Cyclery in Whitefish Montana where a guy was super helpful and gave us a couple of good rides and even a free camping spot, about 25 miles out of town. So we spent the next couple days there riding a 15 mile ride, and then 26 miles the next day. The second day we ran into a couple of downhill riders who were not too happy to see us. Mike passed them on the way up, and then one of the guys started riding right behind him like a madman, looking all funny with his seat all low and tons of body armour and everything, and completely out of control. I turned the corner just in time to see the guy not make the turn in front of him and go flying off the trail tumbling down the steep hill side. Both Mike and I stopped and asked if he was ok and he gave us the yeah yeah I'm fine, in other words leave me alone. We let him go in front, but about 2 miles from the end Mike started to get a flat tire, and had to ride on it so that the air wouldn't all come out (since he's riding tubeless) so he managed to catch up to the two of them again, and this time on the final downhill portion of the ride. Boyyy was sir-crash-a-lot,ride-completely-out-of-control pissed. Mike tried to talk to him after the ride while he was waiting for me to finish and all he got out of him was that he wasn't from North Carolina(what the license plate said), and that he was from somewhere around here (even though we were in the middle of nowhere) and...well i guess that was about it.

Sept 13th-14th: After those 2 long rides, we decided we needed at least a day off the bike and so decided to press westward.

We spent one night right next to the Kootenai river, at a pretty campground that actually didn't have trash in the fire pit. The campground was closed for the season, so of course it was packed with RVs.

The next day consisted of lots of driving we finished off Montana, went through the tip of Idaho and got half-way across Washington before we decided to stop for the night. We stayed next to a dirty lake and had a dirty fire with algae wood, but it was free...so no complaints

Ready to hit the road again, notice the basil plant is still doing well, despite travelling from St Louis and getting run over by atvs at the gallatin, she's still going strong- yay basil!

September 15th: The next day we wandered into Winthrop looking for another bike ride. After establishing that there was only public restroom in the city, and it was closed, and that there was no such thing as free camping we headed off to starvation mountain.

After picking out the best of the about 50 free camp spots we found we loaded up with water and started up the road. Highlights included a very long ride on the road, a very steep sandy side trail, 4 black bears playing in creek about 20 feet from us (a mom and 3 cubs), more very long road riding, being certain we were lost, finding out we weren't, another 5 miles up on the road, and then finally going down- as Mike described it, the worst part of trail he's ever ridden. Now, I don't think it was quite that bad, but it certainly wasn't good. But after flying down a rock strewn gully essentially for a mile or so, things got much more interesting- the trail narrowed, really narrowed.

The next 12 miles were all downhill on singletrack and just got more narrow as we continued. We rode through some a recently burned forest right on the ash from the fire, and then we got to the cliff edge. For about 3 miles we rode down inch wide tread on the edge of a cliff on sand. Precarious doesn't quite sum it up, finally we got down to the bottom only with one minor over the handlebars mishap. It actually didn't hurt at all, but it was really hard to get back up on the trail. So overall, we were glad we did the trail but certainly didn't feel like doing it again anytime soon.

September 16th: Trying to stay well rounded we found a climbing wall. It was a nice place with some cool climbs and friendly people.

Climbing near Mazama Washington

We drove into the National Forest and started to look for a place to camp. But all the campgrounds were not only not free, but costly, and all of the gravel roads had trailheads. Usually not a big deal, but this National Forest was charging 5$ per vehicle to use the trails. Absurd, to park in a parking lot- Mike is even more vehement about this, don't get him started. Anyway we decided that we weren't really using the trail anyway, so we should be fine. We hunkered down at the Pacific Crest Trail trailhead and set up camp, making sure to leave early just in case- we didn't want any more friendly wake up knocks.

The drive through the cascades was beautiful...

Fun in Glacier

2008-09-10T15:22:00.000-07:00

Because we didn't want to be questioned about staying in the parking lot at Many Glacier we decided it would be best to move on to the next lodge lot. Little did we know the next one was a little less crowded so we had trouble blending in (there's something about a bright orange van with kayaks on top that makes you stick out a little bit) but we thought we would be ok. The next morning we woke to a firm rapping first on the front window then every window including the one inches from our face. We froze in terror. We know we didn't ask for a wake up call/knock, it must be included in that park pass. So we stayed still and waited for it to go away. We packed up a little quicker that morning than most. We were gone in minutes. Thank you VW for including those curtains. We wanted to get an early start anyway. Thank you mystery person for the kind wake up knock it was very thorough. So our plan was to hopefully find a way to run Swift Current Creek. The creek was right outside the park to the east on the Blackfeet Reservation. We nervously scouted it and thought the only place that we could take-out was still moving pretty swiftly. We weren't sure we would be able to pull off.

The put-in 3 miles upstream from were we parked the car was relatively calm. We decided to try out what kayakers call a seal dive (get into kayak on land and push off small drop or cliff into water.) So I sent Emilie off the 1-2ft drop and like a pro she landed it perfectly thanks to the perfect push.

This is the take out of the river

Not to mention along the way we saw a cow, an egret, and 2 black bears. A mom and her cub watched us pass from the river side, kinda keeping an eye on us as we went- they ended up following us for a while, and eventually the cub scurried about 30 feet up into a tree- it was incredible.

It was time to do the drive through Glacier. We followed the going to the sun road up up up, and finally got to the crest where it said 6% grade next 12 miles. Well this of course sounded like the perfect opportunity to get the bikes down for a bit.

It was a lot of fun, and we didn't have any problem keeping up with the cars- I have to say, it was a neat way to see the park

When we got stopped by construction, I handed off the bike to Mike and I got to drive, almost as exciting as riding the bike down the mountain side.

As we continued through the park, we just had to stop at this pull off.

We were marveling at the crystal clear water

and the pretty waterfalls

when an idea struck, that water is pretty darn deep...hmmm

I'll admit it took an awful lot of convincing once I got up there. I even had onlookers at the pull-off along the road. When I finally did jumped, Mike said they cheered- For some reason I didn't hear it between my scream as I went down and the water rushing up to greet me.

So to sum up:

-woke up to unrequested wake up call

-Ran uncharted waters, with some really fun rapids

-saw cow, egret, and 2 bears

-rode our bikes down a mountain

-and jumped about 25 feet into a river

All in all I would say it was a pretty good day.

Black leaf canyon and Glacier

2008-09-10T12:41:00.000-07:00

We uprooted from Bozeman hit the road in search for Black Leaf Canyon. As we approached our turn off the highway we were amazed again by climbers vague instructions 12 miles past Chouteau we turned into what looked like someones ranch driveway. We backed out carefully not wanting to be their next trophy hanging above their fireplace. We continued to drive about 15 miles coming to another town with the fine establishment JR's "wildlife refuge". The bug zapper was hard at work in the back yard. We walked in and startled the locals asking where Center road was they looked pretty confused. Then we mentioned the canyon and they said yeah that's straight up the road directly across from the bar. Just stay straight on it about 20 miles. So an hour later we showed up had no idea where the canyon was it was pitch black we found a few campsites and pulled over wondering what this place is like. The next morning we were pleasantly surprised by this amazing view...

Black Leaf Canyon looking east

See if you can find me, I'm pretty small about 90ft up

view of the chilly damp weather

rainbow

the view from camp

First night in Glacier, we decided to live it up and stay in the Many Glacier Lodge.... parking lot

Glacier accommodations- the campground was $20-

View from lake at Many Glacier Lodge

Hiking up to see Grinnel Glacier

Neat clouds

Good view

Ginnel Lake

A look back at what we had come up with Grinnel lake, Lake josephine, and Swiftcurrent lake

Glacier and me

Glacier is cold

He stuck his head in it

Looks like a nice swim

We regretfully descended and revisited the amazing views

Grassy Mountain and Climbing in the Gallatins August 28th-Sept 2nd

2008-09-10T11:36:00.000-07:00

Aug 28th-29th- Before we left Bozeman for good we decided to cram in a few more bike rides. We were lucky enough to find one of the best rides we've ever done. About 7 miles up on superb single track, with outstanding views, and then you get to the top and get to go down it. This is Grassy Mountain in the Bangtail range just outside of Bozeman and it's perfect. It seems like it's definitely designed with mountain bikes in mind. Lots of swooping and banking turns and a whole lot of really fun stuff.

The first 2 nights we were there we stayed near the top, and got to take in these vistaa as we settled in for the night

The next day, running out of water, we decided to check out a national forest campground down the road.

It was free, nice, CLEAN, and had water- a very nice find. Not to mention within riding distance to the trail (although it was a long 2 miles up the paved road after we were done with the ride)

Aug 30th-Spet 2nd:

After 2 excellent days of riding we though we might hit up that Gallatin River one more time before we left (this Bozeman area just sort of has a way of drawing you in, I'm telling you). So we left the Bangtails did some shopping in Bozeman and were off to the Gallatins again.

Unfortunately the weather was not as cooperative as it had been. It was chilly verging on downright cold. So we decided to float down the river in our life jackets for about 30 feet instead of doing the whole 3 mile stretch.

Ready to just relax around the campsite for the day, we were surprised when a couple drove up and asked if we happened to know where the climbing wall was. We didn't, but told them that we would happily accompany them in finding it. After a few trips back and forth down the road, we found the right pull off, and trail and ran up to the wall.

The whole climbing experience was rather short lived because the clouds kept looking darker and darker, and the wind continued to pick up, so we only got 1 climb in, but it was fun anyway- and made us realize that we really had found the near perfect camp spot.

Mike nearing the top of the climb- (Conner took the picture, if you're wondering)

Conner and Allison headed back to Bozeman and we settled in for a chilly night.

A very chilly night- that's snow on those top pines. We ended up spending practically a whole day inside the van, and despite a bit of cabin fever, it was for the most part relaxing.

And then finally we decided it had to happen, it was time to leave the Bozmean area. We climbed a little in the morning and then headed into town to say our good byes. But then got convinced that we should do one more ride- and went up to Mystic Lake with Vince. We were really glad we went, the ride was great (although a little chilly on the way back) and we both successfully tackled the infamous "wall of death". Well, Mike actually walked it on the way back, but you didn't hear that from me. Then on top of a phenomenal ride and sunset- we saw a group of elk in the woods and a Giant bald eagle, that flew from the trees.

And then Finally, it was time to move on...

Hyalite and Gallatin Aug 21st-30th

2008-09-03T13:45:00.000-07:00

Along with flipping around in our new kayaks we also went on a couple mountain bike rides. So I wanted to throw in a picture of Monica the brave showing us what it truly means to ride a mountain bike.

Aug 21st-24th: After a full day of bike repairs, we decided it was finally time to give Monica a break and move out for a little bit. We went up to Hyalite canyon, only 10 miles out of town, and filled our times with some excellent riding. Unfortunately we were there for the weekend so the trails were pretty crowded, but we still had a really good time.

Another unfortunate was the state of our campsite when we first found it. Free yes, but trashed. I guess there is just some appeal I don't understand to throwing beer cans into a fire pit and then shooting at them, there was a sock too...

On our last day in Hyalite we decided we would try a ride that was a little calmer, so we decided to do a 6 mile trail up to Hyalite lake, that Vince and Monica had not ridden before, but had hiked and figured it would probably be "pretty mellow". Little did we know, but we found out pretty fast, I think it was probably one of the most constant technical rides I've done, but was still able to do most of it-most definitely a blast.

The reward at the top, a very scenic alpine lake with mountain goats and everything. And then we got to go back down, even more of a reward.

Thinking that we were gonna have this nice calm ride, this was the only ride where we actually took our real camera along, luckily no mishaps befell it.

One of the best part of the ride was all the waterfalls. I think there were at least 9 right along the trail, and they all were beautiful.

Aug 25th-26th: That night we decided to go back to the Gallatins and have another go at the river. We found a place to camp right next to the river and even had a nice boulder to climb around on. Even better, there was a trail we wanted to ride another 2 miles down the road. Pretty much the perfect place.

Another nice, scenic, free campsite. Don't worry this one was trashed too, but we picked up what we could....sooo frustrating.

Then we hit the river

Here she is- a certain spot called house rock...well that at least is the river we did, we are still working up to that exact rapid

But here are a couple of the rapids we actually did go down. We just took some drive-by pictures on the way up the river.

Not quite as impressive as house rock, but trust me, they look plenty big when you're in the water

The scenery is alright too I guess.

This time we both managed to get down the river without flipping at all- although we did a couple of practices just in case, and managed to get plenty wet. Michael made me go first for most of it, which added another element of terror. He said every time we came up to a rapid he would hear "EEE EEE EEE EEee ee eeeee" and so on fading down the river. It was a little on the terrifying side, but in the end I was glad.

The vanagon all outfitted for adventure- notice the Tupperware box on the top- that's our kayaking stuff box, which was an excellent idea so we don't have another giant bag of stuff laying around the van. We still have been getting over 17 mpg which really isn't too bad.

Sunset from our perfect site

The next morning we got up and pedaled down the road to Garnet Mountain. It starts off as a long gradual climb that goes for about 10 miles up a road getting steeper and much less road-like the closer you get to the top. Then you go down 3 miles on some crazy narrow single track. If you can imagine covering the same elevation of 10 miles in 3, yeah it was pretty crazy.

There was a point where Mike and I both stopped on the trail, and I went to pass him. We had to maneuver the bike pedals so there was enough room to fit both bikes on the trail...

Overall a very great ride...although Mike created a new sound affect to accompany the narrow abyss which we traversed. It was something close to a bleating sheep- trying to find the mountain goat in him, cause if you slid off this stuff, you were in trouble.

Aug 27th: After an early morning shower in the Gallatin we headed back to town to get our alternator belt replaced. Nothing crazy just $90, and not entirely necessary at this exact moment, but it was cracking, and we would really be in trouble if it would decide to go when we were, say anywhere else, so we thought it was best to play it safe.

A nice wake up dip

Financial Report 2008 Update

2008-08-30T17:49:00.000-07:00

Here we are making ourselves closer and closer to the poverty bracket, especially since our new toy purchases (kayaks). Enjoy...

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pkrKefrl6L0lush_Dg8ahUA

Adventures in kayaking

2008-08-21T17:09:00.000-07:00

Driving to the Tetons from Bozeman we took the Gallatin Gateway, home of the Gallatin River. We were just driving along minding our own business when there came this torrent of whitewater next to the road, and an idea was born. A couple days after getting back from the Tetons we had bought our first kayak.

So of course we had to try it out, Mike manned the kayak and Monica and I shared an inner-tube we had found on the side of the road that actually still held air. We figured for the first trip it would be best to conquer a less torrent-full river, so we chose the Madison.

Mental preparation, hard at work

And he's off

We had a very pleasant float albeit a quiet shallow one- although I did manage to knock Monica off the raft pretty good once. Much to Michael's dismay about a half hour through the trip his legs had gone completely numb. Apparently the boat was just a little bit too small for him. So it was time to buy kayak number 2.

But first it was my birthday

Yay my very special day

With Mike scouring Craigslist and the paper we found 2 kayaks the next day, and he decided he wanted something more streamlined so he could slice through that water, and be able to fit his legs in it.

This is it. We took it to the pond the next day and taught ourselves how to eskimo roll. It may look simple enough, but let me tell you it goes against everything that your little instincts tell you to do. If you stick your head up first out of the water you'll go right back under.

We both learned in his boat because it was easier to flip- who knew a whiffle ball on top of your head could look so cool. I'm telling you it's gonna be the next fashion.

Then the day after that I tried it in my boat- and after more hours and hours of practice got it to work pretty darn good.

So then the next day we decided we were ready. After spending the morning at the lake, just to make sure we had the roll down, we here headed off to the Gallatin.

I was so nervous looking at the river I was shivering despite the 90 degree heat.

I know it doesn't look like much here, but do a you tube search of the Gallatin River and you'll understand. I flipped twice, and Mike flipped once. He was able to get himself back over, putting that eskimo roll into practice, but I couldn't quite get it and had to bail out of my kayak instead. This left me floating down the river in my life jacket and Mike chasing after my boat. We eventually all reunited, and next time I'm gonna be ready with my roll. It was terrifying but really really fun. We're just waiting for the next warm day so we can go back again. Maybe I won't direct the kayak on top of the giant rock in the middle of the river next time around...we'll just have to wait and see.

Our newest additions.

The after shot: Cold and wet, but very happy

Bozeman and Tetons July 30th-August 6th

2008-08-20T23:46:00.000-07:00

The only other thing on our agenda was to get to Bozeman in time to meet Monica to go backpacking with her and Vince on the Teton Crest Trail.

So July 30th we were off once again

Goodbye plains of grain

That's right, Emilie can drive the vanagon too, and I did good. Well that is until we got off the highway and I killed it twice and managed to grind the gears, and than made the horn honk by turning the wheel, but I think the van was just a little grumpy- it obviously wasn't me.

And what road trip would be complete without being passed by the statue of liberty?

We spent our first night at the South Dakota Welcome center and by the end of the second day we had made it to the black hills. After a scenic drive we turned down a forest road and found a very nice spot to pull over and camp for the night.

We arrived in Bozeman on August 1st got some backpacking groceries and were ready to head to the Tetons in the morning.

Vince and Monica enjoying the view

After camping a night in the National Forest we were ready to start the backpacking.

On the trail

Taking a lunch break. It was about this time, about 4 miles into the first 13 mile day, that Mike and I both realized we had very significant blisters forming on our feet. I was lucky enough that I had sandals along with me, so I switched over to them, but Mike only had his hiking boots which he had to continue to wear.

We finally reached the pass and started down the other side

And down...

We finally reached this little picturesque spot with 3 more miles to go to the campsite.

Monica leading the way

Waterfall and snow and the longest 0.6 miles I have ever hiked

And finally home for the night, Marion Lake at about 10,000 ft.

This is when we found out that travelling from Iowa, about 600 ft above sea level to 10,000 ft above sea level in a matter of days just isn't a good idea. We both had a terrible night of sleep, and Mike woke up the next morning and lurched himself out of the tent sure that he was about to become reacquainted with his mac and cheese from the previous night. Luckily he managed to keep everything down, but we decided that between vicious blisters and nauseousness we should just head back to the trail head instead of continuing on for the next 4 days and not having a way to get down quickly.

Monica and Vince continued along the trail and Mike and I made our way back to the trail head, splitting the hike up into 2 days.

These flowers were all along the trail. I'm pretty sure it's some kind of columbine and I thought they were very pretty.

Hiking back along the trail, we were literally walking amongst the flowers

After we got out from the hike we took a dip in the Gros Ventre river, which was chilly but quite refreshing.

The Blisters

After a shopping trip through Jackson we went back to the National Forest for the next couple of days. Just sat and relaxed and watched the mountains change with the hours.

Our last night out we had gotten sick of soup and noodles, so went into town and bought some brats, real camping food. The only problem was when it was time to cook it had started raining. So we ended up cooking in the tent vestibule and watched the storm blow over. Everything was fine until about 10 that night when we started hearing low grunting noises very close by. We quickly evacuated the tent and sat in the car for the next half hour or so, occasionally shining the headlights to see if we could see anything. We never did, so eventually we went back to the tent very conscious of the fact that we smelled like cooked sausages. We both woke up the next morning, somewhat to our surprise.

We met back up with Vince and Mon the next day and had a nice dip in the Norris hot spring on the way back to Bozeman. Then we moved in at Monicas.

Mikes birthday and 6 Flags 7/27-7/28

2008-08-20T21:38:00.000-07:00

Nyssa thought it would be a great idea to take Mike out for pizza for his birthday. Happy Joes was so nice they not only gave him a free ice cream sundae, but they even had the whole restaurant sing to him.

Lets all join in wishing Michael Happy Birthday on his very special day, Michael's turning 26 today, lets see if we can get him to stand up for us....clap clap clap....

We then spent the early evening driving to Gurnee IL so we could spend the whole next day at 6 Flags.

After a European make over Mike was ready for a night on the town.

Kumari drove over from Indianapolis and met us in Gurnee, and produced from her back seat a full size hula hoop- don't you travel with one?

It was a red t-shirt battle of the hula hooping. Mike has the faster cadence, but Nyssa seems to have the nonchalant hooping thing down...what do you think?

Kumari was of course the real pro, but it's her hula hoop after all.

The rest of the day was spent running around 6 flags and having a marvelous time waiting in line and occasionally riding a couple of rides.

Coffee shop intellectual meets rock star

I'm not quite sure what to say about that one

Reading up on the Supergirl Mike was elated to find out that she is just like him. Same height, same weight, and who could miss the shocking similarity of those brill ant blue eyes, they were obliviously separated at birth.

and of course the swings

Palisade Climbing and a Wedding July 11th- 26th

2008-08-20T11:47:00.000-07:00

One of the few things we had planned for a long time in our generally lazi-fare lifestyle was Mike and Cayley's wedding on July 13th in the Chicago area. Miss Amber Andress was kind enough to let us stay at her apartment and take us camping.

Here Mike and Amber enjoy a pretty sunset at White Pines State park.

After a very nice wedding and a meeting with other Chicago folk we were off to Dubuque. In a vehicle this time.

Still trying to stay off the bike, we decided to check out some climbing in the area. Kepler Palisades seemed like a good place to go. The only problem was that the bottom of the cliffs were under the Cedar River. So we could climb from the middle up, but not get down to the bottom. Not very convenient.

Michaels mad

So we just camped instead, met an interesting fellow named Noodle and spent the evening chasing the raccoons away from our marshmallows.

Morning dawned and Nyssa was bright eyed and bushy tailed to hit those rock walls

On our way back to Dubuque we stopped in at Pictured Rocks near Monticello.

Nyssa showing that rock

Michael leading his way over a bulge

A few days later we decided to check out the Palisades on the other side of the river. Mississippi Palisade state park near Savanna Illinois. Mary drove up and the two of us and my fam came down .

Mary showing off her new specs. Whose sunglasses are better? You decide in our newest poll...

Mary brought Michael home made thin mints, for a birthday present,but they kinda melted a bit on the drive

Birthday Boy

And how old is Michael tomorrow?

Mary preparing for her first rappel, pretty scary

Check out the pro

Nyssa once again commanding some respect from that rock

My mom even gave it a try- I guess all that violin playing has given her forearms of steel- yay mom!

Nyssa trying the other end of things- I'm at the top being a very trusting sister.

Mike on a hard crack climb

Me trying that same hard crack climb, and nearly clocking Mary in the head

Rawrrrrrr

And then something peculiar happened. Nyssa thought she'd play around on the hard climb. And the whole time she's trying Mike and Mary are just giggling behind us...little did we know....

As we were finishing up the sun started to set over the river

Mary tried her hand at the really hard crack climb

Climbing Jackson Falls 6/29- 7/3

2008-08-16T21:23:00.000-07:00

With Mike's knee still causing terrible pain whenever he started pedaling even after 2 weeks of rest at the Duchow house we decided that it would be best to not be any more dumb, and we rented a car to take us back to St. Louis (cheaper than gas there and back). Of course when we got back we still couldn't bike hence the remodeling. We were also able to work in some climbing.

We went down to Jackson Falls in Southern Illinois and had a good ol' time

Mike descending into the pit

Me at the top of fine 9 a 5.9 that we hadn't been able to do the first time we went down to Jackson Falls, and although it was ridiculous I made it to the top-yay!

After a couple days Mary and Baxter came down and climbed with us too

Crouching Mary Hidden Dragon

Bottoms up

Getting comfy round the campfire. Baxter was a little on the tired side

It was hard to believe we were in Illinois

Baxters barking orders

Mary reaches the summit of a really fun 65 foot climb

Off roading vanagon style

remodels

2008-08-14T20:07:00.000-07:00

Due to injuries we had to find something to keep us busy, and what better thing to do than home improvements. We documented most of our handy work. I think the pictures speak for themselves so here you go.

Duchow dining room before

Duchow dining room after

Flanigan upstairs bathroom before

Upstairs bathroom after (notice the red pipe!)

Drivers side of Vanagon Before

Drivers side of Vanagon after some cans of spray paint

Notice the hand crafted wood insignia

Duchow Kitchen before

Duchow kitchen after

Emilie priming up the ceiling

We are available to do your next remodeling project. The more daunting the better!

St Louis to Dubuque by bike May 11th-16th

2008-08-13T15:18:00.000-07:00

Some may ask why? To be perfectly honest I don't quite remember where inspiration like this comes from, but once we came up with the idea, we were pretty sold on it. The couple days previous we spent a lot of time getting things ready, putting skinny tires on the bikes and making sure the trailer was going to work with the mountain bikes, etc.

May 11th, Day 1: We got up bright and early and expected to eat a quick breakfast and be on the road...Well when 3:30 came around, we finally were all loaded up and ready to go

Departure

Things actually started out pretty smoothly, after a quick load adjustment around the corner (around the corner because that was at least out of sight of the house and the farthest I thought I could let the rather awful rubbing noise continue.) we were on our way. From Webster we biked through Ladue and after a little turning around we ended up on the Creve Coure bike trail and biked over the Missouri River with the end goal being to get to highway 79. We got so close to not having any mishaps, but alas...following along highway 70 on the frontage road we see the exit coming for highway 79. Three miles , two miles, and then our frontage road turns away from the highway and goes through this little town, over the train tracks and to an intersection... hmmm. But suddenly to the rescue on the road directly in front of us

(MRT standing for Mississippi River Trail) which was what we were supposed to be following anyway- Decision made we pressed onward, until we ran into this

and this...as you can see, right about sunset

It started off ok, a little bit wet, but standable. Then the 2nd puddle, a little longer and a little deeper, and then, as far as the eye could see, water. But what choice did we have? Already wet and going the "right" way we decided to push on, I mean that giant truck got through how bad could it be? Lets just surmise to say that things did not improve as we tried to move our water logged bikes and trailer through the flood water. I finally stopped at a half submerged mailbox, trying to hold on to it and keep both feet out of the water my legs screaming like I had just swum miles. Meanwhile Mike is way back lugging the trailer which is creating a wake behind him. It was about now that I realized that he hadn't been yelling for me to slow down for him to keep up but because he had a stick stuck in his derailleur. So he had to step off his bike and reach his hands into the murk to free himself to keep going on. As he's trying to free the bike he looked behind him and the trailer was actually floating. By the time he catches up to me, we still can't see the end of the water. This is when we decide to re-consult the map. Ooops, Highway C is definitely part of the MRT the problem is that it's the part that goes back to the arch. So all that for nothing. We turned around and rode about 3 miles back through the flood water to that oh so famous intersection, and went the other way and sure enough there was 79.

Notice the water draining from the trailer- and the sun has left us long ago

After finally ending up on 79 we continued on to a sign for a campground and settled in for a dinner of cookies m&ms and peanuts. 1st day: 54.74 miles, max speed 26.2, riding time 3:30-10pm.

May 12th Day 2: After convincing the campground host that we really shouldn't have to pay the $15 to stay there we were back on the road again.

I mean$15 for this?- we asked if we could just pay $10 because we are living off a rather limited budget, we're travelling on bikes after all- Some how the guy let us stay for free- I wasn't going to argue

All of our stuff was a bit damp after being submerged in the flood water, but luckily we actually came pretty prepared with a drybag and lots of garbage bags and all the important stuff stayed dry

Unfortunately, my panniers did not fare so well- Apparently a raccoon really wanted to get at my pop tarts.

It was a nice day for a ride

oops

This was one of those times that I was really happy to be on a bike- the road was closed to cars, but we could squeeze right on by

The whole ride up 79 was really pretty but really hilly. We had lunch in Clarksville and I panted like a giant hippo climbing up some of those hills, feeling like I was just as likely to roll backwards as I was to roll forward.

As evening came round we passed the Mark Twain cave and arrived in Hannibal. Not having many camping options and not wanting to go on anymore in case we would have to go up again we settled in a city parked, directly above the train tracks. And then the lights came on in the park, and I no longer needed a flashlight. I could read a book inside the tent just fine. And then a group of teenagers showed up and were playing duck duck goose around our tent. We finally got some sleep when a thunderstorm came around 2 am. It was a long, ear-splitting night, and we were both certain, up until the thunderstorm, that cops were gonna show up any second and tell us we had to move on.

2nd day: 87 mi, max speed 42.4 (there were some long down hills too), riding time 10am-7pm, total mileage: 142

May 13th Day 3:

Ready to ride

Not tempting our good luck we got up and out of Hannibal fairly early and rode over the Mississippi on a very nice bike lane, yay. After fiddling around in Illinois for a while trying to determine what street was what we made our way to highway 57 and Quincy IL as the sky got darker and darker. Just as we got into the outskirts of Quincy it started sprinkling. We found ourselves a McDonalds and settled in for a couple of hours as the storm raged. We had timed it perfectly and left the bikes under an overhang, so we and most of our stuff stayed fairly dry. Once the storm passed we were back out (glad to be on the Illinois side since we were hearing about tornadoes on the Missouri side) and suddenly the going got much easier- we had a glorious tail wind.

Enjoying that glorious tail wind

From Quincy we headed north on 96 passing through the booming metropolises of Lima and Ursa up to Hamilton. Then continuing on 96 right along the river from Hamilton to Nauvoo which was one of the nicest, scenic wonderfully flat 12 miles I've ever biked. There were little rest areas every 2 miles or so, and best of all no water on the road.

We were going to call it a day in Nauvoo, but we were actually feeling pretty good so we recharged on some pizza and decided to keep going.

mmmm recharging

Unfortunately by the time we were ready to stop, we had ran out of places. Lots of corn fields and more train tracks. Finally in Dallas City we saw a sign for camping, we followed the sign to find picnic tables peering out from the river (sigh), but it was late and we were tired, so once again a city park served us well. This time right behind an apartment complex. We figured if anyone would happen to see the tent, they would suppose it was someone elses.

3rd day:92.18 mi, max speed 34.1, riding time 9:20am- 9:30 pm (with 2 hour McDonalds break)total mileage: 234.1

Home sweet home

May 14th Day 4: This was a loong day that seemed to be a lot more heading into the wind than away from it. We had a nice lunch in Oquawka where we stopped at the grocery store bought a loaf of bread a thing of lunch meat, some apples, a couple pieces of fried chicken and a few other things- it was very nice. Then I don't really remember much about the rest of the day we just kept mindlessly riding north

We saw a neat covered bridge with a chocolate river along the way

At some point we stopped at a gas station and bought hot dogs, since we know we were headed to a camp fire that night.

Then we turned on to Washington, and we were on Washington for the rest of my life, and the damn thing would not stay flat at all, ever.

After days of biking in a few hours we finally got to highway 192, and then finally to Loud Thunder Forest Preserve, where we used to go mountain biking when we went to school in the Quad Cities

Yay actual camping, we had another incredibly healthy dinner of 5 hot dogs each.

4th Day: 78.6 miles, max speed 30, riding time 9:20am-8:30pm, total mileage: 313

May 15th, Day 5: As expected, due to the amount of mileage and no rest, the inevitable occurred. Michael's knee stopped functioning. But he pressed on, probably doing a lot more harm to it...but at the time it seemed like such a good idea. As we left Loud Thunder behind we feared for our lives riding on 92. Finally we made it to the Quad Cities and on to the bike path.

Where there was also flooding, but luckily none on the bike path

We followed the bike path up the river and across into Iowa, we then had the brilliant idea that the most direct route between the Quad Cities and Dubuque was to take 61. Direct yes, bad idea, Yes. Getting out of the Quad Cities was terrifying with traffic whizzing by, barely any shoulder and on and off ramps every mile...very bad idea. Finally we found the old route 61 which was essentially a frontage road, which was really nice. Unfortunately, Mike's knee was still informing him that it was a very bad idea to continue so we were trying to find a place to stay before we ran into the main highway again. But nothing was presenting itself, there weren't even any city parks. Finally as we were leaving De Witt IA we came across a church that still had cars in the parking lot. We pulled in and I ran inside. Luckily they were very kind, and said sure you can sleep in our yard- I have to say, I felt a little safer that night then the rest.

As you can see, they had quite a yard

Another play set to call home

We even were able to work in some rock climbing

5th Day: 58 mi, max speed 35, riding time: 10:45 am- 8pm, total miles: 360.3

May 16th Day 6: More Terrible riding on 61. The shoulder got even narrower, and then turned to gravel, we were competing with farm equipment for the little shoulder there was, and Mike was in excruciating pain the whole time. We stopped in Maquoketa for lunch and then just kept going. I told Mike a number of times that I could call and we could get a ride, but he would have none of it- we had come 360 miles, and we certainly didn't want to back off now. Thanks to the help of a package of cinnamon bears we were finally in sight. After a loong downhill that leads over a bridge with NO SHOULDER and up the other side of that hill we had finally arrived at

Our Exit (heavenly angel songs in the background)

So we made it, no crashes we only lost 1 bottle of oil to the flood water (it had been in the trailer, and when we got out, it had dissappeared) and almost lost a sleeping pad (it flew off the trailer along the highway, but some nice people were kind enough to stop and pick it up and bring it to us) and 1 broken knee but we had made it. Home at last, for awhile...

6th day:58.03 miles, max speed 35, riding time 9:15am-6:40pm, TOTAL MILES: 418.4

St Louis Happenings April 27th-May 10th

2008-08-08T17:12:00.000-07:00

Alright- so I know that I'm about 3 months behind but.... we're gonna just give this a try anyway.

To sum up: we had been in Arizona most recently the Flagstaff area, and decided that it was time to come home for a visit. Two days and $250 worth of gas later, we were back in St. Louis.

Over the next 2 weeks we enjoyed having a home again, and got out to ride a few times in the St. Louis area. After getting reacquainted with the shower we headed off to the Berryman for a couple days. At the time it was rather disappointing. It's hard to say if it was the shape the trail was in (pretty washed out), the 3 flat tires we got, or a little bit of both. After hobbling home as the sun went down we decided that one 24 mile ride was enough for the 2 days, and headed back to St Louis the next morning.

On another mini outing we decided to catch up with Ms Anne Docter and go out to chubb trail for a ride. Things were all going fine until we came to ..... the stairs

..... the stairs

Mike got over fine, and I went next, and then after my earlier encouragement Anne decided to go ahead and give it a try too. Things didn't go so well, as in most mountain bike situations, there was just a split second between everything's alright and everything's disastrously wrong. Anne actually cleared the steps fine, and then suddenly hit a rock just wrong and went flying over her handlebars landing chin-first into a rock. I would say you could ask Anne about which rock, but she doesn't remember much about the incident...in fact she was having trouble remembering where we were, if that tells you anything.

The Aftermath...

After a couple 4 (?) stitches in the chin and a good couple of days where "I don't have enough hands to put ice on everything that hurts" Anne has been recovering well, although she has told me that the stairs are gonna be out of the question for a while.

Jacks Canyon April 14th-24th

2008-06-02T22:08:00.000-07:00

Now I've decided that it's time to bring this thing up to date. But to do that, we need to start where we last left you...in April- so travel back with me to a time of, blah blah blah- here we are

April14th-16th:
After spending almost a week climbing near Flagstaff we decided it was time to check out the local mountain biking. We asked around about camping and were told that we should be able to find something right off the road that the mountain bike trails congregate around. Slight problem was that the road was still closed because it was covered in snow. Unfortunately this also applied to a good assortment of the trails (sigh), but we were able to get on a couple of the ones in the lower elevations.

These are both pictures of the Rocky Ridge Trail that Mike and I both loved. Some fun technical stuff, and Fast. We had a blast. We also rode Oldham trail, that went up forever and then down forever, and the fort valley trail system which started off very calm and ended in a constant uphill boulder field, but pretty fun even though I couldn't make it up half the stuff. From what we hear the rest of the trails are supposed to be even better.

April 17th: After a couple days of riding and sleeping in the parking lot of the trail head we thought it would be best to ride in Flagstaff once the snow melted a bit more. With groceries a tank of gas and an oil change, where they actually acknowledged the fact that they couldn't find anything wrong with the car, we were headed to Jacks Canyon.

April 18th-24th: Jacks Canyon is a series of limestone cliffs that have every sort of climb I could think of. Even better the climbs were mostly rated easy, so we had many an ego-day. On top of the cliffs there was a free campground with a pit toilet, but no water. With the nearest town over 30 miles away most people can only stay a couple of days, but with our handy dandy 13 gallon water tank, we could stay for as long as we wished. Well, that was until the pump broke, and we had no way of getting water out of the tank...but we wanted to come home by then anyway.

Our Campsite

Me at the top of "Mickey Mouse" a 5.9

The moon among the Junipers (?)

Cracker Jack Cliff

Mike creating his own swing-

He's coming down from a 5.10d after succesfully making it to the top, twice. This is the hardest rated climb we've done so far

Looking up the crack a 5.10a with a tough start and a really fun easy end

A 5.10b in a grotto- the white marks along the crack are what you stick your hands into

And then we ran into this guy. The campground is at the top of all these wonderful climbing cliffs with a long meandering steep trail that led to and fro. And Mike and I, mainly Mike, had developed a game of seeing who could get to the top of the trail first. As usual he was sealing his mighty lead when all of a sudden he leaped into the air. I thought he was just jumping with jubilation since he had demolished me, but as I rounded the corner he was still standing there, and this little gent was the real reason he had jumped for joy since he nearly stepped on the snake as he was checking on my progress. The snake was big, I'd say close to 5 feet long,but had no rattle that we found.

We watched as he slithered away.

The Last month or two...

2008-05-30T20:08:00.001-07:00

Well, we've gotten pretty behind again-

A quick sum up:

Went to a really cool climbing place south east of Flagstaff

Drove home to St. Louis for a visit

Rode our bikes up to Dubuque IA for a visit

and are planning on leaving tomorrow to bike back down to St Louis.

More in depth descriptions and lots of pictures to come shortly- but I thought I'd just let everybody know we're still alive

Cottonwood-Flagstaff April 9th-13th

2008-05-04T19:48:00.001-07:00

Wednesday April 9th:

It was time to move out of luxury and back onto the open road. If we stayed much longer we weren't going to fit out the door, frozen pizza and brownies had become a staple- you don't realize how much you would miss an oven until you're without one.

This is a picture of a giant tree in Frannie's back yard- A cactus garden in the front and then a giant Cottonwood tree in the back - quite lovely

After leaving the Frannie abode we headed back up towards Sedona and stayed at the same spot we had stayed the 1st time through. The clouds were a little more dramatic this time.

and we and kokopelli watched the sun go down

Thursday April 10th:

The next morning we decided to do one more ride in Sedona and headed to the Cathedral trail. It's a 16 mile out and back trail with a fun 2 mile loop on the end. There are some crazy airy switchbacks on the way down, as this guy is illustrating below.

They were a lot more fun trying to go down them then trying to get up them, although both ways were pretty tricky.

And here is a picture of Cathedral rock- not our picture, but a picture none the less.

After a great ride we went back to our car, where we suddenly became celebrities. The parking lot was packed with people, most of whom had travelled to take in the vista, would hop out of the car for a quick picture and then floored it off to the next thing they could cram into seeing before the sun went down. We did do an interview for some old man from Michigan who wanted to show his friends back home "the interesting people he had met", and Mike lent his bike out to some guy who wanted to make it seem like he was a mountain biker. The nice thing out of all of this is we met a nice couple from Jackson Hole WY who said we should come visit if we end up that way.

After the paparazzi we decided it was time to head North, and we hoofed it the 30 miles back up Oak Creek Canyon to a much less snowy Flagstaff then when we had come through a month earlier. We shopped it up, and filled the water tank and drove 7 miles out of town to a climbing area called the pit. The only problem was that the campground was closed, luckily we don't need no campground, and we stayed in the lot right next to the no camping sign.

Friday April 11th:

Here's the view from the camp site- I believe that's Mt Elden

This is Mike standing at the base of our favorite climb- a 5.10 with a tricky overhang part and some hand holds that were as large as monkey bars

The cliff

After a hard day of hot climbing what could you want more than half cooked brownie topped with whipped cream- we call it brownie surprise

oooo aaaaa

A local delicacy

mmmmmmmmm

Saturday April 12th:

The next day we decided to tackle the cliff again and I got a little too courageous. I got about 3/4 of the way up a 5.11 (the hardest route I've ever tried) and could not get past the overhang. Luckily this guy could do it, and he got our equipment back.

You can see, it's no easy move

That night we decided to move down the road and out of the parking lot. The night before had been full of a nice police officer who said he didn't have a problem with us staying there but the forest service might, and a car-full of teens that were shooting beer cans with sling shots. After 3 unsuccessful attempts to open a Coleman stove, and dropping each time, Mike managed to scare them off using the old tactic of slamming the car door- but we decided it was time to move on anyway.

We found a great secluded spot about 5 miles down the road

Riding in Cottonwood April 3rd-8th

2008-04-29T13:24:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of updates to our devoted readers-

Here are a couple of videos from the trail we rode in Cottonwood. We liked it so much we ended up riding it for about 5 days. Of course it helped we had a home to come back to in Cottonwood- thanks again to Frannie.

This is the beginning of the down hill section of the trail- and I actually got to wear the camera this time. It's pointed a little high, but you can get the general idea of what is going on.

Part of what made the trail so fun was the amount of variety in the ride. This is one of the flowey sections with fun swooping turns.

This is a section that was more rocky and one significant drop- hence the more vibrating camera and funny noises.

And now the big kahauna. It may not look that impressive, but trust me it was- this was the only spot that really made us nervous on the whole trail- each ride led up to this point, but always concluded smoothly. You can sense my relief with my rebel yell.

And the conclusion of the ride. A combination of bone jarring rocks and fast twisty turns.

We were really impressed with this ride, we thought it had a flow that a lot of the riding in Sedona was missing- maybe it was just that we could actually ride the whole thing instead of having to get off the bikes all the time- I suppose that always help the enjoyment factor and the ego.

Financial Report

2008-04-16T18:22:00.000-07:00

Michael has been working on a wonderful little spreadsheet to show everyone exactly how much we have been spending on everything. The only problem is we can't figure out a way to get it uploaded onto the blog. Here is a link that might work. Updated as of 4/5/2008.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pkrKefrl6L0kBalJ_fotkGg

Prescott April 1st-2nd

2008-04-04T17:59:00.000-07:00

April 1, 2008

Our next adventure took us up the mountains to a town called Prescott. With 4 out of the 5 trails considered "Primo trails" we decided we must go there.

This is Jerome the "ghost town" on our way up to Prescott

That's me in the commander seat of the mountain climbing machine halfway up and going strong

This is half way up-That's Cottonwood down there

This is the first area we went to ride called Granite Basin. Which had trails everywhere within the area. Very pretty area.

After a nice ride we headed to the spruce mountain trail head to be all set and ready for the next day. There was a campground just past the trail head, and better yet it was free. The only problem was that it seemed that about half the trees were either missing, or marked with spray paint and plastic ties demonstrating that they would be missing very soon. Driving past one other set of campers we found a nice camp site that didn't have too many colorful ties. Mike managed some bad bottom vanagon driving and nestled us in among the pines.

Here's Emilie at our humble campsite smelling the pines in the air.

This is a ponderosa pine as little baby Emilie sees it.

Here are the pines in normal people vision

This is one of the best non-blurry sunset pictures from the campsite

April 2nd:

We had high hopes for the spruce mountain trail. It's an 8 mile loop that takes you up to the spruce mountain viewpoint at an elevation of 7693'. Our good ol' buddy Cosmic Ray rated it a puck 9 and we were excited. I'm sure you know what all this build up is coming to- disaster. We get on the trail, and around the 1st turn there are more plastic ties- this time blocking the trail, with a large trail closed sign. Apparently they are thinning the forest, they claim for its own good, and therefore need to bring in all of their logging equipment all over the trail. The funny thing was that right before we started the trail a park ranger had driven up and put up caution signs, but didn't mention a thing about the trail being closed. Not to be deterred we tried to ride the other section of the loop for a while. This was the part the tree cutters had already been through and wasn't technically closed, but there was so much debris that the trail became impossible to follow. In great frustration we gave up and tried to figure out what to do with the rest of our day. The only way to ride the trail was going to be by going up a gravel road that leads up to the lookout, and hope the loop isn't closed at the top, so that's what we did. I thought a gravel road, no problem- I don't think I've ridden a road so steep on my road bike- it was absurd, and went on forever. After willing away all my possessions in case I wouldn't make it up this thing before my heart exploded we finally made it to the top. Great view, and there was no mention of any trail closure. We hopped on and took off. The trail was great, some really fun technical stuff and all down. Unfortunately when we had made it about 3 1/4 of the 3 1/2 miles down sure enough we ran into the same construction tape, but at this point there was no way we were going back up. Like little cartoon characters in our neon clothes we scurried from tree to tree, dodging the running equipment, hoping we'd blend in, or at least just be confusing bright blurs on the horizon. After a few stressful minutes we were by the equipment and a turn later back at the car. Overall conclusion- I'm really glad we got to ride at least a part of it, and I definitely want to come back and ride the whole thing because it seemed like a great trail.

After some research into Prescott it actually seems like a promising little city. Not too little, about 35,000 folks, a college, riding and climbing near by, and lots of bike lanes. Plus the highs in the summer average in the 80s while in the winters the highs are still in the 50s. Might be a pretty good possibility. What we would do, or if it would be in anyway conceivable that we could afford to live there are still question marks.

After the ride, we planned to hit up another trail in the morning and find a new camping site near it. Some how we never found the road to turn on, so we just gave up on the whole thing and drove the 35 miles back to Cottonwood and base camp at Frannies-yay!

Globe/Payson

2008-03-31T15:05:00.000-07:00

Tuesday March 25th:

I have to admit we were both a little surprised when we woke up without incident under the overpass. We quickly had some breakfast (cereal with cold milk- oh we had gotten the fridge working off of the propane, we don't really need it yet, but I'm sure it will be very nice when it gets a little warmer) and headed off towards the trail. We wanted to try to get an early start because we knew we were in for a long day. The guide book described the trail as a 13 mile downhill on killer single track. Sounds perfect, if you have 2 cars- we decided to pedal the 3,000 feet to the top. It was all on a dirt road, and the views just kept getting better as you went up. It was pretty neat biking from desert to pine trees to above pine trees, and neither of us minded the climb. Well at least not until the last 3 or 4 miles, by that time I was pretty ready to start going down.

After 2 hours we were finally at the top (no pictures cause we didn't want to chance crashing on the camera) and we started into the snow- 85 degrees at the bottom and snow at the top. The whole first bit was hundreds of feet of calf deep snow, not solid enough to ride on, and yet not melted enough to ride either. Then we got to a barbed wire fence- I'm thinking this is gonna be a long 13 miles. Mike steps over the fence with the grace of a gazelle, and I'm stuck there puttering away with my mini legs. I got the bike over and then one leg, as I'm stepping the other one over my first leg pushes further into the snow and sure enough that barbed wire dug right into my hamstring. It wasn't particularly deep, but we exchanged some words all the same. As I caught up to Mike he wasn't all that sympathetic, and asked me why I didn't just open the gate...to which I replied "gate? that was a gate? AAARRGH"

So not the greatest start, but we were sure as we lost elevation the snow would go away. The only problem was anytime we got out of snow and could get back on our bikes we would turn the corner and there would be a giant tree down in the middle of the trail. This went on for quite a while, get on coast 10 feet get off hop over a tree, another 30 feet on the bike, off for a tree. Every now and then we could actually get a feel for the trail- and it was great, tight twisty single track that was super narrow in parts- tons of pine trees and these crazy fun switchbacks. But then there would be another tree. There was even a time that we completely missed a turn because there were 3 ginormous trees in the path right as it turned. We climbed over the trees and kept going straight, to our great confusion- we were hoping no one could ride this stuff. Oh and the other thing, we were supposed to be going down the whole time, but every now and then this all down hill trail would have a super ridiculous climb- during these times I was not so sure my legs were gonna keep spinning.

So anyway, what we could ride was great, and we were getting excited to be getting out of the trees into the rocks so there would be less dead fall. However, I was following the bad habit I sometime get into of watching where I don't want to go, instead of where I should be putting my wheel, and was having a bit of a rough time. Meanwhile Mike is having a blast hopping and dodging and generally being a very good bike handler. We got to one point where the trail narrows and if you stray, the ground just crumbles and takes your wheel with it. Sure enough that's where I was watching and where I put my wheel and slammed my left hand down on a very solid rock to catch myself. Painful, and frustrating, but not all that bad. After some encouraging words from the other, reaffirming the fact that I am not the worst mountain biker in the world and so on, we were flying down some more boulders over a couple creeks and down down down.

I was trying to stay with Mike, through a relatively non-technical section, when suddenly he hopped over a rock, landed, and then got thrown 3 feet in the air, slammed down on his side and skidded for another 10 feet. We had been going pretty quick, and he was a little slow to get up and walk it off. The only good thing of the crash was that he was still wearing arm warmers, and they likely kept his left arm severity down to a deep 3 inch abrasion rather than a bloody mess. We pretty much limped down the rest of the trail. Intent on finishing it, but not truly enjoying it quite as much.

Then suddenly we popped out at a campground (glittering in the sun because of all of the broken glass) and couldn't find the right trail to get back on. There was a road, and there was a different trail, but our trail was no where to be found. We were really stuck, not having any idea where the other trail went; the last thing we wanted was to end up back at the top of the mountain. We decided to take the road down, and hopefully meet up with our trail, but we never did- just went about 8 miles on the road- very disappointing. And then once we got down it wasn't even the right road, so we had to ride our bikes another 6 miles on dirt roads- half of it up (I wasn't very happy) to get back to our car.

We took a very relaxing shower in the stream that we parked next to, and decided to set up camp for the night.

Wednesday March 26th:

We spent the next day healing our wounds and hanging out at the Globe library. We went across the street for lunch to this little Mexican restaraunt. I got enchiladas for 3 dollars mmm- and we got horchata too- it was really yummy. We wanted to ride the next day, so we headed towards Payson AZ.

Payson seems like a nice town, a lot bigger than I was expecting, and pretty piney for Arizona. We headed for the Mogollon Rim to find the trail for the next day and camp for the night. It looked promising. The site we picked was pitch black and surrounded by pine trees. We built up a big fire and had a nice dinner under a thousand stars.

Wednesday March 26th:

Looking forward to trying out another trail in pine country we got on our bikes and rode the 2 miles to the trailhead. The trail started on the other side of Christopher Creek, which was swollen with snow melt, making the crossing a bit harrowing. The water rushed by under the logs we walked across, and it looked awfullly chilly. According to the book the 1st 2 miles generally take about 30 minutes. The only thing I can figure out is that he is just lying. There wasn't much snow here, but it is obvious that it hasn't left that long ago. And somebody was using the trail when they shouldn't have been. There were 8 inch deep horse prints all over the trail, and it was just a mess. It had obviously been very muddy, and had since dried up very hard. There were points where I would be pedaling, I'd fall into a horse print and my wheel would just stop. The ground was so hard that climbing in and out of the prints was 10 times rougher than the rocks.

Those same 2 miles that were supposed to take 30 minutes took us 2 hours to get through, and the trail was 20 miles long. The worst part was that the loop is really a lollypop and we would have to ride those first 2 miles back at the end. This riding was pure tortue and we decided that as soon as we could bail to the road we would. We got on top of the ridge and the trail improved a little bit, but it still wasn't great. Mike was really feeling it from his crash, and everytime he would hit a bump, especially one of those dreadful hoof pits it would painfully bounce him around.

So we're tryin to get off the trail as soon as we can when suddenly my bike wheel stops spinning. I stop immediatley and call Mike back to look at the damage. I had run over a large stick and it had managed to not only wedge itself into my derailleur but bend it in the most underailleur position I had ever seen. Mike the mighty magic master worked on the thing for 45 minutes when suddenly boom he snaps it back into place, and then gets it working perfectly. I was amazed since I was hoping to just get it ridable enough that we could get it back and then most likely buy a new one.

Finally we got off the awful trail and had a nice 6 mile ride back to camp, which was actually some of the most enjoyable riding we'd done that day. We decided to stay the night in our nice site and then move on to better trails in the morning.

Mike in a hurry to get the fire started

Our nice piney view

Still working

Mike and I had a face off to show our displeasure about the trail, who do you think won?

Friday March 28th:

We decided that after a couple of rough trails it was time for some rest and relaxation. Cottonwood was our destination, back to Frannies, the nice lady who let us stay in her house, and time for some showers! Enjoy the pictures.