drewish.com

Oregon

NE SHORE KLAMATH LAKE, OR - Woke up in the middle of the night freezing. Trying to save weight by leaving the sleeping bag at home and bringing what's really a polarflece blanket wasn't the best idea. Put on all my clothes and got back to sleep until a semi pulled off a couple hundred feet up the highway. My fears that he would park there with his motor idling all night were unfounded.

I got moving at a reasonable hour, made 10 miles and got breakfast around 09:00. It was much more pleasant riding through the Klamath Basin this year, partially because I had a tailwind and partially because it wasn't a dust bowl. Last summer there was a big fight between the farmers and the USDA over water. The feds were trying to provide water for an endangered fish and the farmers wanted to be able to make their mortgage payments. This winter was wet enough that the farmers got to plant and it didn't, as one guy I talked to at breakfast put it, "come to violence".

I stopped at a yard sale just outside of Klamath Falls and purchased three super-pimp western wear shirts, one will be a gift but the other two will soon be making appearances in my photos. The ladies at the yard sale gave me the low down on the bike trail a mile up the road. I forget the name but it was a really nice rails to trails path that hooked up with the Canal Path which took me right into downtown Klamath Falls.

In downtown I pulled up at Bicycle Jones, a very cool shop--last summer they really saved our butts, only to find it was closed Sundays and Mondays. I looked around for a place that was open where I could sit down a minute, think through my options and make a couple phone calls. I found a pizza place and set up shop. As instructed I got some ice for my knee, borrowed their phone book to try to find another bike shop that might be open, and went to town on their salad bar.

With a refreshed knee, a full stomach, and a resolve not to worry about shifting, I set out. My plan was to get to the campground just past the cataracts of US 97 [okay maybe I spelled it wrong, but you know what I'm talking about: the blockages that for years prevented the discovery of the source of the Nile river].

I don't know where to start enumerating the perils of old 97 as it leaves Klamath Falls. On ODOT's Oregon Bicycling Guide those 8 miles are colored red, indicating "Caution areas, due to narrow roads, poor visibility, or high truck volumes". Let me tell you, it's got all three.

It starts with a narrowing shoulder, cut into the side of the mountain, sandwiched between a Jersey barrier and two opposing lanes of semis. Then comes two miles of a long straight stretch with a nice 4 foot shoulder bordered by a very soft gravel that drops 20 feet at a 45 degree angle to a 3 foot wide swath of stinging nettles and a barbwire fence. Throw in a crosswind that has you swerving to avoid both the shoulder and the traffic and you've got quite an expression on your face as you shout "hooo-ahhh" at the passing traffic.

All that said I'd still rather ride it than any federal highway in Iowa, that place is scarry. I spent a few white knuckled minutes staring at my mirror glad that most of the traffic was headed the other way. After this it opens up to some nice wide shouldered, flat riding.

Just trying to get out of California

SR-139 MILE 34.5 MODOC COUNTY, CA - Adin will officially be the last time I camp in a city park--at least one with grass in it. I woke up to pee around 04:00 and heard sprinklers going. Thinking that it sounded like bad news I moved my tent and bike over where the grass didn't look so green. Close but no cigar, an hour later: "glug, glug, glug, cur-chunk, chunk, chunk", that part got watered too. So I moved the bike and tent again, this time onto a patch of dirt between the restrooms and baseball field. Soaking wet I changed into dry clothes and managed to get back to sleep.

The second time I woke up was under much more pleasant circumstances. A bit of precision sleeping-in had allowed my stuff to dry, and put me right on track to be at the Frosty when it opened at 09:00. I got down to the general store, picked up a couple of things (the owner remembered us from last summer) then went to get my breakfast on.

My standard cycling breakfast consists of two eggs, hashbrowns, toast, and a short stack of pancakes. I remembered the Frosty doing a quality breakfast and I wasn't disappointed. The only thing I will say is that I miss midwest prices. In a small town in Iowa or Ohio you could get that same breakfast and cup of coffee for $5.

I moseyed on out of town a little after 10:00 and headed out on a county road, it's a much more gradual climb that meets back up with 139. It's a long straight road with almost no traffic, perfect for riding but it gets a little boring. I practiced playing the harmonica, listened to the one radio station I could get, really what ever I could think of to stay occupied.

The knee's doing alright, both my mom and a nurse on the list recommend icing it. Good advice (like you can argue with your mom AND a nurse), now I've just got to find some ice. I guess I'll keep my eye out for creeks.

The afternoon was great, I had a tail wind all the way up the hill going to meet 139. Coming down the hill was another story, it was all head winds. I guess I'm maturing as a rider, the wind didn't really bother me. It starts blowing, just put it in a lower gear and keep on pedaling. Come to a hill, just put it in a lower gear and keep on pedaling. Maybe riding 4000 miles on an overly ambitious schedule will put you in that mind frame.

Random Thoughts (Feel free to skip on down):

• Fruit Newtons: never as good as they look, no matter what flavor. Save your money.
• I don't mean to speak ill of a tailwind but, moving the same speed as the air, you sure do get hot.
• Sunglasses: Man they're nice. How did I ride without them?
• New marketing campaign for Wet-Wipes: They make showering once a week bearable.

I think I'm about 40-50 miles from Klamath Falls, barring the unforeseen I'll get in there tomorrow. All I really need to do is hit a bike shop and get some lube on my shifter cables. Then it's over into the Willamette Valley and North.

Into Adin

ADIN, CA - I was up and set to get a full day in, until I got on the bike. Right away my left knee started killing me. I'd been babying the other one the day before, letting the left do the burden of the pedaling, a mistake I'll not repeat. Even with an ACE bandage on it, every pedal stroke stung. I picked off the easy 7 miles of flat going around the lake but pulled off into the campground at the bottom of the pass out.

I screwed around doing a little bike eminence, eating, finding a pay phone to use the PocketMailer. Mostly just wasting the cooler, calmer part of the day. Around noon, when both the wind and heat were finally starting to get bad, I got moving.

As long as I took it slow the knee was okay. The thought that kept me going was dinner at the frosty in Adin. Several hours and whole lot of pedaling on some narrowly shouldered stretches of 139 and I was there. And let me tell you: greasy food and a strawberry milkshake are the best kind of cycling food I've found.

From here I'm going to try to get into Klamath Falls day after tomorrow, knee willing. Then I'm kind of thinking I'd like to see how far north I can get, maybe up to Seattle. I've got a plane ticket out of Portland on the 9th of July so as long as I'm there for that... well, it's a wide open road.

North through California

EAGLE LAKE,CA - Got a nice early start today, actually beat the sun out of bed. Something about sleeping uncomfortable that just makes it easier to get up in the morning.

The legs are holding up well I'm to take it pretty easy the next couple of days, shoot for 40 milers then let the mileage come up gradually from there.

I'd been trying to make up my mind about where I wanted to go for a few days. Once I got to Susanville I had to make a choice. If I was headed to East Oregon, Washington or Idaho I'd need to stay on US 395. If I was headed for West Oregon I'd be headed north on CA 139 toward Klamath Falls. I'd been meaning to check the map while I was eating lunch. After sleeping through a couple of the hotter hours of the day I finally got around to looking for the map. It was gone. I looked around for it a bit, with no luck, then decided to go over to the park and think through my options.

There were a ton of kids at the park and they all thought the BikeE was a "tight bike". I spent 15 minutes answering questions. I mentioned loosing my map and one kid said there was a AAA in town and gave me directions. I rode down to the strip mall he'd described and asked some lady if she knew where it was. She told me it was back where I'd just come from then she told how to get there. Now she either gave me really bad directions or she had no idea what she was talking about. In either case she had no business giving me directions. I wish I'd just listened to the kid, at least I found his landmarks.

At that point I decided (rather than paying for a map) to just head north on 139. That's the way we went last summer so I know where I'm going and where the services are. It was a big pull out of town but I wasn't in any kind of a hurry. I'd made my mileage goal that morning just by getting to Susanville. I plugged along over the pass and down into this beautiful grassy valley. I was ready to call it a day at this point but there wasn't really any place to camp, it was all marshy (read: mosquitos). So on I went over the next pass and down to Eagle Lake. The plus of picking up those extra miles is that I'm in position to be eating lunch in Adin tomorrow.

Leaving Reno

DOYLE, CA - After piddling around for part of the morning I finished packing and started loading up the bike. I've got a feeling I'm going to be mailing quite a bit of stuff home. My brother stopped by and took me out to lunch then took my "going away" picture in the front yard, it's pretty cool.

I finally hit the road around 13:00. There's really only one way to go north out of Reno, so I found it a little weird re-riding the route Brad and I rode last summer. This time I'm alone.

It looked like it was going to rain on me most of the way out of town. Storms bring wind and it was mostly side winds but I didn't notice. I spent most of my time trying to figure out why my speedometer isn't working. Fortunately it was free though.

There is defiantly a rhythm to the road. Being out in the middle of it you pay more attention to nature's cycles, the sun, the moon. Then there's the perpetual state of deja vu. I suppose it's the monotony but you find yourself noticing little things over and over, the buzz of power lines, the smell of roadkill, feeling the salt in your sweat crystallizing on your forehead.

I so glad to be back out on the road, I can't think of anything I'd rather be doing right now.

There were a few points during our trip when I never thought I'd saying this, but I miss having Brad along. We argued like a married couple and drove each other crazy but after that there are few people I know better. I wouldn't mind having him here to spell check my emails either.

pocketmailer fixed

i was having problems with my pocketmailer, it would send emails but they'd never show up and i wasn't getting any error messages. angie at pocket mail got me all straightened out; i'd mistyped my reply-to address on the device. i'm assuming that any mail server that got an email from me would check the reply-to to make sure it was a valid domain then upon finding that it wasn't would just drop the email. after all you couldn't very well send a error to an non-existent email address.

now i'm free to finish packing and leave town, secure in the knowledge no email address is safe from my verbose journal entries.

leaving

i leave tomorrow.

more on bush's "peace plan"

nytimes: Bush Demands Arafat's Ouster Before U.S. Backs a New State; Israelis Welcome Tough Line

Israeli officials were delighted. "I thought all the way through the speech, this is the carrot, now comes the stick," a senior Israeli official said. "There was no stick � because we don't deserve the stick."

salon: Fiddling while the Middle East burns

Forget the fact that it is far from clear that Arafat, and the Palestinian leadership in general, supports the current wave of terror attacks or has the power to stop them. The Bush administration presumably knows that the Palestinians are not going to suddenly elect to throw out the corrupt leadership of the Palestinian Authority and replace it with a bunch of hitherto nonexistent Martin Luther Arafats just because the American president -- whose words and actions have shown him to be a one-note moralist who is ignorant of the issues -- told them to.

salon: "Clear moral vision" or "sugar-coated palliative"?

This is the cycle. The only way to break that cycle is to stop rewarding the terrorists. Sharon is rewarding the terrorists. Sharon, in effect, is saying any single person who doesn't want to see a Palestinian state can take an act of terror and destroy the process. This would be as if the U.S. government had said to African-Americans in the 1960s, "We will give you civil rights as long as there's an end to all black crime in the United States. There has to be an entire year with no murders of white people by black people." It's never going to happen.

a william safire article i can agree with

i didn't think it would ever happen but william safire has writen an article i can link to with out a hostile lead in. maybe it's because it's about soccer though...

commentary on bush's speach

well here's the actual quote regarding the settlements:

As we make progress towards security, Israel forces need to withdraw fully to positions they held prior to September 28, 2000. And consistent with the recommendations of the Mitchell Committee, Israeli settlement activity in the occupied territories must stop.

this falls far short of what i was hoping for. it seems to only call on the israelis to stop building new settlements. i don't think the arab street will think it's acceptable either.

i do agree with his assment of chairman arafat however:

I call on the Palestinian people to elect new leaders, leaders not compromised by terror. I call upon them to build a practicing democracy, based on tolerance and liberty. If the Palestinian people actively pursue these goals, America and the world will actively support their efforts.

bush announces his peace plan

bush gave his long awaited speech on the mideast today. the parts highlighted in the ap article seemed pretty balanced. he called for the palestinians to hold elections by the end of the year for a new leader and legislature and the creation of a constitution. of the israelis he "demanded that Israel withdraw to positions it held on the West Bank two years ago and to stop building homes for Jews on the West Bank and in Gaza. Ultimately, he said, Israel should agree to pull all the way back to the lines it held before the 1967 Mideast war."

i'd like to find a transcript and read his actual wording. if he was clear that all the jewish settlements need to be removed i'd be pretty happy with his speech.

[update] here's a list of the major points of bush's speech and a transcript.

check list

my pre-flight checklist looks something like this:

• go to dentist
• fix my web/mail server
• wait for pocketmailer to arrive in the mail
• wait for glasses to arrive in the mail
• buy reno souveniers (for gifts on the road)
• create a drivers cd for my camera
• finish packing

i'm going to plan to leave tomorrow morning but i'm thinking it'll be more like wednesday.

new photo system

i've been looking for a better way to make my photos web accessible for a while. originally i wrote a php site to do it but it was linked to a microsoft sql server so when i moved to freebsd it no longer worked. a couple of days ago i came across gallery and it fits almost all of my needs. playing around with it i put up all my pictures from my first trip to asia, the trip to spain and the bike trip. feel free to check them out. i'll be slowly moving pictures into it, i think the ones from spain are next. keep an eye out.

news wrap up

the fbi is finally warning synagogues and jewish groups that al qaeda might use fuel tanker trucks in attacks against them. apparently this is based on intelligence gleaned from prisoners in cuba. why did they have wait to hear it from them? al qaeda was already linked to an attack on a synagogue in tunisia using this technique. it's hard to predict a new form of an attack but as soon as a one is recognized we should at the very least make people aware of it.

the ny times has a telling quote in an article israel's decision to reoccupy the west bank.

In one of many hand-wringing analysis in the newspapers, the weekend magazine of Haaretz recounted the visit of Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer to a jailed failed suicide bomber, Arien Ahmed, in which he tried to seek out her motives.

Reflecting on their conversation, the defense minister says, referring to the Israeli Defense Forces:

"But unfortunately, while the I.D.F. is carrying out these necessary actions, the operations themselves become a hothouse that produces more and more new suicide bombers. The military actions kindle the frustration, hatred and despair and are the incubator for the terror to come. The religious and political environment immediately exploits this effect and dispatches the new suicide bombers, and the pattern is repeated."

the washington post has a piece that let me appreciate the horrible situation the israeli government has created for the settlers in the west bank.

israel has arrested a settler accused of killing a palestinian man after the funeral of another settler (i mentioned it here yesterday). i'm curious to see what happens with it. the pa's trackrecord in similar circumstances indicates they'd just detain someone for a few months then set them free or possibly trying them in a hastily concocted court.

settler violence

the washington post has a pretty disturbing account of the palestinian man killing the most of a family of settlers in the west bank. one bit they sort of glossed over "[settlers] then went on a rampage in a nearby Arab town, killing one Palestinian, firing randomly in the streets and burning cars and a house." if you were to hold the israeli's to their own standard, the idf should have prevented these terrorists from entering the pa controlled areas.

a little humor about the mideast

arabs slyly building wall around israel.

clinton burning the christians

i don't really know how to introduce this article. mainly it deals with the extremist muslims in pakistan but it's got a great suprise ending.

trip photos

i forgot to mention that photos are up from the driving part of the road trip. i'll go back and add captions later.

mideast update

well the palestinians and israelis seem just short of open war. a palestinian killed a settler and three of her children, the idf killed 3 palestinian children and an old woman, and suicide bombings are just getting worse. they're getting bad enough that more than 50 palestinians took out a full page ad condemning them.

but here's what really gets me annoyed, arafat is finally ready accpet clinton's 2000 peace plan. well great, except it's a year too late. arafat really needs to go but the us and israel need to back off of pushing for his removal. it must be a palestinian decision.

server issues to be resolved

my server (multivac) will have a little down time tomorrow. the case it's in is causing some over heating/crashing on the weekends when the air get's turned off at the office where it lives. it should only take an hour or two but if you send me an email and it bounces that's the reason.

the trap called reno

okay i'm still here in reno. last night i went with steve and bob up to jen and shannen's house and hungout with them and their friend molly. i'd stopped drinking on the road trip for cost reasons. it seemed like a good idea at the time but man free beer causes the worst hangovers and i've still got a doosey of one.

funny link

man, with more math teachers like this, it would have been my favorite subject.

major change of plans

i've had a big change of plans, i was going to be doing the driving trip for most of the summer but after meeting this couple riding from bakersfield to bozeman mt on a tandem for their honeymoon I really want out of the car. the speeding ticket on the way home confirmed that this needs to be a riding summer.

so the short is i'm back in reno and getting ready to ride until the 8th of july or so. i'm flying to ny city with my dad the 10th to the 14th and then I've got to start packing for the move to portland. my working plan right now is that I'd like to see the grand coulee dam up north on the columbia river, there's a woody guthrie song of the same name that i'm really into of the same name. i'll see how far i get before i run out of time and have to ride back.

on the road again

bishop is a pretty boring place during the week, i checked out all the parking lots at the gorge and there were no cars. i think i'm going to be headed up to yosemite today. maya, who works with joe, told me i should go hike half dome, it's supposed to be really pretty.

with charles in the gorge

charlie and i camped out at horton creek, you guested it, the free campground. we hit the upper gorge for most of the day doing one 8 that went up a crack in a dihedral. it was one of the funnest climbs i've ever done. normally i'm used to looking down and seeing rock dropping down in front of you--it's kind or reasuring--this one i'd look down and just see emptiness and charlie standing way down there in the middle of the v.

climbing in the owens river gorge

i went up to the central gorge this morning hoping i'd be able to meet up with someone and get some climbs in. i got a belay first thing in the morning from this team of asain kids who were flying up 5.11s on the great wall of china (it seemed kind of funny at the time). i felt a little peer pressure to get on something a little harder than a 5.9 so i hopped on a 10a, i made it up it but man, that wasn't a good route to warm up on.

after a quick nap a little later in the morning i hooked up with a party of three dotcomers spent the day climbing with them. we flew up some 8s and 9s, it was a great because they were right about the level i wanted to be climbing at.

charles came down to bishop that evening hang out and climb tomorrow. while i was waiting for him at shat's bakery i got to talking with the old guy who calls himself the sierra phantom. he could tell a story, said he'd spend most of 50 years living up in the sierras. said he'd been in national geographic, reader's digest, and a bunch of other news sources. i'm not sure how much i belive but i'd like to do a little research on him.

sitting around in bishop

this turned into a total sitting around day, i got a note up a wilson's sports looking for a partner. then i just sat around working on the computer.

i got an email from joe saying that he'll have sunday and monday off so i'll try try to get a hold of him.

another bike ride this summer

i finally caught up on the news about the nbg (national bike greenways)'s relay ride, i'd been a bit behind since i left this summer. very bad news, their chicago to des moines rider, andrew heckman, was hit by a car breaking his pelvis and skull, you can read more about it on his fiance's website.

i keep thinking of all the things i've done that were just plain stupid that i was able to get away with. i've been lucky, really lucky, i hope that andrew get some luck now. the ride is now in his honor and i've decided to sign up to ride the portland to sacramento segments. i'm going to talk with martin, head of the nbg, about setting up some kind of sponsorship to raise money for andrew.

climbing in the alabama hills

yesterday i didn't do much at all. went out for breakfast, then got some coffee and sat around. i met a newly wed couple riding from bakersfield, ca to their home in bozeman, mt for their honeymoon.

went up to the alabama hills in the afternoon to look around and see if i could meet up with some people to climb with. ended up running into another couple from montana, nate and heidi were heading out but said they'd meet me this morning if i wanted to climb then.

i hooked up with them around 10:00 and we got on a couple of 7s and 8s then one 10b. before nate lead the 10b he asked to borrow a couple of draws. he was grunting pretty good the whole way up and when he got down, i made some kind of remark like "boy i don't know if i'll make to to the top of that". "you better make it up there, your draws are at the top and i'm sure not going back up". i got my draws back and had a blast, it was a good crimpy face climb. i'd love to spend a week climbing in the alabama hills.

they decided they wanted to go for a swim in the afternoon and i since they were leaving the next morning just figured i'd head up to bishop, try to meet up with some people in the gorge.

summit day

at 05:10 i woke up and started throwing on clothes trying to get ready. at all the ranger station when i got the permit they told me not to leave anything in the car that had a scent to it food, chapstick, dishes. when you're camping out of the back of your car that's just about everything. so at the time it seemed like a good idea to just park a little way down and walk up, hopefully catching a ride up to the trailhead. not it'd been at least four years since i'd been up the portal road to the whitney trailhead so i wasn't too sure how far it was. if this is starting to sound like foreshadowing that's because it is.

i parked the truck a little before 06:00 and hiked almost 5 miles up the road to the trailhead. the only two cars that drove by ignored my extended thumb. i kept thinking it was always just a little bit further. by the time i realized where it was it was too far to walk back to the truck and have a shot at the mountain. i arrived at the trial head around 08:00, most people start around 03:00 or 04:00.

i had plenty of time to think on the way up, the walk on the asphalt had really taken the spring out of my step and i wasn't sure how far i was going to make it. i started telling myself that i'd hike until 13:30 and turn it around if i wasn't close. it was beautiful country and on the whole i was feeling pretty good.

the trail is 11 miles to the summit with the last campground at mile 6, 3 miles of switchbacks up to summit ridge and another 3 miles to the summit. about 1/4 of the way up the switchbacks i find a fellow named greg chilling out on the rocks. "which way you going? up or down?" "not really sure yet" he replied. i told him about my whole 13:30 plan and it kind of intrigued him. up the switchbacks we went and i finally started passing a couple of people who were headed for the summit.

at around 13:30 we hit the summit ridge. earlier in the day another hiker had told me about mt muir, another 14,000 ft summit on the ridgeline, but 2 and 1/2 miles closer. he was a bit vague on how to get up it but it was on tiny map that came with my permit. not really wanting to go back empty-handed i mentioned it to greg.

greg was into it so we started trying to find a line up onto the top of it. we did some scrambling and 45 minutes later were on top of it. until we looked to the left and saw that we'd picked the wrong spire. at this point we were both huffing pretty bad and no intention of scrambling down, hiking over to the other side and then hoping that we could find a way up what seemed like a 4th or 5th class climb (this is a reference to the yosemite decimal system of rating terrain. 4th class indicates hands and feet are needed with ropes optional. 5th class being ropes required (unless you're some crazy solo climber)) from the 3 sides we'd been able to see.

i hiked with greg down to his camp, he fed me a top ramen and gave me a tylenol--which at that point i really needed--and i started bombing down the hill. i was trying to make sure i'd get down before everyone else, i really didn't want to walk all the way back down to my truck and i figured with a sob story like that someone would give me a ride.

wayne wadell was that kind soul. it was his 52nd birthday and he'd come to climb mt whitney. he was interesting character, a huey door gunner in vietnam, a lead rocket booster testing team leader for the ill-fated west coast space shuttle program, and now a going to school for a degree in theater. my favorite story was how in a cowboy hat like mine he left los angles, ca on a monday and arrived in huntsville, al on a thursday hitching rides from truckers. said he averaged 40-something miles-per-hour the entire way.

oh also during the hiking i drank some snow water. greg and i have a bet going on whether or not i'll get giardia. check back in about 5 days and see if i'm complaining.

hanging out in lonepine

today i was heading back to the campground and noticed two kids with really big packs and a really big black rotwiler. i asked them if they needed a ride, turned out andrew, christina and dude (the dog) were doing the pct. they were trying to get up to horseshoe meadow maybe 20 something miles out of town. not having anything else to do and feeling like i really need to pay back the rides i got in wyoming last summer i said sure, plus joe lane (1999 pct alumni) would have kicked the crap out of me if he heard i didn't.

i dropped them off and since i still didn't have anything better to do went for a hike. man let me tell you that's some pretty forest. an hour or two later i headed back to the campground and started trying to get ready for whitney tomorrow morning.

someone tell dan

dan should get a kick out of this. salon on dumpstering

in lone pine

i went south through mojave. took some pictures of all the mothballed airplanes. it was a real trip, right behind some random strip mall were near 100 planes of all types and airlines.

worked my way up 395 from there. the next morning i stopped at some random campground to look around and the only other guy in the parking lot was wearing climbing shoes and a helmet. curious because he was by himself i asked if he was rapelling. turns out he was solo aid climbing. i walked down into the volcanic gorge a little later and found him almost ready to start. i sat there watching him for almost two hours and i've got to tell you, it's the slowest kind of climbing i've ever seen. i talked to him when he came down to clean the first half of the route. he told me about the climbing in the alabama hills (near lone pine and mt whitney) and a little bit about aid climbing theory. i took a ton of pictures, they'll be up here real soon now.

in lone pine i stopped at one of the sporting goods stores and bought the climbing guide. it had directions to the blm's free "climbers" campground. i got a permit hike to the top of mt whitney and went up to the campground to relax.

this morning i woke up early and the wind was blowing worse than the day before. i didn't really have everything ready and since the permits are free for walkins i decided to try it again tomorrow. untill then.

news roundup

file this under oops.

plans

i'm going to end up staying in slo for another day. it's a very cool town, lots of very cute girls, i've almost run into a couple of things while gawking at them.

today i finally got around to looking at a map and realized how far south i am. that previous bit about going to see my grandmother first it out. i'm going to hook up with 395 and try to do the potal at mt. whitney. i've got some time so getting a permit shouldn't be a problem. after that i'll go north to bishop, i don't see much point in planning beyond that.

slo update

went out climbing with roger this morning. we went a few miles north to this place by the ocean (i don't have the guide with me, otherwise i'd put the name). it was good did a few 5.8s an 5.9s. i didn't really want to push it much beyond that, they seem afraid of overbolting here, runouts of 20 ft were pretty common.

the folding bike is shot, i finally got around to looking at it this afternoon. the fork is bent and front axle seems bent. i'm going to call dahon and see how much money they want to send me a new fork. my knee on the other hand is on the mend, it's finally scabbed over and other than when i first wake up in the morning doesn't hurt.

i think tomorrow i'm going to head down the coast a little, find a place to camp for a day kind of enjoy the cool beach air, after that i'm headed north.

urrrg more server stuff

okay so the box that my server runs on got moved to a new location and the ip address chaged. i got it updated but it might take a little time for everyone to pick up the changes.

i also got some pictures up so scroll down and look at them.

land seizures continue

the idf has begun a new round of land seizures, the ap reports. i don't see how stealing more land is going to help israel prevent future violence.

the conflict in the middle east spills over into... alabama?

the ny times had an article the other day about how a house race in alabama has become proxy battle between israeli and palestinian supporters. when i was having dinner with khaldoon and rula khaldoon mentioned that he'd sent $100 to the guy. after reading the article i think the guy's a bit of a scum bag but since he's one of the few politicians not sticking to the pro-israel line i'll probably send him a few bucks too.

san louis obisbo

i camped at a state park on the coast south of salenas (spelling?). it was my kind of place, cheap, only $1.00 per person per night. i got going early, headed south for san luis obispo.

sometime during the morning i noticed a message on my voicemail, my thai friend called saying she wasn't able to get her visa. i was pretty sure she'd be able to get it so this was a bit of a surprise. in san luis obispo i got on the internet at the public library and sent out some emails.

at this point there was no hurry and a little coffee sounded good. at the 2 dogs coffee shop i started talking to a guy with two quick-draws an a sling (that's climbing gear) for a book bag strap about the local climbing. he drew me a map to the the climbing shops and gym and off i went in search of a climbing partner. at the granite stairway one of the employees roger offered me a driveway to park in and pointed me up to the climbing wall at the calpoly campus. i set out on the folding bike, that until then had been stowed in the back of my pickup. on the way back some fluke of fate sent me flying over the handle bar of my bike causing a nice patch of road rash on my knee and hands. i made out a lot better than the bike, it's not rideable, i'm still walking it off.

farther south

left san jose tonight, headed south on the monterey highway then picked up highway 1 along the coast. picked up a hitchhiker, mike, south of monterey and drove him down to his house. i feel like i need to pay back a couple of the rides i got last summer. he was a pretty cool guy he'd gotten stuck here because of september 11th then fell in love with the place, sort of like i did in portland.

i'd been planning on heading north up the coast to oregon until i got an email from my friend in thailand saying that she'd find out on the 4th if she got her visa. if she gets it she'll be arriving in la on the 5th from there we'll probably cruise around ca doing some touring and climbing, if she doesn't get it i'll probably head through the sierras to bishop through reno to portland.

more server issues

turns out that the mail server wasn't starting up correctly after the reboot. got the startup scripts fixed though so it should be okay in the future. bottom line is that mail was bouncing until about 11:00 yesterday.

server issues

multivac (my server) took a couple of days off over the weekend. my friend hee was able to get it straightened out for me. i wasn't looking forward to driving back to reno to do it myself. i think my mail was bouncing so if you sent me anything on friday or saturday i probably didn't get it.

san jose

i'm over in san jose visiting my burningman friend chris.

yesterday i had dinner with one of the daughters of the family we stayed with in jordan. rula her husband khaldoon and their two daughters (who's names i can't spell) are living in south san jose. i stopped in for a very nice dinner on saturday. got a couple pictures that should be up on the server once i find a bit of bandwith.