spoofed.org

A bunch of us have been trying to arrange a camping trip of some sort for quite a while now. Between various holidays, work schedules, and the general difficulty of trying to get 20 people together, it took quite some time for it to happen.

Thanks to Nick's persistence, it finally came together.

We loaded up the Jeep and started on the long, 6 hour drive to Death Valley. We arrived long after dark at Wildrose, but managed to set up our site in good time. The sleeping experience the first night left something to be desired. The desert floor is basically solid rock, so getting a tent stake in the ground in any way that you could hope to hold down a rain fly was basically impossible. I wasn't feeling particularly creative, so we just put the rain fly on top and secured it to the tent poles, simply bypassing the tiedowns that you should use to pull the fly taut. Soon after we went to sleep, the cold air from up higher in the mountains (we were camped at roughly 5200 feet) comes rushing down into the valley, and our tent was like a wind tunnel. I got up half naked with a headlamp to remove the fly, and went back to bed.

Saturday after an hour or two of milling around, cooking breakfast and packing up camp, we drove to Mosaic Canyon for what had been planned as a short hike, but turned into a much longer, more enjoyable adventure. The canyon is an amazing place with all the different rock formations.

I tend to not make New-Years resolutions, as I'm off the mindset that you shouldn't need some significant event such as the new year to get your ass in gear. This year, however, I've started to adopt a few goals that I've been following quite well so far:

• If I drink coffee, I drink it black
• Carry no credit card debt
• No more than 8-9 hours of sleep on any given day, including weekends

The last goal has resulted in me being quite productive on weekends. This may come as a shock to many people who knew me growing up, as I would routinely sleep 10-12+ hours, often times seeing days without daylight.

This weekend I decided that I'd push myself to within my physical limits on both days. Saturday I ran/hiked the 5 mile loop of Echo Mountain. Actually, I think the part I did is technically the Lower Sam Merrill trail, which hooks up to the Echo Mountain trail at the top. I took a detour at the turn-around at the top to zip over to the Sunset Ridge fire road, followed by another few miles on the dirt road that follows soon after. I didn't have the GPS with me, and gmap-pedometer seems to croak after 20 or so waypoints, but the roundtrip was probably in the neighborhood of 10 miles. Not bad for 2.5 hours.

Today I figured I'd repeat yesterday's fun, but this time on my bike. I knew I was up for a challenge, as all the times I've been up to Echo Mountain I don't think I've ever seen anyone riding up the route I took, as it is quite treacherous. The inclines are quite steep for a bike, the switchbacks occasionally require that you get off your bike or skillfully whip the back tire around using your front brake, and many portions of the trail are very narrow and coupled with 25-100' drops onto rock outcrops on one side. The other people on the trail were mostly courteous to the fact that it sucks to have to stop while grinding uphill. A few people stopped me to discuss how crazy it was going up.

And then I continued on the trail over to Sunset Ridge, and nearly died a horrible death on the way out. There is a portion of the trail that has a large, finger-like rock outcrop on the right side of te trail. Naturally, the trail narrows a bit and winds its way around the rock, but over time and from some abuse/neglect, the portion on the left side has eroded away leaving an avalanche of rocks that goes a good 50' downhill and is nearly vertical. Stupidly, or perhaps because of adrenaline, I thought that my bike would fit around the rock. It appeared to fit just fine. Coming back, I slowed down to see how close I had come to my doom. In fact, my bike did not fit, and the only way to get around the rock was to leap across the gap-o-death.

The ride down made the grueling uphill climbs totally worth it. A good 5 miles of downhill on some of the best trails in Southern California -- hardpack dirt, strewn with rocks and the occasional bit of sand. It was over in less than 30 minutes.

More pictures here

Oh, and did I mention that its 85 out today, in the middle of "winter"?