Short Version:
Our visit to Yellowstone National Park draws to a close
Long Version:
Obsidian from the Yellowstone Basin has been found as far away as the Mississippi Valley (a long way away). The pre-European peoples made arrowheads and other implements from it. Much of what was used came from an area called the Obsidian Cliffs, which was both far less impressive that Tuhua, off the east coast of NZ's North Island; and carefully devoid of any legitimate or safe illegitimate parking spots - we suspect to stop people stopping to play collector. If that was the goal, it sure as eggs worked on us, as we passed on by, heading north to Mammoth Hot Springs and its much-vaunted terraces.
If Old Faithful was a cultural imperative for the Amerikans, the terraces at Mammoth Hot Springs were almost in the same league for us, affording as they do a glimpse into the past, to what the Pink and White Terraces near Rotorua must have looked like prior to the Tarawera eruption of 1886. Like a coral reef, most of the constructs were dead, leaving only fantastic skeletal remains behind. They looked pretty cool. There were some few active, living environments too, and they ranged from pretty neat to truly awesome; Canary Springs was probably the most amazing thing we saw in the whole of the park. Fantastically-shaped bacterial colonies piled atop one another and spread fan-like across plateaus formed by the corpses of their forebears; colors waxed brightly, then blended or stayed clearly separated, depending on the paths taken by the hottest waters; fern-like tendrils and fronds swayed in the gentle currents. Magical spot.
It was starting to get cold in the valley, and we still had a long way to go, so we piled back into the Reaper, ignored the irritating squeak which had started to emanate from the front left wheel, and blasted back the way we'd come for a bit, before hooking eastwards towards the waterfall region of the park. It was nearing full dark by the time we arrived at the Lower Falls, but the light of the moon was ample for us to appreciate the spectacle we found at the end of the 600-vertical-foot path down the cliff-face. There was a LOT of water piling over the precipice, and the cataract was almost glowing in the moonlight. We caught glimpses of the Upper Falls in the near distance on our way back up the path, then saw them from much closer quarters after sharing chilli sandwiches in the deserted parking lot.
The moon had disappeared by the time we reached the Sulphur Cauldron, leaving us in absolute darkness, except where our stupidly-powerful night-riding lights illuminated whatever was in their path like spotlights hitting a stage. Actors on this stage were largely bubbling pools, some of water, others of bright yellow molten sulphur. The sound of the bubbling seemed louder than in the daytime, and some of the bubbles sounded really large; James Earl Jones bubbles. Elk were roaring not far away, and the sound that we'd found incredible and a wee bit strange during the day (and from the safety and relative comfort of the Reaper) took on a whole new, rather frightening dimension in the cold, cold darkness outside. The glimpse of a coyote, caught by the edge of a beam, in stalking mode and heading our way provided little reassurance, and it was with relief that we leaped into the Reaper, with just a little more leapy vigor than usual, and set off again.
We were soon back out of the van and back on high alert as we hiked up the hill past a number of small fumaroles towards the Dragon's Mouth, which was making some seriously scary noises as it bubbled away in the dark. When we played our lights over it we saw a restless pool, running back under an overhang into impenetrable darkness. It was from this cavern that the noises were emanating. Further up the hill we found the Mud Volcano, which apparently once was a full-fledged volcano, albeit one made of mud. It blew itself to bits back in the 1800s, though, so what we found was a decent-sized mud pool, bubbling away quietly in the night. After some debate we decided to hit the long way home; a loop hike up and around the top of a hillside. We'd not long set off when the second-thoughts started, encouraged by the elk roaring away somewhere in the darkness, and by the knowledge that creatures with teeth were around and about and quite probably hungry. We had opposing strategies for warding off the eaters; Nene making as much noise as possible so they'd know we were there and multiple and that they should go away and not be startled when we rounded a corner; me trying for absolute silence, so they'd not come to investigate the strfange and potentially edible noises. At a guess the sum total was probably something like one clumsy, noisy creature that smelled like two: probably edible, definitely interesting. We made it to the really stinky Black Dragon Caldron (sic) unmolested, then back down Cooking Hillside (it started heating up in 1978, killing all the trees that grew on it), past Grizzly Fumarole and the Mud Geyser area, which was really impressive in the returned moonlight.
Back into the Reaper, back onto the highway, south past the really large and rather pretty Yellowstone Lake to a region where we were tormented by owls, which seemed to appear from nowhere to threaten the Reaper and its occupants before disappearing again into the darkness. Eventually we made it to the Lewis Lake Campground, where we found ourselves a spot and fell into bed and to sleep without much further ado.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
More Yellowstone in a Day
Short Version:
We're still in Yellowstone National Park
Long Version:
A sprawling complex has grown up around the Old Faithful geyser area, with accommodation buildings, stores, and a sizeable visitor centre. We arrived pretty much bang on the start of the next eruption window*, and hotfooted it outside to see some steaming action. After a short delay, the steaming hole started to vent larger and more vehement blasts, and soon it was blowing a spout of superheated water and steam high into the air. The coolness of the surrounding air meant that there was extra steaming going on, which made it difficult to see details of the spouting water, but the Amerikans who were sharing the carefully-safetyised viewing environment seemed satisfied. I guess for them the eruption ticked a national cultural imperative off the list, and once it subsided the vast majority waddled back to their oversized vehicles and set off down the highway in air-conditioned comfort.
We got on our bikes.
The chill in the air meant that Lovely Wife was riding with one hand on the bars and the other tucked into a pocket for warmth, swapping whenever the exposed hand became too painfully chilled. We stopped at a number of geothermal points of interest, including several brightly-colored pools and some bizarrely-shaped geyser spouts. Apparently many of the pools were once even more brightly-colored than they are now, but have been cooled and dulled by the trash people have thrown into them, part-blocking the hot water feed from the underground. Likewise some of the geysers, which have lost power or stopped altogether. Still, there were a lot still active for us to look at: Sporadic Geyser, with its many bubbling children; Sawmill and Mortar Geysers, the noisiest of all the geysers; the small, quiet pools that were Economic and Spa Geysers; and the peaceful, relaxing setting of the aptly named Riverside Geyser, where we sat in the sun for quite a while before being startled by the beginning of what was to prove to be the most spectacular of the eruptions we witnessed. The breeze along the river pulled some of the steam aside, exposing the 75ft column of superheated water to view, and the spectacle continued for long enough that it was still going when we set off back to the Reaper, biking along the "No Bikes Allowed" boardwalk which passed the quiescent Giant Geyser (last eruption: January 2010; next eruption: no-one knows) and culminated at the spectacularly ugly towering vent of Castle Geyser.
The Old Faithful Area is the best-known geo-thermal hotspot in the park, but is by no means the only one. On our way north we stopped at several more, taking in some incredible sights:
- Spasm Geyser and the brilliantly-colored Silex Pool
- The young and grumpy Red Spouter, which formed in 1959 and is a hot spring in the Spring, a bubbling mud pool in the Summer, and, as we saw it, a gas fumarole in the Fall**.
- The Grand Prismatic Spring was largely obscured by steam, but had many buffalo hoofprints wandering around it and looked really pretty in the photographs on the signage
- Variously-colored bubbling mud pools at the Artist's Paintpots (by this stage of the day it was so sunny and hot that one of us was shirtless. Can you guess which one of us it was? Clue: The reaction from other park-goers was not applause or gleeful ogling)
- The impossible-to-predict Constant Geyser, which erupted twice as we watched, then refused to so much as burp for anyone else.
The road had been following the Firehole River, which is very pretty and is, apparently, well-stocked with trout, despite (or possibly because of) the thousands and thousands of litres of super-heated water that are dumped into it every minute by the various spouts and geysers and springs. We'd seen many more buffalo since the first herd, as well as a stoat/weasel creature with a black-tipped tail, several deer, and two coyotes whose behaviour couldn't have been more different; the first was standing, serious and silent and still as a (non-volcanically-active) stone near a tree in a field; the other was frolicking and leaping about in a riverside meadow - we think it may have been chasing small critters in the long grass. Another of the day's critter highlights came to us from a small station-wagon; nine puppies and their mother, in transit from the Oregon coast to St Louis, Missouri. That's a LONG way. Between playing with the tiny dogs and protecting our delicious eggy burritos from the cheeky grey jays, lunch was rather eventful, although it was still incredibly relaxing to be sitting in the sun, away from the conveyor-belt sight-seeing of the park road.
* = Most of the geysers co-operate with human endeavor to the extent that they erupt on a reasonably predicatable schedule. There are exceptions; some follow no discernible pattern whatsoever. Those which do adhere to schedule are flagged by Park Rangers as being expected to erupt within a certain window, the duration of which varies from minutes to hours to days.
** = This was the first geothermal entity that really smelled like Rotorua. We got a wee bit nostalgic. My notes say "Satan's Anus"
We're still in Yellowstone National Park
Long Version:
A sprawling complex has grown up around the Old Faithful geyser area, with accommodation buildings, stores, and a sizeable visitor centre. We arrived pretty much bang on the start of the next eruption window*, and hotfooted it outside to see some steaming action. After a short delay, the steaming hole started to vent larger and more vehement blasts, and soon it was blowing a spout of superheated water and steam high into the air. The coolness of the surrounding air meant that there was extra steaming going on, which made it difficult to see details of the spouting water, but the Amerikans who were sharing the carefully-safetyised viewing environment seemed satisfied. I guess for them the eruption ticked a national cultural imperative off the list, and once it subsided the vast majority waddled back to their oversized vehicles and set off down the highway in air-conditioned comfort.
We got on our bikes.
The chill in the air meant that Lovely Wife was riding with one hand on the bars and the other tucked into a pocket for warmth, swapping whenever the exposed hand became too painfully chilled. We stopped at a number of geothermal points of interest, including several brightly-colored pools and some bizarrely-shaped geyser spouts. Apparently many of the pools were once even more brightly-colored than they are now, but have been cooled and dulled by the trash people have thrown into them, part-blocking the hot water feed from the underground. Likewise some of the geysers, which have lost power or stopped altogether. Still, there were a lot still active for us to look at: Sporadic Geyser, with its many bubbling children; Sawmill and Mortar Geysers, the noisiest of all the geysers; the small, quiet pools that were Economic and Spa Geysers; and the peaceful, relaxing setting of the aptly named Riverside Geyser, where we sat in the sun for quite a while before being startled by the beginning of what was to prove to be the most spectacular of the eruptions we witnessed. The breeze along the river pulled some of the steam aside, exposing the 75ft column of superheated water to view, and the spectacle continued for long enough that it was still going when we set off back to the Reaper, biking along the "No Bikes Allowed" boardwalk which passed the quiescent Giant Geyser (last eruption: January 2010; next eruption: no-one knows) and culminated at the spectacularly ugly towering vent of Castle Geyser.
The Old Faithful Area is the best-known geo-thermal hotspot in the park, but is by no means the only one. On our way north we stopped at several more, taking in some incredible sights:
- Spasm Geyser and the brilliantly-colored Silex Pool
- The young and grumpy Red Spouter, which formed in 1959 and is a hot spring in the Spring, a bubbling mud pool in the Summer, and, as we saw it, a gas fumarole in the Fall**.
- The Grand Prismatic Spring was largely obscured by steam, but had many buffalo hoofprints wandering around it and looked really pretty in the photographs on the signage
- Variously-colored bubbling mud pools at the Artist's Paintpots (by this stage of the day it was so sunny and hot that one of us was shirtless. Can you guess which one of us it was? Clue: The reaction from other park-goers was not applause or gleeful ogling)
- The impossible-to-predict Constant Geyser, which erupted twice as we watched, then refused to so much as burp for anyone else.
The road had been following the Firehole River, which is very pretty and is, apparently, well-stocked with trout, despite (or possibly because of) the thousands and thousands of litres of super-heated water that are dumped into it every minute by the various spouts and geysers and springs. We'd seen many more buffalo since the first herd, as well as a stoat/weasel creature with a black-tipped tail, several deer, and two coyotes whose behaviour couldn't have been more different; the first was standing, serious and silent and still as a (non-volcanically-active) stone near a tree in a field; the other was frolicking and leaping about in a riverside meadow - we think it may have been chasing small critters in the long grass. Another of the day's critter highlights came to us from a small station-wagon; nine puppies and their mother, in transit from the Oregon coast to St Louis, Missouri. That's a LONG way. Between playing with the tiny dogs and protecting our delicious eggy burritos from the cheeky grey jays, lunch was rather eventful, although it was still incredibly relaxing to be sitting in the sun, away from the conveyor-belt sight-seeing of the park road.
* = Most of the geysers co-operate with human endeavor to the extent that they erupt on a reasonably predicatable schedule. There are exceptions; some follow no discernible pattern whatsoever. Those which do adhere to schedule are flagged by Park Rangers as being expected to erupt within a certain window, the duration of which varies from minutes to hours to days.
** = This was the first geothermal entity that really smelled like Rotorua. We got a wee bit nostalgic. My notes say "Satan's Anus"
Yellowstone in a Day
Short Version:
We visit Yellowstone National Park.
Long Version:
Yellowstone Day dawned cold. Really cold. It was the cold that woke us, and kept us awake despite all efforts to the contrary. When we eventually succumbed to bladder imperative and exited the Reaper we found a frozen white riverscape. Delicate traceries of icy leaves adorned frosted branches on plants sprouting from frost-rimed ground. The Reaper was whiter than it had been for a long time; patterned ice covered windows and side panels and doors and mirrors alike. Too cold to break our fast there - we'd tried, but the water bottles were iced shut - so we packed up camp. Fingers froze despite more than one pair of gloves; it's a tough call whether to leave them on and take longer, or take them off and get colder but for less time exposed. In the end we got away with all digits intact, and left the icy-cold Polecat Creek steaming in the even colder air as the sun threatened to rise over the eastern hills.
We'd done some maths in between animal encounters the previous night, and had figured out that our plans to hit not only Yellowstone, but also the Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, Yosemite, Arches, and various other National Parks meant that we were better off buying an Annual Pass for all USA National Parks and Monuments than paying at each one. So we forked out eighty bucks to the unfortunate-looking but very pleasant ranger and set off into the park. Straight into a low cloud. We were fearing the worst for our one day of sightseeing, but as we hauled higher and higher up the wall of the huge caldera that contains the bulk of Yellowstone Park the cloud grew thinner and finally vanished altogether. We crossed the Continental Divide (a feat we were to repeat several more times throughout the course of the day) and then dropped down into the crater proper, where we stopped to have a look at the Kepler Cascades; a series of waterfalls in a canyon, viewed from a platform high above, which was covered in ice and just a wee bit slippery.
There were a number of deer grazing at the roadside. We nearly hit a couple of them. We also nearly hit one or two of the cars which had stopped in the middle of the road to take photos of several cow elk which were meandering about. We'd seen plenty of elk in California*, so carried on around the bend... where we in turn stopped in the middle of the road, confronted by a bloody big bull elk with bloody big antlers**. All four hooves were planted firmly on the asphalt as he eyed us suspiciously. It felt like we sat there for much longer than it could really have been, and then he snorted, shook his enormous head, and wandered off into the trees. Then he started roaring. It was without a doubt one of the craziest noises either of us had ever heard. No-one else had so much as glimpsed the beast, which made us feel kind of special.
Not long afterwards, we rounded a bend and found ourselves braking hard to avoid plowing into the back end of a traffic jam. The Reaper's not-so-aerodynamic front end came in handy at this point, affording us views over the top of the cars in front of us to the cause of the blockage: a herd of buffalo, standing on the road. They were huge. The big bulls, particularly, seemed to dwarf the smaller vehicles***. There were several calves in the herd, and even they seemed to emanate a sense of power despite only being the size of a large motorcycle. The buffalo seemed completely unconcerned about the proximity of even the biggest RVs, moving either minimally and at the last moment or not at all. Eventually enough of them moved far enough aside to allow one lane of vehicles to start moving, and we were underway once more, towards Old Faithful and the geothermal hotbed it spearheads.
* = Dirty wapiti!
** = Not nubbins****
*** = Not that there were many smaller vehicles about - we're in Amerika after all
**** = All together now; (E) A nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, (A7) A nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin! (REPEAT)
We visit Yellowstone National Park.
Long Version:
Yellowstone Day dawned cold. Really cold. It was the cold that woke us, and kept us awake despite all efforts to the contrary. When we eventually succumbed to bladder imperative and exited the Reaper we found a frozen white riverscape. Delicate traceries of icy leaves adorned frosted branches on plants sprouting from frost-rimed ground. The Reaper was whiter than it had been for a long time; patterned ice covered windows and side panels and doors and mirrors alike. Too cold to break our fast there - we'd tried, but the water bottles were iced shut - so we packed up camp. Fingers froze despite more than one pair of gloves; it's a tough call whether to leave them on and take longer, or take them off and get colder but for less time exposed. In the end we got away with all digits intact, and left the icy-cold Polecat Creek steaming in the even colder air as the sun threatened to rise over the eastern hills.
We'd done some maths in between animal encounters the previous night, and had figured out that our plans to hit not only Yellowstone, but also the Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, Yosemite, Arches, and various other National Parks meant that we were better off buying an Annual Pass for all USA National Parks and Monuments than paying at each one. So we forked out eighty bucks to the unfortunate-looking but very pleasant ranger and set off into the park. Straight into a low cloud. We were fearing the worst for our one day of sightseeing, but as we hauled higher and higher up the wall of the huge caldera that contains the bulk of Yellowstone Park the cloud grew thinner and finally vanished altogether. We crossed the Continental Divide (a feat we were to repeat several more times throughout the course of the day) and then dropped down into the crater proper, where we stopped to have a look at the Kepler Cascades; a series of waterfalls in a canyon, viewed from a platform high above, which was covered in ice and just a wee bit slippery.
There were a number of deer grazing at the roadside. We nearly hit a couple of them. We also nearly hit one or two of the cars which had stopped in the middle of the road to take photos of several cow elk which were meandering about. We'd seen plenty of elk in California*, so carried on around the bend... where we in turn stopped in the middle of the road, confronted by a bloody big bull elk with bloody big antlers**. All four hooves were planted firmly on the asphalt as he eyed us suspiciously. It felt like we sat there for much longer than it could really have been, and then he snorted, shook his enormous head, and wandered off into the trees. Then he started roaring. It was without a doubt one of the craziest noises either of us had ever heard. No-one else had so much as glimpsed the beast, which made us feel kind of special.
Not long afterwards, we rounded a bend and found ourselves braking hard to avoid plowing into the back end of a traffic jam. The Reaper's not-so-aerodynamic front end came in handy at this point, affording us views over the top of the cars in front of us to the cause of the blockage: a herd of buffalo, standing on the road. They were huge. The big bulls, particularly, seemed to dwarf the smaller vehicles***. There were several calves in the herd, and even they seemed to emanate a sense of power despite only being the size of a large motorcycle. The buffalo seemed completely unconcerned about the proximity of even the biggest RVs, moving either minimally and at the last moment or not at all. Eventually enough of them moved far enough aside to allow one lane of vehicles to start moving, and we were underway once more, towards Old Faithful and the geothermal hotbed it spearheads.
* = Dirty wapiti!
** = Not nubbins****
*** = Not that there were many smaller vehicles about - we're in Amerika after all
**** = All together now; (E) A nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, (A7) A nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin, a nubbin! (REPEAT)
Monday, October 25, 2010
Moose on Slate Mountain
Short Version:
Another great ride with a moose encounter, happy burgers, near-misses in the National Park.
Long Version:
Our second Pocatello morning dawned... actually we have no idea how it dawned, because we were warm, and clean, and in a comfortable bed inside a house, all of which adds up to "Not hurrying to arise in the morning."
When finally we did haul ourselves out into the world, we found another perfect riding day waiting for us, which was a very good thing, given that a ride was exactly what we were planning.
We dropped Lisa's truck at West Fork and drove the Reaper to the Gibson Jack trailhead. From there, we rode up a steep hill, then up alongside Dry Creek to the top of its valley. There were a couple of great viewpoints along the way that showed what a difference a drop or four of water can make: Dry Creek was a strip of lush trees running up the center of a landscape of arid brown grasses. We'd been warned by an outbound runner that there were some ornery moose about, so we were on high alert right up to the point where we relaxed, which was just before we encountered the moose and her calf. Luckily, they were no more keen to make our acquaintance than we were theirs, although we would have liked to ogle them for longer before they hightailed off into the woods. Especially given that their departure meant we had to ride up a really steep hill.
Once up that, though, it was several descending traverses with occasional short climbs, and then the main descent, which saw us drop down through a pretty valley, swinging from side to side through a series of sweeping corners, popping us out on the West Fork trail, ten minutes of flying downhill from the trailhead.
Reaper collection was followed by burgers for lunch: happy elk mixed with happy goose. Apparently goose, happy or otherwise, is not a particularly pattie-friendly meat, so they cut it with elk to make it stick better. Whatever the science, it was delicious.
And then we hit the road, northbound, through Idaho Falls and into Wyoming, where we drove in the dark through a National Park, narrowly avoiding cleaning out a coyote, a deer, and a herd of elk along the way despite our slow speed. Eventually we made it to Polecat Creek, where we set up camp with the smell of bear in our noses and fell asleep quickly as the stars twinkled overhead. Probably.
Another great ride with a moose encounter, happy burgers, near-misses in the National Park.
Long Version:
Our second Pocatello morning dawned... actually we have no idea how it dawned, because we were warm, and clean, and in a comfortable bed inside a house, all of which adds up to "Not hurrying to arise in the morning."
When finally we did haul ourselves out into the world, we found another perfect riding day waiting for us, which was a very good thing, given that a ride was exactly what we were planning.
We dropped Lisa's truck at West Fork and drove the Reaper to the Gibson Jack trailhead. From there, we rode up a steep hill, then up alongside Dry Creek to the top of its valley. There were a couple of great viewpoints along the way that showed what a difference a drop or four of water can make: Dry Creek was a strip of lush trees running up the center of a landscape of arid brown grasses. We'd been warned by an outbound runner that there were some ornery moose about, so we were on high alert right up to the point where we relaxed, which was just before we encountered the moose and her calf. Luckily, they were no more keen to make our acquaintance than we were theirs, although we would have liked to ogle them for longer before they hightailed off into the woods. Especially given that their departure meant we had to ride up a really steep hill.
Once up that, though, it was several descending traverses with occasional short climbs, and then the main descent, which saw us drop down through a pretty valley, swinging from side to side through a series of sweeping corners, popping us out on the West Fork trail, ten minutes of flying downhill from the trailhead.
Reaper collection was followed by burgers for lunch: happy elk mixed with happy goose. Apparently goose, happy or otherwise, is not a particularly pattie-friendly meat, so they cut it with elk to make it stick better. Whatever the science, it was delicious.
And then we hit the road, northbound, through Idaho Falls and into Wyoming, where we drove in the dark through a National Park, narrowly avoiding cleaning out a coyote, a deer, and a herd of elk along the way despite our slow speed. Eventually we made it to Polecat Creek, where we set up camp with the smell of bear in our noses and fell asleep quickly as the stars twinkled overhead. Probably.
Wing Barrels and a Trench run
Short Version:
A chance meeting leads to clean and fed and comfy, two good rides, two rounds of disc golf, some interesting informations
Long Version:
Our wee stream was in shadow when we awoke, so we blasted on down the road to the Cherry Springs Picnic Area for breakfast. We were nearly done when we met some dogs who were rather pleased to be on their way out for a walk, and then we met their owner, Lisa, who gave us invaluable ride advice* and stopped to chat for longer than Tulip and Sonny would have liked. Eventually the hounds managed to drag Lisa away, and we set off up the road to the West Fork trailhead. We were about to get on the bikes when Lisa appeared, and invited us to stay the night and/or join her and her accomplices for a rock-climbing session. We were keen, and agreed to catch up post-ride.
The uphill was rather pleasant. We were riding in a valley full of fall color, on a trail in fine condition. The surrounding countryside was very dry; the hills were the same color as those of Waiheke or the Port Hills late in summer. We climbed, we consulted maps, we ate nutritionally-sound foods, and then, after a hundred-or-so minutes, we started down the chute.
It was great; twisting and turning, and always descending, dry and hard-packed, and fast as fast can be. For the first time in a while we were kicking up rooster-tails of dust, and were riding well-spaced, which meant that by the time I arrived Nene had already discovered that the people in the bushes were archaeologists surveying a site which had turned up a bunch of artefacts, including some made of obsidian, probably brought thither from Yellowstone National Park, several hundred miles to the north. We chatted to them for a while, then blasted down the rest of the trail, and a half-mile or so of paved road, back to the Reaper. Another picnic at Cherry Springs yielded vast amounts of interesting informations:
- Wing Barrels: The theory is that any hunter who has been out harvesting grouse places one wing from each bird harvested into the wing barrel. The relevant authorities then periodically empty the barrel, tallying the number, age and sex of the grouse harvested in the area
- Trapping season: The marten we rescued from the toilet near Revelstoke, BC was very cute. In Idaho, they set traps for them, and then make mittens and other garments out of their fur. Scoundrels. They also trap otters, which is a long way beyond the pale. Interestingly, marten traps are required to be at least two feet above the ground, to reduce the chances of entrapping females. No information as to whether the martenwomenfolks are safe because they can't jump, or whether they're just too lazy to do so.
Delicious foods and interesting informations ingested we set off into town, to the City Creek trail network, where we rode another two hours or so on more well-designed and well-built trails. The uphill was gentle, following a creek up its gully, criss-crossing it regularly on a series of bridges. The descent back to the carpark included some nice traversing, a half-pipe section similar to the Anaconda trail on Godley Head near Otautahi**, and one straight and narrow flying downhill through tall grasses. The effect was similar to a big-screen, surround-sound viewing of the Battle of Yavin in Star Wars where Blue, Gold and Red Squadron's X- and Y-Fighters fly down the trench on the side of the Death Star to the Achilles' Heel maintenance portal where they deposit their ordnance. Great stuff.
We ran into Lisa again in the parking lot, setting out for her evening ride as we set off to the nearby disc golf course, which was packed! The course was a short 9-hole, and both of us played better than our adopted handicaps demanded. We got worse the second time around though. It was interesting to note that well more than half of those playing were women, in stark contrast to disc golf course patronage we've observed in NZ and BC.
And then we took Lisa up on her offer: stealing her daughter's room for the night, using a bunch of hot water, and eating lots of delicious foods. Good beer, interesting people, great conversation, good sleep (for one of us).
* = Includng the fact that the trailhead was just up the road, saving us a drive of twenty miles or so into and back out of town
** = Christchurch, NZ
A chance meeting leads to clean and fed and comfy, two good rides, two rounds of disc golf, some interesting informations
Long Version:
Our wee stream was in shadow when we awoke, so we blasted on down the road to the Cherry Springs Picnic Area for breakfast. We were nearly done when we met some dogs who were rather pleased to be on their way out for a walk, and then we met their owner, Lisa, who gave us invaluable ride advice* and stopped to chat for longer than Tulip and Sonny would have liked. Eventually the hounds managed to drag Lisa away, and we set off up the road to the West Fork trailhead. We were about to get on the bikes when Lisa appeared, and invited us to stay the night and/or join her and her accomplices for a rock-climbing session. We were keen, and agreed to catch up post-ride.
The uphill was rather pleasant. We were riding in a valley full of fall color, on a trail in fine condition. The surrounding countryside was very dry; the hills were the same color as those of Waiheke or the Port Hills late in summer. We climbed, we consulted maps, we ate nutritionally-sound foods, and then, after a hundred-or-so minutes, we started down the chute.
It was great; twisting and turning, and always descending, dry and hard-packed, and fast as fast can be. For the first time in a while we were kicking up rooster-tails of dust, and were riding well-spaced, which meant that by the time I arrived Nene had already discovered that the people in the bushes were archaeologists surveying a site which had turned up a bunch of artefacts, including some made of obsidian, probably brought thither from Yellowstone National Park, several hundred miles to the north. We chatted to them for a while, then blasted down the rest of the trail, and a half-mile or so of paved road, back to the Reaper. Another picnic at Cherry Springs yielded vast amounts of interesting informations:
- Wing Barrels: The theory is that any hunter who has been out harvesting grouse places one wing from each bird harvested into the wing barrel. The relevant authorities then periodically empty the barrel, tallying the number, age and sex of the grouse harvested in the area
- Trapping season: The marten we rescued from the toilet near Revelstoke, BC was very cute. In Idaho, they set traps for them, and then make mittens and other garments out of their fur. Scoundrels. They also trap otters, which is a long way beyond the pale. Interestingly, marten traps are required to be at least two feet above the ground, to reduce the chances of entrapping females. No information as to whether the martenwomenfolks are safe because they can't jump, or whether they're just too lazy to do so.
Delicious foods and interesting informations ingested we set off into town, to the City Creek trail network, where we rode another two hours or so on more well-designed and well-built trails. The uphill was gentle, following a creek up its gully, criss-crossing it regularly on a series of bridges. The descent back to the carpark included some nice traversing, a half-pipe section similar to the Anaconda trail on Godley Head near Otautahi**, and one straight and narrow flying downhill through tall grasses. The effect was similar to a big-screen, surround-sound viewing of the Battle of Yavin in Star Wars where Blue, Gold and Red Squadron's X- and Y-Fighters fly down the trench on the side of the Death Star to the Achilles' Heel maintenance portal where they deposit their ordnance. Great stuff.
We ran into Lisa again in the parking lot, setting out for her evening ride as we set off to the nearby disc golf course, which was packed! The course was a short 9-hole, and both of us played better than our adopted handicaps demanded. We got worse the second time around though. It was interesting to note that well more than half of those playing were women, in stark contrast to disc golf course patronage we've observed in NZ and BC.
And then we took Lisa up on her offer: stealing her daughter's room for the night, using a bunch of hot water, and eating lots of delicious foods. Good beer, interesting people, great conversation, good sleep (for one of us).
* = Includng the fact that the trailhead was just up the road, saving us a drive of twenty miles or so into and back out of town
** = Christchurch, NZ
Bad Driving at Nampa, Noisy Creatures
Canada's CBC radio is great. Amerika has lots of radio stations too.
One of the few interesting things we've heard on NPR - the Amerikan Public Radio Network - was about the Wormfest in Banner Elk, North Carolina. They hold worm races, and then determine the snowfall forecast for the coming winter by assessing how wide the copper band on the body of the winning worm is.
Into Idaho, and the Rest Areas started to bear Rattlesnake Warning signs. We passed a town where billboards promised that workers' hospital bills would be paid by the uranium mining company they worked for, which we thought was rather nice of them, and then we started what was to be a series of crossings and re-crossings of the Snake River. We'd passed 1000km since leaving Vancouver somewhere near North Powder, Oregon, and then hit 23,000km in the Reaper just before Nampa, Idaho, which is where the church bus full of church people pulled an incredibly rancid maneuvre whilst attempting to enter the Interstate, causing us to take some serious - and seriously scary - church bus avoidance action. We passed industrial ruins, and many, many trucks; some with "Oversize" signs attached carrying enormous wind turbine blades; others carrying other trucks. One was even carrying a tow-truck. We passed Massacre Rocks, and eventually stopped at a Rest Area near Coldwater, where we saw an old man wearing a one-piece jumpsuit made from what looked very much like modern car seat fabric. And then we hit Pocatello, Idaho, stole some internet access from a tyre company, and then headed out of town to a patch of National Forest, where we camped for the night next to a wee stream, where small creatures frolicked about joyously, and noisily, all bloody night. Grrrr.
One of the few interesting things we've heard on NPR - the Amerikan Public Radio Network - was about the Wormfest in Banner Elk, North Carolina. They hold worm races, and then determine the snowfall forecast for the coming winter by assessing how wide the copper band on the body of the winning worm is.
Into Idaho, and the Rest Areas started to bear Rattlesnake Warning signs. We passed a town where billboards promised that workers' hospital bills would be paid by the uranium mining company they worked for, which we thought was rather nice of them, and then we started what was to be a series of crossings and re-crossings of the Snake River. We'd passed 1000km since leaving Vancouver somewhere near North Powder, Oregon, and then hit 23,000km in the Reaper just before Nampa, Idaho, which is where the church bus full of church people pulled an incredibly rancid maneuvre whilst attempting to enter the Interstate, causing us to take some serious - and seriously scary - church bus avoidance action. We passed industrial ruins, and many, many trucks; some with "Oversize" signs attached carrying enormous wind turbine blades; others carrying other trucks. One was even carrying a tow-truck. We passed Massacre Rocks, and eventually stopped at a Rest Area near Coldwater, where we saw an old man wearing a one-piece jumpsuit made from what looked very much like modern car seat fabric. And then we hit Pocatello, Idaho, stole some internet access from a tyre company, and then headed out of town to a patch of National Forest, where we camped for the night next to a wee stream, where small creatures frolicked about joyously, and noisily, all bloody night. Grrrr.
A Cold Day in Hell
Short Version:
A long ride. Coldness. No pets, no dyes, no removal of wetsuits.
Long Version:
The Red Devil trail from the Sand Creek trailhead was really nice to ride, despite the damage caused by motorcycles. It had nice feel and sections with great flow, and an hour on a trail like that is about as good a warm-up for a major mission as you can ask for.
The Devil's Gulch trail also had motorcycle damage, but was pretty excellent nonetheless. There was some envy when we met a guy riding the trail the other way, though - we'd been riding uphill for what felt like hours! By the time we reached the steep and nasty climb out of the gulch proper, we were knackered. Especially me. Actually, Nene was still fresh as a bloody daisy, and blitzed the climb quickly and without apparent effort. Grrrr. At the top of the grunt we turned onto Mission Ridge, and began the ascend a little/descend a lot of a downhill-trending ridge ride. The trail was incredibly dry, but was a lot of fun, and it was with definite sadness that we reached the end of the trail - and not just because we had to ride up and over the Red Devil hill again to get back to the Reaper, food, and warmth. Ride over it we did, though, with fifty minutes of climb earning us ten minutes of down, for a grand ride total of six hours on the bikes; the perfect way to ease ourselves back into riding after a week of hot-tub soaks and over-indulgence in delicious foods and alcomaholic beverages!
We were cold and tired, and especially cold, so it was early to bed with umpteen layers on. We shivered our way through delicious Indian curry on mashed spuds before Friday night motorcyclists drove their trucks past us and up to the trail for some riding and yee-hawing, and then we slept as best we could in that kind of cold, waking to find ice on the Reaper, and the plants, and the puddles. It was really cold.
We scraped the ice off the windscreen and set off. Junkyard guy was feeding his animals; we counted twelve dogs and fifteen cats, and there were more of each, which we would have counted properly if not distracted by the very cute dog walking around on its two front legs, twisted rear legs held high over its head.
We'd been too cold in the trailhead valley to eat delicious foods or make coffee, so we found a picnic spot in the sun at a town called Monitor. It was lovely and sunny, but the wind had a distinct chill to it. We noticed that there seemed to be less Amerikan flags around than in most other similar-sized Amerikan towns, and figured that we'd stumbled on a hotbed of Islamic Communism. This theory was confirmed when we visited the restrooms, where the doors were festooned with signage, warning us not only about the unlawfulness of bringing pets into the building, but also banning the use of dyes and the removal of wetsuits.
So we stayed grey, left our neoprene on, and went on our merry way, to a fruit and veg stand, where we purchased delicious foods, and then on into some seriously weird desert, where military convoys appeared and disappeared between rocky outcrops and wind farms with no apparent wind to spin their enormous turbines crowned the hilltops. The towns we visited became significantly Hispanic, as did the radio stations we were picking up, and then we were on the Interstate again, crossing the Columbia River and into Oregon, and then up into the Blue Mountains to camp in the woods. We'd seen a bunch of weird and wonderful roadkill, including coyotes, cows, deer, raccoons, and a very stinky skunk, and we'd seen a hugely fat woman driving an old Camaro Z28. All in all, a good day's driving... but we were still a LONG way from the State line, and even further away from our next destination: Pocatello, Idaho.
A long ride. Coldness. No pets, no dyes, no removal of wetsuits.
Long Version:
The Red Devil trail from the Sand Creek trailhead was really nice to ride, despite the damage caused by motorcycles. It had nice feel and sections with great flow, and an hour on a trail like that is about as good a warm-up for a major mission as you can ask for.
The Devil's Gulch trail also had motorcycle damage, but was pretty excellent nonetheless. There was some envy when we met a guy riding the trail the other way, though - we'd been riding uphill for what felt like hours! By the time we reached the steep and nasty climb out of the gulch proper, we were knackered. Especially me. Actually, Nene was still fresh as a bloody daisy, and blitzed the climb quickly and without apparent effort. Grrrr. At the top of the grunt we turned onto Mission Ridge, and began the ascend a little/descend a lot of a downhill-trending ridge ride. The trail was incredibly dry, but was a lot of fun, and it was with definite sadness that we reached the end of the trail - and not just because we had to ride up and over the Red Devil hill again to get back to the Reaper, food, and warmth. Ride over it we did, though, with fifty minutes of climb earning us ten minutes of down, for a grand ride total of six hours on the bikes; the perfect way to ease ourselves back into riding after a week of hot-tub soaks and over-indulgence in delicious foods and alcomaholic beverages!
We were cold and tired, and especially cold, so it was early to bed with umpteen layers on. We shivered our way through delicious Indian curry on mashed spuds before Friday night motorcyclists drove their trucks past us and up to the trail for some riding and yee-hawing, and then we slept as best we could in that kind of cold, waking to find ice on the Reaper, and the plants, and the puddles. It was really cold.
We scraped the ice off the windscreen and set off. Junkyard guy was feeding his animals; we counted twelve dogs and fifteen cats, and there were more of each, which we would have counted properly if not distracted by the very cute dog walking around on its two front legs, twisted rear legs held high over its head.
We'd been too cold in the trailhead valley to eat delicious foods or make coffee, so we found a picnic spot in the sun at a town called Monitor. It was lovely and sunny, but the wind had a distinct chill to it. We noticed that there seemed to be less Amerikan flags around than in most other similar-sized Amerikan towns, and figured that we'd stumbled on a hotbed of Islamic Communism. This theory was confirmed when we visited the restrooms, where the doors were festooned with signage, warning us not only about the unlawfulness of bringing pets into the building, but also banning the use of dyes and the removal of wetsuits.
So we stayed grey, left our neoprene on, and went on our merry way, to a fruit and veg stand, where we purchased delicious foods, and then on into some seriously weird desert, where military convoys appeared and disappeared between rocky outcrops and wind farms with no apparent wind to spin their enormous turbines crowned the hilltops. The towns we visited became significantly Hispanic, as did the radio stations we were picking up, and then we were on the Interstate again, crossing the Columbia River and into Oregon, and then up into the Blue Mountains to camp in the woods. We'd seen a bunch of weird and wonderful roadkill, including coyotes, cows, deer, raccoons, and a very stinky skunk, and we'd seen a hugely fat woman driving an old Camaro Z28. All in all, a good day's driving... but we were still a LONG way from the State line, and even further away from our next destination: Pocatello, Idaho.
Amerika, Again
Short Version:
One last headline, the Border Police say no to Nene, a long drive with an unpassing maneuvre, we end up in a junkyard
Long Version:
Running well behind schedule as usual, we barely had time to glance at the newspaper before we hit the road. Of course, this being Vancouver, the one headline we did note said "B.C. Leads National Study Into Vagina's Ecosystem."
At the border, we were asked to go inside the building, unlike the many Canadians and Amerikans who were being passed back and forth without undue delay. We'd been expecting to be accosted, though, as it had happened last time, so we weren't particularly concerned. Apparently, we should have been.
The Border Police gent who came to the counter was tall, stood with an almost military bearing, had a silver moustache, and was absolutely not going to let Janine into the country. Especially once he requested "The address where you will be staying and contactable tonight," and got: "Um... somewhere in the Wenatchee National Forest?"
Luckily for us, Officer Van Bever stepped in. He was, we found out, a dual-citizen Canadian-Amerikan with Scottish ancestry, and had served in the police in Canada prior to becoming a US Border Police officer. He asked lots of questions, like: "You have jobs to go back to in NZ, yes?" We answered all his questions honestly. ("Um... no.")
Basically, we answered every single question as wrongly as was possible, and by rights he should have blocked Nene's entry to the US. But, having recognised that no-one as naive as us could ever pose a threat to Amerika, he decided to let her in, and we rolled on down the highway towards Bellingham, past the rollerblader and the sled-dog transport truck who'd crossed the border much faster than we had, past the handpainted sign for the taco/guns/ammo shop and over the Nooksack River into Bellingham, where we finally bought another replacement camera.
We saw no Silvertip action in Everett, and both of us left Value Village empty-handed, which is both rare and disheartening. Not as disheartening, though, as passing a bus near the top of a fogged-in mountain pass and realising that without the lights of the bus ahead of us we were essentially blind. We unpassed the bus, and followed it to the end of the fog.
Finally, 400km and lots of hours after we'd left Vancouver, we found ourselves approaching Sand Creek, driving between huge piles of junk: cars, trailers, tyres, household appliances; you name it, there were piles of it on both sides of the road. Critters skittered about the place, half-seen in the glare of the Reaper's lights, and we were starting to wonder how we could have got so lost when all at once we were through, and back into forest, and then at the trailhead, where delicious foods were followed by some sleeping.
One last headline, the Border Police say no to Nene, a long drive with an unpassing maneuvre, we end up in a junkyard
Long Version:
Running well behind schedule as usual, we barely had time to glance at the newspaper before we hit the road. Of course, this being Vancouver, the one headline we did note said "B.C. Leads National Study Into Vagina's Ecosystem."
At the border, we were asked to go inside the building, unlike the many Canadians and Amerikans who were being passed back and forth without undue delay. We'd been expecting to be accosted, though, as it had happened last time, so we weren't particularly concerned. Apparently, we should have been.
The Border Police gent who came to the counter was tall, stood with an almost military bearing, had a silver moustache, and was absolutely not going to let Janine into the country. Especially once he requested "The address where you will be staying and contactable tonight," and got: "Um... somewhere in the Wenatchee National Forest?"
Luckily for us, Officer Van Bever stepped in. He was, we found out, a dual-citizen Canadian-Amerikan with Scottish ancestry, and had served in the police in Canada prior to becoming a US Border Police officer. He asked lots of questions, like: "You have jobs to go back to in NZ, yes?" We answered all his questions honestly. ("Um... no.")
Basically, we answered every single question as wrongly as was possible, and by rights he should have blocked Nene's entry to the US. But, having recognised that no-one as naive as us could ever pose a threat to Amerika, he decided to let her in, and we rolled on down the highway towards Bellingham, past the rollerblader and the sled-dog transport truck who'd crossed the border much faster than we had, past the handpainted sign for the taco/guns/ammo shop and over the Nooksack River into Bellingham, where we finally bought another replacement camera.
We saw no Silvertip action in Everett, and both of us left Value Village empty-handed, which is both rare and disheartening. Not as disheartening, though, as passing a bus near the top of a fogged-in mountain pass and realising that without the lights of the bus ahead of us we were essentially blind. We unpassed the bus, and followed it to the end of the fog.
Finally, 400km and lots of hours after we'd left Vancouver, we found ourselves approaching Sand Creek, driving between huge piles of junk: cars, trailers, tyres, household appliances; you name it, there were piles of it on both sides of the road. Critters skittered about the place, half-seen in the glare of the Reaper's lights, and we were starting to wonder how we could have got so lost when all at once we were through, and back into forest, and then at the trailhead, where delicious foods were followed by some sleeping.
A Wooden Leg, a Parasite, Silvertips
Short Version:
We eat delicious foods, grind up a mountain, and then leave.
Long Version:
Thanksgiving, be it Canadian or Amerikan, is essentially a harvest festival. Canadian Thanksgiving is a month earlier than its Amerikan counterpart. I assume this is because the cold comes earlier and with greater force here in the north*. We spent a lot of the weekend either shopping for, cooking, or eating delicious foods. In line with most of what we've heard about Vancouver - and especially North Vancouver - it rained most of the weekend, although we did get one day of glorious sunshine, on the Sunday, which one of spent running in the woods and swimming in the icy-cold pool, while the other more responsible one did a bunch of planning and preparation for the next leg of the trip, which should see us blasting around Utah and parts as-yet unknown. There were fifteen of us for Thanksgiving dinner, including one with a new take on a wooden leg and one who'd acquired some form of nasty parasite on a recent trip to Africa. The doctors in Uganda had given him some medication for it. One of the possible side-effects listed on the package was "trouble," but it was the Captain who provided the best examples of trouble on the night; carnaging several people with pumpkin cheesecake spillage and then setting fire to the decorative vines.
A day or two later we decided it really was high time we got high in Vancouver. So we found a spot for the Reaper near the top of Skyline Drive, and stopped in to see Monsieur Le Couteur, who was drying freshly-cut rocks in the sun atop the garbage cans. He'd spied a bear half an hour earlier, and was mildly concerned that it might take it into its head to rummage round in the garbage, thereby disturbing his carefully-ordered sample set. We ran away, westwards along the Powerlines trail, and snuck in to the Grouse Mountain wolf enclosure, where we saw no wolves, but some most excellent evidence of their presence: a child's shoe, lying forlornly in the no-man's-land inside the fence. No severed foot inside, and no bloodstains, but emotive nonetheless.
And then we found the start of the Grouse Grind trail, and went up. And up. And up. We were by far the fastest critters on the trail, and half an hour or so in we were getting ready to start in on the self-congratulatory stuff. Then we saw the sign. It said: "HALFWAY"
Oh.
Maybe we should slow down then.
The trail got steeper, which made slowing down easier, and then got steeper again. More and more of the trail was steps, none of which were regularly-sized or -spaced. Some of them were too high for Nene's little legs to manage easily, and she had to scramble. More and more of the people we encountered were sitting down, or leaning against trees. Many of them were sweaty.
Eventually we reached the top of Grouse Mountain and spent some time taking in the views out over Vancouver, with Georgia Strait and the Island to the west, and Amerika's Olympic Peninsula to the south. Then we walked back down, via the BCMC Trail, which we'd been told would drop us out at the top of Skyline, near the Reaper and the promise of a cold drink. Turns out, though, that the trail which connects near-direct to the top of Skyline is the OLD BCMC Trail. Not the one we took. The one we took dropped us back at the bottom of the Grind. So we then got to walk back up half a mountain to get to the trail that took us back down to where we wanted to be. Normal people probably would have wandered back along the flattish Powerlines instead. Actually, all evidence points to normal people not doing the Grouse Grind in the first place, with a second level of normalcy kicking in at the top, where 95% of climbers take the gondola back down. Scottish heritage says no to paying for unnecessaries, though, so we arrived back at the Le Couteurs' several hours after we'd left, thirsty and hungry and with really tired legs. Ginger beer and whole-wall maps and photgraphs were awesome, as was the electron microscope. The killer, though, was the enormous fossilised tooth, which is quite possibly the coolest item in the world.
Then we went home, had a hot tub, and watched some hockey** on the enormous television - first home game of the new season for the Vancouver team. We were keen to go along, but the cheapest seats cost $91 each, which kind of gives lie to their slogan: "We are all Canucks." We've decided to adopt a team from the third-tier competition instead, and have settled on the Everett Silvertips, because their mascot is cool***. So cool, in fact, that we decided to go there.
* = Apparently Vancouver is further north of the equator than Dunedin is south. This may or may not have some bearing on Dunedin being a shithole.
** = That's ice-hockey for those of you who believe that field hockey exists and/or is relevant and/or is watchable
*** = A silvertip is a grizzly bear.
We eat delicious foods, grind up a mountain, and then leave.
Long Version:
Thanksgiving, be it Canadian or Amerikan, is essentially a harvest festival. Canadian Thanksgiving is a month earlier than its Amerikan counterpart. I assume this is because the cold comes earlier and with greater force here in the north*. We spent a lot of the weekend either shopping for, cooking, or eating delicious foods. In line with most of what we've heard about Vancouver - and especially North Vancouver - it rained most of the weekend, although we did get one day of glorious sunshine, on the Sunday, which one of spent running in the woods and swimming in the icy-cold pool, while the other more responsible one did a bunch of planning and preparation for the next leg of the trip, which should see us blasting around Utah and parts as-yet unknown. There were fifteen of us for Thanksgiving dinner, including one with a new take on a wooden leg and one who'd acquired some form of nasty parasite on a recent trip to Africa. The doctors in Uganda had given him some medication for it. One of the possible side-effects listed on the package was "trouble," but it was the Captain who provided the best examples of trouble on the night; carnaging several people with pumpkin cheesecake spillage and then setting fire to the decorative vines.
A day or two later we decided it really was high time we got high in Vancouver. So we found a spot for the Reaper near the top of Skyline Drive, and stopped in to see Monsieur Le Couteur, who was drying freshly-cut rocks in the sun atop the garbage cans. He'd spied a bear half an hour earlier, and was mildly concerned that it might take it into its head to rummage round in the garbage, thereby disturbing his carefully-ordered sample set. We ran away, westwards along the Powerlines trail, and snuck in to the Grouse Mountain wolf enclosure, where we saw no wolves, but some most excellent evidence of their presence: a child's shoe, lying forlornly in the no-man's-land inside the fence. No severed foot inside, and no bloodstains, but emotive nonetheless.
And then we found the start of the Grouse Grind trail, and went up. And up. And up. We were by far the fastest critters on the trail, and half an hour or so in we were getting ready to start in on the self-congratulatory stuff. Then we saw the sign. It said: "HALFWAY"
Oh.
Maybe we should slow down then.
The trail got steeper, which made slowing down easier, and then got steeper again. More and more of the trail was steps, none of which were regularly-sized or -spaced. Some of them were too high for Nene's little legs to manage easily, and she had to scramble. More and more of the people we encountered were sitting down, or leaning against trees. Many of them were sweaty.
Eventually we reached the top of Grouse Mountain and spent some time taking in the views out over Vancouver, with Georgia Strait and the Island to the west, and Amerika's Olympic Peninsula to the south. Then we walked back down, via the BCMC Trail, which we'd been told would drop us out at the top of Skyline, near the Reaper and the promise of a cold drink. Turns out, though, that the trail which connects near-direct to the top of Skyline is the OLD BCMC Trail. Not the one we took. The one we took dropped us back at the bottom of the Grind. So we then got to walk back up half a mountain to get to the trail that took us back down to where we wanted to be. Normal people probably would have wandered back along the flattish Powerlines instead. Actually, all evidence points to normal people not doing the Grouse Grind in the first place, with a second level of normalcy kicking in at the top, where 95% of climbers take the gondola back down. Scottish heritage says no to paying for unnecessaries, though, so we arrived back at the Le Couteurs' several hours after we'd left, thirsty and hungry and with really tired legs. Ginger beer and whole-wall maps and photgraphs were awesome, as was the electron microscope. The killer, though, was the enormous fossilised tooth, which is quite possibly the coolest item in the world.
Then we went home, had a hot tub, and watched some hockey** on the enormous television - first home game of the new season for the Vancouver team. We were keen to go along, but the cheapest seats cost $91 each, which kind of gives lie to their slogan: "We are all Canucks." We've decided to adopt a team from the third-tier competition instead, and have settled on the Everett Silvertips, because their mascot is cool***. So cool, in fact, that we decided to go there.
* = Apparently Vancouver is further north of the equator than Dunedin is south. This may or may not have some bearing on Dunedin being a shithole.
** = That's ice-hockey for those of you who believe that field hockey exists and/or is relevant and/or is watchable
*** = A silvertip is a grizzly bear.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Short People Are Evil
Today's Vancouver Sun lamented Canada's failure to gain a seat on the UN Security Council, beaten out by Germany and Portugal. One of the staff writers referred to Portugal as an "afterthought nation of just 10 million," which I thought was a little rude. A spokesperson for policy thinktank Rideau Institute referred to the failure to win the seat as "Canada's Hindenburg moment," attributing the vote to "Canada's dismal performance on climate change, foreign aid, peacekeeping, asbestos, reproductive rights and the Middle East." All sounds very Amerika-lite to me, but the Hindenburg comment did bring back fond memories of this picture:
Speaking of pictures, this one from the Sun:
Speaking of pictures, this one from the Sun:
struck me not only as highlighting what a diverse bunch people are, but also as depicting with great impact the emotional state of this crowd in Copiapo, Chile, as they watched the first of the long-trapped miners emerge from the rescue pod. Originally it was the guy in the upper left corner who caught my eye, with his round face, high collar and happy-clapping upper-teeth-only joyousness, but the longer I looked the more the guy in the lower right stole the limelight. Not the orgasmic guy with the sombrero in the middle; the guy to his left / our right. The little one. The evil dwarf midget one, with the clasped hands and the hairless noggin. What strikes me most about him is that even he - long steeped in evil, sidekick of some horrendous mad scientist guy, hardened to deeds that would make even Josef Fritzl or Graeme Capill blanch - is showing some very raw, near-transcendental elation. Hard to reconcile that he's going to leave this happy crowd with a young girl in tow, take her back to the underground lair, and immobilise her with leather straps and metal buckles for his master to use as an unwilling plaything and/or experimental subject*.
Fact: Short people = evil.
Fact: Short people = evil.
* = Ralphus has details. And feets.
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