Island ramblings

There's talk that it's going to start raining later today... after about three weeks of summer weather. I hope that won't be the end of it. I certainly feel like we're entitled to more than that. Maybe that's why I've been thinking about the California Channel Islands this morning.

Warm, sunny days and cool, crisp nights. Sea caves. Sea lions and cormorants. History and remote, wild beaches. And reliably vivid, cerulean skies.

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Although the day up here turned out to be much better than predicted, here's a few more reasons why I can't get these particular islands out of my head:

Smiles

This is one of my favorite photos. I took it on a kayak outing to the Nisqually Delta years ago... I don't remember who this little girl was but I'm sure she's in college now. (Funny, I haven't aged a bit.)

I do remember though, that the day was perfect for sea kayaking. There were seals everywhere and birds and, along the shore, plenty of crabs and other crawly things to keep a kid's interest. The smile on her face and the obvious joy that she was getting out of the day's activity was infectious. I see the picture now, all these years later, and I still get happy about spending time on the water.

And that is what it is all about. It's supposed to be fun.

Punk'd

There was a report yesterday of an orca that was struck by a fast-moving boat in Haro Strait. The boat in question wasn't a commercial whale-watcher; it appeared to be a private boat and it has yet to be located.

From what I've been able to find out, it was a pair of kayakers who told authorities about the speedboat, although they didn't actually claim to have seen a collision. They reported only that the boat in question ripped through an area where a small pod had just come up for air, and the fact that an orca was subsequently found to be lolling at the surface, possibly in distress, was enough to get the story of a hit-and-run out to the news wires.

Two and two do not, however, always make four. It turns out that the affected whale is an 18 year-old female, and she appears to be pregnant. She has been viewed by whale experts in the hours since the initial reports of the "accident" came in, and they seem satisfied that she is not in any distress, other than what might be common to first-time mothers (of any species).

So it's a happy thing, rather than a cause for any consternation, right? Right. The thing is, I wouldn't be surprised to see the restrictions on boaters - including kayakers - get even tighter in Haro Strait because of this incident and others like it. After all, a boat traveling at a high rate of speed was still too close to the whales, even if reports of a collision were exaggerated. It didn't happen, but it could have. The distance requirements now have boaters staying at least 200 yards away from the orca - the next step could very easily be to close the area to watercraft completely. It is an option that has been discussed before.

Two and two sometimes make five.

Bonding

Two nights of car camping with a 4 year-old has its ups and downs. Mostly ups, though. Micah and I did an end-of-summer whirlwind trip around Rainier, first night at White River, second night at Ohanapecosh. (Don't you just love saying "Ohanapecosh?" Four year-olds do, I can tell you that. Saying it, singing it, whatever.)

A couple side trips as well: Sunrise in the morning and Tipsoo Lake for lunch. With a few random hikes and unscheduled explorations along the way. There is so much to see that it's a shame to spend much time in the campgrounds. National Parks are, in general, a balance between the wild and the tame, between untrammeled beauty and concentrated humanity. In this, Mount Rainier strikes a decent compromise. Not as stunningly wild as say, Gates of the Arctic but a whole lot better than Yosemite.

The snow is going to start falling again soon. Best get up there yourself before the white blanket gets pulled back over everything.

Some paper with that?

I went up Mount Si a week or so ago... nice hike, for the most part. It really is a beautiful place. The views from the top are breathtaking.

Because of its proximity to the population centers of western Washington, it sees a lot of use. Which is ok. The thing is, there's only one restroom there and it's at the parking lot. Which means, if you've got to go number 2, and you aren't familiar with the process (in the woods, at least), you are going to leave your mark.

Judging from the used bumwads and the human droppings I saw all up and down the hill, you'd be just as well off hiking in a sewer. With as much traffic as this place gets, there's got to be a better way. Maybe another toilet, or blue bags, I don't know. Meanwhile, watch your step.

Back to the mountain

I'm not sure if this summer weather will hold... never can tell, can you? Regardless, the boy and I are heading up to Mount Rainier for a couple days, maybe three. Going to do a little car camping and day hiking, nothing too extreme, but every bit the adventure. Especially when you're four years old.

I'm working on campground reviews for White River and Ohanapecosh for another web site, which is the official excuse, (er, reason), for the trip, but it really just seems like it's time anyway. Mary started coaching already, school is just around the corner and despite the recent flash of warm days, my calendar tells me it's all going to change soon. So, off we go.

This shouldn't even be political

"Sooner or later in every talk, Brower describes the creation of the world. He invites his listeners to consider the six days of Genesis as a figure of speech for what has in fact been four billion years. On this scale, a day equals something like six hundred and sixty-six million years, and thus 'all day Monday and until Tuesday noon, creation was busy getting the earth going.' Life began Tuesday noon, and 'the beautiful, organic wholeness of it' developed over the next four days. 'At 4 P.M. Saturday, the big reptiles came on. Five hours later, when the redwoods appeared, there were no more big reptiles. At three minutes before midnight, Christ arrived. At one-fortieth of a second before midnight, the Industrial Revolution began. We are surrounded with people who think that what we have been doing for that one-fortieth of a second can go on indefinitely. They are considered normal, but they are stark, raving mad.'"

That's John McPhee, in a passage from the seminal book, Encounters with the Archdruid, published back in the misty past of 1971, mostly quoting David Brower. As pertinent today as it was then... perhaps even more so.

Justice delayed

I went to the peninsula the other day, a little surf safari before the summer ends. On the way, I stopped by the courthouse in Port Angeles for the latest hearing for Amber Steim, the woman who plowed into Ellen DeBondt's truck back in March. (See above photo). It was a quick affair, this hearing. Pretty much a legal sprint by the defense, with the upshot being that everyone agreed to meet later on - September something - to talk about it all some more. Meanwhile, Ellen is still dead.

From what I've been hearing, the likely sentence, should Ms. Steim be found guilty, will be between 2 and 3 years. And all this time that her defense team has been stalling and stumbling, dork-dancing through the motions and counter-motions, all this time counts as "time served" for the defendent. In other words, if they do their job well, maybe she won't actually have to don prison blues at all. Much. Two years, maybe three... for causing the death of another person.

In Washington, a Class A felony convict will get an additional 5 years added to his sentence if a firearm is used during the commission of the crime. I don't know how much using a knife will get you. All I know is, if I ever aim to kill anybody, first I'm going to sink a few drinks... and then I"m going to use a car.

Low visibility

The idea was to climb Mount Si by the light of a full moon and have breakfast at the top at sunrise. This being western Washington, however, we hiked up the steep trail in the tepid glow of our headlamps and the black of night progressed incrementally into the gray of day, rather than exploding in beams of radiant light.

The best laid plans... as they say.

Still, breakfast was delicious and the group was a lot of fun. There were 22 of us (I think), and I am pretty sure I was the oldest. We left from the parking lot at about 3am and I got to the summit a couple of minutes after 5am. Each of us had a backpack with some of the items for the breakfast feed, and we made a pile of the communal food for Marc and Paul to put together. The dutch oven cuisine (4 ovens, actually), was outstanding and was consumed in short order. Mimosas all around, and not a drop gone to waste.

Most of the group picked their way to the top of the haystack, the true summit, once the light had gotten established. Shrouded in fog and cloud, for the most part, but the mists parted now and then to provide occasional views of the Cascades and the valley below.

This is the 5th annual for Marc and Paul, and it just gets more popular each year. It was my first time going with them, and although I have done the trail before, it's been years. It's a busy trail, probably the most-used in the entire range, and I encountered at least a hundred people on my way back down. Maybe two hundred. And all those people have an impact. (Maybe more on that later.)

A good time, overall. A nice way to start the morning.

An inside job

The ironic thing about keeping a blog on outdoor adventure is that so little of the writing actually happens outdoors. Or I guess it's not that ironic really, for a Luddite like me. I don't tweet, my phone is not "smart," and I have neither the capability nor the inclination to post from the wilderness. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with those things, or that maybe I wouldn't benefit from a satellite linkup and a solar panel... just that I might have been born too early.

Or late. I can't keep them straight.

I once managed a Tacoma guiding company called Tahoma Outdoor Pursuits. Don't look for it now, it's long gone. Actually, it morphed into Azimuth Expeditions in 2004 which, although it is still on the go, bears little resemblance to its predecessor. I used to joke that, for the "outdoor" part to work, somebody had to do all the planning and deskwork and so, for me, the company could just as well be called Tahoma Indoor Pursuits. Not a joke at all, actually.

This is the time of year, with the brief summer already mostly in the books, that I normally start to think about what the next year is going to look like. Like I said, Azimuth Expeditions is still kicking, and I should be laying out the 2012 schedule soon, moving the prospective class dates around the calendar, seeing where the conflicts might arise and gearing up for another season.

Should be. Haven't really started yet. Hard to say why, exactly. I just feel more tired than I used to feel at this point. Tired of the indoor pursuits, I think. I'll get on it. Really, I will. Just not today.

Today I'm going for a paddle.

It's called "wildlife"

First of all, I need to say that the killing of Robert Boardman was an absolute and undeserved tragedy. He was the hiker that was gored to death by an aggressive and hostile goat on Klahane Ridge last October. I feel for his family in their loss and I can only imagine their grief.

But now, a Tacoma attorney has filed a $10 million-dollar lawsuit against the National Park Service, alleging wrongful death because the animal in question had been known as a "dangerous animal" prior to the event and should have been removed. The suit seeks $5 million for Boardman's estate, $3 million for his wife and $2 million for his step-son, plus $22,000 in other expenses.

Goats are not native to Olympic National Park. They cause all kinds of grief to the environment and if they didn't look so damn noble and cool perched on crags in the high country, they would have been eliminated years ago. I am in favor of their being taken out of the mix, either with tranquilizers and helicopters or bullets and pitchforks... whatever. The fact of the matter, however, is that they are there now and they need to be accounted for.

Robert Boardman didn't deserve to die. All accounts are that he tried to get away from the goat and the goat acted in what could be called a malicious and predatory manner. (If you want to get all anthropomorphic about it.) But here's the thing: the goat was a wild animal. Wild animals do wild things, like eat their food raw, crap wherever they want to and, sometimes, kill hikers. This particular goat was shot by rangers later in the day, so he won't be a repeat offender, but that doesn't mean it won't happen again sometime.

I wrote about it back then... I knew this goat (or his twin), and I had a dicey encounter along this same stretch of trail some months before Boardman's death. The event shook me a bit, although I didn't spend too much time thinking about it later and it never occurred to me that the Park Service was to blame. Who knew? Maybe the next time I get chased by a bear, or stalked by a mountain lion, or bitten by a mosquito, maybe I'll get me a quack lawyer with an eye for a fancy government payout.

There is no situation so tragic and horrible that adding a lawyer won't make it worse. The minute you leave your car and start up the trail or down the river or out into the bay, you are no longer at the top of the food chain. Figure out what you are going to do to deal with that fact, but leave your wrong-headed notions of safety and entitlement back home.

A Guide's life, redux

I was reading a piece by David Quammen the other day, in which he described his brief career as a guide as demanding "the humility of a chauffeur and the complaisance of a pimp."

Hardly a glowing review of the profession and, to be fair, Mr. Quammen was speaking of his time as a fishing guide, an occupation I don't know much about. (I catch my fish at Safeway, mostly, and although I can probably guide you to the seafood counter, I don't expect a tip for my trouble.)

I've been a kayak guide for over 20 years now and while I don't feel the same way about my time on the water as he did, the man has a point. I've had great luck most of the time, with clients who are both interesting and adventurous, and some of them have turned into long-time friends. Then there are those who make a guide's life far less enjoyable, far more stressful. I guess what I'm saying is, if you are the type to hire a guide, please just be nice. Be decent. It's a tough job, no matter how you look at it.

Another plug

I haven't mentioned these guys enough. One of the good shops - and there aren't nearly enough of them left.

If you are looking for quality gear, or top-of-the-line instruction, or just a place to go and breathe in the finer fumes of kayaking, look no further. Portland Kayak Company has been very good to me over the years and I feel like I owe them a shout-out. At least.

First weekend in October

I heard from Ned the other day and he is committed to doing the Rainier climb (that I have been talking about all year), on October 6-9. He tore his achilles tendon last winter and I thought he might not be able to do it at all in 2011, but he is coming along well with his physical therapy and the prognosis is much better now.

Yes, I could have tried it without him but there are at least two very good reasons that I am choosing to stay on his rope. The first is that, with over a hundred summit climbs to his credit, going with him provides a measure of safety that I would be unlikely to find anywhere else. The other reason, just as important, is that going along with him guarantees a good experience, regardless of whether we make the summit or not. You can't not have a good time when you're hanging with Ned.

I'll be writing another installment about the climb for visitrainier.com in the next few weeks, this one about gear requirements (you can catch up with what I've written so far here), but the real climbing piece will come after the first weekend in October. Now we just have to hope for good weather, always a fickle fate.

How long Kopachuck?

I saw in the news the other day that the campground at Kopachuck State Park is still closed. Laminated root rot is the culprit, a disease that causes trees to just up and fall over, according to the folks at the State Park brain trust, and the campground is going to remain closed until they figure out a way to deal with it.

There are those who see a conspiracy here, something about keeping the surrounding wealthy neighborhood pure (socioeconomically speaking.) I don't know much about class warfare, or root rot either, but I do know that Kopachuck was on the State's list of possible park closures a few years ago and just narrowly escaped extinction at that time. In a way, it seems inevitable that the place will be shut down. And sold, and developed, and will ultimately become the future site of more unsightly waterfront McMansions for the uber-rich. The State needs the money, and that's where the money is.

The money is most definitely not in parks.

Worse things happen at sea

The long-awaited family vacation began yesterday. A decent first day of driving took us to a rest area just outside Yreka, California. And then we hit what you might call a snag.

If, by "snag," you mean a piston through the block. That's right, the Westy has a blown engine, we're in a hotel in Yreka and we're going to be continuing south tomorrow in a rental car the size of a kleenex box, with roughly the same amount of horsepower. Now we're heading out to dinner... if by "dinner," you mean margaritas.

It's been quite a birthday.

Summer arrives in the San Juans

Just got back a couple days ago from a great trip to the San Juans, one of the best I've ever had. Which is not to say that it was all easy - it wasn't - just that it ended up a success on every level. Overall, the weather was pretty good, and a couple of the days were magnificent, but we did have a few moments of unplanned adventure as well. A rescue in the rip off Toe Point (Patos Island), and a subsequent night's stay on the island that was not on the itinerary was the major schedule deviation, but it all worked out in a way that made it exciting and pleasing for all involved.

Marc and I paddled out to Sucia from Orcas Island on Saturday night, just to get the camp together and ready for the next day. In the morning, we paddled back to North Beach to meet the folks who had come up from Portland for the trip. The packing was over pretty quickly, and we got back on the water in short order. It felt like summer, with a warm sun high in the sky and a light breeze that hardly disturbed the calm seas.

We got the rest of the camp put together, then spent the afternoon circling the northern portion of Sucia, ogling the magnificent sculpted cliffs and the intricate passages and islets near Ewing Island and wishing it would be like this forever. The sunset was awesome (a word I feel I most definitely overused during the course of the week), and I slept like a baby. More or less.

Monday dawned cooler and overcast, although the conditions at the start didn't give an accurate indication of how bad it was going to get. About 2/3 of the way over from Sucia to Patos, the wind kicked into a different gear, from the southeast (southeast!?!), and mixed with the rip off Toe Point in a most disconcerting manner. I could feel the capsize coming, probably three or four minutes before the fateful event. The rescue, however, went according to Hoyle and by the time we all tucked into the cove just around the north side of the island to get warm and dry, the sun had come out. Which was nice, but it didn't last.

We opted to pull the boats out of the water on the north shore and walk around to the camping area near Active Cove, by which time the wind had built to fearsome levels. Discussions were begun about uncomfortable bivy options, but what ended up happening was decidedly less extreme. Three of us (me, Marc and Matt - the 17 year-old son of the couple who booked the trip), lit out across the lumpy water to Sucia and came back with the bulk of the gear, which made our night on Patos significantly less rustic.

The next day was more benign, weather-wise, although we flirted with a serious rip just north of the channel for a while as we returned to Sucia. After lunch, we continued on to Matia as the weather got better and the seas began to remember how they are supposed to look in summer.

Dinner was a spicy pesto lasagne in the dutch oven (thanks Marc), and the next day, consensus had us staying at Matia for another go-round. We did a day paddle, with empty boats, around Matia and Puffin Islands... wildlife-rich, hot breezes and picture-postcard bliss all the way. Seals, with their human-sounding calls and ridiculous fart noises, as well as squeeking eagles in the trees along shore, gave us all the sound track we needed. Jumping off the dock before dinner was all the proof we needed to decide that summer had indeed arrived.

Note: Matia is the jewel of the northern tier... big trees, rock walls, wildlife's Grand Central Station... how have I not gushed about this place before? Ah well, there is still time.

It all ended the next morning. Another perfect sunrise and a trip back across the channel to Orcas, skirting that dastardly Parker Reef, and it was over. Dammit.

When do I get to do it again?