Final Days at South Pole

Well, I'm almost out of here, actually an entire week left but with the amount of work left to do, I think that will proabably fly by. I just hope I can get back in time for Thanksgiving.

Here is a little video I made of the trip down and from around the station. Enjoy...

Cool Websites

If anyone is interested in further info on the USAP program and Antarctic in general, check out my company's websites...

http://www.usap.gov/

This site has some cool photos:
http://photolibrary.usap.gov/

Our weekly Newsletter:
http://antarcticsun.usap.gov/

November 7, 2005

Here is another acronym you don�t see every day. DNF which stands for "Do Not Freeze". You put this BOLDLY on anything, obviously, you don't want frozen. This includes packages, luggage, cargo, etc with anything temperature sensitive. This could include computers, office furniture. Office furniture???? Yeah, the South Pole is a an ergonomic nightmare, all the office chairs that utilize pneumatic or hydraulics to raise and lower are permanently bottomed out and you feel like a midget reaching up to type at the keyboard. It seems that DNF sometimes needs to be a little bolder on some of that cargo.

After spending the entire day in front of a computer, I needed to get out for a while. So this evening, I ventured outside to get a breath of fresh air, so to speak. At -75 F with the wind chill, it was a rather brisk walk. It seems like we may as well be on Mars for how difficult it is to suit up for a simple walk outside the station, and clearly, I did not choose my gear wisely. I was only able to withstand a few minutes outside at a time. However, I did manage to capture a few shots of an incoming C-130, so I think. It is hard to tell because my goggles kept icing up and I could barely see through the viewfinder. After about 5 minutes, my right hand started to ice up with frost nip and I had to go back inside to warm up again. Undaunted, I headed back outside to get a few more pictures of the station, the pole and the old station dome as the sun had circled 180 degrees from the last time I was out there and would be at my back this time. I did manage to take some pictures without removing my outer gloves; I hope I didn't freeze my video camera too much.

While walking back to the station, there were a couple of guys outside building scaffolding so they could start putting the siding on the new station. I must say that I am simply amazed how these guys are able to work in that temperature. It seems pretty pathetic that it is such a huge ordeal for me to just walk out to the geographic pole and back inside the station while these guys are working out there for, I don't know, 15 to 20 minutes at a time, maybe more. Now that is hard core.

November 6, 2005

Sunday's are typically a day off for most folks at Pole. On this Sunday, John Carpenter's movie "The Thing" was shown in the new station. I believe it is a yearly tradition to watch "The Thing" at station opening (and maybe again at closing) every year. Interestingly enough, the version of the Thing at the South Pole is in betamax and the betamax player is likely kept around just for this movie. After some work getting the movie to play, it seems to have been played one too many times, we all sat down to enjoy this classic. I could sit here and pick apart the entire movie, but then, it is fiction. One funny moment comes to mind when the Thing first appears, someone says, "Mac wants the Flamethrower!!".

FlameThrower


Needless to say, the entire TV lounge breaks into laughter. They have a flamethrower at a polar research station, where fire is one of the primary concerns for everyone's safety? Not to mention the fact that everyone is walking around in the movie with guns, prior to any known danger? Anyway, it makes for a good movie, unfortunately the beta tape cut out just as the Thing was getting loose and wreaking havoc on the station. Fortunately, there is a shipment of DVDs on its way and "The Thing" is among them. So The Thing tradition continues...

At Pole

So here we are, sitting in an empty cargo plane, packed like sardines, waiting to step out onto the bottom of the earth. I pretty much bundle up in everything I possibly can and unfortunately, did not have my balaclava on me, it had been in my checked bag which I never unchecked in Mcmurdo. So I step out and am immediately greeted by some friendly faces from work and they walk me about 50 yards to the new station. I step inside and there is a lady handing out room assignments. She takes one look at me and says, do this (as she holds her palm on her nose and rubs it back and forth). I put my palm on my nose and say why? She says, your nose has turned white. So I'm at the pole for no less than five minutes and I have already gotten frost nip on the nose. Kind of painful when it warms up, but as I understand it, not nearly as bad as frost bite can be. I really need to find that balaclava.



Fortunately, I arrived at South Pole just in time for lunch, which was really pretty good. It turns out that due to shipping costs, a meal at the South Pole is probably the most expensive meal a person will ever eat. What you don't eat, food scraps, etc, gets shipped all the way back to the states for disposal. Needless to say, you take what you can eat and eat what you take. After lunch. Another orientation. However, this time the atmosphere is remarkably different. In short, the pace here is slower and much more congenial. There are a lot less people at the South Pole, which makes for a much cozier environment compared to the feel of McMurdo, which some describe as a cross between a mining town and a fraternity house. Kind of the Deadwood of the Antarctic. After the orientation, I went on a little sightseeing trip of the station and was fortunate to visit the old station under the dome before it gets dismantled later this year. I am staying in the new station, in a berthing just outside of the dining facility (they don't call it a galley anymore). The new station is remarkably clean, efficient, comfortable, warm, sterile. After nearly 30 years, the old station had grown quite a bit of character. It will be a long time, if ever, before the new station will get that "Lived in" feeling. I'm actually very lucky as most transitional people (such as myself since I'm only here for three weeks) stay out in what is called Summer Camp. You betcha, summer camp is, well, a camp with tents and everything. Okay, the tents are heated but not very efficiently and you have to go outside to use the facilities. If you live in summer camp and you have to pee at 3AM, you must don all your ECW gear or freeze, walk out into mid day sun (The sun doesn't actually go down in the summer) and then crawl back into bed to get warm again while listening to the 24/7 shifts of snow bulldozers making snow birms outside your tent. Large coffee cans are a hot commodity for a commode, no stench as they freeze as soon as you set them on the floor. Needless to say, not much sleep going on in summer camp. Anyway, I was able to get some "Hero Shots" outside the old dome, at the ceremonial South Pole and at the geographic south pole. Now it is time for me to get back to work and focus on the reasons why I'm down here.

Onward to Pole

Well, the flight did not get cancelled and we PAX were loaded onto a C-130, shoulder to shoulder, knee to knee, boot to boot. We shared the cargo plane with three rather large pallets loaded in the back of the plane. Kind of a human cattle kind of thing going on, now this is the "hurt flight" I remember. Fortunately, it was only a three hour flight to the South Pole. However, this flight could also circle for a couple hours and then head all the way back due to weather and we had a pretty measly sack lunch this time. Fortunately, we did not end up circling and landed with a half a degree (Farenheit that is) to spare or it would have been too cold to land, -51F vs -50.5 F. We landed on the skiway, and as we taxied toward the station, the "Loadmaster" opens the parachute door in the back of the plane (big ramp looking door that drops down) and he releases all the cargo into a cloud of white. The cargo literally falls out the back of the plane onto the skyway as clouds of blowing snow billow into the cargo area of the plane.

Arrival in McMurdo

We arrived at the CDC at about 0615, got suited up in our ECW gear, checked our bags and headed over to the International Antarctic Center for some breakfast. At 7:30, we watched an orientation video and headed out to the runway to board the C-17 Globelifter. On the way out, we were each handed a bag lunch unlike I have ever seen before. This was a grocery bag full of goodies. The reason for this is that we could literally fly the 5+ hours to McMurdo, circle around for a few hours while waiting for the weather to clear and possibly fly all the way back to Christchurch just do try again the next day. After 12 hours on an extremely loud flight, the grocery bag would seem a miniscule comfort.


After arriving in Mcmurdo and sitting through what seemed like endless hours of orientation in the Chalet (The Chalet is the nicest structure in McMurdo and looks like an old ski hut), I was finally able to drop my stuff off at my room and get out of the ECW gear and into jeans. I then found that my checked bags would not be available for pickup until 5PM AND I had to do what is called “Bag Drag” at 7PM in preparation for an early morning flight. Bag drag is the USAP term for checking your luggage for an upcoming flight, they take your bags, weigh them and load them onto pallets. They also weigh your carry on and yourself wearing all your ECW gear. Think of it like checking in at the airport and then they ask you to step up onto the scale holding all your carry on bags. If you are ever in Mcmurdo and you see a bunch of people walking towards building 140, all decked out in their ECW gear and hauling all their orange ECW and personal bags, well… it is pretty obvious what they are doing.

The funny thing is that “bag drag” is one of those terms that is so instilled into USAP lingo, people forget that new folks have no clue what they are talking about. For example, we all just arrive in Mcmurdo and sitting in orientation, the lady giving the orientation says, “who is on their way to pole”? About half the group’s hands go up. So she says, “your flight leaves at 0800 tomorrow and you have Bag Drag at 1900”. Needless to say, there were quite few blank stares.

Oh, here is another good one... We are all on board the airporter on our way to board the C-130 for our flight to South Pole from Mcmurdo. An airporter, by the way, is a bus used in Mcmurdo to taxi people around, it looks like buses used at airports to take you to the rental car company, you know, the ones with the seats in two long rows lengthwise down the bus. Anyway, a guy jumps on board and says, “good morning I’m going to be the Loadmaster on your flight this morning”. I’m thinking, Huh? Is that some kind of stewardess? He goes on to show us how to pull an oxygen mask over our head and says it will provide about 5 minutes of air, you will know when it is out of oxygen when you take a breath and the plastic sticks to your mouth but not to worry because 5 minutes is plenty of time to get the plane down below 10,000 feet. Then he says, there are no “comfort facilities” on the C-130 but there is a U-Bucket up front. The funny thing is that I know exactly what he is talking about. U stands for Urine. I’m thinking he is wrong; there are comfort facilities on board because after 3 hours of holding it, that U-Bucket is going to be a huge comfort.




So anyway, I couldn’t pickup my bags immediately after arriving in Mcmurdo, and even if I could, I would just have to haul them right back to check them back in for Bag Drag. So I decided to stop by the new Network Operations Center and say hi to all the folks I work with on a daily basis but only via email and phone. Its nice to be able to put a name to a face. I finally went to Bag Drag, labeled all my bags and decided to ask the woman weighing our luggage, what are the chances of this flight getting cancelled? Pretty good she said, they have been cancelled nearly every time this past week. So I asked for my bags back and retrieved a couple pairs of underwear and socks, just in case and then she had to weigh them again.

Still in Christchurch

On Sunday, I stopped by the Clothing Distribution Center (CDC) to pick up my ECW gear. I tried each and every piece of clothing to ensure a proper fit. The last thing I wanted was a clothing malfunction at -50 F.
While trying on some of my expedition weight long underwear, this woman poke her head into the Men’s changing room and says, Anyone going to South Pole, come meet me in the office. Since I’m heading to the Pole, I go see what she wants. She tells me she is here to hand out our drugs. I say I don’t need any drugs but thanks. She says to take them just in case. It turns out that she was giving everyone acetazolamide which is used to combat altitude sickness. So, I take the bottle thinking it may be useful the next time I go to Nepal or something, I mean, big deal, South Pole is around 9000 feet and I live at 7000 feet. Well, it turns out that despite being 9000 feet, barometrically, it fluctuates anywhere between 9000 and 12000 feet as a result of the extreme cold. Think of it like a low pressure system when a storm is coming in. Pole has an extremely low pressure system simply due to the colder temperatures. I figured if it was around, 12000 feet, the altitude at which I start feeling altitude effects, I may need the pills since you cant really “descend”, the number one cure for altitude sickness.




After successfully checking out all my ECW gear, I was told to report back to the CDC the following morning at 0630 for my “Ice Flight”, formerly known as the “hurt flight” because it is so painful. However, this year, the bulk of the Ice Flights are conducted by a new behemoth of a cargo plane, the C-17 Globelifter. Needless to say, with all the cargo and limited number of passengers or PAX as they are called, the flight to Mcmurdo this will be the easiest and most comfortable flight most people have taken to the Ice all year. To pass the time in Christchurch, I strolled around the city and tried to get a few video shots to document the trip. With the bulk of USAP folks already on the Ice, Christchurch was a little quiet.

Just arrived in Christchurch

Well, I feel like I just spent twenty hours on a plane.... probably because I just have. Since It is only about 10:30 AM in Christchurch, my hotel room is not yet ready so I thought I would take a walk. Lo and behold, I find myself at an internet cafe. So far, the trip has gone relatively smooth, considering that I spent most of the day prior to leaving for the airport suffering on the couch from my sinus infection. However, Dr. Carson finally came through and had antibiotics waiting for me at the pharmacy which we picked up on the way out. Feeling much better now. Shure is nice to have a Dr. Patient relationship when your in a pinch like that.

The flight from Denver to LA was great and uneventful, I had about a three hour layover in LA where I watched the Matrix (again) on my laptop while I waited. I believe the plane from LA to Aukland was a 747 jumbojet and it actually take a whole hour to board. Around 11 PM, I set my clock back six hours so I would start thinking in New Zealand time which seems to be working, I did get a few exceedingly uncomfortable hours of sleep on the plane. For some reason, there was some sort of metal box mounted under the seat in front of me. I believe it controlled the video systems in my row but then who knows, the point is that I could only put one foot under the seat at a time. As a result, I spent the entire night on the plan shifting from one uncomfortable position to the next and now the entire night is simply one uncomfortable blur. However, I did get three movies in to take my mind off the pain. War of the Worlds, what can I say, it was cool. Fantastic Four, Dumb! .. and the First half of "Lords of Dogtown", pretty interesting given that I was something of a skater when I was a kid and these in the movie were well known to me, in name that is.

Since I had a bunch of expensive company wireless ethernet bridges, food in my bags, had hiking boots and had visited a farm recently (with those same hiking boots), customs in Aukland pretty much took forever and I thought I was going to miss my connecting flight to Christchurch. When I finally got out of customs, I literally ran to the domestic terminal, typically a 15 minute walk according to the signs along the blue and white line rout to the terminal, which took me about 4 minutes. Felt great after sitting on my bum for the last 20 hours. However, it turned out that I as a whole hour early so I sat and sweated in the cafe nursing a cup of Joe for an hour.

So anyway, after a quick flight to christchurch, meeting with RPSC travel, here I am at an Internet cafe in Cathedral Square in downtown Christchurch. Tomorrow, I have to check in at the Clothing Distribution Center at the Antarctic Center to pickup my Extreme Cold Weather (ECW) gear and get ready for my flight to the ice the following day. At this rate, I should be in Mcmurdo on the 31st and on the waiting list for a flight to the South Pole. Last I heard, there were several flights to Pole backed up and sitting in Mcmurdo.

Downtown Aquarium

Video of Kyle's Trip to the Aquarium(MPEG):

On Sunday, Kyle, Papa and I met Sarah, Eric, Emma, Carolyn, Doug, Liam and Owen at what used to be known as "Ocean Journey". However, it has recently changed hands and is now owned by Landry's seafood and I believe it is now called the Downtown Aquarium and restaurant. Ocean Journey used to be pretty cool but it is now truly amazing though a little more like a theme park than an Aquarium.

Unfortunately Jack had to stay home since he had been up all night puking but Kyle had a wonderful time checking out the Shark, fish, Crabs, tigers, everything. Kyle did a little jig in front of a giant inflatable whale shark and managed to attract a smal crowd after several minutes of dancing.



When we got inside, Kyle spotted the grouper, Yelled "Grouper!" and ran over to sit down in front of his new friend. I think he sat there just looking at his spotted Grouper for about 15 minutes til we moved on.



They actually have live tigers at this aquarium, which seemed to enjoy stalking the little kids from the other side of the plexiglass.

A little unsettling to say the least.

When we got to a large tank with a number of Great White Sharks, Kyle promptly lay down in front of the tank for a better look. Interstinly, most of the other 2 to 4 year olds coming through burst into tears upon seeing a tank full of sharks.

Jack's First Soccer Game

Video of the game(Windows Media File):

Jack had his first soccer game last week on team "Little Tykes". At first, I dont think he was quite getting the idea of kicking the ball down the field to the goal and seemed to just be chasing the ball around the field. However, it didnt take long for him to figure out how to score at which time he turned into a little Hellion on the field. While defending his goal, what Jack lacked in skill, he made up with a good 'ol shove. With a strong push, he was able to send the biggest player's goal shot askew. Needless to say, we had a talk with him about the use of "hands" on the filed.

Off to Antarctica...

It is official... well not exactly official yet, but I have been asked to go back to Antarctica, this time to the South Pole to assist with a major Server upgrade project. I am really looking forward to this trip but regret the fact I will miss Tiffany's birthday as I will be gone most of November. Here is a picture from my trip to Mcmurdo back in October, 2002. I dont think I will get to spend much time in Mcmurdo this time around. Instead, I'm off to experience a new meaning of cold.

Chicago Basin Loop Backpacking Trip, July 13-16, 2005

Well, I was going to post this a while back but never had the time to write up the trip report...

The plan was to do the 35-37 Mile Chicago basin loop from Elk Park to Needleton in the South San Juans above Durango, Colorado. Using various websites such as Stephen C. Grigory's very useful Trainloop Site and the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad wilderness information site, we planned on an aggressive five day schedule with a possible 14er thrown in on the 4th day. However, due to circumstances beyond our control, (snowy passes, miles of avalanche debris, raging creeks, afternoon lighting storms, etc), we were slowed down enough that we missed the opportunity climb 14,082 ft Mt Windom on Day 4 and instead chose to hike out a day early, enticed by beers on the train.

Day 0
With a late start and 2 hour delay on Wolf Creek Pass, Kevin and I spent most of the day driving to Durango but managed to arrive just in time for Happy Hour at the Steamworks Brewery. Although Kevin warns me of the extremely strong and most excellent IPA, I opt for one more than I should. After dinner, Kevin and I head over to his girlfriend's property where she has just finished building her house. However, it turns out the house had just been sold and we end up spending the night in her trailer parked out front. It turns out that the new owner has already moved in and gives two somewhat inebriated backpackers-to-be a tour of the property. After going through our gear one last time, we hit the rack early as we needed to be up at the crack of dawn to pack, find a fulfilling breakfast, and catch the 8:15 AM Durango Silverton Express Train Station an hour prior departure.

Day 1
We end up eating a monster breafast at a little greasy spoon called Oscar's in downtown Durango. After breakfast, we are still early for the train so we wander around the grocery store looking for flip flops to replace my very heavy Chaco Sandals which I had originally planned to bring for stream crossing. The whole theme of our trip had been "lightweight backpacking", so a pair of heavy duty sandals just seemed overkill for a couple puny streams (so we thought). Well, no flip flops were to be found at 7AM on a Wednesday morning in Durango so we head over the the D&SNGRR parking lot, shoulder our packs and head out to the train platform around the corner.


We loaded up our packs in the baggage car and took our seats and waited...
About a 15 minutes later, still sitting on the train, we start to wonder why we were told to arrive 1 hour early. After multiple individual trips to Starbucks while the other held our seats, the train finally began to show signs of departure and we finally departed at 0816.

If you have never taken the D&SNGRR, it is well worth the trip but it can get rather long and a round trip ticket would definitely make for a long day of constant shaking and everpresent soot.
The view from the train was totally amazing as it follows the Animas river on its way to Silverton. The Animas was running incredibly high, the 2004/2005 snowpack must have been huge! I almost wished I was there for boating instead of backpacking.

At about 11:15, the conductor stopped by to tell use that we were about 15 minutes from our stop at Elk Park. He asked us what we were planning to do and I told him we were going to circle around to Needleteon, that is, up over the continental divide and back to the Needleton stop. He looked at me for a few moments and then asked if we had ice tools. I looked at “him” for a few moments and said no.. we are backpacking. He then began to tell me how all the passes were completely snowed in and nobody has yet made it on foot this year (without ice axes and crampons that). Needless to say, I started to get a little worried.

About 15 minutes later, we are brought forward to the front of the train as it arrives in Elk Park. Another conductor asks me about our plans and again I mention our route which results in yet another conductor’s disconcerting pause. He then says, “make sure you are on the passes before 10 AM or you will be up to your chest. Not having brought any snowshoes, this sounded like good advice. I believe we ended up hitting about four passes on this trip, not one of which, ok maybe one, were before 10 AM.

The train finally came to a stop in Elk Park which is about halfway between Silverton and Durango, we stepped off and the conductors handed our bags down to us as well as a family of four whom also stepped off the train in Elk Park. It turns out the family was simply going to camp in Elk Park for a few days and then catch the train back to Durango, they didn’t seem to be in much of a hurry.

Kevin's with the train departing Elk Park in the background.

We had about 10 miles of uphill to do that day so we proceeded to unpack our food bags for a quick lunch. After scarfing down a quarter of a loaf of Hawaiian bread, sausage and cheese, we headed off looking for the trailhead. According to the map (Note: we did not bring the actual USGS quads as something like 5 or six separate quads are required, so we each bought one of the waterproof maps they sell at stores like REI. Not quite as detailed but we figured the trail would be well marked…), the trail followed the river, so we headed to the junction of the Train Tracks and Elk Creek and started hiking up Elk Creek. Needless to say, this was a mistake. We got about a half mile up Elk Creek before we realized just how deceiving our glossy REI map really was compared to an actual USGS 7.5 Quad. In fact, Kevin’s map was slightly different and showed the trails not on my map and vice versa that would later prove to be a real pain up near Hunchback pass. Anyway, we decided to hoof it back to the spot the train dropped us off at to get a fresh start when we happened to stumble across the Elk Creek Trail. I had immediate déjà vu as I realized I had been in this exact same spot nearly 16 years ago when I had gone to Colorado for a 30 Day Outward Bound Course in this area.

As we headed up the Elk Creek trail, we stopped and signed the trail register which I looked through to see if anybody had made any note of doing the loop from Needleton. No luck, however, there were a few interesting entries. One party had a member who hurt their back about 7 miles up the trail and had come back out to catch the train. Another party had spotted a black bear and marked the GPS coordinates. There was also a sign indicating a foot bridge was out on Vallecito Creek due to an avalanche and that the river and debris field was not passable to Pack animals. At the time, we didn’t really think anything of the bridge being out, so we would have another stream crossing, big deal….

Several miles up Elk Creek trail, we passed a little clearing next to the creek where I was struck be Déjà vu again, though it cannot be considered Déjà vu as this was a distinct memory, I had spent 3 days in that exact spot while on my Outward Bound solo trip. In fact, it came back so clearly that I distinctly remembered picking raspberries just to the north of the trail and lo and behold, there they were.

After several hours of tortuous uphill hiking in the heat, we finally stopped for a rest next to a couple of beaver ponds, downed some power bars, decided we had only been hiking for about two hours and had maybe made 3 or 4 miles. It was going to be a long day.

At about 1500 we had just broken out of treeline and decided to stop for a break, get a snack and a little go juice (chai tea). During the 20 minutes or so we were resting, some serious thunderclouds started rolling in from the East and the wind started to really pick up. Although we figured we were only a couple of miles from where we wanted to camp at Eldorado lake, we also figured it would be best if we were a little less exposed during the lighting storm. So we headed back down the trail a couple hundred yards and began to setup camp in the midst of a howling wind. Around 1630, the wind died down and we cooked an early dinner.

After dinner, we proceeded bear bagging our food and had to hike even further down the trail to find a suitable tree. Needless to say, our bear bag that night was pretty pathetic and I’m embarrassed to say that the process of getting a line up and over a single usable branch in two trees was even more pathetic. In Colorado, especially above treeline, the trees simply are not suitable for proper bear bagging. Kevin and I have found that the easies way to do get our food at least 10 feet off the ground is to find two trees relatively close together and for each of us get our own 50’ of P-Cord over a branch tie the ends together in the middle, attach our stuff sacks containing our food and haul on the ends, heaving at the same time. You really need 100’ of cord to do this right so we both carry a 50’. Hauling the food up is the easy part, actually slinging a limb that is about 15 to 20 feet of the ground is the hard part.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that we had a visitor to our camp while we were eating dinner. It must have been the biggest Mountain Goat I have ever seen. Actually, it was the only mountain goat I had ever seen but it was definitely large. It turns out they like to eat the foliage upon which humans have urinated, probably for the salt. Needless to say, this guy was doing circles around our camp. Where we had marked our territory, he was gobbling it all up.

Day 2
The next morning, our visitor was back and getting a bit more aggressive about looking for food. As I was umm, taking my morning constitutional, he started heading my way and I was not exactly in a position to start running. Just then, he lets out a snort and bolts off into the bushes. It turns out that Kevin had been trying to scare him off by lobbing a few rocks in its direction when he actually nailed the goat right between the eyes as it was eyeing me. I felt a little lucky it didn’t head butt me not to mention a little pissed at Kevin.

Our Visitor. This guy was huge, I swear. The funny thing is that we actually saw packs of them on Day 4, apparently there is a ton of them in Chicago Basin where they are a real nuisance due to the proximity of a billion campers.

The hike up to hunchback pass was probably one of the more enjoyable sections on this trip. It was as green, open, and a cloudless sky as far as you could see. Although there were not as many wildflowers as we had seen in the Maroon Bells, it was still beautiful to see them in waves between the snow drifts. Not exactly what we had expected based on conversations with the train conductors.

We were up and over Hunchback pass by noon and had a quick lunch just over the top alongside what appeared to be the headwaters of Vallecito Creek

For the remainder of the day, we hiked down the Vallecito trail at an expeditious speed. Around 4pm we crossed rock creek and were coming around a corner when we were stopped in our tracks by a huge black bear directly in front of us. We weren’t really sure if we should start backing away, it clearly did not see or smell us. A little nervous, we decided to stand tall and started talking in a deep voice, “how ‘bout them bears, eh? The bear immediately stood up to its full height, looked around, spotted us and started trotting away. At this point we realized we had a camera and tried to snap a photo but by the time we got this shot, the bear was already getting out of site.











If you look really, really, close, you can see the bear just to the Right of the big grey rock. I know, I know, it may as well have been bigfoot but I assure you, that is a gigantic black bear! Click on the picture for a larger view (and user your back button to return to this page).

We hiked for another two hours or so until we spotted what looked like a primo camping spot on the East Side of Vallecito Creek (which was now a raging torrent and a little scary to think about crossing with full packs). It turns out that others had apparently the same idea in previous years, in fact, it looked like some sort Outfitter’s campsite with horse tethers, rope, tarps, horseshoes and bones everywhere.

Note: Hiking down the Vallecito Creek trail, it seemed as though we were about as remote as possible in the mountains of Colorado which is why I was startled to round a switchback and nearly stepped on a hiker sitting on the ground resting. I said Hi, wondering if the guys was Ok and he simply said Hi, so we continued on without another word. After we returned to Durango, we were headed over to get some pizza and as we crossed the main drag, I swear to god, I spotted this same dude walking the opposite direction. Except this time, he seemed to be all “scratched” from head to toe as if he had “crawled” through all the avalanche debris.

Day 3
We saw some serious mileage on the previous day and our late start on day 3 was the result of the aches incurred. However, once we got on the trail, we again attained a pretty fast cruising speed, only to be slowed down by several avalanche debris fields. At one point, we were jumping from trunk to trunk through the debris and later had to walk several hundred yards uphill in order to circumvent some impassable sections. In all, I would estimate that we trudged through about a mile of avalanche debris but it was so time consuming, it definitely seemed to be a bit farther.

At about Noon, we were thrilled to find our bridge over Vallecito Creek intact as we were headed up the Johnson Creek Trail. We had remembered the sign at the trail register indicating a bridge out but couldn’t remember exactly what bridge that was! We ate lunch at the bridge and met a guy leading a group of about 7 College or Senior high School kids whom had already been out for 17 days.

The hike up Johnson Creek trail was pretty grueling but certainly had some amazing views higher up the trail. Despite a number of stream crossing which would simply have been rock hopping in previous years, we still made pretty good time. However, by the time we broke out of tree line, we decided to start looking for a campsite as we did not want to get too exposed as we were starting to get the usual afternoon thunder and lightning and if we continued on, we would simply start climbing up to Columbine pass where we certainly did not want to be at that time.

Day 4
We got an early start as we felt Columbine pass was going to be a real ass kicker. In fact, my heart went into my throat as I saw tracks going off to the south to another pass and which passed over some seriously steep snow fields with unforgiving run outs. Fortunately, we quickly determined this was Trimble pass and not Columbine pass and breathed a HUGE sigh of relief.

View looking up at Columbine Pass from Johnson Creek Drainage

On the last push up Columbine pass, we encountered a husband and wife with their 10(?) year old son whom they were taking on his first backpacking experience. Apparently they were doing the loop in the opposite direction and were extremely interested to hear about trail conditions. We said goodbye and within minutes we were standing on top of Columbine Pass where it was all downhill from there.

We had two itineraries when we originally set out. According to the aggressive plan, we should have camped in Chicago Basin the night before and climbing a 14er on Day four. However, getting slowed down by stream crossings, avalanche debris and playing it safe with the afternoon thunderstorms had put us behind schedule by about 3 or 4 hours. As a result, we did not arrive in Chicago Basin until about Noon on the day we were supposed to be climbing Mt Windom.

While eating lunch we contemplated making an attempt on Mt Windom or … setting up camp and hiking out the next day. We were pretty beat and I said, I could sure use a beer about now. So Kevin says, we may be able to make the 2:30 Train if leave now which gives us a little over two hours to hike the seven miles down to the Needleton stop. Needless to say, we flew down that trail, stopping only briefly to talk to the poor saps trudging up until the though of beers urged us to politely excuse ourselves and continue the run downhill.

We arrived at Needleton just a little after 2PM. We washed up in preparation of rubbing shoulders with the tourists again and waited for the train. Unfortunately, the train does not make a 2:30 stop at Needleton and despite a bunch of poser backpackers (liquored up and carrying trashbags full of empty beer cans and brand spanking new (and matching) gear) waving their arms off trying to stop the train. So… we waited another hour at which point the train stopped and we got on despite a little fiasco with the conductor on being a day early.

Once back in town, we had pizza, coffee, a six hour drive back to Denver and a whirlwind of memories from the last four days.

Katrina Disaster Donations

According to the FBI in a recent CNN article, Katrina relief scams are proliferating on the internet. As you open your heart and your pocket book, do not be afraid to give, but please don't get scammed. Check out this article at American Red Cross through Amazon's Donation page since I trust the Red Cross and Amazon far more than some unknown organization. Besides, donating through amazon is super easy and efficient when you are a current customer.



While I'm at it, there is a website setup by the Red Cross for families to get hold of each other at http://www.familylinks.icrc.org/katrina

I wish I could do more, I can only hope this information helps somebody.

Paul

Happy 4th of July everyone. I hope everyone has a great weekend and remembers the importance of this great day. We have already lit all our fireworks and as you can see, Jack and Kyle are ready for their parade, although we have a bit more decorating of Jack's Monster truck to do.

Who says you cannot take a 4 year old backpacking?

With a lot of patience, plenty of time and very few miles to travel, I found it is entirely possible. On Friday, Jack and I set out on the Missouri Lakes Trail in an attempt to make it to the lower lake, which is about 3.5 miles. Jack carried a kid sized backpack that held his water, fleece, rainjacket and whistle. I found that due to the amount of water on the trail, Jack was far better off wearing Sandals while hiking up hill but really needed shoes on the downhill. I had given him the whistle with strict instructions to only blow the whistle if he was lost and could not see his Daddy. He took this literally and waited for me to get far enough ahead and out of site for hme to start blowing. Therefore I told him about the little boy who cried wolf and morphed the story into the little boy who blew his whistle. I think he got the moral but now that I think about it, I should have just let him blow that whistle to his hearts content. Anyway, we spent about 3 hours on the trail when Jack reached his limit and I had run out of stories (which seemed to distract him enough to keep moving forward), so we found a nice little campsite which I believe was about 2.5 miles from the trailhead. Once we got into camp, Jack helped me setup the tent, kitchen tarp, get water, cook dinner, start a small campfire and Bear Bag. Jack thought the freeze dried spaghetti dinner was simply outstanding and even wanted seconds. I wasnt sure if he just really loved it or was just so hungry that he would have eaten Dirt.




Unfortunately, i started drifting off before the stars really came out so we got ready for bed a before it got dark, I read a little from the current book in my backpack, (Part of Robinson Carusoe. I only had a portion of the book as I had ripped it in half on a previous trip to save weight and the first couple of chapters ended up in a campfire somewhere in the Maroon Bells last year). However, he was more interested in wrestling than reading, he must have gotten a second wind. Although the temperature dropped quite a bit Friday night, I think he slept just fine wearing his winter PJ's inside Tiffany's sleeping bag (which I had tied knot about 3' from the bottom to make it kid size). I think he was pretty bummed as we broke camp Saturday Morning and prepared to walk out. Next time, we will have to go for two or more nights but I will definitely want to bring a second adult unless I am able to grow eyes in the back of my head.

Finally... an update

Wow, I have been really terrible at keeping this site up to date, I guess that is what having a newborn in the house does to you. Anyway, I have updated the family album with pictures from February through June. It has been a pretty uneventful last few months as our lives essentially revovlved around taking care of the boys.

Jack has finished his first year of preschool which I think has really payed off, he is no longer hiding under desks (his tiger dens) and growling at passers by, but is actually playing with the other kids. In fact, he has made a couple good friends in his preschool class that he continues to see once a week or so.

Both Jack and Kyle have started private swim lessons which is a big relief for Tiff andI as they both have no fear of the water and have had even less skills.

On Father's Day, the whole family went hiking up above Boulder which was a lot of fun and if you can believe it, Jack hiked 4 miles under his own power until we were turned aound by snow.

It's A Boy!

Carter was born this morning at 10:31 AM and weighed in at 7lbs 15.7oz. Tiff is recovering at the hospital and appears to be doing fine. Jack was able to stop by this afternoon and hold Carter for a few minutes and seems thrilled to have a new baby brother to beat up on. Well, I'm off to the hospital...

Here are some photos....
http://paul.beckford.net/Albums/MyFamily/05-01/FamilyAlbum.htm


Video of Carter's Birth (Please be patient this is a large file and takes a while to load. If it is jumpy, press pause, get a cup of coffee, come back and enjoy):

windows media file

A full size version is available to download here:
http://paul.beckford.net/media/video/Carter1.mpg



Paul

Kyle's Birthday

Here is a little video I made for Kyle's 2nd Birthday...

I just wanted to thank everyone for their amazing generosity. Kyle certainly had a wonderful day. As I write this, he has arisen from his afternoon nap and is going to town on all his toys with Jack. Thanks Everyone.

Isn't Santa Awesome??

Christmas Day with the Woolen Family...

Isnt Santa awesome?

Jack's Favorite of the day...

A momentary lull in a frenzied present opening session...

Nobody ever sends the out takes from their christmas card picture, so this year, I almost sent a collage. But in the end, I had a change of heart but still think it would be funny to share a picture or two that did not make the cut....