Wandering...

Day Eighteen - June 27th, 2009 - Homeward

2009-07-05T21:11:00.004-04:00

Breakfast, then hike, then boat, then bus - back at the office we pick up our stored stuff, then head to the airport.

A couple of hours later we fly to Cusco. A couple of hours after that, Lima. In the Lima airport we buy a bottle of the national liquor, Pisco. We wait around for an eternity, then at midnight we fly to Atlanta. This flight seems really, really long. This is the first time any of us has come through the international concourse in Atlanta. It's really, really stupid. Due to the design of the airport, there's no way to separate the people whose destination is Atlanta from those who are catching a connecting flight. Therefore, after claiming our checked baggage, then going through Customs, we have to CHECK OUR BAGS AGAIN, AND GO THROUGH AIRPORT SECURITY AGAIN!!! This is COMPLETELY ABSURD! We have our bottle of Pisco in our carry-on, and TSA informs us that this must be checked. YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING. We're just trying to GET OUT OF THE DAMNED AIRPORT. WE LIVE HERE! No, she says, you have to take it all the way back to the Delta counter and check it. Unbelievable. We say never mind, keep it. She says it's really not that big a deal to go check it. We say listen lady, we've been traveling for 24 hours, believe us, it's a big deal. I can't believe NO ONE said ANYTHING, and there were NO SIGNS. I bet this happens hundreds of times a day. Besides that, people had been so nice in Peru, bending over backwards to help us out, and people here were being lazy, indifferent jerks. Welcome to America. We leave our Pisco behind, and go CLAIM OUR BAGGAGE AGAIN. Allison's Dad picks us up, and we are HOME.

This was an absolutely stellar trip. The people were great. The food was (mostly) excellent. The country is beautiful and diverse. I'd go back to Peru. Of course, there are lots of places to see before we die...

Day Seventeen - June 26th, 2009 - The Amazon

2009-07-05T17:55:00.021-04:00

Breakfast at 4:30, then we hike out to the river. Mom isn't feeling well, so she sits this one out. We take a boat 1/2 hour upriver, then hike about 1/2 hr to an oxbow lake (a lake created when two sides of a bend in a river meet and it makes a shortcut, then what used to be the bend is sealed off into a lake). We hop a pontoon boat with one other group. We cruise around the lake for three or 4 hours.

We see a family of giant river otters (rare). We see a number of birds, many of which Mom has in Southwest Florida.

Eventually the guides bust out cane fishing poles and bait their hooks with beef. Are they fishing for piranha? Yes!

Jhin catches one, and shows off its teeth, then tosses it back.

We head back to the dock, hike back to the river, boat back to the port, and hike back to the lodge. We crash until lunch, which is excellent.

We hike to the clay lick - a place on the river bank that's rich in minerals that the Macaws like to lick.

There are no Macaws at the clay lick today, but we do see one Red and Green Macaw up in a tree on our way there. Mom is feeling better and joins us for this hike.

We stop back at camp for a moment, then head to the river again. On the way we see some Red Howler Monkeys, and they are howling. They howl when one band of monkeys gets into another's territory. They sound like some sort of sinister machine. We board our boat for a ride upriver to a medicinal garden and Shaman's residence. We get a tour of the gardens, with our guides and the Shaman's assistant describing how the various plants are used. They give us a leaf to chew, without telling us what it is. We get a tingling sensation in our mouths, then numbness. We find out that this plant, Cordoncillo, is a natural source of novacaine, but it's a much more pleasant sensation than getting novacaine at the dentist's office. Drama happens when a guy in our group faints. Turns out he always faints when he gets shots, and his brain has associated the mouth-numbing with getting a shot, causing him to faint. Crazy.

Later in the tour they show us a plant whose seed pods contain some powdery, orange pigmented seeds. They use it to paint our faces, like "war paint". The garden tour ends with what the shamans call the "master plant" Ayahuasca. Ayahuasca is to the natives here what Peyote is to the Native Americans. It is used spiritually, and ceremonially. We stop by the Shaman's lab, where we are given samples of a number of different things. One is an herbal energy drink, another is a natural Viagra, and another is Cat's Claw, a cure for all sorts of things.

We head back to our lodge, have another excellent dinner, and crash. Hard to believe, but tomorrow we are headed hhhhhh. Hhhhhhhhhh. Home.

Day Sixteen - June 25th, 2009 - From Cusco to Puerto Maldonado, in the Amazon

2009-07-05T17:21:00.022-04:00

Mom & I are feeling somewhat better (I have a sinus infection, she probably ate or drank something bad) and we're headed to the Amazon. Our hotel has called a cab for us, but they are late, and so begins Transportation Adventure #3. The hotel continues to assure us that the cab will be here any minute, but we have a plane to catch, and eventually we give up and walk down to Plaza San Blas. We get a cab, and during the 15 minute ride to the airport our driver informs us that normally you should arrive at the Cusco airport 2 hours early. As it is, we will be less than 1 hour early. We are crossing our fingers at this point. There are a ton of police in riot gear outside the airport. Hmmm. We enter the terminal, and the line at LAN Airlines is over 100 people long. Dang. A roving LAN employee assures us that despite the fact that we are checking baggage, we can use the express kiosks. Allison steps up and enters her info. She prints a boarding pass, and finds it to be for her flight to Lima, 3 days from now, not today's flight. Crap. We pull the roving employee over and explain the situation. We are ALL immediately moved to the front of the customer service line. SUPER SCORE! We wouldn't have made our flight any other way. We get our boarding passes and head thru security to find no one at the departure gate. It has changed. It's only right across the hall though, and soon we are on the plane, and not only that, we're in the FIRST ROW.

The flight is just over an hour, with excellent views of the snow-capped Andes. We land at the tiny Puerto Maldonado airport, and take a bus to the office of Rainforest Expeditions, our tour company for this portion of the trip. They have storage here, and we shuffle our stuff around so we're taking as little as possible for the next couple of days. We board the bus with other folks headed to the same lodge. One of them talks about the infamous burned bridge. They say it was about 2 hrs from Cusco, which pretty much confirms that it was the bridge of our early adventure. So the locals eventually set fire to what timbers remained. Wow.

The bus driver stops briefly and points out a monkey in the bushes on the side of the road. It is the smallest variety of monkey that exists here, and it is indeed tiny. A few minutes more, and we arrive at the Tambopata River, where a boat is waiting.

We board for the hour and a half ride to the lodge. They serve us fried rice, with the portions individually wrapped in banana leaves. It's great. On our way to the lodge, our guide points out the capybaras on the shore. These animals are the largest rodents in the world.

Eventually we arrive at the "Port", some wooden steps leading up the muddy riverbank. A 10 minute hike up a muddy trail brings us to the Posada Amazonas Lodge, and it's beautiful.

It's an open-air complex, with separate buildings connected by wooden raised walkways. The rooms are great - no doors or windows, just curtains, no hot water, and mosquito nets for the beds. There are large racks of "Wellington" boots at the entrance, and we are instructed to pick a pair for the duration of our stay (the trails here are very mucky, it's a rain forest after all...)

We settle in, and at 2:30 we hike with our guide, Jhin, to the Canopy Tower. Jhin is clearly very knowledgeable, and explains much about the flora and fauna that we encounter along the way. We see some of one of the larger varieties of monkeys along the way, and a number of interesting birds. Our group consists of the 4 of us and an Indian couple.

The Canopy Tower is a 37 meter tower, constructed mostly of steel scaffolding components, that is taller than all but the very tallest trees. The view is incredible. We hang out awhile, and descend. On the hike back to the lodge, we see Leaf-Cutter Ants at work. They are amazing to watch.

So industrious. Having had a proper night's sleep, and being in a completely new and different environment, we are no longer pining for home.

Our tour company, Rainforest Expeditions, has set their operation up in the most eco-friendly way possible. Also, they hire as many of the native people as possible, and after 20 years of operation, the locals have the option of completely taking over this lodge. It's been in operation for 12, so it's up in 8 more years.

We have some beers at the open-air bar, then a fantastic dinner. Each group has dinner together with its guide, and Jhin informs us that we'll be getting up at 4:30 for an early morning lake tour, so we crash.

Day Fifteen - June 24th, 2009 - Cusco

2009-07-05T14:22:00.018-04:00

Today in Cusco it's the day of the only festival that we actually knew would be happening and planned on attending - the Inti Raymi Festival. Inti Raymi was an ancient Inca celebration in honor of the Sun God, Inti. It was suppressed and eventually prohibited outright by the Spaniards, who called it a pagan ceremony, opposed to the Catholic faith. Since 1944, a theatrical representation of the ceremony has been taking place at Sacsayhuamàn, a large and beautiful Incan ruin just outside of Cusco.

Of course we weren't supposed to be arriving in Cusco until later today, just catching the end of the ceremony. As it is, we get to see the open. We sleep late, breakfast, then wander down to the Plaza. These days the ceremony starts in the Plaza de Armas, then marches the 2 kilometers uphill to Sacsayhuamàn, where it continues. The Plaza is starting to fill up with spectators, and we plant ourselves in a 2nd floor cafe overlooking the scene. Hundreds of actors and dancers take part in the very detailed and choreographed ceremony. A "king" is carried in by his underlings. There are armies of costumed people in formation filling the square. The king steps onto a platform in the middle of the square and delivers a speech in Quechua. A woman near us in the cafe is translating to Spanish for her friends.

The presentation proceeds out of the square towards Sacsayhuamàn. Mom heads back to the hotel for some rest. The rest of us head toward Sacsayhuamàn, but we stop at the nearest restaurant we can find, "Restaurante Turistico Sajama". Lots of restaurants have the word "turistico" in the name, which means "we have food that gringos may enjoy". Despite the name, the place is kinda tucked away, and by the looks of it, and the waiter/owner's enthusiasm, we doubt that many turistas come here. It is good, and we pay 19 Soles for all 3 lunches, with bottled water (about 2 bucks a person, definitely NOT turista prices).

Side note: We are all very tired after yesterday's epic hikes followed by last night's emergency travel session, and Mom and I are not feeling great, plus we've already been in Cusco for a few days before now (been here, done this). All of this conspires to make us sort of "ready to be home". In light of this, I made a list of the things that I was sick of at this particular moment:

Exhaust fumes, especially diesel

Dust and dirt

The smell of urine (Human, Dog, Alpaca) People pee everywhere here, as there are no public restrooms, and many alleys and sidewalks reek of it.

No heat

Waiting (for ANYTHING)

Advertised items not being available

Bad tasting beer (whatever the cause)

Wooden flutes and pan pipes, or for that matter, Andean music in general

Noise

Earplugs (which I've worn to go to sleep most nights)

Tingling hands and feet (another wonderful side effect of Diamox)

and last (but not least), Potatoes (they're everywhere, at every meal) I suspect that there is a positive correlation between the number of days spent in Peru and the number of potatoes left on a gringo's plate in a restaurant (unless the gringo is Irish, of course)

That said, we are leaving tomorrow for the Amazon rain forest, and we realize that we will probably be re-invigorated for the trip.

Myself, Terry, and Allison slowly make our way up the road to Sacsayhuamàn, walking with throngs of people, almost entirely locals. Bleachers are set up around the main stage, and it's 80 bucks American to get in, but crowds of people are gathered on the hillsides surrounding the event, watching for free. We wander about for awhile, as much to see Sacsayhuamàn as to see the festival. Finding a vantage point to see the festival proves difficult indeed, and would've only been possible if we'd staked out a spot a couple of hours ago. Still it was cool to be a part of the whole thing, especially given the locals to turistas ratio.

We head back and check on Mom at the hotel. She's not feeling well, and requests chicken soup. Allison goes out to fetch it, and I nap. Later myself, Allison, and Terry head to dinner at the restaurant where Allison got the soup. We are all excited by the extensive Mexican Food section of the menu. Despite what you might think, Peruvian cuisine is as different from Mexican as Mexican is from Italian. We like Peruvian, but are ready for something else. We ALL order Mexican. The waiter disappears for a few minutes, then returns to inform us that they have everything on the menu except Mexican food. Wow. We are getting used to restaurants not having something that we want, but this is the first time our ENTIRE order has been nixed. We reorder. It is good. We head back and check on Mom, who says she's feeling better. We crash.

Day Fourteen - June 23rd, 2009 - Machu Picchu

2009-07-05T13:32:00.024-04:00

We wake at 4:40, eat, and march to the Machu Picchu bus stand.

We round the corner to find several hundred people in the bus line already! Crap! There are many buses though, and they are leaving and returning rapidly. In about 1/2 hour we are on a bus.

We will miss the sunrise, but it's really cloudy, so it wouldn't have been all that dramatic anyway. A 20 minute ride puts us at the gate to Machu Picchu. We hike in, and despite the bus lines it doesn't seem that crowded. It's a big place, and it's incredible. One of our goals here was to hike to Huanah Picchu, a small ruin on a mountaintop overlooking Machu Picchu, and we are reminded by a sign that only 400 people per day are allowed on the hike, so we breeze thru Machu Picchu to get into the Huanah Picchu line. Terry sits this one out - she has an old ankle injury from a car accident, and it's a long, steep hike - she stays down at Machu Picchu and reads a book. The hike to Huanah Picchu takes us

about an hour. Despite the fact

that the Incas were shorter than us, they built their steps REALLY TALL. We have to stop and huff and puff periodically. Once on top, we find a beautiful little ruin, with terraces, houses (apparently of royalty) and an incredible overhead view of Machu Picchu.

We toodle around here for a bit, take some photos, and head down. Then we make a thorough self-guided tour of Machu Picchu. Next up, we hike out to the Inca Drawbridge, a relatively mellow 1/2 hr hike. Back in the day you could go across the bridge, but a turista fell to her death in years past, so now it's gated off. We head back to Machu Picchu, and Mom and Terry split off to catch a bus back to town. Allison & I start to hike out the Inca Trail, with plans to go as far as the next ruin, Wynah Wynah. We barely get started though, when we run into some folks that, based on their gear, are clearly off the trail. Allison asks them how their Inca Trail experience has been, and they say great, except that they did their 3rd AND 4th days of hiking in one day, today, because of the train strike tomorrow. WHAT? TRAIN STIKE? Yep. Apparently the rail system is striking tomorrow, as a show of support for the people in the Bagua region. We are supposed to leave and head back to Cusco tomorrow, and the only way out of Aguas Calientes is by train. The next morning we fly out of Cusco to Puerto Maldonado for the Amazon portion of our trip, so it has become imperative that we reach Cusco tonight. So begins Transportation Adventure #2.

Allison & I do a 180, and catch Terry & Mom before they've reached the bus stand back to town. There are a number of alterations that will have to be made in our plan, which was to take the train back to Ollantaytambo, and take a taxi back to Cusco. The only train with seats available runs at 9:20 PM. Allison & I wait for about an hour in the train line, not sure if we'll get on, but we do. The next order of business is to get a car from Ollantaytambo to Cusco. This has to happen tonight, because of the possibility that the roads will also be blocked tomorrow. We call the hostel where we stayed in Ollantaytambo, and she says she'll have a cab waiting at the train station for us. The final puzzle piece is lodging. Our hotel for tomorrow night fortunately has rooms tonight as well, so it seems we are set. We will of course be abandoning rooms that we've paid for in Aguas Calientes tonight, but none of us are really sorry to be leaving this town early.

We get all of our stuff packed and head to dinner at a really nice place. Eventually a family that we'd been chatting with on the train on the way in sits at a table beside us. We ask when they're leaving, and they say tomorrow. We inform them that no, they won't. Two of them hop up and run to the train station. They return a while later with tickets for tonight. Apparently Peru Rail is turning away new fares, but still giving seats to folks that had tickets for tomorrow.

The train ride has sort of a hurricane party feel - like we're all escaping. One person on the train talks of having to cross a bridge between Puno and Cusco that had been burned. We wonder if it is our bridge. When we arrive at Ollantaytambo the crowd literally runs from the train to try to get cabs. Our driver has a sign with our name, and soon we are on the road. It is very late, and I alternate between snoozing with my head hanging and jerking awake in time to see us pass with very little room. Sort of a dreamy hell-ride. Finally we arrive at our new hotel back in Cusco. Allison & I have to climb what seems like a billion stone steps to get to our room. We are tired of stone steps at high altitude.

Day Thirteen - June 22nd, 2009 - Ollantaytambo/Aguas Calientes (Machu Picchu Pueblo)

2009-07-05T12:44:00.028-04:00

After breakfast we hike around the Incan ruins in

Ollantaytambo. They're really impressive - lots of terraces, beautiful buildings on hillsides, and lots of underground water channels that feed beautiful stone

fountains. We wander the town a bit, marveling at the aqueduct system that there is all around the town of Ollantaytambo. The town itself is really quite interesting, worthy of exploring.

After our morning of exploring as much as we can squeeze in, we hop a train to Aguas Calientes. The train ride affords us great views of the Urubamba River, and we imagine kayaking it. For awhile it would be super-fun Class II, with a little III thrown in, but eventually it becomes wayyyy more serious. Continuous treacherous rapids, almost all the way to Aguas Calientes.

Aguas Calientes is a town that exists only to vacuum up as many dollars as possible from the massive flood of turistas visiting nearby Machu Picchu. They are trying to convince the world that the new name is "Machu Picchu Pueblo", but by either name it stinks just as badly. We check into our hotel, Gringo Bill's which is kinda crappy, and I pop one of the Coronas that I've been toting around since Cusco. It tastes better! At the time I assumed this was because we were at lower altitude, but now I'm guessing it's because I wasn't taking Diamox any longer. We grab lunch at a recommended french restaurant in town, Indio Feliz, and have a wonderful and much needed meal.

Buses run from Aguas Calientes up to Machu Picchu starting at 5 AM and run continously all day, and we want to be on the first bus - both to beat the crowds and to see the sunrise - so we crash early.

Day Twelve - June 21st, 2009 - Pisac/Ollantaytambo

2009-07-05T06:52:00.001-04:00

We wake up early enough to catch the set up of the Pisac market. This market is largely local, with vendors selling food and housewares as well as items for the tourists. We walk around and check out the efficiency with which they set up the market.

After breakfast we grab a taxi up the mountain

to the trailhead to the Pisac ruins. From here you hike downward through 4 magnificent ruins, with the option of looping back to the road and your waiting taxi, or hiking all the way down to town.

We take about an hour and a half exploring the ruins, and Terry and Mom head back to the Taxi, with Allison & myself hiking down to town.

Ends up taking about an hour and a half. Of course when

we arrive in town, the market is in full swing, and it is enormous. It spills out of the square and down many side streets. We wander and shop a bit, eventually running into Terry and Mom. We walk around some more, have lunch, chill for awhile, then catch a cab to our next destination - Ollantaytambo.

On the way to Ollantaytambo, we pass through the town of Urubamba, where there is a Festival happening. A banner stretched over the road reads "Festival Gastronomico Del Cuy", which means "Gourmet Guinea Pig Festival". We check into our hostel in Ollantaytambo and grab an excellent dinner at a very nice place beside the river. I have a Coca beer, which is exactly as it sounds, a beer brewed with coca. It's ok.

Day Eleven - June 20th, 2009 - Horsies/Cusco/Pisac

2009-07-05T06:49:00.000-04:00

Today we've scheduled a horseback tour of various Inca ruins above Cusco - the second thing we booked with the travel agent the other night. We are delivered by taxi out of Cusco and to the stable, where we saddle up. Terry has trained & shown horses since being a teenager, and is our go-to expert. The horses are a bit sad, but she says they're ok (not great).

My horse farts constantly. Allison says this is only fitting. I can't argue. We ride for about an hour, arriving at our first ruins, the Temple of the Sun and Moon. There is a guide there to show us around and explain what is known of the place. We spend about 40 minutes here. Pretty cool place.

We saddle up, heading back in the direction of the stable, and before we know it, we are there. We're a bit confused. The tour map that the travel agent showed us had A LOT more ruins on it, 8, in fact. We question the horse wranglers, and they say no, that was the whole tour. Some students that have been on the ride with us agree that they were supposed to see much more.

The horse guys genuinely seem to not know anything about this, so begrudgingly we head back to Cusco in the taxi. It was a nice way to see some beautiful mountain scenery, and we did see the one ruin, but feel a bit ripped off.

We head down to our travel agent's office to complain. We are starving, but Allison wants to get this over with, and I contend that it will be better to get this out of the way while our blood sugar is low, as we'll be nastier. Not only did we not get what we were sold, but there were ruins on the map that we could've gone to by car and foot, but we won't have time in our trip now. We'd paid 15 bucks a person, for a total of 60, and we're gunning to get half of it back. We lodge our complaint, and the agent talks in circles for awhile. Her english speaking counterpart that was here the other night isn't here now. Shortly after this process starts a woman shows up who is clearly the owner, her boss, so now our agent is really trying to put the blame on us, saying that we misunderstood. After much arguing, she offers 3 bucks each - 12 dollars. I say this is loco (my favorite part of the argument). We go in circles again for awhile, and she offers 20. Allison isn't giving in, though, and finally, after much escalating and simmering down and arguing in circles, we get our 30. Go team. We are starving, and in the interest of having something that we know will be good, we head back to 2 Nations for lunch. Since I'm in Peru, and interested in trying native cuisine, I have the Aussie Burger. It is a massive burger with an egg, bacon, sliced beets, and a bunch of other stuff. It's great.

We wander about for a bit, then say goodbye

to our lovely Hotel Corihuasi, hopping a van to our next destination. After a beautiful 40 minute drive through the mountains, we descend into the Urubamba river valley, the Sacred Valley, to the charming town of Pisac. On the way Jamie notices that the hotel Allison claims to have booked for the night is not in the Lonely Planet. Allison starts to worry that the hotel that she's booked for us in Pisac is not, in fact, in Pisac, but rather is IN CUSCO! We arrive, however, to find that there is, indeed a Pisac Inn, right on the square in Pisac, and it's beautiful. Allison just needed to have something to worry about as things were going too smoothly!

Pisac has some excellent Incan ruins on a mountainside

above town, and an enormous, fabulous market in the square on Sunday (tomorrow). When we arrive, an abbreviated version of the market is already open, although starting to close down. We wander the booths for a bit, and almost wish we'd not bought anything yet on the trip. The selection here is incredible, and tomorrow's market will eclipse this one entirely. We have another excellent dinner at a restaurant overlooking the square. The activity of the folks in the square is frenetic. It's like watching bees at work. Booths are being taken down, and merchandise packed away, while others are being put up for tomorrow. People are coming in and out of the square from every street, on 3-wheeled bikes piled high with merchandise, tables, and parts for their booths.

Day Ten - June 19th, 2009 - Chinchero & Cusco

2009-07-05T05:49:00.001-04:00

One of the activities we booked at the travel agency last night was a taxi to the town of

Chincero, a beautiful small town about a 20 minute drive outside of Cusco.

We are picked up after breakfast by our taxi driver who turns out to be a great guide as well.

Our first stop is a weaving school & coop here. There is a pretty

courtyard here, where women young and old are working away spinning thread & weaving all sorts of textiles. They have some really pretty stuff for sale. I buy a belt, and Allison buys a handbag.

We move on to the Plaza, with a short jaunt through their cathedral

which is built on an old Inca foundation. We check out the Inca ruins here, including a large field, where the locals have potatoes laid out on the ground for freeze-drying. Our driver/guide is very informative. Then it's back to Cusco.

We wander the Plaza and watch some more of the Festival, then visit the large, modern, Inca Museum. We are starving when we leave here, and walk into the first restaurant we come to, which kinda sucks. It might be the first bad meal we've had since our first day in Peru. We head down the Hatunrumiyoc Street (in the Quechua language "big stone") where the largest Inca wall in Cusco exists. This wall includes the famous 12-sided stone. The Incas'

stonemasonry skills were nothing short of incredible. In most examples of their carved stonework the stones are not uniform - every stone is uniquely carved to fit the others around it. This wall is no exception, and one giant stone in particular has become famous for its 12 carved sides. Like many Inca structures (especially those in Cusco) The Spanish took advantage of the Incas' excellent work to build a building of their own on this foundation. Here an opportunistic and unsolicited "street guide" sees us taking pictures and moves in to educate us (for tips, of course). She is surprisingly professional and informative for someone hustling on the street, and has a 3-ring binder with photos to help illustrate her talk about the stonework and legends associated with it. She shows us the hidden patterns of the Snake, the Condor, and the Puma (the three sacred animals of the Inca) which are built into the stone wall. Pretty cool.

Terry has been without new clothes for 2 days, and after a number of phone calls it becomes apparent that the only way for her to get any info about her luggage will be to go to the airport,. so she & mom head down there. Allison & I wander for a bit, then head to the hotel for a snooze. Mom & Terry show up with her luggage. Hooray! We all rest for about another hour, then head down to watch more of the dancing & festivities at the Plaza de Armas.

We head to dinner at 2 Nations Restaurant, another recommendation from Allison's colleagues, Priscilla & Ernie. It is owned by an Aussie husband and Peruvian wife, hence the name. We ask the aussie about the beer here. At this point we've tried Cusqueña (light and dark), Arequipeña, Franco, Zenda, and Brahma (all Peruvian) as well as Corona, and they've all had that weird taste. He says that it is indeed the altitude - and what the breweries try to do with the carbonation to compensate for it - that makes the beer crappy. Side note - Just yesterday, back here in the states, I am surfing a climbing forum when I come to a discussion about Diamox and altitude sickness. Turns out that one of the side effects of the Diamox that we've been taking is that carbonated beverages taste like crap. Funny not to add this piece to the puzzle until now. The food at 2 Nations is great.

Mom & Terry head to bed, but Allison & I got a bit more napping in today,

so we head down to the Plaza for yet more festivities. More music,. more dancing, more amazing costumes.

We are just leaving the plaza when I recognize a guy that was on our bus - and stayed with it - when we were stuck at the broken bridge (Day 7). We get the scoop. An hour or 2 after most of us defected to the other bus, the truck was finally cleared from the bridge. 3 or 4 more vehicles crossed, then the locals of the town grew pissed, wanting money for the materials of theirs used in the bridge repair. Their town and bridge were, after all, being exploited to some degree because of this strike, and all of the traffic HAD, after all, broken their bridge. They began yanking the replacement timbers up and tossing them into the river, and threw rocks at at least one car. At that point the driver of our original bus told these folks that they'd better find any way they could to get to Cusco, so they balanced precariously across what remained of the bridge and caught another bus, arriving at about 1:30 in the morning. We figure we left at just the right time, with just enough - but not too much - adventure.

Day Nine - June 18th, 2009 - Cusco

2009-07-04T19:48:00.000-04:00

Initially we'd told my sister Terry that we'd meet her at the airport upon her 6:45 arrival, but in light of yesterday's events, we elect to sleep in, and let the hotel shuttle go and grab her. Eventually she arrives at the hotel, but her luggage didn't make her connecting flight from Lima to Cusco, so she has no clothes. Crap.

We breakfast and head down to Cusco's Plaza de Armas.

Cusco is a very big, and, at least in the part that we're in, very pretty city. The plaza has not 1 but 2 massive and ornate cathedrals. And guess what?

There's a celebration going on. It's the 4 day 'Festival de Cusco'.

It involves daily and nightly parades of groups from all over the country, playing traditional music and performing traditional dances in beautiful costumes.

We watch the festivities for awhile, walk around for a bit, then have an excellent lunch at Pachapapa (Earth Father) with another Arp Andina player providing ambience.

Here I get another dose of culture when I order Chicha, an ancient ceremonial beverage made of fermented corn. Traditionally the fermentation was aided by the brewer first chewing the corn to add saliva enzymes, then spitting it into the vat. This practice has been abandoned in the modern world. It tastes a little like sour hard cider. It's hard to drink at first, but as with many strong drinks, it gets easier as I go. We have an appetizer that has avocado. Terry declines, stating that she doesn't like avocado. Blasphemy! I offer that it's probably the greenness of it. She says "No, I like green M&Ms"

We wander the shops of Cusco, where I find a familiar comfort: Corona! We'd love to like Peruvian beer, but our experience so far with at least 4 brands has been pretty bad. We head back to the hotel, where Terry crashes, still jetlagged.

The rest of us pop Coronas, which surprisingly, have the same salty soda water taste as other beers we've had here. We had wondered if it had something to do with the altitude, and now we are pretty sure.

We nap, then head to dinner at Inca Grill, a really nice gourmet joint overlooking the Plaza de Armas. At this point we are all dying for some fresh salad, so I ask our waiter if their salad will kill me. He assures me that all of their produce is washed in purified water, and I ecstatically order a shrimp salad. The shrimp have been crusted with black and white quinoa and lighly fried, and it is stellar! We wander into one of a million tiny little travel agencies and book some activities for parts of the next 2 days.

Day Eight - June 17th, 2009 - Puno to Cusco (epic!)

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Bad pun of the day: We'd brought much bigger packs than we needed, in anticipation of all of the stuff we'd buy. Allison had already loaded up on a number of things including some pan flutes for gifts. As we prepared to leave, she said "Why is my pack so huge already? Must be all of those flutes" I replied "they're the flutes of your labor".

After breakfast we hop into a cab at 7:15 for a ride to the bus station. Today

will be our epic Puno to Cusco 12-hour ride. The bus leaves a bit late, at 8:45, and drives 100 yards, to the nearest gas station. Then we are on the road. We'd asked Yolanda the other day if this would be a public bus, and she'd said yes. Of course we'd pictured some ramschackle bucket of bolts, loaded down with chickens and donkeys, careening around the mountain roads. In fact it is a Mercedes Benz tour bus, and really nice. Kind of a relief when facing a 12 hr ride.

Side note - Many of the handicrafts that we've seen EVERYWHERE that we've been, in shops, in markets, at roadside stands beside tourist attractions, in the hands of sellers roaming the cities, are EXACTLY the same design of product, just with color and embroidery patterns varied. Clearly someone (the government?) has identified certain items that the turistas will buy, and they are cranked out by the billions in a factory somewhere. When I say billions I really don't think I'm exaggerating here. Trust me. There are certainly small-run handmade items to be had around Peru, but sometimes it's hard to know if you're getting the mass-produced stuff or not.

The bus trip is LONNNNNNG. Some excellent scenery though.

The circuitous route required by the strike is over half unpaved roads, which navigate several high mountain passes, some with turns that the bus can barely make. No one would ever take this route unless forced. I have one of my greatest missed Kodak moments. Passing through a city, there is a motorcycle with 2 people and 2 live sheep on it. There's a sheep up front, mostly laid across the handlebars, then the driver, then another sheep across the seat, then the rear passenger. You do what you have to to get by...

We'd been through all sorts of small, poor towns, we'd waited on livestock to clear the road, we'd stopped to remove fallen rocks from the road, we'd used the nasty bus restroom, since it NEVER stopped for passengers to get off, and on, and on, and on... until, just after sunset, and about 2 hours from Cusco, we stop, and pull off to the side of the road, into a long line of stopped cars. Hmmm. Turns out that a cargo truck has smashed through the timbers of a one-

bridge just ahead, that we HAVE TO CROSS to get to Cusco. It's stuck in the middle of the bridge, rear wheels dangling over the water. There are probably 100 cars and trucks backed up on either side of the bridge, waiting for it to clear. Probably NONE of these people would be taking this route if it weren't for the strike, which is probably why the bridge broke to begin with. A small team of truckers is busy working on either side of the stranded truck. I climb up on the steel bridge structure to watch by headlamp, hanging my butt out over the river below. I take a few pics of the guys working, long exposures with no flash. I'm pretty sure that taking flash pics while they are trying to work will result in me being force-fed my camera. There are 3 guys on each side of the truck.

have some massive timbers laid across the steel structure of the bridge, and are using the two biggest hydraulic bottle jacks I've ever seen to jack up the truck's rear end. Clearly the goal is to get the truck's wheels completely above the broken road surface, then repair it with some eucalyptus tree trunks that are already cut to length and ready to slap into place. Then just drop the truck and drive away. Of course, questions remain: How long will this project take (possibly hours), when complete, will the bridge be able to hold all of the huge trucks (and our bus) or will it break again immediately. If the bridge does hold, will there be a massive traffic jam?

Some of the folks on the bus catch wind that another bus (unrelated to our bus company) is on the other side, ready to take up to 70 people to Cusco. Our driver assures us that everything will be fixed and we will be on our way in an hour or two, and reminds us that he can make no guarantees about the other bus service. Still many people have shouldered their loads, and are making their way across the precariously screwed up bridge, balancing on the steel structure where no timber exists, working between the men working on the truck. We weigh the options, and eventually decide to join them. We cross the bridge, and walk about a half mile up the road to the waiting bus. On the way we hear a cheer come from the bridge. Probably it was the moment that a timber was successfully placed under the wheels of the truck. The new bus is even nicer than the one we were on, and it's taking us for 10 Soles a person (about $3.33). Score. Of course, it's in a long line of stopped traffic, and it's facing TOWARD the bridge. We pull out into the empty oncoming lane, back up for about a mile, and finally find a place that the driver deems suitable to turn around. After a 9 point turn we are on our way to Cusco. We arrive VERY VERY tired, at 10:20, about 13-1/2 hours after leaving Puno. We do a lot of wondering about the fate of our original bus, and the few (maybe 4 or 6) people that stayed with it. We will learn more later. We grab a taxi, and he swings us by a great little sandwich shop on the way to our hotel. We are starving, and our avocado and cheese sandwiches are excellent. Avocado is everywhere here, and for that we are not sorry. We finally arrive at our hotel, Hotel Corihuasi. It is a beautiful little place, spanish mission style, with little stone steps leading to rooms here and there around a pretty little courtyard. We crash, hard.

Day Seven - June 16th, 2009 Puno

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We venture out after breakfast and check out the Museum de Carlos Dreyer. Dreyer was a german antiques collector who lived in Puno for many years. When he died he bequeathed his collection to the city of Puno, and they put together the museum. Interesting artifacts from the Pre-Inca through Spanish Colonization.

We step just outside and around the corner to the Plaza de Armas, and sit on the cathedral steps to watch a parade. It is a happy, festive event, but for a cause. The parade consists mostly of students, all carrying signs that proclaim in one way or another that kids should be in school, not working a job. Interesting. We step into a cafe in a little art coop, where I have Coca tea for the trillionth time. I will be addicted to Coca by the time we leave.

Back at the hotel we verify that there will in fact be no train running tomorrow. Crap. Yolanda finds us the 1 bus that will be making a special trip, taking the long way around. We get some of the last seats. We walk around and check with a few

travel agents, and verify that this is indeed the ONLY bus, or transport of ANY kind that will be going from Puno to Cusco tomorrow. Normally it is a 6 hour bus or train ride, but due to the circuitous route required, this will be a 12 HOUR RIDE! Oh well, we feel fortunate to have gotten it. Yolanda only speaks spanish, and very rapidly, even though Allison has asked numerous times for her to please slow down. Allison & my mom have done the most Spanish studying by far, and I (and especially Terry) lean on them throughout the trip, although most of the time I can squeak by alone. Yolanda's supercharged spanish is incredibly frustrating to Allison, but to her credit, she'd hooked us up with an excellent Titicaca tour, the fantastic experience at Balconies de Puno (NOT in Lonely Planet), and the ONLY transportation from Puno to Cusco.

Many of our activities, restaurants, and hotels have come from the Lonely Planet guide, as has our next destination for today, The Yavari Project. The Yavari is the oldest single-propeller driven iron ship in working order today. It was ordered by the Peruvian government in 1861 from the James Watt Foundry in Birmingham, England. Its purpose would be to collect goods from around Lake Titicaca. There was no rail to Puno at the time, so the ship had to be built in a modular fashion, with no single part being heavier than a mule could carry.

It was then carried over the Andes to Lake Titicaca, at 12,500 feet above sea level, and reassembled. It was launched on Christmas Day of 1870. It was originally powered by

a steam engine meant to burn coal, but coal was lacking, so it ran on dried llama dung. In the early 1900s the engine was replaced with a semi-diesel. In 1975 the boat was passed on to the Peruvian Navy, which let it slide into a sad state of disrepair. In 1987 some british enthusiasts evaluated its restoration potential, found it to be worthy, and started a non-profit with this goal in mind. Now it is nearly 100% restored, and open for tours. This was really cool to see. We also knocked out another of our goals with this little side trip as well, which was to take a Moto-Taxi. A Moto-Taxi is basically a three-wheeled vehicle constructed largely of one motorcycle front-end paired with two motorcycle rear-ends, and a small vinyl cabin for passengers. They are everywhere here.

We head to dinner at Ukuku, and have some really good pizza. Also we have the best beer we've tried yet - Franco. We've been through three or four brands so far, and all of them have that salty-club-soda-mixed-with-beer taste, but this one's not so bad.

Side note - There are dogs everywhere in Peruvian cities, roaming free. We ask if they are strays, and are told that no, they belong to someone, and in fact they all look well-fed, just dirty. They are always headed somewhere with purpose, as if on a mission. I guess they just do as they please around the cities in the daytime, and head home at night. (The dog in the photo above is the dog that Allison decided she should bring home with us. Of course, it was not interested in us at all, just kept moving its nap spot to stay in the sun.)

Day Six - June 15th, 2009 - Lake Titicaca

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After breakfast we are shuttled to the docks, and board a tour boat.

A guide sits at the front with a microphone, and is loaded with information - in english and spanish. The first stop is at one of the floating islands of the Uros people. The Uros live on about 40 self-made floating islands, fashioned from totora reeds, which grow all around the shallows of Lake Titicaca. There are about 2000 Uros left, but only a few hundred still live on the reed islands. We visit one of their islands, where they have all sorts of handicrafts out for us to buy, including mobiles made from the totora reeds. They use this plant for everything. They give us a short demonstration of how they build their islands, translated by our guide, as they speak mainly Aymara. We get about a half-hour ride in a traditional boat made of reeds. They stopped using these boats a few years ago, upgrading to modern boats, some even with - gasp! - MOTORS. They keep one or two of the boats around though, for us turistas. From here it is on to the island of Taquile.

Taquile is a 5.7 square kilometer island about 45 km from Puno. Its population is about 1700, and the people have a culture all their own. The island is like a small mountain. We take a beautiful hike winding up from the docks

toward the top of the island, where we will have lunch prepared in one of a number of restaurants. The hike winds through homesteads, pastures and farmland. At the top of the hike is a plaza, with - surprise! - a shop where you can buy crafts. Taquile is known for its fine handwoven crafts, regarded as some of the finest in Peru. We buy more stuff.

Lunch is excellent trout, with a beautiful open-air view out over the Lake from whence it came. And there is also a demonstration of the local music and dance.

We hike down to the boat for the long ride back to Puno. On the way back, we chat personally with the guide about his life, and he asks about ours. This was nice.

As we near the docks, the guide is on his phone for a bit, when he finishes, he informs us that in a couple of days, on the 17th, there will be a protest for the Bagua people in a town between Puno and Cusco, and no trains or automobiles will be allowed through. Thus begins "Transportation Adventure #1". For months we've had a train booked to Cusco on this day, and there aren't any other trains scheduled on the days immediately before or after. Also, my sister joins us in Cusco on the 18th, the next day! We start scrambling to figure out how to get to Cusco. We have the bus from the docks drop us at the train station, and the station agent verifies that there is a distinct possibility that the train will not run. He is supposed to call our hotel tomorrow morning to let us know.

We head back to the hotel, shower, and head to a restaurant that Yolanda recommends for its food, traditional music, and dance, Balconies de Puno. It is the warmest place we've been in days. As we are waiting for our food the band sets up and begins, and they are excellent. Two guys play nylon string guitars, with another on the Charango, an andean instrument with 5 pairs of strings, similar to a Ukelele. There are 2 guys that alternate on wind instruments, between the Quena (a tubular wooden flute) and various wooden pan-flute type instruments, such as the Siku and the Antara. One guy plays a Wancara, a large, bassy skin drum. All of them sing.

About the time we get our food, the dancers start. There are generally 2 females and 2 males, in the small space in front of the band, which is basically right in front of our table. They are decked out in traditional costumes, and they are fantastic. They dance for a song, then disappear to another room somewhere.

The band plays another tune without them, and then they emerge once again, in completely different but still elaborate costumes, and do another traditional dance for a song. This pattern continues for over an hour, at which point they've come out at least 12 times, always in new costumes. It is an incredible show!

Day Five - June 14th, 2009 - Drive to Puno

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Juan picks us up at 7 AM for the drive to Sillustani and Puno. The drive starts by backtracking our way out of beautiful Colca Valley. Then it's on through beautiful mountains, past many llama and alpaca herders, past a huge and beautiful lake with flamingos, and through a couple of small cities. We reach Sillustani in early afternoon. Here there is a beautiful, relatively well preserved Pre-Inca and Inca burial ground on a small, high plateau overlooking two lakes.

The architecture of the Chullpas (funeral towers) is incredible.

The audacity, to even think that they could build this way, so tall, with stones that weigh several tons each, unbelievable. We have a guide for a 1-hr tour here, but he sorta sucks. He doesn't know the history well, and sort of gives us a bunch of vague baloney. Still really cool though. In the town that has developed just below the burial site, there is..

SURPRISE! a festival going on.

We don't stop there though, and head on to Puno, about another half hour.

Puno is a fairly large city. It's built over ancient terraces, on the edge of Lake Titicaca. Arriving at our hotel, we say goodbye to our excellent and personable driver of the last few days, Juan. Our hotel - Joya del Titicaca - is a little run-down, and we consider looking for another place for the next 2 nights, but it's not that bad, the price is low, and the water gets hot, so we roll with it. It's also right in the thick of things in the most touristy section of Puno, which is really convenient for walking. I've vowed that I will try to do something to stay in shape during our Peru visit, and while Allison is in the shower I try to find enough space on the floor of our tiny room to get a workout in. I do about 5 pushups and I'm so out of breath from the altitude that I declare it a wash. Oh well.

We stroll out to Calle Lima, a pedestrian-only street, filled with shops, restaurants, internet cafes, markets, etc. It's nice to be on a no-car street. City traffic here is semi-lawless, and a bit harrowing, especially when you are trying to see the sights. We stop for an excellent early dinner at La Casona. We stroll a few shops, spend some time in one of the many internet shops, and visit the ATM, which becomes one of our favorite things to do in Peru. One of our objectives here is a tour of some islands of interest on Lake Titicaca. The manager of our hotel, and probably owner, Yolanda sets us up with a tour that includes everything - bus from hotel to docks, boat with guide, and a bus back home.

Day Four - June 13, 2009 - Colca Canyon

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After breakfast and coca tea in the freezing cold dining room of the lodge, Irene gives us a small tour thru Yanque's Cathedral, the Catedral Imaculada Conceptiòn. When the people were force-fed Catholicism by the Spanish, they mixed in all kinds of their own ancient spiritualism. It makes for a really interesting melange of cultures. All of the carvings, sculptures, and paintings in cathedrals have traditional Catholic Saints represented alongside the icons of the Inca and Pre-Inca, most notably Snakes, Pumas, and Condors. Also a mix of the cultures can be found in their traditional dress, their art, and their music, among other things.

We have been in the Colca Valley, but now we drive into Colca Canyon proper, where the walls are super steep.

We stop at Condor View, a park set up where the condors tend to soar.

There are probably a hundred or so other turistas here. There are 4 condors perched on a rock outcrop nearby, and I clamber down a trail to get photos of them. Irene says that people show up earlier to see the condors fly, but in winter the birds wait a little later to take flight.

She's right, clearly many turistas have been

waiting for awhile,

and not long after we arrive the condors slowly, one by one,

take flight. I shoot about a billion pictures here. The birds and the setting are amazing. They fly right overhead, sometimes almost close enough to touch, and they're huge. In all, we probably see about 12 or 14 condors, sometimes as many as 8 at a time, and are told that we are really lucky. Indeed, we run into people later in the trip that were in

the same place on a different day, and saw very few, if any.

Here, as with any place where turistas congregate, there are women selling handicrafts, and we buy some more stuff.

We eat at another buffet in Chivay, also excellent, and then head to the market complex there. It is a semi-enclosed complex of booths, and a mix of places that turistas shop and places that cater to locals. There are booths with all sorts of handicrafts of the sort that we've been seeing at our roadside stops, booths with all sorts of counterfeit backpacks and sportswear (Adidas, The North Face, etc) booths with meat, hardware, toys, electronics, pretty much everything.

We are taken to a hot springs complex in Chivay, where we say goodbye to our guide for the last few days, Irene. She has been excellent and informative. We'll miss her. The hot springs feel amazing. We soak for about an hour, then Juan drives us back to the lodge in Yanque. We have a couple of hours to kill before dinner, so we walk into town, where the festival is still going on. A small, ragtag little brass band is marching around town blaring music, and we follow them for a moment. We stop into a small co-op shop that sells local artwork, and buy a few things, then head back for dinner.

After dinner we hole up in our room for a few hands of cards. As close to the heater as was possible.

Day Three - June 12, 2009 - Colca Canyon

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We are picked up at our hotel after breakfast to head to Colca Canyon for a couple of days. We are in a Peugot passenger van that would hold about 12 people, but it's just our driver, Juan, our guide, Irene, and the three of us. Luxury. We stop at a store on the way out of town, where our guide instructs us to buy a bag of coca leaves. Coca is a sacred plant in Peru, and a huge part of its traditions and culture. You can buy coca leaves, coca tea, and coca candies everywhere. It is used in offerings to the gods, and

as a remedy for all sorts of things, most of all the prevention of altitude sickness. Irene shows us the proper amount, and how to fold and chew the leaves. Prior to leaving the states we'd all been provided with Diamox, a prescription for the prevention of altitude sickness, and Allison & I had debated about taking it. Much of our trip

would be spent at high altitude, but none more so than the Colca Canyon portion,

particularly today's travel, which goes over a pass higher than 16,000 feet. I'd taken Diamox for the first couple of days of the trip, but decided this morning to try to get by without it.

We stop at a roadside cafe in the middle of nowhere at very high altitude and have some Coca tea. It is excellent. Coca is of course the plant that cocaine is made of, but it has no euphoric or stimulating effect unless refined into cocaine.

Coca tea becomes a daily ritual of the trip. There are vendors set up in booths in the cafe parking lot. With the exception of one person, all of the handicraft vendors that we see for the entire trip are female, and most are older. They are selling all kinds of woven alpaca goods, and all kinds of intricately embroidered, brightly colored textiles. I buy a sweater.

All along this drive in the mountains we pass herds of Alpaca and Llama. Usually just with 1 person and maybe a dog wandering with 20 or 30 animals, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. We also see

the 3rd type of camelid that exists in Peru, the Vicuña.

They are endangered, and protected, and they're really beautiful. There are some of them that are sheared for wool though, and the products made from it are really, really expensive.

A cheap Alpaca scarf might sell for 5 bucks, but a Vicuña scarf would sell for several hundred. This is based on 3 factors, the scarcity of the animals, the relatively small amount of fiber that you get from each shearing, and the fact that the fiber is super fine, much finer than cashmere.

We stop at a very high pass, near 16,000 feet, where locals and

turistas alike have made offerings to Pachamama (Earth Mother). You fan out 3 coca leaves and point them toward particular volcanoes in the 4 directions of the compass, place them on the ground, and stack rocks over them, like a cairn. There are hundreds of cairns, they are everywhere. Obviously it has become a favorite thing for the guides to have the turistas do. I am dizzy just walking slowly. Perhaps I'll go back on the Diamox... We stop a little later at some toilets at another high pass. Irene says they are the highest toilets on Earth. They're pretty high, but I'm sure there are higher.

I don't know her well enough yet to say so though.

We stop for an outstanding buffet in the town of Chivay.

All kinds of Peruvian food. Soups, veggie and rice dishes, chicken, alpaca, pork, potatoes, potatoes, potatoes. There are about 1200 potato varieties grown in Peru, and it seems that they eat some sort of potato at every meal. There is a guy in the restaurant playing an Arp Andina, or Andean Harp. It's very much like a traditional harp, but with a hollow wooden sound box. He is excellent, and sounds like several people playing at once.

We drive deeper into Colca Canyon. The scenery is amazing. The Pre-Inca and Inca civilizations built hundreds of thousands of terraces on the mountainsides for farming, all fed by water channels originating on the mountaintops. They also built thousands of miles of rock walls to separate farmland and pastures. The number of labor hours that went into all of the infrastructure that they built had to have been truly staggering. Clearly the population was much, much higher before the spanish came. Many of the terraces are still farmed, but they are a small fraction of what is here.

We stop into the small town of Coporaque for a trek to some Chulpas (ancient gravesites) on a mountainside. They are the graves of a Pre-Inca civilization, the Wari. We walk from the town square, out past the fields of grain and livestock, and up a mountainside trail. We reach the gravesites in a couple of hours. They are like little stone houses built into a cliff face.

Most of the graves have been looted in

the distant past, and there are bones and skulls out amongst them. It's a little bit creepy. With Irene's direction, we make another offering of coca leaves.

We see a giant hummingbird, the

first any of us has ever seen.

Way down below us - probably a half mile away, near a field on the outskirts of town, we see two young girls dancing together. Irene says they are local girls who dress in their traditional ceremonial dresses and dance for photos for the turistas. There are many people here that you want to take pictures of, especially early in the trip, and they're generally fine with it, for a tip, of course. We usually give them 1 Sole, the Peruvian currency, which during the duration of our trip is about 1/3rd of a U.S. Dollar. We take a long time on the rest of the hike, and I suspect that the dancing girls will give up and go home before we get to where they are.

The hike leads us past ruins of the ancient people's homes, built from stacked stone. When the Spanish colonized South America, they mandated that all of the local people that were spread all across the land would move to more centralized towns and cities, and they did so with force. They also forced the locals to destroy many of their own homes, to discourage them from returning. It ended up being a huge mistake, as there generally was not enough water in the centralized locations.

It is fully dark now, and we haven't seen the two little girls for quite some

time, but when we get to where they were, sure enough, they emerge from somewhere. They are 7 and 9, and are dressed in their beautiful ceremonial dresses, and have their blanket spread out with samples of local corn and different types of grains.

We take some photos and tip them, then offer to help them pick up their wares so they can get home. In the process of helping them clean up, Allison notices that they have three tiny miniatures of their traditional hats, made of fired clay and painted. She asked if they were for sale, and the girls were willing to sell them.

(A really sweet souvenir, we don't see anything of the sort on the rest of the trip.) Then they stepped out of their dresses (they have modern clothes underneath) and pack their wares to return with us to town. We were the only turistas on this hike today, and they've waited probably 4 hours in the cold to make a few Soles off of us. We get back to the van pretty late, and Juan has worried about us.

We are driven to the town of Yanque, and dropped off at our lodge. It's a nice place, but very cold. Not only is it winter, but we're at high altitude, and Peruvians generally don't have heat. At most nice hotels, if you ask, you can usually get a space heater for your room, and we do so. It isn't enough to make our rooms warm though, just not freezing. To make matters worse, the showers are lukewarm at best. Peruvians also don't generally have hot water. Most nicer places have solar hot water, and all of the places that we end up staying have it, but I think we've waited a little too late this evening to take advantage of it. The upside is that we're in a really dry climate, so a shower doesn't seem nearly as critical as in high-humidity areas. Dinner is decent. So far, since our Cusqueña experience, we've struck out on finding ANY other brand of beer, and none of us are desperate enough to have another of those. For dessert we are served a bowl of something that seems like blackberry flavored corn syrup. We don't eat much of this. Tastes like children's cough medicine.

We are on the outskirts of Yanque, which is a small town, and we can hear music and fireworks coming from the town center. Apparently it is the Festival of Love, in honor of the Patron Saint San Antonio. Every town's cathedral has a patron saint, and for Yanque it's San Antonio. Fiesta #2 for the trip...

Day Two - June 11, 2009 - Arequipa

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After a nice buffet breakfast at the hotel we walk to Mundo de Alpaca, a museum of sorts, built by one of the leading Alpaca industry companies. There are about 3 Million alpaca worldwide, with nearly 80 percent of these in Peru. It is a large part of their life and their economy. The museum has exhibits set up that show the history of alpaca

production, as well as the modern process, from farming

through finished products. They have women from rural areas where alpaca are raised, showing how the fiber is separated, processed, and woven into products. It's a really nice place, and an educational experience. Of course they

have a gift shop, where you can buy some of the nicest (and most expensive) alpaca products that we

see for the entire trip.

We walk across town, over the Chili River, to the town of Yanahuara where we encounter several small protests related to the struggles that are going on in the northern Amazon. These are just a few small, peaceful marches, but there are police in riot gear located at several points in Yanahuara as well as Arequipa.

With the encouragement of a few local women, we hike up to the Mirador Yanahuara, another beautiful plaza with requisite cathedral, and an excellent viewpoint overlooking Arequipa. We were running a little behind, time-wise, but these women were insistent that we check out the beautiful view. We have lunch at a very nice restaurant there. I have Lomo Saltado - alpaca meat stir-fried with some veggies. It is great. Very lean, but not gamey, sort of like bison. We race back to our hotel in a cab to prepare for our raft trip.

We are picked up by the rafting company in a van. After picking up more tourists

around the touristy section of the city, we head out of town. They stop at their out-of-town HQ to hitch up a trailer with rafts, and we're off again. The scenery of the country is interesting, lots of agriculture. Finally we are at the put-in. They suit us up in wetsuits, helmets, life vests, and old keds sneakers, and divide us into 3 boats, each with a guide. After a brief instructional session we are off. This section of the Chili River has a ton of class II, a few sections of III, and one section of IV. It is aptly named, as the water is FREEZING. We are mostly warm in our wetsuits, but our feet are cold. We share our boat with an Italian couple. It is a total blast, with almost continuous, super-fun whitewater for over an hour. There are 2 places where we have to walk a short distance, one of them in the water. It is frigid. When we were at the office, and they said we'd only be on the river for just over an hour, I'd almost voted not to take the trip, but it turns out to be well worth it. Really, really fun!

A couple of Allison's colleagues, Priscilla and Ernie, lead student trips to Peru periodically, and among their many recommendations for the trip is a rooftop restaurant on the Plaza de Armas.

It is supposed to have an excellent sunset view, so we race to change clothes and head down to the Plaza. On the way, we pass by the rafting company, right when one of our guides is coming out. He recognizes us, and is excited -- he goes

back into the office to grab mom's flip-flops, which she left in the van. We get to the restaurant just after sunset, but the sky is still pretty. I try what has become the national drink of Peru, the Pisco Sour. Pisco is a liquor distilled from grapes. It was developed by Spanish settlers in the sixteenth century. Chile and Peru tend to fight over ownership of Pisco. Chile produces and exports more, but it has been a part of Peru's history for much longer. In a trip report that Gerry Weber wrote of he and Anneke's trip to Peru a few years ago, he said "Piscos Abound!" We now know what he meant, the drink is everywhere. The recipe is loosely thus:

2 oz. Pisco

1 oz. Lime Juice

3/4 oz Simple Syrup

1 Egg White

1 Dash Bitters

Shake hard or blend with ice and strain into a glass. The bitters are an aromatic garnish to top the foam.

It is excellent, although it violates one of a number of don't-get-sick precautions: it contains ice, which undoubtedly was produced with TAP WATER, which most likely contains WEE BEASTIES (as Leeuwenhoek would've said). We are of course not supposed to drink tap water, not supposed to eat fruits or vegetables washed in water (unless we are peeling them OURSELVES), not supposed to drink fountain drinks or drinks with ice, not supposed to eat food from street vendors, and not supposed to rinse toothbrushes with tap water, among other things. These precautions become routine, and are not that much of a hassle, although it is a bit of a shame not to be able to eat street food. Below in the square there is traditional music, dance, and costumes. It is the Fiesta de Corpus Christi. We soon realize that Peru is Fiesta central -- almost everywhere we go there is some sort of celebration (or two).

Day One - Peru 2009 - Allison, Will, Jamie (Will's Mom), Terry (Will's Sister)

2009-06-30T10:09:00.005-04:00

Will says:

My mom retired in October of 2008, and it was Allison's idea to go on a trip with her to celebrate this occasion. We were kicking around places to go, and Allison threw out the option of Peru. We floated the idea past Mom, she said "great!" and Allison started to make the plan. She researched all of the destinations, with Terry tossing in the idea of hitting the Amazon region. Allison spent many hours searching on the web and emailing folks in Peru, as well as talking with friends and colleagues who'd spent time there, and she put together a fantastic trip for us. And here it is (was):

Day 1 - June 9-10, 2009 - Travel to Arequipa

Mom drove up yesterday from Florida. Terry joins us half way through the trip. Today we fly out of Atlanta at 5:45 PM on Delta, arriving in Lima at around 12 AM. It takes us a bit to figure out what time it really is -- they're in the same time zone, but DO NOT observe daylight savings time. We nap in the modern, clean, nearly deserted Lima Airport, then fly to Arequipa at 3:15 AM on June 10th. We are now on a LAN Airlines plane, which is owned by Delta. We arrive in Arequipa at 5:10 AM, and are greeted by a van driver from our hotel - Casa de Mi Abuela (My Grandmother's House).

Arequipa is a modern city, in the way that third world cities are modern. Lots of new buildings, lots of buildings in mid-construction, lots of exposed concrete, lots of traffic, lots of areas of poverty here and there, and lots of dirt. It is surrounded by beautiful volcanoes. Our hotel is in the nicer, more touristy part of Arequipa. Casa de Mi Abuela (photo to the right) is a beautiful little refuge of buildings, courtyards, and pretty trees. We nap. We wake mid-morning and walk down to the Plaza de Armas (below). Every Peruvian city of any size has a Plaza de Armas, or central plaza, with a nice park in the square, and a Spanish Cathedral overlooking it from one side. The cathedrals vary in size and ornateness, depending on the size of the city, and when the cathedral was built. Every one of them is beautiful. We walk through the cathedral briefly, then walk up the road to visit the Juanita Museum. Juanita is the name given to an Inca girl that was sacrificed on the summit of the Ampato Volcano, at around 20,000 feet in altitude, about 1466. She was discovered by American anthropologist Johan Reinhard in 1995, preserved in ice. She remains frozen in a glass case in the museum. Imagine the Incas climbing to 20,000 feet, in the snow, in rope sandals... It's a great museum, with many artifacts, and a good tour guide. It finishes in the room where Juanita rests. Eerie.

We eat lunch at Mixto's, on a rooftop deck near the plaza. Cuy (guinea pig) is a delicacy in Peru, and I've committed to trying it while I'm here, and decide to dive in and get it out of the way. I order Cuy Frita (fried guinea pig). Mom and Allison order a pizza. We are excited to sample Peruvian beer, and order a Cusqueña, by far the most predominant beer in Peru. It is terrible. It tastes like a crappy beer, with salty soda water added. W

e hope there is better Peruvian beer. Our food comes. The pizza looks fine.

The guinea pig looks like a guinea pig. Literally, it looks like they plucked a guinea pig from its running wheel and tossed it right into the fryer, then onto a plate. I orient the plate so that it's looking at Allison. I admit that I'm a bit disturbed by the whole and complete animalness of it all. I start to dig in with knife and fork. I know it's a bit cliché, but it tastes just like chicken. There's very little meat on a guinea pig, however, so the knife and fork don't work very well. I'm sure that the locals just tear off a leg and gnaw on it, but I'm not quite willing to go that far, so after a few bites I resign to eating some of the pizza (which we all agree sort of sucks). The waiter takes the cuy away, mostly intact. We bet that this happens more often than not (with the turistas). We hope that the food gets better along with the beer.

We head up the road to the Monasterio Santa Catalina, a convent built in 1580, and enlarged in the 1600's. There are approximately 20 nuns living in a small portion of the complex, with the remainder open to the public as a museum. We walk ourselves through a self-guided tour. It is a beautiful complex (left). We are still a bit jet-lagged, and head back to the hotel for a nap.

Later we toodle around town a bit more. We wander into the Cusipata river rafting company (there are many companies offering whitewater rafting, this one is recommended by Lonely Planet) and book a short raft trip for tomorrow afternoon, just out of town. We head to dinner at a vegetarian place, Lakshmivan. It is excellent. We have vino tinto (red wine) instead of beer. Things are looking up on the food and drink front...

Heading to Peru

2009-06-04T04:24:00.004-04:00

Our 2009 summer travels are taking us out of the country. We are heading to Peru with Will's mother, Jamie, for a packed trip from Arequipa to Puno to Cuzco to the Amazon. Will's sister, Terry, will be joining us in Cuzco for the second part of our trip. We will do our best to update our blog when we are not exploring canyons, observing wildlife, visiting ruins, or simply getting to know the local culture and people.

Our itinerary:

June 10th - 12th Arequipa

June 12th - 14th Colca Canyon

June 14th - 17th Puno/Lake Titicaca

June 18th - 25th Cuzco/Pisac/Machu Picchu

June 25th - 27th Puerto Maldonado/Southern Amazon

Seneca Rocks, West Virginia

2009-05-27T17:25:00.013-04:00

Seneca Rocks

May 20-22nd 2009

We had honeymooned at Seneca Rocks in June of 2004, and loved it. For some reason we hadn't made it back though. It's easy to drive 2-1/2 hrs. to Chattanooga to climb for a day, and 3-1/2 hrs to NC to climb for a weekend, and somehow not too hard to fly to Vegas to climb for five days, but driving 9-1/2 hrs to climb at Seneca had been difficult.

The Seneca Rocks formation is a giant fin of Tuscarora Quartzite, maybe 1/2 mile long, running north/south, several hundred feet high, and not very thick. Sort of a giant potato chip jammed into the earth on edge, with a big notch taken out of the middle (referred to as the "Gunsight Notch"). It is divided into West Face and East Face routes, and due to the notch in the middle, North Peak and South Peak routes. It yearns to be climbed upon.

The town of Seneca Rocks is basically a 3-way intersection with 4 buildings, and 2 of them are climbing related. One of them is The Seneca Rocks Climbing School, and the other is the Gendarme climbing store, one of the oldest continually-open climbing stores in the country. It's named after a giant pillar

of rock that once stood at the center of the Seneca Rocks formation. The Gendarme was first ascended in 1939. It fell on October 22nd, 1987, a mere 2 days after the last ascent.

We arrived at Seneca Shadows Campground on the evening of the 19th. Anne & Tom would arrive late that night. Seneca Shadows is a beautiful Forest Service campground, with pretty, well-maintained sites and hot showers. It was nearly empty, which rocked.

Day 1 - A quick jaunt to the Gendarme to buy another guidebook, since I'd managed to leave BOTH of ours on my desk at home. Fortunately there is a new edition available, so I wasn't buying something we already owned. The new one is definitely expanded and easier to use too.

The temps had hit mid-40's, and it was still chilly when we started out, so we elected to start on the East face, in the sun. Mistake. We were immediately hot. We would start on the West face and finish on the East for the next two days. We started with an excellent 5.8, Ye Gods and Little Fishes. It's a beautiful corner, with cracks, flakes and jugs. Everything

here is nearly dead-vertical, and VERY sustained, so it all feels pretty sandbagged. Starting the trip with Seneca 5.8 first thing in the morning was a nice wake-up call. From here we traversed right a bit to Dufty's Popoff, 5.7. Based on the photo in the guide, I directed Allison up a difficult face (right). (Anyone who has read our previous posts would think that I would have learned my lesson by now. - Allison) Had we read the description we would've realized that she was supposed to be a bit further right, in a dihedral that looked much easier. Oh well...

We hiked across Broadway Ledge to Frosted Flake (left), and climbed this with the second pitch variation, Kid Galahad, for 2 pitches of 5.9. Although somewhat daunted by the concept, my (Will's) ultimate goal was to lead some Seneca 5.10, and we were just about there...

We scrambled up to the top and signed the summit register for the second time. I'm pretty sure that this was the first place we'd ever been that requires 5th class climbing to achieve, 5 years before.

We rappelled back down to Broadway Ledge and hiked north to the fantastic cracks of Castor and Pollux, both 10a, and both highly recommended. Will led Castor without incident. A short piece of 5.6 which comprises the 2nd pitch of Conn's East landed us on Alcoa Ledge, from which several routes depart. One of them is Orangeaid, a beautiful 10b. Will led this, also without incident. At this point it was getting late, and Anne & Tom had appeared below on Broadway, so we all decided to hike out. We got a little lost on the descent, and separated, but found Anne's helmet, which someone had kicked off of Broadway Ledge earlier. We never would've found it had we not been off-route.

We drove over to the swimming hole on the North Fork of the South Branch of the Potomac River, and cooled off with beer. Made burritos for dinner, with black beans, corn, and cabbage. Methane and sulphur dioxide levels in our truck camper are rising...

Day 2 - The weather is definitely on a warming trend, and even if it hadn't been, we'd still be starting on the shady West Face today. Allison led Banana 5.6, and Debbie, 5.7 as a single pitch. A short scramble leads us to the base of For Madmen Only, a 5.10, which Will leads. This puts us on the summit ridge north of the Gunsight Notch. We've never been to the North Summit, so we mountaineer over to it in a couple of pitches. We rappel down and climb Tomato, an excellent 2-pitch 5.8, which lands us once again more or less on the South Summit. We rappel down the East Face to Broadway Ledge. Will leads Pollux, 10a. We rappel back to Broadway and scramble up through the Gunsight Notch, and rappel the West Face again. Then it's back to camp, where Tom a

nd Anne make excellent chili.

Day 3 - Tom and Anne had climbed Pleasant Overhangs, a 3-pitch 5.7, the day before, and it looked good, so we started on this today. The position on this route is incredible. The entire 2nd pitch is a rising traverse under a giant roof, which Allison led. (left) The route does, however, have a fair amount of rotten rock. Anne pulled off a hand-hold the size of a softball the day before. She carefully wrapped it in slings and lowered it to Tom. They're taking it home as a souvenir (don't tell).

Anne & Tom were leaving to drive home today, and the plan was to finish climbing by 3 pm, and meet for pizza at Harper's (one of the 4 buildings that comprises the town of Seneca Rocks). Allison & I figured that if we really cruised, we could complete one more route to the top in the hour and a half that remained. We chose Thai's, a 5.6 with a number of variations up to 5.10b. Allison led the first pitch, and Will ran the entire rest of the route together to the top. We think the variation we did was 5.9ish.

We hiked out with Anne & Tom and had our pizza. They headed home, and Allison & I turned toward Harper's Ferry, where we'd planned to go kayaking the next day, but when we got back into a cell coverage zone Will learned that his uncle Louis had died that morning. We decided to cut the trip short and head down to Florida to hang out with Will's family.

It was an excellent trip, with a sad ending. We'll have to try to make it back to Seneca in less than 5 years this time.

We just passed a church. Its interchangeable sign read, "IN ORDER FOR YOU TO UNDERSTAND GOD, YOU MUST STAND UNDER GOD".

Be-lated New Year's Climbing Post

2009-05-26T22:22:00.017-04:00

Cochise Stronghold

New Year's 2009

Right after Christmas 2008 we met Anne & Tom at Cochise Stronghold, a collection of Granite spires and blobs in the Dragoon Mountains of Arizona. Allison & I drove the truck, since it's set up for camping. Basically we're trading the misery of flying with camping & climbing gear and renting a car for 2 12 hour days of driving each way.

We left my Grandmother's place in Northwest Florida on Allison's birthday, December 28th. We think we stayed in a hotel in San Antonio, but can't quite remember, as we are writing this 6 months later. Powered through the next day, arriving at the slightly snowy East Stronghold early that evening, with Anne & Tom waiting. There is climbing all over the Stronghold, but it's generally divided into the East and West. The East has a developed Forest Service campground, with tent pads, picnic tables, and vault toilets. The West is wilderness camping, anywhere you like, with cattle grazing around. We would spend a couple of days in the East and move over to the West.

Day 1 - 12.30.08

Today we'd set our sights on What's My Line, a relatively short but aesthetic 5.6. The climbing here has a bold reputation, meaning not a lot of opportunities for placing protective gear, so we thought we'd ease into the difficulties. The regular start involves a rather exposed bit of what the book calls "fourth class" to gain a bolted anchor, from whence you rappel and then pendulum into the line. Anne & Tom had chosen this start, but unfortunately thrashed around looking for the "fourth class" and didn't findit. That's because the approach is clearly fifth class. They would return tomorrow to climb it. We, on the other hand, had chosen the 5.9 direct start, which includes some 5.8 R (runout, or not a lot of protective gear). There was supposedly a short 5.8 pitch before any of the 5.9 and any of the 8 R, so Allison got first lead. Of course we'd forgotten to bring any of the topos or route descriptions up the long approach with us, and I kept insisting that she needed to go further. When she finally built a belay and I joined her, we realized that she'd led the first 2 pitches, including the 8 R. Great, that meant I didn't have to! We cruised up the rest of the route, a sweeping face loaded with the biggest "chickenheads" we'd ever seen. On southern sandstone a chickenhead would be just what you might imagine, a feature sticks out from the rock, about the size and shape of a chicken's head. In this case, however, they are giant plates of granite. You feel like you're climbing a massive reptile's back. Most of the protection on this route consists of slinging these features, and many of them won't hold a sling. Exciting. Despite being well-known as an area classic, this was our least favorite route of the trip.

Day 2 - 12.31.08

Today Anne & Tom would hike back in to climb What's My Line, and we'd set our sights on Wasteland, 5.8, 6 pitches. In the parking area we met a guide who knew Andrew Kornylak. He and his client would be the only other people on this formation today. Fun and varied climbing, with some great exposure and position, and of course an excellent view. Apparently there are Africanized Bee colonies living near Wasteland, but they didn't visit us today.

Drove back to the campsite and walked over to the What's My Line trailhead to wait for Anne & Tom, who arrived shortly thereafter. We were relieved to hear of their success this second time around. We all made the adventurous drive over the Dragoons to the West side, via Middlemarch Pass, on the remote, unpaved Middlemarch Road. We picked a place to camp near the trailhead to Sheepshead Dome, which had several objectives that we all wanted to climb. The East side campground is nice, but being on this side in the middle of nowhere is nicer.

Day 3 - New Year's Day '09

We all wanted to climb Ewephoria today, 5 pitches, 5.7, with the 5.9 "Too Tough to Die" finish. I found a pair of Ray-Bans at the base (score), but pledged to post them to the Arizona forum on Mountain Project when we got home. Pitch 1 feels totally sandbagged first thing in the morning. The rest of the route is fun but uneventful, until the final bit of the TTTD finish (Will below left), which is a spectacularly exposed and steep bolted slab to the top.

Allison & I topped out, then scrambled down to a ledge over to the side of the last pitch to get photos of Anne & Tom climbing it (below right). We all signed the Sheepshead summit register, took group summit photos, and hiked down.

Day 4 - 01.02.09

Anne & Tom headed over to the sport climbing area "Isle of You", and Allison & I hiked back up to the Sheepshead to get on Absinthe of Mallet, a 5.9+, but with a bolted slab 2 pitch direct finish variation that goes at 10b. This was excellent. Our favorite route of the trip, and the finish was the hardest slab lead climbing I've ever done. Really heady in a couple of places.

We all drove into

Tombstone tonight, a cheesy "Old West" town, and visited Big Nose Kate's, a saloon, with people in old west dress and six guns playing poker, etc.

Day 5 - 01.03.09

After 4 splitter days, today was supposed to bring rain, but we awoke to perfect skies again, so we all hiked up to the Sheepshead one more time to climb Peacemaker, a 7 pitch bolted 10a. More fun, mostly slabby climbing. Cruised this and then took pictures of Anne & Tom topping out from the trail below.

We all drove into BENSON? had dinner, got a hotel. The next morning Allison & I started the long drive back to Atlanta, and Anne & Tom went to various oddball museums and things, like the airplane graveyard. An excellent trip.

Upon arriving at home, I did my duty and posted a message about the found sunglasses to the Arizona forum on Mountain Project. I didn't hear anything for the longest time, and was really enjoying "my" Ray-Bans, when finally, in April, the owner checked the message board and contacted me. I mailed his glasses, and asked for the 5 bucks shipping to be refunded. He sent me a check for 20 bucks.

Everything Else

2008-07-27T10:41:00.024-04:00

July 18th, 2008

Wow, so it's been awhile! Logistically, blogging became much more difficult after the laptop fried...

When we last left our heroes they were lazing around Banff on what would've been a perfect day to climb Eeyore's Tail, with plans to hit it the next day (today). Well, it rained intermittently all night (of course), and at 4 am, the alarm sounded in perfect sync with booming thunder, and it started raining harder (of course). We killed the alarm and rolled over. In the planning stages of this trip, we knew we'd be visiting a lot of places that are famous for finicky weather, but we thought that Banff would be the least finicky. Too many rest days. Too much sitting around. Getting antsy. End of vacation looming closer. Gotta move.

We decide "to hell with Eeyore's Tail". The route isn't known to be fantastic anyway, and the only reason we're doing it is to redeem ourselves from our epic years ago, which certainly we've done, if not on the same route. We decide to blast east to Yamnuska, a huge cliff just west of Calgary. The weather is known to get better as you head east. But (of course), when we arrive, the cliff is shrouded in dark grey clouds. It looks like an awesome place to climb, but right now it looks very cold. Clearly there are a number of forces working in concert here, the net result being a negative effect on our motivation level. They are:

The weather (of course)

Our time allowance in days (it's dwindling, we're antsy)

The fact that we've gotten A LOT of climbing in already (satiation, complacency)

The fact that we've gotten A LOT of climbing in already (we're tired)

So with some misgivings, we turn southward, toward the U. S. A. (God Bless It).

On the recommendation of Cheryl, the Kain Hut Custodian, we drive through Kananaskis Country, on the eastern border of the mountains. It is beautiful. We enter into Montana through a customs gate at high altitude that's only open in summer. Immediately we miss the metric system. In Canada when a sign says that your destination is 100 km away, you're there in virtually NO TIME, since you're programmed in MILES. Upon reentry, we jokingly remarked "Now it's gonna take FOREVER to get anywhere." Yes, of course we realize that this would wear off if we spent lots of time in Canada...

We drive through Glacier National Park, also amazing in its beauty, but a bit of a pain owing to lots of roadwork. Another twist on the kiteboarding theme -- near the center of the park, someone is kiteboarding on a glacier, with a snowboard.

We continue southward, passing so many familiar icons of our country. Wal-Mart. Applebees. Office Depot. Just to assure ourselves that we've returned to The States, we stop in Polson and each eat a HUGE plate of bad mexican food, which we immediately regret. We camp on the side of a road on National Forest land, just east of Missoula.

July 19th, 2008

We decide today that we'll head to Devil's Tower (and climb it this time), then The Needles, in the Black Hills, so we need guidebooks for each, which we'll pick up in Bozeman. On the way there we take a break from the interstate on a scenic highway, which takes us through the charming old west town of Anaconda. We both realize that we'll never be able to see or hear that word again without thinking of Sir-Mix-A-Lot. We cruise into the lovely Bozeman, and all of the downtown retailers have the sidewalks filled with sale items. We grab our guidebooks at the local climbing store and notice (inside joke here) that Chris Sierzant is on the cover of the current edition of Urban Climber. We blast for Devil's Tower, arriving at about 9 pm and, once again, snag one of the last campsites. At about 10 we notice headlamps on the tower. A party of 2 is slowly descending.

July 20th, 2008

We rise at 5:20 am, eager to beat the heat and the crowds. We'd attempted The Tower on our very first road trip, in June of '03, but due to bad timing and route selection, we'd pretty much been baked off the rock, and left frustrated. On the way here yesterday, we'd decided on the Durrance Route, (5.6) which would mean our second climb from "50 Classic Climbs in North America" in less than a week. You have to register to climb here, and register your return (for safety reasons). In the climbing office we find out that the Durrance Route is closed for raptor nesting. Many climbs throughout the nation are closed from spring through mid-summer if raptors have chosen to nest there. They generally reopen when the young birds fly the coop. As an alternative we choose "Bon Homme" with the "Horning Variation" (5.8). Will leads pitch 1, Allison pitch 2, and we simulclimb the summit pitch. The route is fine, but a bit of a grunt. Remind me to lie back the first pitch next time instead of jamming. It is excellent and redeeming to summit the tower finally. We spend some time on top, take a few photos, then rappel. It is clear that the rappel route is set up for single rope rappels, and when we see this we should know better than to be greedy and do double-rope raps, but we do it anyway, and of course, pulling our ropes from the last rappel they get stuck. We do have one whole rope though, so Will leads the first half of the first pitch, up to the last rap anchor (which we'd skipped in our greed), frees the rope, and rappels down. At least it was the fun part of the pitch, and not the grunty part.

Hiking out, we encounter some obvious climbers hiking in, and we all stop and chat. We find out that one of them is Frank Sanders, who, on July 3rd, wrapped up a charity campaign which entailed summitting The Tower every day for 365 days in a row. Imagine doing this in winter. Brutal. We totally cheese out and ask him to pose for a photo with us. Then we hit the road for The Needles.

The Needles consist of tall, thin granite spires, some over 200 feet, with summits that are barely big enough for one person to sit on.
They're located in Custer State Park, in the Black Hills, in the southwest corner of South Dakota. They're known for a strict bolted-on-lead (runout) ethic, so much of the climbing here is very bold. The park itself is mostly unspoiled, aside from the work of the same pine beetle that wreaks havoc at home in the southeast. It is loaded with tourists sightseeing. They are fascinated by the rocks, and even more fascinated by the climbers. Much of the surrounding area is a cheesy wild-west tourist wonderland (more water slides, mini-golf, dinosaur and fossil exhibits, sad petting zoos, gift shops, the whole gamut). Presumably it all developed as a side attraction to nearby Mt. Rushmore. We establish camp at Stockade Lake Campground.

July 21st, 2008

We set our sights on a group of rocks called the Cathedral Spires, and the Cathedral Enchainment (5.9), which includes tagging 3 tiny summits with some rappelling in between, but never to the ground. It also involves a 25 minute approach, which we mess up initially, but eventually we find the start of the route, at the first spire, West Gruesome (5.7). Cool route, which we climb in 2 pitches, and sign the summit register.
A huge, menacing cloud is rolling in though, and we decide to bail, at least temporarily. Will rappels down, and as Allison starts rapping, it begins to rain. We find a convenient little cave in which to hunker down and eat some lunch, as it rains and hails. The rain stops, and we emerge, but the clouds don't look much better, and the rock is wet, so we hike out. We are glad to have tagged one tiny summit anyway...

We drive to a very popular sightseeing spot, the Needle's Eye area, named such because a massive tower right beside the road separates into two, then rejoins up high, creating a huge needle's eye. There we encounter some Needles regulars, one of whom is pictured and discussed in our guidebook, prolific Needles first ascensionist John Biddick. The weather clears, and we follow them back to some climbs a short bit from the road. We climb Obstacle Course (5.10b), on some unknown formation, then the Direct Route (5.8) up The Gnomon.

July 22nd, 2008

We return to the Needle's Eye area, and climb Threading The Needle, which of course entails climbing right through the giant Needle's Eye.
Will leads, with the spectacular 9+ finish. Then we toprope the 5.10 on the front of the formation, leaning on the front of the truck as we belay each other. We answer tons of questions from the sightseers, the most popular of which is, of course, "How'd you get that rope up there?". We relocate to the Ten Pins area and finish our Needles experience with the classic tall, thin spire, Tricouni Nail (5.8). There is no anchor at the top -- you merely pass your rope between two bulbous "heads" on the summit, and simul-rappel off of opposite sides. This results in a classic needles photo op (thanks Peggy!):

We pack up and head toward The Badlands, pausing to view Mt. Rushmore from the road (which is surreal).

We camp at the Sage Creek Campground, in the middle of nowhere in Badlands National Park. There is very little infrastructure here, and what little there is is well-preserved from the 50's or 60's. It truly felt like we were in a period movie, a feeling that was supported by the fact that all the way out the long dirt road to get here we were following a 1938 Dodge coupe (now parked at a campsite a few hundred feet from us). This is a beautiful place. We shoot at least 100 photos in this campground alone. Gotta love digital.
July 23rd, 2008

We continue through The Badlands, then make the uneventful drive to Minneapolis, where we visit Janna, a college friend of Allison's. We arrive at Janna's D & B & B (Dinner AND Bed AND Breakfast) where we finally get to meet her four precious girls- Quinn, Gillian, Aubrey, and Shelby. Janna treats us to an amazing dinner- she should go into the hospitality business.

July 24th, 2008

This morning we wake up and hang out with Janna and her girls for a little while before hitting the road. We get to see a little of Minneapolis by taking a walk around Lake Harriet, one of the lakes in the Chain of Lakes. We grab lunch in a great little neighborhood and then head out of town. Thanks for the great visit, Janna and family!

We arrive at our chosen campground at the Starved Rock Campground in Illinois only to find it full. So, this will be our first night out of the whole trip where we end up crashing at a hotel- not really even a hotel, we stay at the Starved Rock State Park Lodge.

July 25th, 2008

The rest of the trip home is pretty uneventful aside from a quick stop in St. Louis to pick up a kayak that we bought off of Craigslist before we left town in June. We stay at a hotel again on our last night, because driving way off of the interstate late at night, only to find a state campground full or full of mosquitoes seems awful. We just want to get home. We DO miss the bed setup in the back of the truck though. It was truly the most comfortable place we slept for the entire trip.

July 26th, 2008

We make it home. Yep, here we are back in Atlanta. And, it is hot. But it does look like we've had some rain, so maybe it won't be quite as bad as last summer. The trip ends with cooking out and a movie at the Starlight Six drive-in down the street with some friends. A good way to wrap up the trip...back in Atlanta with our friends. Also, we were able to hook the semi-dead laptop to another machine and pull off all of the photos that we thought might be permanently lost. A new photo posting of those can be found in this set.

We'll be posting some videos on our flickr site soon.

Random notes, July 27th, 2008:

We drove a grand total of 7,765 miles. This may seem silly with current gas prices, but for perspective, we spent less on gas on this entire trip than we spent 5 years ago for our plane tickets to Banff alone, and we experienced SO much, in SO many places. We'd have happily paid double. We had a self-prescribed speed limit of 65, which saved a lot of gas, and possibly speeding tickets. It is nice to be home, but certainly that feeling will be short-lived.

A & W

Bugaboos (Cont.) to Canadian Rockies

2008-07-17T12:45:00.024-04:00

July 13th, 2008 (continued)

Refresher: We're climbing the Northeast Ridge of Bugaboo Spire. Will takes the first pitch, and it is fantastic. Allison takes the second, pausing for one of our best climbing photos ever:
We continue to swing leads, and the climbing continues to be fantastic. The clouds build a little more, but most of the time seem to dissipate before passing over the sun, keeping us quite comfortable. We simulclimb part of the easy chimneys, probably around pitch 7. Somewhere in this area 2 guys pass us at breakneck pace, and continue to simulclimb most of the route. They are cruising it.

Allison stops to apply a Band-Aid, way up in space:

A photo we took of the ridge from the top of the previous day's climb shows 2 climbers at about our current position. They are almost dead center in the photo, on a large ledge on the ridge. If you click on the photo you'll be taken to the photo on Flickr, and from there you can look at a larger size:
We thought we were high when we topped out yesterday's route, "The Ears Between", but we are only half way up Bugaboo Spire, and the summits of The Donkey's Ears are way, way below us. This thing is tall.

Nearing the top, on the 10th pitch:

Bugaboo Spire has 2 summits. On our route, you get very near the North Summit on the 10th pitch, do a short rappel, and then a short scramble gets you to the top. You then do an easy but incredibly exposed traverse to the South Summit, about 100 meters away, and just 21 feet higher. We get sucked in to following a party that has passed us somewhere on the route, and Will suspects that it is the wrong way, (confirmed later, at the hut), but we get there nonetheless, it just takes a little longer than it should.

Signing the Summit Register. This climb adds to the short list of summits that we've visited that can only be reached by 5th class (technical rock climbing):

Among lots of other information, Rob and Mark had informed us that the descent was really involved, and took just as long as the climb. They weren't lying. It involves 5 rappels, mixed with tons and tons of downclimbing and scrambling along the Kain Route, and people have gone every possible way many many times, so the best route is entirely less than obvious. On the Mountain Project page for this route, there is a comment at the bottom that reads: "People will tell you to do the Kain route before the NE ridge, so you are familiar with the descent. The party we met who ignored this advice and wound up spending 2 nights on the spire can confirm that this is good advice." Ouch. Miserable. We find our way, although at times it is clearly not the best way, and finally wind up back at the Kain Hut at about 8:15, almost 16 hours after leaving, feeling enormously satisfied. We are met with congratulations from the folks at the hut who knew we were up there, some of whom followed our progress with a spotting scope. We have some dinner, and the last of our beers, and hit the hay. There is a reason that this route is included in "50 Classics".

July 14, 2008

Time to pack up and head out of the Bugaboos. We say our goodbyes and depart from the Kain Hut. After three days of intense climbing and hiking, the hike down is not as easy as we had hoped. But, we make it down without any problems, and the chicken wire appears to do it's job- no eaten tires.

Upon arrival on paved road, we immediately head south to Radium Hot Springs, a tourist trap ("one of the armpits of civilization" - Will), but nonetheless quite a pleasant experience. We're not quite sure if the heated pool is really heated by a natural spring or just by man, but it feels good on our thrashed bodies either way. After leaving the hot springs, we head back to Golden to find that our computer has not been fixed, and then drive up to Kicking Horse Ski Resort. We entertain the idea of hanging out in the area for a night and then doing a little downhill biking, but instead decide to head back into Yoho National Park and camp again at Chancellor Peak Campground.

July 15, 2008

We wake to a lazy day of driving and sight-seeing with limited walking. Our first stop is at Takakkaw Falls, (or Takakakaka Falls as Cheryl pronounced it), said to be one of the highest waterfalls in Canada, it was worth the short walk that it took to check it out. What was most interesting was how much water was falling since you could not actually see the glacier from which it was flowing.

Our second tourist stop was the Spiral Tunnels. When the Canadian Pacific Railroad first cut its way through the Canadian Rockies, the slope of the railway was so steep that trains were often flying off the rails. Therefore, spiral tunnels were built where the train would circle back on itself as it made it's way down the mountain. We stopped and waited with many others for the train to come through. It was interesting to see the train circle through the tunnels- plus, it did not require any hiking or exertion of any kind.

We departed Yoho National Park and headed into Banff National Park. We visited the park five years ago for our friends Tara and Brian's wedding, so we knew what to expect with the frenzy of tourists. We made a few quick stops and then headed off to find a campspot.

July 16, 2008

Our main goal in Banff is to climb Eeyore's Tail on Mount Rundle, just outside of Banff. Yet, we still need a day or two to recover from the Bugaboos, so we decide to take a hike, recommended by Will's mom, Jamie, to check out the Teahouses around Lake Louise . The hike took us up to the first teahouse at Lake Agnes, about 3.4 km. Then we took off to check out the view from the Big Beehive, about 1.6 km further. At the lookout we ran into some folks with a map that showed that we were, in fact, on a trail that would take us to the second teahouse. So, off we went to the Point of Six Glaciers Teahouse. It's a beautiful little structure where they make fresh scones and bread and serve hot tea. So, we partake of hot tea and a delicious scone before making our way back to the madness of Lake Louise. In total we think that we probably covered about 13 km, some of it quite steep. It was nice not to be carrying huge backpacks, and we feel that our time climbing and hiking at altitude with heavy loads has helped our endurance.

Upon arriving back at the Chateau Lake Louise, Will spots Rob and Mark, two climbers that we met at the Kain Hut. They had decided to leave the hut a day early and had spent the day climbing at Lake Louise. They are staying in Banff for the night with another climber that they met at the hut, Kris, so we decide to all meet up for dinner. We grab dinner at the St. James Gate Olde Irish Pub and get beta from Kris for a local route to climb tomorrow as the weather does not appear to be ideal for Eeyore's Tail.

July 17th, 2008

We sleep in again, and awake to crystal clear skies at 10 am. Immediately we wish we'd done Eeyore's Tail today, but it's too late to start now. We breakfast at the cafe at the YWCA Mountain Lodge, where we'd stayed years before for Tara and Brian's wedding. This is the same cafe we ate in on the morning that we had our epic on Eeyore's. After breakfast we park near the trailhead for Tunnel Mountain. A short hike brings us to the base of the route. If this were in Atlanta, it would be a destination crag. It sits smack in Banff though, and judged on that scale, it is sort of a turdpile. Will is feeling incredibly lethargic and unmotivated. We hike out. We will take it easy in Banff today, and fire up Eeyore's Tail tomorrow. And so that brings us to the Internet Underground, where we sit now.

More later,

A & W

Bugaboos!

2008-07-15T19:08:00.010-04:00

July 9, 2008

Last night we drove into Yoho Provincial Park, and camped at the beautiful Chancellor Campground. The trains passing right next to us only woke us for a few minutes throughout the night : ).

July 10, 2008

After breakfast we drove east for a brief visit to the Yoho Visitor's Center, then headed back west and south to the Bugaboos. This is a really high commitment undertaking. First, you drive a rough dirt logging road for about 46 km. Then you have to porcupine-proof your car. There are porcupines in the area that love to eat rubber, and they will eat all of the rubber parts of your car -- hoses, bushings, even the tires. At the parking, there is a corral filled with rolls of chicken wire. You basically wrap the base of your car with the chicken wire, place rocks on the base of the wire, and lean short pieces of wood on the top to keep it all in place.Then you have to figure out how to pack all of your climbing gear, clothing, sleeping bag, and food for the duration of your stay, and keep it light enough to do the 3-hour, 2400 meter elevation gain hike to the Kain Hut. When packing for the road trip, we'd made the decision to leave our bigger packs at home. We regret this now. We had several climbing objectives here, and as the weather is very finicky, we planned to stay for 5 days. I have to put all of the food, and the 2 six packs of beer into a day pack, and strap that to the top of my crag pack. (We're only bringing the essentials). After a lot of gear and food sorting, we begin the trudge. It is a well-maintained trail, but the load on your back makes it arduous.

You have to keep reminding yourself that it will be well worth it. A few minutes into the hike it starts to rain lightly. It stops after a while, then when we are nearing the Conrad Kain Hut, it begins to snow. When we finally arrive, it's snowing quite hard, and collecting on the trees. I'm not sure if I've ever been so happy to walk into a door. Removing my pack is heavenly, but with the snow we wonder if we'll get any climbing in. Many people visit the Bugaboos several times without ever getting to climb. The weather is notorious.

For being in the alpine backcountry, the Kain Hut is quite posh. Clean running water from the glaciers above, electricity, stoves, padded sleeping bunks, and places to hang climbing gear to dry, with heaters below the hangers. The Applebee Campground lies another 45 minutes up the trail, and gets you that much closer to the climbs, but of course requires bringing a tent, stove, and sleeping pads, and if the weather is nasty, the Kain Hut is a much better place to be.

Dining area at Kain Hut, snowing hard outside:

We stake out our place in the bunks, prepare dinner, and chat with other climbers about the various routes they've done, and the logistics involved. We meet a guy named Rob from Knoxville, TN, and his partner Mark, from Salt Lake City. Rob climbs at a lot of the same places in the southeast that we climb. He and Mark are half way through a 10 or so day stay here, and are knocking off all kinds of classic climbs. We pump them for all kinds of info. It is still snowing hard, and collecting. Cheryl, the friendly and informative hut custodian, gets the forecast via 2-way radio or satellite phone at 9 pm every day, and it calls for 0% chance of precipitation tomorrow. If all of the routes aren't covered in snow, we may just get some climbing in.

July 11th, 2008

We sleep in, hoping to let the rock melt and dry, and to recover from lugging our loads up here. One of the climbs on our tick list is McTech Arete, a 5.10- on Crescent Spire that's not extremely tall (about 185 meters), and has a somewhat shorter approach (a little over an hour). Other climbers tell us that it will be one of the fastest routes to dry as well, so we decide to go have a look.

We stomp up the trail, periodically crossing snow. The weather is slightly more reliable here in August, but at that point the snow has melted enough to create serious crevasse danger. We arrive at the route, and it looks dry, so we rack up. Allison takes the first 5.9 pitch, and takes a nice whipper at the crux, then sends it handily. From there we alternate leads to the top, and I swear the first pitch is the hardest, despite the ratings that say otherwise. The route is stellar, but the experience is somewhat unpleasant due to heavy cloud cover all day (it is COLD).

We head back to the hut for dinner, beer, and more chat about climbs with our hut-mates. Our main objective here is the Northeast Ridge (5.8) of Bugaboo Spire, a huge, high commitment climb. We'd had a big day today though, and wanted one slightly more mellow day before attempting this. There is always a hut custodian and a park ranger residing at the Kain Hut during the summer, and we sat down with Todd, the ranger currently on duty, to discuss what we might climb tomorrow. He recommended the route "The Ears Between", a 5.7 that goes up South Crescent Tower.

July 12th, 2008

The approach today is very similar to yesterday, and is starting to feel a little shorter, and somewhat routine, although a little more has melted. The sun is out today, and it makes a huge difference in comfort. The route is fantastic. We do a 5.8 direct start, and swing leads to the top. It results in a tiny summit atop a spire, one of "The Donkey's Ears". The scramble down is a bit unpleasant, but it was worth it. Of course, as usual, it doesn't feel like we got quite the rest day we needed, considering tomorrow's plans, but oh well...

After dinner we get a small scare when Cheryl informs us that there is bad weather on the way. About a half hour later, however, she gets the official forecast, which again is 0% precipitation. Yay! We turn in at 9 pm, with the alarm set for 4 am.

July 13th, 2008

Getting up at 4 is hard. We make breakfast, pack some gear that was left out to dry, and start the now familiar approach. The first 2/3rds of the approach is the same as for McTech Arete, but we have to go about 1/3rd farther to reach the base of the Northeast Ridge of Bugaboo Spire.

Alpenglow on the approach at sunrise:

This will be the first route we've attempted that's included in the famous-among-climbers book "50 Classic Climbs in North America". Climbers in-the-know refer to it, not so affectionately, as "50 Crowded Climbs in North America". As it happens, we are the first party to the route, even beating several parties that were camped up at Applebee Campground. It is cloudier than we'd like, which is worrisome on such a climb. If the sky decides to unleash holy terror, there is nothing you can do, as it would take hours to get down.

We're now out of internet time, so tune in later to see how we fared, or check our Flickr site, and make your own guess...

A & W

Last days in Squamish

2008-07-09T20:08:00.012-04:00

July 6th, 2008

Today we would try to keep things relatively mellow, in an effort to do something really big tomorrow. Will had it in his mind to do the Grand Wall (Lite), a 5.11 A0 route that goes right up the middle of the Grand Wall of the Squamish Chief, then exits about 2/3rds of the way up via a ledge traverse. Dropping the "Lite" designation from the name would entail going all the way to the summit via 4 more pitches of extremely difficult climbing. Even with our plan to do the Lite version, this would be far and away the most sustained, difficult long route we'd ever attempted, and while Will was experiencing a little anxiety mixed with optimism, Allison was really concerned about her ability to follow. More on that later.

We headed across the road to the Upper Malamute Cliff. It's a relatively small cliff that swoops right down into the Howe Sound. Allison led an excellent and long (48m) 5.9 route, High Mountain Woody. It was getting really windy at this point, and crowded with climbers, so we took a drive out to the Squamish Windsurfing Park. It's out on a long jetty, where the Squamish River spills into the Howe Sound, and like all other outdoor sports here, it is set up for maximum fun & convenience. The "Windsurfing" part of the name is a bit leftover, as there was only 1 person windsurfing, and about 40 people kiteboarding. This looks like more fun that should be legal. If only we lived closer to the beach...

In the afternoon we went back to the Apron of The Chief, where we first climbed upon our arrival here, and did a route on the north side called Calculus Cracks (5.8). It was a nice route, if a little monotonous, and it was probably more than we should have been doing today, given our tentative plans tomorrow.

We headed back to "The Scene" at the campground parking to cook dinner, and pulled in beside another couple, Jon and Kara from Washington state, although we didn't know their names yet. We'd chatted with them at the base of the Grand Wall, while climbing on our second day, and also while we all made dinner last night. John had climbed some pretty difficult routes while next to us at the Grand Wall base, and Allison had mentioned once or twice over the last couple of days that it might make more sense for Will to ask Jon to do the Grand Wall with him, as the chance of success would be much greater if both climbers could lead hard sections and share the burden. Will had some misgivings about such an undertaking with someone he hadn't climbed with before, but Jon seemed competent and confident, and had a good attitude, so Will decided to ask:

Will: "Hey, are you guys climbing tomorrow?"

Jon and Kara: "Yeah, I think so."

Will, to Jon: "You have any interest in doing the Grand Wall, with me?"

Jon: "Hell yeah!"

So names were exchanged, plans were made, and off we went to crash, dreaming of seas of granite...

July 7th, 2008

We met in the parking lot for breakfast at 8, sorted some gear, and Jon and Will hiked in to the Chief, with Allison & Kara heading over to the Smoke Bluffs.

Will writing in first person for a while... The Grand was fantastic. We had the best weather yet. Jon fancied himself an excellent liebacker (this would prove to be true) and so when we divied up the hard pitches, he chose Perry's Lieback (11a), leaving me with The Sword (11a). I'm not sure if I could have climbed this pitch clean even on my best day. Perhaps after some rehearsal, and a nice long rest, but perhaps not. Fortunately I was able to cheat my way through it by pulling on gear. Not to go into too much detail, there was a ton of fantastic climbing on the route, and it would not have been possible without someone else that was climbing at (probably above) my level. This is by far the most strenuous day of climbing I've had, ever.

Will belaying atop the 2nd to last pitch, with Jon following:

We hiked down, and met Kara and Allison back in the parking lot for a celebratory beer at about 6 pm. Then we all headed over the the Brewery one more time for a celebratory dinner. We all exchanged contact info, said our goodbyes, and crashed, our last night in Squamish. We love this place.

(Allison now:) Once the guys set off for their adventure, Kara took me to check out an area that Will and I had not visited yet called Smoke Bluffs. This is more mellow location with mostly single pitch climbs that are easily top-ropped. We both led Cat Crack and Corner Crack and then top-roped Flying Circus, a a great 5.10a crack with some fun finger jams. I don't think that I have ever climbed as many routes that required finger jams as I have here in Squamish. I've always avoided the finger cracks at T-wall (the Tennessee Wall in Chattanooga- our favorite local climbing area), but am now anxious to get up there and work on my technique.

Kara and I returned to the Chief parking lot in time to catch Will and Jon on top of the Sword pitch of The Grand Wall. We watched a bit and took a few pictures and then met back up with the guys back at camp. As we mentioned in one of our first blog entries, our trips are really made by the people we meet along the way. It was great hanging out with Kara and Jon.

July 8, 2008

This morning we packed up our tent and said goodbye to Squamish. We stopped by the Brackendale Bistro on our way out of town for a great breakfast and then hit the road. The plan was to make it to Glacier National Park by evening. The drive through the mountains was beautiful, taking us by Whistler (where we popped in for a second, but felt no need to stay) and through Garibaldi Provincial Park. We exited the mountains to end up in a terrain very similar to the high desert in Utah. Sage was everywhere, and it got quite hot, quite quickly. We hooked up with the Trans-Canada Highway and followed the Thompson River a little while until it became dammed to create a reservoir/recreational area similar to Lake Powell on the border of Arizona and Utah. This was not really where we wanted to hang out, so we continued east along the Trans-Canada Hwy. We pulled into Revelstoke, B.C. in the late afternoon and decided that we should go ahead and look for a campsite there so that we could explore the area in the morning. We found a great spot about 15 minutes north called Martha's Creek Provential Park.

This morning, we woke up and drove up the Meadows-in-the-Sky Parkway and hiked to the summit of Mt. Revelstoke. From the summit we could see panoramic views of the Columbia Mountains.

We left Mt. Revelstoke and continued east to Glacier National Park. The first view that we got driving into the park was of a range of mountains with razor thin ridges. They were incredibly striking, making us gawk like a couple of tourists...oh, wait, we are a couple of tourists. The rest of the drive was similarly gawk-worthy, arriving on the east side of the park only to be greeted by the Rocky Mountains.

So, here we are, sitting in an internet cafe in Golden, B.C. Oh, did we mention that our computer died on us? Yep, we'll be bloggin' from the cafes from now on. We're not having too much luck with our technology these days as Allison's cell phone was water-logged on our mountain biking trip, and there is no hope for reviving it. In any case, that's why we haven't posted many photos, and why we have not updated our flickr site. We'll work on that next time!

The plan now is to head to the Bugaboos tomorrow morning. We will be staying at the Kain Hut, owned and operated by the Alpine Club of Canada. We'll be in touch when we get out of the mountains.

Hasta Luego!

2008-07-05T21:30:00.008-04:00

Some of you have been wandering when we would update our blog next. Sorry...we had to wait for a rainy day at Squamish before we could hide away in another wireless cafe (or, in this case, wireless brewery.) In any case, here goes:

After a lazy morning of breakfast and blogging in Hood River, we headed to Portland, dropped off the truck for a few minor fixes, and then rode our bikes to meet up with Cory (a friend from Atlanta who moved to Portland) and Tara (Allison's roommate from college) and Colby (her two year old son) at a great restaurant called Por Que No. It was in a "transitional neighborhood" on Mississippi Ave. Great food and area. Then we took off on our bikes and explored Portland with Cory. Portland is such a bike-able city. You cross a main road every once in awhile, but for the most part, you are riding through neighborhoods. And, people watch out for bikers. Afterwards, we hooked up with Tara and Brian (her husband, and Will's partner in crime from our Africa trip) for dinner at Toro Bravo, a great tapas restaurant.

July 1, 2008

This morning, after breakfast, we took off to visit the fantasy world where Brian works, called Nike. It's really an amazing campus, with more than enough locations for running and walking, a whole soccer field, an indoor basketball court, spinning arena and even an indoor climbing wall.
On our way home, we got to visit the coolest playground imaginable in Washington Park. Who knew what treasures we would find by hanging out with a 2 year old?

The afternoon was spent among the millions of books at Powell's bookstore- Cory's place of employment. If you haven't been there, you must go at some point in your life. For dinner we were able to get all of our Portland friends together at Deschutes Brewery.
The evening was topped off with a hike through Forest Park, a beautiful green space not too far from Cory's abode.

July 2, 2008

The day started off early in an effort to catch the 12:45 ferry from Port Angeles, WA to Vancouver Island. Even after a few extended stops for road work, we made the ferry without any problem. We arrived in Victoria and headed to Allison's aunt Dabney's house. She has a home overlooking the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Olympic Mountain Range. Unfortunately, it was too cloudy to see the view, but we had visited about 5 years ago and knew what was behind the clouds. We had a fabulous visit with Dabney, getting a chance to walk around her beautiful neighborhood.

July 3, 2008

After a leisurely breakfast, we decided to hit the road for Nainamo, BC to grab a ferry to Horseshoe Bay on the mainland north of the city of Vancouver. The city of Vancouver isn't on Vancouver Island. It's so confusing! A relaxing and scenic ferry ride landed us on the road to Squamish, our first major climbing stop. Excitement building at this point. Entering Squamish we are greeted by a sign proclaiming it "The Outdoor Recreation Capitol of Canada". We got one of the last available campsites at the Stawamus Chief Campground, and then ran over to The Apron area, and ticked off Diedre (5.8), one of the undisputed classic moderate routes here. The guidebook says "The most popular climb on the Apron...subject to heavy crowding and lineups, unless you're willing to climb at night or in the rain." Amazingly, there wasn't a single party anywhere on the Apron. Apparently it had rained this morning, and the relatively late hour (about 3:30) probably helped. We polished off this fantastic climb, and the day was feeling like a coup on many levels. Walking into one of the most popular (and rainy) climbing areas on earth, on a Thursday afternoon, scoring a campsite, and having one of the most popular routes to ourselves. A great first day at Squamish.
We topped it off with dinner at the Howe Sound Inn & Brewing Company, with excellent food & beers. The restaurant has a huge mural of the Chief (the largest rock formation here, and center of the climbing) with routes marked. It's really fun to be in a place where rock climbing is such a part of the community. In many places in the states, the climbing community is constantly tiptoeing on thin ice, at odds with the communities where the best climbing exists. Not so here.

July 4, 2008

Slept in a bit and headed over to the base of the Grand Wall of The Chief. Eric (who we climbed with in Boulder) had recommended the classic finger crack "Exasperator". Of course, our late start meant that there were already some folks on the route, and others waiting to try it. No worries, there are hundreds of routes here, and we hopped on Peasant's Route, a 5 pitch 10c just 20 feet to the left. We'd read that the ratings were a bit soft here (a soft rating would mean that a climb of any given difficulty grade would feel a bit easier than it's rating). This was a chance to test that theory, and we're not so sure that we think the ratings are soft here. A great route nonetheless, and after a little waiting we ticked off Exasperator as well. Thanks Eric, an excellent recommendation! We cooked dinner on the truck tailgate in the parking lot, surrounded by other climbers doing the same.
The folks parked next to us saw Allison's Triple Crown socks (a prize from the southeast's Triple Crown Bouldering Competition) and asked where we were from. Turns out she'd spent some time in Atlanta recently, and had climbed at Wallcrawler, our gym on Dekalb Ave (for any of you that know Dave from the gym, tell him we met his friend Samantha). Small world, the climbing one especially. One of the things that I love about climbing is that you can be in the middle of nowhere, hanging off a cliff face, and discuss minute details about a particular section of a particular route that is hundreds of miles from where you are, and hundreds of miles from where either of you live. It makes you feel like part of something relatively exclusive.

July 5, 2008

The forecast called for rain today, and we indeed awoke to rain. It was relatively light, so we stopped into a bike shop for a mountain bike trail recommendation. We biked most of the route of the Test of Metal mountain bike race, which took place last week. About halfway through the ride the rain ramped up considerably, and we were cold, wet, and very dirty by the end of it. We went by the Squamish Recreation Center, which offers showers for a small fee, and a pool, hot tub, and workout facility for a little more. We opted for hot showers only, dropped our laundry off for wash & fold service, and headed back to the Brewery for lunch, where we sit and write this. Having a blast. Forecast calls for rain tomorrow morning, then better weather for a few days. The Grand Wall awaits...

2008-06-30T12:29:00.002-04:00

In the interest of time we decided not to visit Salt Lake City. We stopped briefly in Green River, and later grabbed dinner at Rooster's Brewery in Ogden, then it was on to City of Rocks. City of Rocks National Preserve is a major climbing destination consisting of huge granite blobs, pretty much in the middle of nowhere in the bottom center of Idaho, near Alma. Getting there involves driving 25 or so miles on well maintained dirt roads, dodging giant jackrabbits all the way. We arrived in Almo at 11:00 pm, and stopped into the convenience store to try to buy a climbing guidebook for the area. They were all out, and informed us that the campground was full, due to some sort of festival going on here. They directed us to an "RV Park" just up the road. They told us that it was not maintained, and they didn't think anyone even checked the pay station. Indeed, when we pulled in it was competely deserted, and looked as if no one had stayed there in years. It consisted of leveled gravel pull-thru sites in an open grazing field. We fed the pay station the requested $10.00 anyway, and decided it was the perfect, quiet place to crash for the night.

The next morning we drove into the climbing areas, marveling at the enormous amount of climbing that must be here (we picked up a guidebook at the Visitor's Center on our way out, and there are over 750 routes listed). The blobs are everywhere. For the non-climbers, in the sidebar you will find a link to an abbreviated Glossary of Climbing Terms from the end of an old trip report. We had a look at someone else's guidebook, and chose a few climbs on Elephant Rock (recommended by Anne and Tom), namely Rye Crisp (5.8), The Pygmies Got Stoned (5.10a), and Columbian Crack (5.7). All were fantastic. The rock here is amazing, and the number of routes and close proximity campsites seem to make a future group rendezvous here essential. Anybody? We were on the road to Hood river by 11:00 am.

Boulder

2008-06-28T22:21:00.000-04:00

We rolled into Boulder on Wednesday evening and hooked up with Tracey at a great restaurant just down the street from her house, Centro. Bedtime followed soon after with plans to get up and climb in the morning.

June 26, 2008
On Thursday morning, we woke up and headed out for Eldorado Canyon. As on our previous visit to the Canyon, we marveled at the amazing little community of Eldorado Springs. It seems like quite an ideal place to live.

Our initial plan was to climb the Green Spur- on our last visit to Eldorado, we climbed a route called the Yellow Spur, possibly one of our favorite multi-pitch routes. We hoped to find the Green Spur a similarly spectacular route. We arrived at the base of the Green Spur to find a party of two at the first belay as well as a party of three slowly making their way up the first pitch. Therefore, Will decided that he should warm up on a 10c instead, Grandmother's Challenge. Allison started off by leading the first pitch (8), only to discover that she used up all of her gear before arriving at the belay. Therefore, Will took over and made his way to the first belay stance. The crux of the route was the 10c roof immediately above the belay. Will took off and pulled the off-width roof without much problem. Unfortunately, we can't say the same for Allison. (I'm blaming it on the top-rope pulling me off the route.) In any case, with a little help from Will, Allison made it up the route just in time to be greeted by a thunderstorm coming from the south. We decided to rap down and not risk the lightning. Of course, by the time we walked out, the sun was shining again.

We headed back into Boulder where we strolled a bit and then had a fabulous dinner- Will had paella cooked by a visiting chef from Barcelona.

June 27, 2008
One of the best things about our road trips is visiting our friends and hooking up with folks along the way. Two of our friends, Skip and Kelly have a conference to attend near Rocky Mountain National Park. They decided to arrive early- Kelly and Eric from Houston and Skip from Atlanta- and meet us for a little climbing. We hooked up early and hiked to the first Flatiron, barely 10 minutes out of town. The route was absolutely fantastic. Rated 5.6, the challenges were more mental than physical with the first two pitches being run-out slabs with great friction. We topped out at the first false summit and then climbed along the ridge to reach the real summit- at 1000 feet. The views were incredible. A highly recommended route.

After descending from the summit, we headed back into Boulder for lunch. Again, we found a great dining experience within a stone's throw of Tracey's house., West End Tavern. Talk about a great location.

After lunch we headed up to Flagstaff Mountain to check out the local bouldering. It was a little warm for bouldering, but fun to check out new areas.

The day's activities were wrapped up with a dip in the pool at Kelly and Eric's hotel. Then off to meet Tracey for dinner at Med before she took off for salsa dancing with her Boulder folks.

June 28, 2008
We decided it was time to stop lingering in the fairy tale town of Boulder and head on towards our next fairy tale town of Portland, OR. We are now heading in that direction with a few detours in Green River, WY, Salt Lake City, UT, City of Rocks, Idaho, and Hood River, OR. I hope we can do this all in two days!

Days 1 & 2

2008-06-26T00:32:00.000-04:00

06.24.08 Day 1
Our proper sendoff for any road trip has become breakfast at Ria's Bluebird in Grant Park, our favorite breakfast in Atlanta. Only 2 miles from home, already various allergies are clearing up, leading us to the conclusion that we must simply be allergic to not being on vacation.

Approaching Columbia, MO, we drove into some of the most menacing clouds we'd ever seen, and thought for moment we'd see a tornado first hand. I looked up just in time to see the last second of some ball lightning exploding in mid air. We had dinner at a bar in Columbia and retired to Katfish Katy's Campground, along the Missouri River. Their lower campground has been under water for a few weeks, but the upper one is fine, if a bit buggy. No matter, we're just here to sleep.

06.25.08 Day 2
About a mile from our campsite, between potato fields, stands the Missouri State Champion Burr Oak (pictured below). Last measured it is 84 feet tall, with a spread of 116 feet. Its trunk has a circumference of 272 inches at 54" above the ground, and it is about 350 years old. We breakfasted in its shadow, and began what will probably be the most boring day of driving on the trip, the long, straight interstate between Columbia and Denver. I maintain that playing though your ipod library alphabetically by song is usually more interesting than utilizing Shuffle.

We stopped at Grandma Hoerner's Foods, beside the interstate in Alma, Kansas, where they produce and package all natural salsas, jellies, juices, and other items for stores around the country including Trader Joe's and Harris Teeter. It was surprising that such a small operation could output enough product for big chains like these. We sampled and bought a lot of stuff.

At a fuel stop near Abilene, KS I photographed this hearse, painted like the General Lee, of Dukes of Hazzard fame. I was taking a picture of the side that said "Beads For Boobs -OR- Boobs For Beads" When the owner said "The other side's better. My goat ate up this side." so I moved around to get shots of the "FREE MAMOGRAMS" side. See our Flickr site for a photo of their buddy's trailer, painted with zebra stripes and labeled "BUSH WACKER" So far this drive isn't nearly as boring as we would've imagined.

We rolled into Boulder at sunset, with a beautiful view of Long's Peak. We met up with our friend Tracey, who moved here from Atlanta 2-1/2 years ago. We'll be staying with her for a couple of nights.

Accessorizing our "Mobile Home"

2008-06-22T22:20:00.000-04:00

Installing Dome Lights

Making Curtains

Canadian Rockies Summer 2008

2008-06-21T22:50:00.000-04:00

Gas prices are rising and there seems to be no end in sight, so why not take a trip across the country? This summer we're heading to the Canadian Rockies to do a little climbing in Squamish, the Bugaboos, Yamnuska, Banff, and a few other places. We've decided to send out our trip reports via a blog- yep, we're venturing into the blogosphere. This gives you the option of checking in on our travels whenever you want...or not!

Below is a tentative itinerary for our trip. Feel free to pass along any recommendations of places to stop and check out along the way. Also, we are not quite sure how we are going to get from the Canadian Rockies to Minnesota, so any recommendations there would be welcome as well!

June 24
Head out of town!
June 27 - 28
Boulder
Eldorado Canyon
June 30 - July 2
Portland, Oregon
July 2 - 3
Vancouver Island, BC
July 4 - 8
Squamish, Vancouver, & Skaha
July 9 - 10
Glacier National Park
July 11 - 14
Bugaboos
July 15 - 21
Bow Valley; Banff, Yamnuska, Jasper, Lake Louise
July 22
Calgary
July 25
Edina, MN
July 27
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