Do the bear

Happy New Year!

If you can make it down, I'll see you at Owen Beach, 11 AM, New Year's Day. The 1st Annual T-Town Polar Bear Paddle... Years from now, you'll want to be able to say that you were there!

For more info, check out the Matelot site, follow updates and messages on the club's user site or call (253)691-7941.

Blue moon

There's a blue moon on New Year's Eve this year, a combination that certainly must be fairly rare.* As rare as the last day of the year, the dregs of 2009, the final few lines and movements.

One more day to get it done, whatever "it" may be, before the odometer rolls over for another cycle.

* Last blue moon on New Year's Eve was in 1990; next one due in 2028.

Looking forward

As a somewhat obsessive list-maker, I am drawn at this time of the year to review the vitals - where I've been, where I want to go next. Not resolutions exactly, but rather a guidance system for the upcoming year. Cairns of experiences, Inukshuks of the mind. In terms of the Olympics, there are places I need to see and things I must do that, frankly, I can't believe I haven't done already.

I will go to the Tubal Cain Mine next year. It's not a complicated venture - I just haven't made the time for it yet. I want very much to do a winter traverse of the peninsula from the Dosewallips to Lake Quinault but it will likely have to wait until later in the year - I can't fit it in until then, I'm afraid. (The other thing I'm hoping to do with that trip is to use public transportation to get to and from the route... that figures to be a pretty interesting part of the story in itself.)

Then there's the Pummel in February; I'm looking forward to that in a big way. There are a couple of different paddling symposia, in Port Angeles in April and in Port Gamble in May. I'd really like to do a Straits crossing in May too, from the Elwha to Victoria and back... I'll need to consult the calendar, I think.

The big trip, of course, is the Olympic Grand Circle. As of right now, I'm planning on starting on July 16th in Olympia (Launch party at the Fish Tale anyone?), and spending between 3 and 4 weeks en route. I am anticipating an excellent adventure, with the surprises and wonder that come with any such undertaking. I hope I learn a lot.

The mornings are still my water time, when I ferry the board down to the Foss, do my strokes in the rain and shadows, trundle home again before the sky gets light. I actually paddled through ice cakes that had formed over near the Martinac shipyard the other morning. The ice wasn't there today but it was still cold. Thinking about the year that's about to begin is a great way of staying warm.

Stirring it up (Part 2)

Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia and overall environmental savant, said it this way in his book Let My People Go Surfing: "One of the hardest things for a business to do is to investigate the environmental effects of its most successful product and, if it's bad, to change it or pull it off the shelves. Imagine that you're the owner of a company that makes land mines. You're employing people, and you're one of the best employers around, giving people jobs and benefits, but you've never thought about what land mines actually do. And then one day you go to Bosnia or Cambodia or Mozambique, and you see all these maimed innocent people, and you say, 'Wow! This is what land mines do?' You can either get out of the land mine business (or tobacco or fast food) or continue, knowing what your products really do."

Thinking polymers and bioconsistency again, vis-a-vis plastic kayaks. I don't know the extent to which the construction of wood and composite boats contributes to pollution; I'm sure there are environmental consequences of using polyester resins and gelcoat, for example. But even if this is so, even if the short-term effects on the ecosystem are adverse in either case, it seems to me that plastic kayaks are still more of a long-term liability for the planet.

There is an island of plastic out in the Pacific, larger than Texas, made entirely of floating plastic debris. Fishing floats, chunks of buckets and squeeze-bottles, disposable packaging and anonymous flotsam, twisting in the slowly moving ocean currents, carried steadily around the circle. It wouldn't surprise me if there weren't a few roto-molded polyethylene kayaks in there as well.

I have to think that the ongoing, long-lived negative implications of plastic kayak construction outweigh any benefits incurred in terms of pricing and durability. A composite boat, well cared for and maintained, should last a lifetime, which, let's face it, is all the durability anyone needs. At some point, however, the fibers will become brittle, the resin will fade and crack, and that same composite kayak will begin to separate into its various elements. It may take a long time, but it will, one day, be gone.

The plastic continent in the North Pacific Gyre, on the other hand, will always be there. From here on out.

Boxing Day

The sun was out this afternoon and I took advantage of a couple hours of down time to get a daylight paddle in. Launching from Steilacoom and heading south down the shore, I made it quickly down to the old Steilacoom Marina. All that's left is a pile of rubble now, after a fire completely leveled the place a few months ago. It's a location marked by years of tragedy; perhaps the fire will turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to it.

The sea lions that come to the south Sound in winter have always congregated there at the marina. They were still there, even though the surroundings have changed. The sagging float that they have used for the last 20 years or so remains in place, the last remaining vestige of what once was. The weight of the huge, blubbery bodies overpowered the flotation of the dock, and the platform itself was submerged. Choruses of snorts and grunts echoed in the cold, clear air.

Across the water, off into the western distance, the mountains were out.

Stirring it up

I am rethinking plastic. Specifically plastic kayaks, but one thing is always connected to another, isn't it - who knows where it will all end?

It's convenient and so damned practical, after all, this plastic. The problem is that polycarbonates and polyethylenes (along with an alphabet soup of multi-syllabic related compounds), are the guest who will not leave, the gift that keeps on giving. Plastic is not just durable: plastic is forever.

As I ponder the kayaks on the retail racks, I can't help but wonder if this is all getting a bit out of hand. Some recreational "kayaks" come in at less than $300, which make them accessible to almost anyone. Touring boats, whitewater designs - all of them more durable, more enjoyable and more affordable precisely because they are made of plastic. But nothing comes for free - there is a significant cost, which we are all trying, apparently, to avoid having to pay.

What with this being the Christmas season and all, I am aware of the vastly larger world of plastic that exists out there: everything from kids toys to electronics and appliances, to garbage cans and food bags. In the grand scheme of things, the amount of plastic that goes into making kayaks must be quite tiny. But that may not be the point.

The thing is, the outdoor industry in general makes its hay on the notion that their products are somehow environmentally sensitive or, at a minimum, are tools to enable greater safety, enjoyment, whatever, of the natural world. It doesn't make sense to sell products to better interact with the environment at the same time that the environment is being degraded by those same products.

Perhaps this is simplistic, or maybe it's just simple.

The Grand Circles

When I was a kid, my wild country was Lake Los Carneros, just a quarter-mile from our house in Goleta, California. I rode my bike down the trails beneath the eucalyptus, down to the swampy northern shore, where some of the older kids had built jumps and forts and stashed their dirty magazines. I hiked through the tall grass, stalking king snakes and playing soldier. I had an inflatable boat, a cheap vinyl dinghy that I hauled to the lake almost every day that summer between 6th and 7th grade. I'd float and fish, drifting with the wind, occasionally hooking a bass or a crappie. I'd pull my way up into the reeds that grew around much of the lake, dense forests of tules and cattail.

I knew that lake. From all sides. I spent so much of my childhood exploring at Lake Los Carneros that, wild though it seemed, it was second nature to me. That familiarity and understanding is what comes with seeing something from all sides, from every possible perspective. Which is ultimately what circumnavigation, the notion of a "Grand Circle," is all about.

There is a modern Grand Circle route in Utah, a driving loop that touches on such scenic marvels as the Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde, Monument Valley and Lake Powell. It cuts through the hoodoo deserts and crosses the ancient ravines and canyonlands of the Anasazi and the Navajo. "The People." I have been to some of these places and I would like to return; it seems a magical part of the country to me.

Likewise, in southeast Asia, there is something known as the Indochine Grand Circle, an ancient system of tracks and byways, linking Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand. Through thick rainforest, where tigers still prowl along the river's edge, where the inky darkness of the jungle night is shattered by the neon (Singha, Tiger, Heineken) coming from the slat-wood tavern near the junction. Traders and hippies, refugees and double agents. I can only imagine.

I remember reading a book once called Everest Grand Circle, an account of a high country traverse of the mother mountain through two countries and hundreds of years in time. Ned Gillette and Jan Reynolds, as I recall. It wasn't a climbing book, strictly speaking, but the central memory I have of the story is the relentless up and down. The book is, unfortunately, gone from my library now.

I have daydreamed about a trip, let's call it the Caribbean Grand Circle, something that starts and ends in Key West, perhaps, or New Orleans. A small-boat journey around the edge of the North American underbelly, down through Texas and Mexico, crossing over to the Dutch Islands and on up the Antilles. Deserted cays, coconuts and white sand, as well as expatriate con men, country club ladies and reggae... to my mind, it would be living some wild and rambling Jimmy Buffett song. There is no reason it couldn't be done.

The idea of an Olympic Grand Circle seemed to rise in my mind, fully born, when I first heard that the Olympic peninsula is actually surrounded on all sides by water. Almost immediately, my thoughts were drawn to the possibility of a circumnavigation, to the different environments that the route would pass through, to the sense of perspective that such a water journey would provide.

That was over twenty years ago. It is only now that I am finally getting around to planning the actual expedition. I have kayaked much of the route in years past, and I've done several short canoe outings on the fresh-water segment, but I've never linked it together in one big circular dance. It is a trip that has been done before, I'm pretty sure, but it isn't done often. And the way I'm doing it - using a combination of canoe, kayak and SUP to travel the 425 mile course - has never been attempted.

I feel like I've been working toward this journey for a long time. Twenty years, at least.

Here's to the tilt

Is it warmer out there? Does it seem warmer to you? Maybe it's just that it's not as cold as it was last week, when it was in the teens and twenties. It's not as cold as all that, so in comparison, conditions today seem almost spring-like.

Or, you know, maybe it's all because we've turned the corner, in a cosmically orbital sense, and are moving back toward the light. Not sure if anybody noticed, but the sun set at 4:21 PM today, here in western Washington. That's a minute later than sunset yesterday; the days are beginning to expand, slowly getting longer.

Maybe the extra daylight just made it seem warmer.

First

Have you heard the one about the real first ascent of Mount Olympus?

The tale begins with the July 1907 issue of Steel Points magazine, in its own words, "a wee bit of a magazine, published at Portland, Oregon, occasionally by William Gladstone Steel, a crank who doesn't know any better than to love the mountains, lakes, streams and forest, and who for thirty years has been seeking and classifying information pertaining to the mountains and the Pacific Northwest."

An article in this issue, written by Oregon historian George H. Himes, makes the claim that a party of early settlers and explorers made it into the interior of the Olympic peninsula as early as 1854. Not only that, this group of prominent Olympia pioneers was also, according to Himes, the first to summit Mount Olympus. To wit:

"The first ascent of Mount Olympus was made in the summer of 1854, and it is believed during the month of July. A party composed of Col. Michael T. Simmons, F. Kennedy, Eustis Hugee, a surveyor, Henry D. Cock, B.F. Shaw, woodsmen, and four Cape Flattery Indians, one of whom was named Captain Jack, went out on a private exploring expedition, and at length found themselves in the vicinity of Mount Olympus. The matter of making the ascent was discussed and finally Shaw and Cock decided they would make the attempt, which was successfully accomplished the following day."

Aside from the nagging feeling that some of the individuals mentioned by Himes sound painfully close to joke names (Hugee? Cock? Really?), it's a pretty interesting hypothesis. George Himes appears to have been a legitimate historian of his time, and much of the material in the Steel Points issue checks out, authenticity-wise. There are problems, however, with the dates of the purported expedition, inasmuch as they don't completely jibe with the schedules of the alleged participants. Beyond that, just the liklihood of this august group making such a trip together, utterly unreported in the media of the day - for whom Olympic exploration was a persistent subject - stretches the credulity muscles to their tearing point.

I have no new information to add, except that I can't help but think about the accounts of the O'Neil expeditions in the late 1880's. As I read the account of their explorations in the Olympic backcountry (and it was all backcountry then), I was struck by how many times they came across signs of other white men where none were to have been before. There were no true trails perhaps, but the region was hardly inaccesible. Doubtless, hunters and trappers made unofficial forays into the interior that went unpublicized. The name Wickersham came up quite a bit, as I recall. It seems reasonable to suggest that there is at least a chance that O'Neil and his crew were not the absolute first to get deep into the Olympic high country.

It seems odd to me though, if the 1854 expedition really did take place, why it is that Michael Simmons himself never mentioned the trip? I'm just saying.

Only eight shopping days left...

... and less than a week to go until the solstice, until the pendulum of daylight begins to swing in the other direction. Toward the light.

Look at the size of that...

Mark the calendar:
La Push Surf Pummel 2010
Feb 19-21, 2010

For more information on the actual event, get in touch with Ken and Ellen DeBondt

Speaking for myself, I have already reserved lodging... you can't be first, but you can be next. Click here to get yours.

Toxic water

Maybe, just maybe the planet wants to get rid of us.

According to the front page of the Sunday paper, October and November saw a massive algae bloom off the Northwest coast that killed up to 10,000 birds ("at least 10,000 birds," in another article I found online.) The single-cell, saltwater algae species responsible for the mayhem is a toxic little sucker called Akashiwo sanguinea; the orgy of avian killing has possible consequences for human existence as well.

The algae gets whipped into a froth in the surf zone, and the result is a thick foam that covers birds and, apparently, other things too.

Environmental issues are tricky, because at some point, they turn into political issues, and there's already way too much noise going on in that department. When the subject turns to politics, it is inevitable that any further discussion will generate substantially more heat than light. What caught my attention was this little nugget: Surfers and kayakers who rode through the foam near Westport, Grays Harbor County, complained of sinus problems and a lingering loss of taste and smell. Well, just great.

Scientists aren't sure what caused this bloom, or the other ones that preceded it. Which should give all of us pause, regardless of our individual political bent. As Julia Parrish, a professor of aquatic and fishery sciences at the U-Dub, says in the piece, "It's definitely a warning sign of something. We don't know what."

If she doesn't have a handle on it, there's likely not much hope for me.

Three new routes

I didn't make it to the Deception Pass Dash yesterday. It was a combination of different forces that kept me in Tacoma rather than drive up to the race: sick kid, broken vehicle, family obligations and my own cough and runny nose, for starters. Then again, it may be that I'm just not much of a racer... it was never a priority. I would still like to attend, but perhaps just not as much as I'd like to do other things. I haven't heard any reports about it yet, but I'm sure the event was a success; the weather was perfect and the turnout was good.

Gary McCall and I got out on the water in the afternoon for a rare daylight paddle (for me), Owen Beach to Gig Harbor. The cold wasn't even noticeable once we got underway and it was a quick trip across the Narrows to the Tides Tavern for a brew and some onion rings before heading back. There were some large icicles hanging on the dirt cliffs below Point Defiance, a rare sight here on the west side. As we approached Owen Beach just before dark, we came across a pair of climbers all decked out in their ice climbing gear, having some fun on the ribbons of frozen water.

"That's a first ascent," I called out to them from about 20 feet out.

"It's our third one this afternoon," one of the climbers replied. She was beaming, clearly enjoying the moment, and the foolishness of it all. I'm not an ice climber, but I can definitely appreciate the obvious pull that hanging ice has on some people, even little frozen trickles like these. They were clearly doing it as a joke, but it was a good joke.

There is a part of me that wishes I would have made it to Deception Pass, but the rest of me is happy that I spent the day the way I did. You just can't do everything.

Country roads

The road between Sappho and Clallam Bay, SR 113, twists and winds through the valleys and, at a few places, touches the mountains as well. The route of the two-lane blacktop has varied a bit since it was first constructed but, for the most part, it follows the original course. Cut through deep stands of ancient forest, it was a 35-mile track of muddy ruts and plank road, built from both ends, meeting near the middle, with most of the work carried out by - get this - area settlers "working out" their poll tax.

According to a government web site dedicated to Washington's rural heritage (?), the poll tax required every male over the age of 21 to pay for the construction and upkeep of the local roadways. A fellow could either use money to pay the requisite amount (4 or 5 dollars, usually), or he could use the sweat of his brow. Two days labor was what it took to balance his accounts, and the deal was that he had to provide his own axe, shovel or pick, depending on which implement of construction the supervisor called for.

If you don't think times have changed, think about that for a while.

Brrrrrrr

This cold snap we're feeling here in western Washington has me wondering if I'm starting to show my age. Which is almost the same thing as feeling my age, except worse. (There is a reason that, as we get on in years, we feel the pull of Miami or Phoenix, San Diego or Key West. Nobody retires and moves to Minot, to Grand Rapids, to Billings. We cool as we age - we are programmed to search out the heat.)

If you are, at this point, looking for warmth in this part of the country, you will be disappointed. It's 27 degrees out there now; it was down as low as 13 degrees overnight. The frost is thick on the roof and lawn. The sun is out and we are supposed to see the temperatures rise throughout the day, but it is still icy cold, and very unlike Washington.

I have lived in Newfoundland and Ketchikan, both of them much colder than here, with all the attendant miseries of winter. Shoveling snow, seemingly endless colds and coughs - it is the dark part of the year in the northern latitudes, dark in every way. Much more so than western Washington, but I notice the difference is getting harder to see as I get older. I do know that I don't enjoy this as much as I used to...

Fish wrap and field reports

Here's the media perspective from the Reach, somewhat skewed but mostly accurate. It's always interesting to get a glimpse of the way that others see you.

Meanwhile, the Field Report (with photos), is up on the Azimuth Expeditions web site. Enjoy the read.

Back

Okay... let's get the weather myths dealt with right from the start: it's no colder in the Tri-cities than it is over on this side of the Cascades, at least not this week. Which is chilling me at the moment, to the bone, but really, I was grateful for the weather the last few days on the Hanford Reach. Cold in the mornings, sure, but downright comfortable on the water, with the fat winter sun perched on my shoulders.

The Reach was an amazing trip... unending vistas and a complete lack of scale that made the float seem even more alien and wonderful to me. I'll get a trip report up on the Azimuth site in the next few days but until I do, here are a few shots to set the mood.

Gone to the east side

I have a few days off here, and I'm planning on spending them some place different and new. To me, at least. I have had it on my list - oh, that list. That constantly-growing, insatiable list - for years now. I can only imagine what the Columbia River looked like back in the day, wild and raw, as much a force of nature as the tides and the glaciers.

My imagination is a good one, but I doubt it can do justice to the original. The river that once was, is gone. There are more than 400 dams in the Columbia River Basin, storing and diverting, changing the way that water flows through the area, re-making the land in our image. We needed the electricity, the aluminum, the agriculture. To secure our future and in order than civilization should advance, we needed what the river could provide. So we took it.

We didn't get it all though. At least, not yet. There's one section left that still looks the way it used to look. From what I've heard, anyway. Paradoxically saved from development by the Federal nuclear-weapons-of-mass-destruction department, the land along the river here is still pristine, for the most part. "Looks pristine," is probably a better way of putting it (I have heard of 3-headed fish and such.) Still, by all reports, the river is beautiful.

I'm pumped to take a SUP ride through the Hanford Reach. It will be cold, but it looks like the skies will be blue. It gets down into the teens at night, but the days will be considerably warmer. The shuttle has been arranged, the gear is packed (mostly), and there's 33 miles of feral river out there just waiting for me. I am ready to go.

December morning

It is a day of reckoning, this December the 1st. Perhaps reckoning is too harsh a term, but it is certainly a day to drop back and take stock, at least in terms of what the rest of the year will bring. If you are planning on doing some particular thing or traveling to some particular place, and you'd like to get it done in 2009, you have but one short month in which to make it happen.

It's clear and sunny this morning, a welcome change. I can see the peaks of the eastern Olympics, snow-covered and sharp as knives. It's the first day I've seen them in weeks and it gets me thinking about the things I have, so far, left undone. There are places over there that I want to see, routes I am aching to try, but this year has already run out for them. December is heading in other directions for me; the wild shores and high mountain passes of the Olympics will have to wait for 2010.

I am leaving on Thursday for eastern Washington and a 2-day paddleboard ride through the Hanford Reach. Chris Pattillo, Mike Willis and myself are planning on doing the Vernita Bridge to Ringold section of the river, a 33-mile classic trip through the last free-flowing segment of the Columbia. I don't know how often it's been done on a SUP, in December. Probably never. Then there's the Deception Pass Dash, set for the 12th... I'm not sure whether I'll be piloting a kayak or a SUP yet, but it seems like it will be a good time and I'm planning on being there when that deal goes down.

Meanwhile, there's the web site to finish and publish, continuing research and writing related to the next paddling guide book, as well as important Christmasy doings that seem to pop up everywhere this time of year. It's a fast month, and it always goes by so quickly there at the end. I never thought 2010 would get here so soon.