Blocksma's Year-End Video/Christmas Card

Well, it's that time of year again - we eschew the more traditional mailing format of Christmas cards and instead take some of our favorite memories from the year and put them with a song that we like to listen over and over and over again (which is helpful, because making this thing makes you listen to that song a million times).

Merry Christmas and happy New Year to all - may the next 12 months be even better than the last.

Fall Breakin'

We have lived in Colorado now for four years, which includes four attempts at making a break for the Utah border over Liz's school endorsed Fall Break. The past three years have all been abject failures at making this trip happen, and this fall we were committed to making some autumn desert camping happen.

Well, it didn't happen. BUT!

We arose on the morning of our scheduled departure to weather forecasts of low 50's for high temperature marks and 50% chances of rain. Ugh. Sitting in bed with a map, we scanned all the potential locations within a 6 hour drive that would be entertaining (and warm) enough to visit. We still had four free days, and desired to get a break from the regular routine.

Luckily, we eventually landed on Lander (see what I did there?) and decided that the reputation for information and local beta at the Wild Iris Climbing Shop in town was enough to make us not need a perfect plan to leave home. We set to finalize packing clothes, food and climbing gear, and made way to Snooze downtown to christen the trip with a good breakfast. (they have Root Beer French Toast. Just sayin.)

Rolling the four.five hours northward to the base of the Wind Rivers, we ducked into Wild Iris to get the local climbing book and directions to campgrounds. After October, the national forest campground just near the base of Sinks Canyon becomes free, and we found a great spot right along the Popo Agie river as dark settled around us. The river was running so loudly that it was all you could hear while stoking the fire, and the day seemed to melt into night. It is always surprising to me how quickly my mind can settle when I turn my phone off and sleep out-of-doors.

The next morning we arose slowly (it was warmer than Utah, but it's still October camping. It's chilly.) and eventually walked over to the Scud Wall section of the main area of Sinks Canyon. We had the wall to ourselves for a large portion of the day, though eventually shared some space with some kids who were enrolled in a NOLS course that is headquartered in town. We picked out some moderates to remind us that we don't climb often enough anymore to hit the more epic routes, but were still able to get about five routes in by the end of the day. (I ended with a long lead of the 5.9 Duck Soup that didn't relent for me at the top. With only an anchor to set, overhanging jugs and no feet, I simply could not get my arms to comply with my order to hold me pat until setting the anchor. Liz got her first taste of catching a lead fall, and I eventually bailed on the thing, cursing a storm the whole way down. Blast.)

Afterwards, it wasn't quite time for dinner yet, so we went to inspect the famous sink and rise of the Popo Aggie river that were camped just up canyon from. While the wiki is more detailed, effectively what has happened to this river is that the softness of the limestone along the bed of the water years ago gave way at some point, and the river literally dives between rocks and disappears. Crazy. You can walk down to where the water escapes and see it go - though it's even more odd in person.

A quarter mile later the river returns (after going under the freeway) in the form of a two deep-pocketed river beds filled with milling trout. Dye tests showed that the water takes over 2 hours to get from sink to rise, and as of now no one really knows the extent of the underground system that the water encounters. ALSO, their is more water coming OUT of the rise than is going IN to the sink, so at some point different sources of ground water join the party. Nuts. My favorite part of it all, though, is the funny/sad/funny again plight of the trout in the river. As they head upstream to bed their eggs, they hit a roadblock at the rise and just get stuck. The state of Wyoming has placed some fish food dispensers to keep them fat and happy, but mostly it's fun to image a lot of confused conversations happening between them under the water as to what direction they turned incorrectly to end up in a dead-ending river.

Friday night was spent inspecting the fire and listening to river before retreating around 8 pm. Fall camping can be tough - sunlight is completely gone by 6:30 - so you get to enjoy the comfort of your sleeping bag more than most trips. Over Saturday morning breakfast we decided to head home that evening and sleep in our warm bed (we had also run out of food) but not before we explored the canyon a little more. Driving up the road a few more miles found the trailhead for the Popo Agie falls, which made for a really enjoyable 4 mile out-and-back that displayed fall's best colors and and increasingly granite canyon top.

After sampling some great Lander fare for lunch, we rolled home and watched the Wyoming landscape seem to move slowly even at 80 mph. Utah it was not, and at some point we'll actually give Canyonlands it's due, but hanging out in the foothills of the Wind Rivers shouldn't be considered a substandard consolation. Now the trick is to start thinking about winter sports....

Labor Day Visitors

Dwight, Jenny, and their Elisabeth come to explore Colorado for a week. Elisabeth fills our cabinets with baby food, renames the cat "Memet," and completely charms and entertains us. We get to share some of our favorite places with them, and in return they share their company and Dwight's delicious cooking with us.

Indian Peaks Wilderness August 2010

Back in March, when the weather was cold and damp and summer felt like forever away, I started dreaming of sleeping outside amongst the mountains. Campsite reservations during summer weekends are insanely hard to come by, and as I started looking around, I found that many campsites had already been filled in March. So I randomly picked a weekend and booked a large campsite, assuming we'd come up with plan sometime in the coming 5 months. The Indian Peaks had been on our go-to list for a while. All we needed was a campsite and a few friends.

We spent Saturday afternoon ambling along the Lake Isabelle trail with friends, some hiking, some staying around the lakes to fish. The weather became cool and cloudy and ended in a rainy evening back at the campsite.

Sunday morning was cloudless, with a fall-like breeze. The sixty degree sunshine provided some welcome relief from the ninety degree heat back home. Doug and I decided to stick around for the day and hike the Blue Lake trail. We spent a few happy hours surrounded by deep greens and wildflowers. Our relatively early start meant that we essentially had the whole basin to ourselves before heading back to the trailhead.

Rocky Mountain Folks Fest August 2010

What better way to spend a hot summer weekend than with some of your favorite folks listening to some of your favorite folk? Jake, beloved cousin and mandolin extraordinaire for the band Joy Kills Sorrow, reserved us tickets (which we learned upon arrival were actually backstage passes) for a weekend of outdoor music in the mountains. Aside from the JKS show, we caught some other revered acts as well -- Ani Difranco, Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn, and a few more.

Joy Kills Sorrow. They demolish sorrow with the power of bluegrass. Check them out.

Look What We Can Do! (A blog of crafty proportions)

We have much that has been left unblogged. August came and went without a blog post to mark it. So we will get to some adventures, but first its time for you to marvel in our recent handiworks.

First, a set of patio chairs that we made with some wood from the local recycled hardware store. Our first DIY project requiring extensive use of a saw, which we borrowed from a neighbor. We even managed to keep all of our fingers intact.

We finished just in time for the big family visit in late July and it made for some lovely evenings sitting on the porch.

Next up, two refurbished pieces of furniture from the local thrift store. The bench needed a good sanding and re-upholstering of the cushions. Definitely my most complicated sewing project yet and by all accounts a success.

The coffee table matches our kitchen table which was made by my dad some 30 years ago. I didn't snatch a before picture, so you'll have to trust me that it looks better with a sanding and fresh coat of stain.

And finally, this was a recent Saturday evening accomplishment: Peach Upside Down Cake, for which I promised the recipe. It comes from Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, which is a kitchen library staple for us.

Peach Upside Down Cake

You’ll need a 10 inch cast iron skillet. If you don’t have one, stop reading this and go buy one. Almost kidding. You could also probably use an 8x8 square pan and just melt the butter and brown sugar together in the microwave before baking.

3 TBSP butter

¾ c light brown sugar

4-5 freestone peaches

1/3c chopped pecans

¼ tsp almond extract
1/2 c butter, softened
3/4 c sugar
1 tsp vanilla

3 eggs at room temperature

2/3 c finely ground almonds

1 c flour

1 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 375F. Heat the butter with the brown sugar in a 10 inch cast iron skillet over medium heat until the sugar is melted and smooth, then remove the pan from the heat.

Halve the peaches (no need to peel; just poke with a knife or fork and they will soften while they cook). Place them cut side down on the sugared. Fill the spaces in between the chopped pecans.

For the cake, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, then add the vanilla and almond extract. Beat in the eggs one at a time until smooth. Stir in the nuts, followed by the rest of the dry ingredients.  Cover the peach/sugar mixture with the almond batter and bake for 35-40 minutes. Let cool for a few minutes then turn over onto a plate.

Serve with vanilla ice cream or a dollop of bourbon infused whipped cream.

Sibling Vacation 2k10

Our years of cajoling family members into coming to visit us has finally paid off. All at once. Liz and her siblings plus spouses, significant others, and children tally 11, so any family get-together is no small affair. They gracefully endured hours in planes, trains, and automobiles to spend a week with us, and we in turn got to take them on some of our favorite adventures--hiking Horsetooth Rock, climbing and hiking at Vedauwoo, Rocky Mountain National Park, the local drive-in theatre, plus our typical board game shinnanigans. It's rare that we all find ourselves in the same zip code these days - all the more reason to enjoy every minute (and to capture it all in snapshot and song).

 

You can see a higher quality version of it on the Youtube, but they killed the audio track because we didn't personally write it. Awesome.

Goodbye, Flickr

Listen, Flickr, we need to talk.

I know that we've been together since 2005. And it's been a good five years, but, some things have changed. I know we've been pro-users together since 2007, and we've enjoyed the service you've given, but, since we need to give you another $25 by the end of the week to continue being so I took a look at the data.

It wasn't good.

What that basically says, is that we had a large spike of viewing at the end of July, with the posting of vacation pictures. After that, we've been at about 2 or 3 views of pictures a day for months now...

Listen, it's not you, its, well.. facebook. People don't care enough to click through a link and look at pictures, they'll really only look at them if they're already on the site they are currently reading. Which is usually facebook. Its the new AOL, apparently.

So, we'll continue to use you, but we're going to have to take our relationship back a step and only let people see our most recent 200 photos, and not upload more than 100 Mb a month.  I know that change can be scary, but I need that $25 in a about an hour when I go grocery shopping.

Also, you don't integrate with the geo-tagged data that I already entered into iPhoto, which is a pain in my ass.

See you around!

A 'Voo Weekend

I'm a tardy blogger at the moment, and will have to use breaks in actual work (read: a paper due soon) to write up some posts about recent happenings. Or not-so-recent, as my timing would have it.

We used to have our cousins, Dylan and Ann, living in town with us here in Fort Fun. It was nice. We liked them a lot. Then they moved, and the town was worse for it. BUT, they were recently nearby again for a few weeks, and we managed to enjoy their company over dinners, campfires and climbing crags, most of which in the context of our beloved Vedauwoo. A few weekends ago was such a time, and a number of friends headed North to do some camping and climbing with the long lost cousins.

Arriving a day early, Liz and I got to spend a crowd free afternoon getting our slab on at the Fall Wall. This particular part of the main area is actually the first place that I had ever climbed.. uh.. ever..  with said cousins five summers ago. It was nice to see it again, with a better (worse?) haircut and if anything else, more gear of my own.

The evening and following day found more friends arriving, and we traipsed over to the plumb line crag to get our taste of crack-tastic goodness. Most everyone got a good dose of flailing shoulder, knee and fist first on the rocks before deciding that enough skin had been sacrificed to the 'voo overlords.

Dinner and a campfire that evening with good friends and conversation overwhelmed the crowds in which we were camping, and we were homeward bound come Sunday morning. After running around most of the west coast for a month, it was a perfect reminder of why we love living on the front range with the people we are lucky enough to call friends.

FLICKR.

The Hoodoo that You Do

Utah is nuts. Well, in July.

Getting extremely tired of the 106 degree weather, we saddled northward(ish) from Zion to spend the day at Bryce Canyon. While still warm, losing at least ten to fifteen degrees made a fairly large difference, and we set out to enjoy our day at yet another ridiculous national park.

Bryce Canyon Hoodoos

Bryce Canyon is very deceptive. As you enter the park, you get no feel for the type of topography that lies just beyond some of the trees to the East where the canyon lip stands. Even until you walk right up to the lip, you really have no idea what is in store for you. The colors and the power of the earth is on display, and the pictures do not do it justice - such an otherworldly experience.

Still not tan. Weird.

 We decided to hook three different loops together to make for a nice 6 mile afternoon, and took in the Queen's Garden Loop, half of the Navajo Loop and the Peek-a-boo Loop. Without a guidebook or someone telling us what we were looking at, it was mostly a hike of staring at crazy formations and shades of orange that we were fairly certain all had names but didn't know. We once again quickly decided that a short backpacking trip on our next return should be in order, if only to see the entire park and find some more solitude.

Hoodoos on the Peek-a-Boo Loop

 The one thought that blossomed in our heads while hiking, though, was how much we wanted to see home again. We decided after getting up and out of the canyon that we would drive through the Escalante Staircase (a drive in itself that is worth going to the area for) and try to find a campsite at Capitol Reef National Park - which would get us in range for single day of driving the following day back to Fort Collins.

Arriving in Capitol Reef was a little eerie. The park itself has a major highway running through it's skinny (and elongated) middle, so there was no entrance station. As we rolled down to the single campsite, almost half the spots were still open, and all of the current residents were all super quiet and seemingly placated. There are all kinds of fruit orchards strafing the campgrounds, and the fact that this area was a Mormon settlement in the 1800's is easy to see due to the orchard size and order.

Capitol Reef Vista

Ten bucks got us a gigantic campsite with a flushing toilet - and without even seeing any of the park proper it made me want to stay a whole week. It was just so less busy and so much quieter than any of the other parks we had been to, it was the perfect antidote to feeling crushed by all of the RVs and cars we had forded to arrive.

In the morning we did a short drive around some of the park to grab some pictures and get a sense of the scenery before getting out of dodge and eventually eating lunch at Colorado National Monument. The CNM was our final stop of the trip, and also marked the 9th national park/monument/scenic area that we had gotten to see. All it took was ~6000 miles and a month!

Colorado National Monument - Independence Monument

We eventually got back to our driveway, exhausted but happy to be back to our beds, friends and kitty cat. All of the different sets are on the Flickr: Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef and Colorado National Monument. A final and summarizing group of pictures from the entire trip can be found on the Flickr right here.

Woof!

Zion National Park

California is nice. They have a lot of produce, people we love and Yosemite National Park. But what Cali doesn't have is the scenery of Southern Utah - which was a drastic change in pace from every other place we had been visiting so far on this nutty trip.

Sailing into the town of Springdale from a night in Las Vegas (a well intentioned exploration of Sin-City that confirmed every expectation of not really liking it at all...) we got some information at the wilderness desk of Zion National Park and eventually found a campsite at Mosquito Cove. The cove is.. deceptive. While driving through without many people in attendance, it seems nice, flat, next to a river and best of all: free. Once you have picked a spot and pitched a tent, though, some exploration only finds the worst side of free camping. Trash, used toilet paper, dead chairs, sometimes bullet casings (but no dirty diapers, at least) were strewn about like some urban johnny appleseed had made his rounds but the night before.

Zion Sunset

Tired of such grossness after only one night, the morning saw us waking up and directly finding a spot in Zion proper. We were once again directly next to the same river, but wading in it and not finding the remnants of a case of Mountain Dew made the required afternoon cool down much more palatable.

The final push up to Angel's Landing

 After relocating, we made our way up to the top of Angel's Landing with about fifty million other people (or so it felt). Angel's landing is a crazy hike that uses a network of chains to keep people from falling off the edge, though apparently someone had done so even just earlier this year. To make matters even better, about halfway up the tall and final portion, a fierce rainstorm picked up and began to soak and chill us with some nasty winds. We sat it out, and discovered a small blessing of the storm: most of the people behind us gave up their hopes of summiting and turned around. We enjoyed the views of the Zion valley over lunch and eventually picked our way back down to camp. The rest of the afternoon was spent in a local coffee spot doing homework (doug) and adjusting pictures (liz).

The view atop Angel's Landing

 Earlier that morning, we had gone to the wilderness desk again, in order to obtain a permit to do the full 16 mile day hike of the Narrows for the following day. Upon inquiring, we were immediately (and effectively) talked out of it by the ranger on duty. She told us that it was longer, wetter and not nearly as fun as it sounds, and we were better off saving the $70 it would cost us (permit plus private shuttle fees) to simply walk up nearly halfway to the Big Springs feature in the river valley and come back down. We were disappointed to not get the whole experience (and will do it in an overnight next time - though we need some partners to help plant a car!) but she appealed to my cheapness, which usually tends to win.

The Virgin River in the Narrows

So, for our second day we rode to the top of the valley in the park's shuttle system, and headed up the five miles of the Virgin River attempting to lose as many large groups and families attempting to do the same thing. After mile 2, most dropped off and we were set to the challenge of walking upstream of a river that at times was very deep (some portions, though avoidable, were easily deeper than my height) and consistently cold.

Ever use a river as a trail?

Narrows Congregants

 We watched the walls come in and out, saw the way the sun moved across the small sliver of sky above and got utterly soaked. Turning around at Big Spring, we decided to skip the whole 'walking' thing, and after triple-wrapping the camera swam as much of the river down as we could. It wasn't all the much faster, but it was much more fun!

Big Spring - Not just a Clever Name!

 It turned out that the ranger was completely right - by the end of our little 10 mile day, we were pretty tired of slipping on rocks and only wanted to something warm to drink. Overall, though, the hike was one the most interesting and unique things we've ever gotten to do, and really really want to give it the two day treatment in the future.

(Here's all of the shots in the Flickr set)

In Love in the Narrows

Yosemite Valley's North Rim Backpacking Trip

Satisfied, showered and happy to see another couple in love take the plunge, Liz and I nosed the Subie Easterly to find Yosemite National Park. Liz had spent all of one real day at the park in 2002, and I had only done one real hike myself in 2003, so we were completely geeked to get to spend a week in our favorite park.

Arriving late on Sunday night, we got our backpacking permit at the Hetch Hetchy wilderness station and immediately found out that our planned campsite (Tamarack Flat) was a) Full and b) only taking reservations, anyways. Taking it as a sign to stay put, we pulled into the Hetch Hetchy backpackers campground and took to completely sorting out our car of all bear-attracting things. We took a walk of the reservoir that nearly killed John Muir (spiritually, not literally.. though that could be argued) and eventually got some sleep.

Hetch Hetchy Reservoir

The morning found us excited to get to the beginning of our trip, a hike we originally read about in Backpacker last year. The original recipe (and hook of the article) was that the hike began from the valley floor on very old, rockslidden road that is no longer listed on any maps. Doing a little poking around and reading trip reports revealed that not only is the beginning portion of the hike on said rockslidden road sketchy, but difficult and not necessary. A cursory examination of the area gave us our starting point of the Tamarack Flat Campground and a downhill jaunt to where the original recipe met us at Cascade Creek. From there, we actually continued on up to Ribbon Creek where we camped next to El Cap for day 1. The 2000' ascent in less than 2 miles was a bit of a burner, and we got to enjoy the late snow melt running down the granite slope of Ribbon Creek to celebrate our first night.

On top of El Cap

The next day was another 7 miles, though this time punctuated by crazy-awesome views of the valley as we continued. We first topped El Cap, and I scrambled down to see the spot where most climbers ascend from climbing this monster. Scampering around and up to Eagle Peak proved to give the best (and highest) views of the valley for the entire week - and the day eventually ended on the banks of Yosemite Creek, directly before it turned into Yosemite Falls.

The view from Eagle Peak

Day 3 began with the knowledge that it was our longest day, and day 2 had ended with some nasty blisters from our dainty feet who were not used to actually carrying weight. (wah!) Taking a glance off of Yosemite Point and greasing up with sunscreen and DEET, we made it around multiple creeks to eventually have lunch on top of North Dome and get yet another perspective on the valley. From there its a good five miles around to the top of the Snow Creek trail and our campsite on the lip of the valley wall that was literally directly across from Half Dome. This site won for best campsite of the entire trip (including every other campsite we'd come across in Washington, Oregon and California) and gave us an awesome show at sundown.

Half Dome Sunset

Day 3 Campsite Under Cloud's Rest

A Lovely Spot for Breakfast

The final day began with the 2500' descent over 1.5 miles to Tenaya Creek and a deluge of tourists at Mirror Lake. We made some friends who were also doing nearly the same hike as us for the week, and were very graciously given a ride back to our little car hiding out on the wrong side of the valley from where we ended up. That night we ended up having dinner in Lee Vining just East of the Park at the Mobil gas station, where we had the best fish tacos we've ever had. Seriously. At the Mobil. The whole California segment of our trip was capped with a free campsite just south of Mono Lake, where we were basically on a large sandy beach covered with sage and juniper and another nice view of the sunset.

Mono Lake Campsite

As far as having a first time multi-day backpacking experience goes, ours was incredibly rewarding and a lot of fun. We feel like our wimpy car-camping personas were (finally) stretched and are excited to explore more of our own backyard in such a fashion...  as soon as I can talk myself out of needing a real pillow. Seriously. Real pillows are amazing.

To catch all of the shots, head over to the set on Flickr. And I finally tagged all of our recent pictures to show up on the Flickr Map, if that suits your fancy.