What did I find up there? Just a bunch of roofing debris and a rat's nest; and no insulation whatsoever. Now I need to decide what to do with my newly found space. One idea is to open up the ceiling in the living room to make it more spacious. Another cool thing I could do is to create a sleeping loft up there. Also, a couple of skylights would be nice. Oh, the possibilities... Well, the first thing I need to do is to clean up all of that debris up there.
May 14, 2006
Mother's Postcard Sputnik
Check out this webpage that my mom is working on. She has a large post card collection and has and made a wonderful sample of it available for everyone's enjoyment via the Postcard Sputnik. It features selections from categories such as: "Incongruities", "Swell People", "Fine Accommodations", "Civic Pride", "Ribaldry: the Underbelly",
"Satan's Stuff", plus many others.
http://www.braininajar.com/PostcardSputnik.htm
Also, today is mothers day.
May 7, 2006
Slacking Off
Yeah, I've been slacking off on my blog as of late. To make up for that, here is an illustrated report of a unique mountain biking trip I made a couple of weeks ago. My destination was a place called Slack Canyon, which is located just east of Wenatchee. The Great Northern Railway built a line through this canyon in 1909, and it was abandoned around 1985. My goal was to follow this grade as best as I could on my single-speed mountain bike, starting from the town of Waterville and going all the way to the Columbia River. The resulting trip was a nice loop trip that anyone with a little sense of adventure and navigation skills could replicate.
I arrived in Wenatchee right at sunrise on Friday morning. I felt refreshed, but needed breakfast; found a nice diner near the train station that was open at this hour. After breakfast, I stopped at a grocery store to stock up on 2 days worth of snacks and meals, and then I rode over to the Columbia Transit Station. At Columbia Station, I boarded Link Transit Route 25, destination: Waterville. I was the only one on this bus, and I had a friendly chat with the driver along the way. The most wonderful thing about this bus is that it starts in Wenatchee at elevation 650' and terminates in Waterville at elevation 2625', not bad for $1! I disembarked the bus in downtown Waterville next to a lovely park.
I was way ahead of my semi-planned schedule, so I took a few minutes to hang out at the park and re-pack my stuff; from here I would be on my bike for the next two days, and I had to make sure that everything was tied down securely. It was sprinkling a little bit, but the weather forecast suggested clearing skies later in the day and the next day. I met the groundskeeper of the park, and asked him if he knew anything about the Slack Canyon railroad grade. He mentioned something about a trailhead that was recently built somewhere along it, but he was a little fuzzy about its exact location. I thanked him for the info and complemented him on the condition of the park.
Now it was time to head out of town and find the railroad grade descending into Slack Canyon. I took the road heading south out of Waterville, past the town burn pile and skirting the bottom of Standpipe Hill, then into the wheat fields. I located the grade pretty quickly, just a few miles south of Douglas, where it follows Douglas creek in a small gulch. Here, the grade was quite overgrown; no problem, a dirt road paralleled the grade and followed the natural contours of the creek for a distance.
I soon found myself in a place called 'Alstown' according to my map. Alstown consisted of a functional grain elevator, a couple of functional and non-functional houses, and a field of cars and farm equipment, most of which were clearly not functional. One of the old houses looked like it could be a good place to squat for a night, but I still had plenty of distance to go today. At this point, the road veered up to the plateau of wheat fields, while the grade continued down the gulch. I attempted to follow the grade, but it was tough going on my single-gear bike, so I turned back and followed the road eastward for a couple of miles. I intercepted Slack Canyon Road, which I knew from previous experience would take me into the canyon. This road is interesting; it follows a perfectly straight line up in the plateau, but then suddenly becomes steep and windy once it hits the canyon. I quickly bombed down this road and found Douglas Creek and the railroad grade again. Here, there is a new fancy trailhead and parking area. Posted at the trailhead was a map showing a trail following the grade northward from this point. The other posted signs were a little ambiguous about whether bikes were allowed on this trail, but they sure didn't seem to say no.
I still had plenty of time to work with, as I was planning to camp somewhere in Slack canyon, and I was pretty much there. So, I decided to stash most of my camping gear and follow the grade uphill as far as I could on my bike. When the trail was on the grade, it was pretty easy to negotiate on a bike, but then I came to the first creek crossing. There used to be a small trestle here, but it was long gone. The trail made a steep bypass down to the creek, and there was a log across the creek. But this was an evil log, it was perfectly round with a warped section in the middle, so that the whole log would rotate when a downward force was applied right above the deepest part of the water. My bike, which I was pushing alongside me, helped me barely avert a faceplant into the mud. A new strategy was needed, especially since the map seemed to indicate that there were many more of these crossings to come. A fortunate last minute packing decision several days ago meant that I had my sandals with me, so I took off my bike shoes and donned my sandals. Wading through the thigh-deep creek was easy and refreshing on this warm spring day. The map was not kidding, the trail crosses the creek at least 12 times within the next few miles, each time at the site of a former trestle, requiring me to pick up the bike and carry it down and up a slightly-treacherous bypass trail. Using sandals is the way to go here, although I lose a lot of power by not using my clip-in shoes (particularly since I'm driving a single-gear), it was worth it to be able to just walk right through the many creek crossings.
Except for the obstacles mentioned above, this trail was a beautiful ride, it goes through some impressive cuts, and I didn't meet a single person out here on this lovely Friday afternoon. But before too long, afternoon was creeping into evening. One of the locals in Waterville had warned me about rattlesnakes, and here I was in sandals carrying my bike through some brushy parts of the trail, and experience tells me that snakes like to hang out on the trail to catch the last day's warmth as the sun goes down. With that in mind, I reached a site where a particularly large trestle had been, and the timber foundations were still visible. After eyeing the long bypass trail, I decided to turn around at this point, even though this spot did look passable. I had hoped to follow this trail and the grade all the way to another road intersection, just to confirm that another connection might be possible. I do think the connection is possible via a road that dips down into the canyon about 1.5 miles south of Alstown. A future trip will be needed to confirm this connection.
I retraced my tracks back to the trailhead, repacked my bike, and continued down the semi-improved road that goes down Slack Canyon, sometimes following the old rail bed. This road has its share of bridgeless creek crossings as well, including another thigh-deep one; the sandals again came in handy. Further down Slack Canyon, Douglas Creek drains into an impressive set of waterfalls carved into the bedrock. In this area I set up camp, ate a cold dinner, and went to sleep as the stars were just starting to peek out.
On Saturday morning, I crawled out of my bivy sack and sleeping bag as soon as the sun rose over the horizon and hit me. Ate some snacks for breakfast, broke camp, and was soon on my bike again. Just south of here, the railroad used to go through a tunnel, but it is now almost completely collapsed. The road switchbacks up a ridge to bypass this area, which I followed. After reaching the crest of this ridge, I was treated to a sweeping view of Moses Coulee, the geologic formation that Douglas creek drains into and eventually leads to the Columbia River. From here, the road takes a nosedive down to Palisades Rd at the bottom of the coulee, while the railroad grade makes a graceful sweeping arc along the wall of the coulee. I followed the grade, not being quite sure if it would go all the way through. It did go through without any significant obstacles, except for a few barbed wire gates near the bottom, which were easily circumvented. When the grade touched down at Palisades, I shifted over to Palisades Rd. Now it was smooth sailing on paved roads, slightly downhill, all the way to Highway 28.
At the intersection of Hwy 28 and Palisades Rd, I located the old highway and followed it northward; this was much more pleasant than riding with traffic. After a few miles, it merged with the main highway near Rock Island Dam, and I rode along the shoulder of this busy highway. Just past the dam is the town of Rock Island. I had the option of loading my bike onto a Link Transit 23 bus from here to get back to Wenatchee, in fact the next one was scheduled to depart in only 30 mins, but it was such a nice day for a ride that I decided to complete the loop with my own wheels. It's 8 miles from Rock Island to Wenatchee, and the highway has a nice wide shoulder. As I approached Wenatchee, I noticed a nice new bike trail running along the river; I'm not sure where this starts, since it just kind of appeared on my left.
Following this trail, I was in Wenatchee in no time. First thing I did in town was eat a scrumptious vegetarian burrito at a Mexican joint near the train station. After that I headed back home in Seattle.
In all, I rode about 50 miles in 2 days, but it was almost all downhill, the perfect trip for a single-gear mountain bike loaded down with camping gear. There are not many places where you can make a loop in which you gain all of your elevation on public transit, and then follow a gradual descent through a remote canyon with some challenging biking terrain and beautiful scenery. This loop could probably be done in a day, with an early start and shrewd navigation skills. This is also the perfect time of year for venturing into the shrub steppe lands of eastern WA.
You know those new quarters that have been coming out for each state in the U.S.? Well, the State of Washington is currently polling residents to choose from one of three candidate designs. Two of the designs look like crappy tourism promos developed by some chamber of commerce, or something that you would see painted on the back of someone's massive R.V. But one of the coins is a simple depiction of an Orca Whale in a local Native American style. This would be a nice tribute to the native people who first settled this area, and an acknowledgement of the (relatively) peaceful role the tribes had in shaping the first European settlements in Washington State. Also, the blowhole is really cool. Canada includes a tribute to their First Nations peoples on their $20 bill. Let's be more like Canada, vote for coin #3, and tell all your friends.
Vote here:
http://www.governor.wa.gov/quarter/default.asp
April 2, 2006
Tuning in to the Space Station
I'm really digging this new internet audio station on Soma FM, called Space Station Soma, described as "spaced-out ambient and mid-tempo electronic". It's not quite as sleepy as their Drone Zone station, not as crazy and randomly annoying as Cliphop, and not as booty or sappy like Groove Salad is sometimes; the Space Station is just right.
Tune in direct here or go to http://www.somafm.com/.
March 26, 2006
R.I.P. Dirty Jesus
I'm sure you have all heard about the shooting rampage on Capitol Hill early this Saturday morning. Well, my friend Jeremy Martin, a.k.a. 'Dirty Jesus' is among the dead. I had just seen him on the Friday evening prior to the incident. He helped my friend Jesiah and myself rescue a dead Mitsubishi minivan (The Shuttlecraft) from an impound lot. He came up with us to look at the alternator of the van, which was the probable source of the trouble, and he deemed that he could replace it fairly easily. Jesiah's car had died earlier in the week, so this van was going to become his new wheels after the alternator was fixed. So we towed the van back to the now infamous blue house on Republican St. and parked it right next to the driveway. Less than 24 hours later, Jeremy, along with 5 others, was brutally murdered. Jeremy's offering to help fix the Shuttlecraft was a perfect example of how he was a sincere friend always willing to help. He did not in the least deserve this fate that became of him.
Have fun in Hell Jesus, we'll miss you.
March 9, 2006
Several weeks ago, our dear President Bush submitted a defense budget to congress, which included $120 billion for wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. How much is that? Well divide that number by our current population, 298,270,369, and you get $402.32 per person. The family rate? $1,033.96 for the average 2.57-person household. And for that price, you don't even get the whole war, just the annual subscription.
Congratulations! You have just bought a War.February 11, 2006
Last weekend, I embarked a snowshoeing trip, but it turned out to be a bit more of an adventure then I had planned. My stated plan, which I emailed to a friend before leaving home, was as follows:
Surprise Snowshoe Adventure
I'm going to take the bus to Gold Bar and try to hitch a ride up Hwy 2. I want to get dropped off at the Surprise Lake trailhead. From there I'm going to attempt to reach Spark Plug Lake, then maybe drop down into the Deception creek valley and head back to Hwy 2 from there. Then hitchhike back to Seattle/Everett/Woodinville and come home.Sunday morning, woke up and my daypack was ready to go. I hopped on my bike and left my house at about 7:30AM, coasted down to Pioneer Square and stashed my bike in the bike room at my office. I wanted to catch the 7:48AM route 510 bus to Everett, but unfortunately my altimeter watch was running 5 minutes slow, so I lollygagged too much and missed it. With an hour to kill until the next bus, I roamed downtown for a breakfast joint. Unfortunately nothing was open; my old standby, "The Diner" was closed for the damn superbowl, so I had to settle on a meal at Starbucks. Caught the 8:48 bus to Everett Station, and then transferred to the Community Transit route 271. I napped almost the whole way. Arrived at the end of the line in Gold Bar at about 11:10, now an hour behind my planned schedule. I got picked up after about 15 minutes of waiting, by a couple who was headed to the Stevens Pass Ski area. I asked to be dropped off at a place called Scenic, which is at the western portal of the BNSF Cascade Tunnel, and also the location of the Surprise Creek Trailhead.
I started up the Surprise Creek trail around noon on a beautiful sunny day, following a pair of ski tracks and some older snowshoe tracks. At about the 1-mile mark, the trail is supposed to cross Surprise Creek, but the tracks I was following continued down the west side of the valley, so I kept following them. At about the 3400' elevation level, I was planning to veer off of the trail and head up towards Spark Plug Lake. Well, to my delight, these ski tracks continued exactly in the direction that I wanted to head; they seemed to have been made by telemarkers equipped with skins, and they made me a nice ramp of compressed snow for me to follow up the ridge.
The tracks continued to Little Plug Lake, where the skiers obviously had made a U-turn and began their descent. I continued for another few hundred feet of elevation to get to Spark Plug Lake, elev. 5587'. The lake was completely frozen over and the snow on top had little ripples like sand on a beach. It was about 3:30PM or so and the sun as starting to get low in the horizon. I wish I had brought my camera, it was so peaceful and beautiful up there; but you'll have to use your imagination. I spent a few minutes absorbing awesome views here of Glacier Peak, Mt Baring, Index, Hinman, and Daniel.
A very short way from the lake is the top of the ridge, I scrambled up to this and peered down into the Deception Pass drainage. I ate my lunch, including tofu sandwich and Gala Apple, and contemplated my next move. The easy option from this point would be to turn around and retrace my steps, after all there was a nice path I could follow even in the dark. The other option was to continue my plan and venture into unknown terrain, coming out via Deception creek. It was a little bit later in the day then I would have liked, so there were only about two hours of daylight left at the most. But part of the reason that I hitchhiked up here was so that I could do a loop, so I felt like I should complete the loop as planned, otherwise I would look back and feel somewhat defeated. I double-checked the batteries in my headlamp, and then descended the ridge towards Deception Creek.
I made a bee line straight down and slightly northward, hoping to intercept the deception creek trail where my USGS map showed that the trail crosses the creek (Although later I checked the Green Trails map, and it shows that the trail stays on the west side of the creek, hmmm...) Descending the fluffy snow in snowshoes was a breeze, I must have dropped 2500' in about 20 minutes. When I intercepted the creek I found myself in a spot where the swift current butted right up with steep cliffs on the east side. Near this spot there was a fallen log across the stream, but with about 2.5 feet of snow perched on top and pushed over like a cornice. I wanted to get across somehow so that I could follow the route of the trail more or less. My options at this point were 1) Go back up and around these cliffs to the east side of the stream and continue northward, 2) go upstream and look for a better place to cross, or 3) brave this scary log. Daylight was fading, and going back uphill really did not seem like a pleasant option. Here's how I got across the log: I oriented my snowshoes perpendicular to the log, facing upstream, and stamped down the snow good and hard. Then I scooted over one snowshoe's width and stamped down another section of snow, then repeated, making sure that I was always centered over the actual log. Eventually, after a few scary moments where the snow shifted under me, I made it over to the other side. That problem was solved, but the worst was yet to come.
At this point, the trail is supposed to rise for about 200' of elevation, up the valley away from the creek. I decided to follow this general route because I felt that the trail probably did this for good reason. I dialed the bearing of the trail into my compass and attempted to follow it more or less. I ended up on some pretty steep terrain and had to traverse some steep slopes, not being quite sure if I should get high or drop down more. While on a particularly nasty section, I noticed that one of my snowshoes wasn't sitting right on my boot; I investigated and found that the binding was partially torn off. I made some adjustments and switched feet so that the broken one would be on the downhill side, which seemed to help, and then I pressed on. Not too much further, the snowshoe came off almost completely; when I lifted up my foot the snowshoe would just dangle underneath, and then fall off to one side when I stepped back down. I tried walking without one snowshoe; I would posthole about 2 feet on each step and it was impossibly difficult to make any real progress this way. This was just about the worst place for this to happen. If this snowshoe had broken earlier, I could have turned around and retraced my steps, following a path of partially compacted snow, but now going back 2500' up the ridge was not an option. It was really getting dark now, and I was about 2.5 miles from the highway. The only bright spot in this situation was the moon shining brightly through a clear sky above.
Luckily I had a small piece of rope with me, it was tied through my belt loops and was holding up my pants. With this piece, I was able to fashion a makeshift binding to hold the snowshoe to my boot. It worked pretty good for flat terrain and even going straight uphill, but traversing a slope was not really doable, I had to follow a zigzag pattern to avoid these kinds of slopes, which was slow going. Also, I had to stop every so often and tighten the rope, not to mention cinching up my pants.
Eventually I reached another substantial creek crossing, Sawyer Creek. The creek was situated in a narrow ravine, not a good place to cross. My altimeter indicated that the trail was probably above me, so I went upstream a bit. There I discovered the footlog where the trail crosses the creek. This was a welcome sight, but again there was the 2+ feet of snow on top of the log. The footlog featured a railing on one side, but the snow was piled above it in places. I carefully sidestepped again across the log; this technique actually seems to work pretty well. After this point, the trail follows a course almost due north. I tried to head this way with my compass, but I quickly lost any evidence of the trail, since it was buried under so much snow. Navigating only with my compass, altimeter and the topography, I continued northward. Oh, and another unfortunate discovery I made was that I had lost my fleece jacket somewhere along the way, and also my foam butt pad, they were strapped to the side of my pack but must have been torn off by a tree branch or something.
Around the 2400' elevation mark, I noticed a fallen log with an unnaturally straight cut in it, which was damning evidence that the trail was nearby. I could make out a depression in the snow and follow it. From there I could follow the trail no problem all the way to the trailhead. There was another footlog near the end of the trail, which required more of the sidestep technique, but by now I was getting pretty good at it.
A short jaunt down a snow-covered logging road brought me to the highway, but by now it was about 11:00PM. I took off my snowshoes and put on some dry pants; unfortunately my wet boots were the only footwear that I was carrying. Then I crossed over US-2, wearing my INB-issue headlamp with red LED, and tried to catch a ride to somewhere, anywhere. Westbound traffic at this hour was pretty sparse. Two cars passed me within about 15 minutes, and then the third one stopped.
The nice person who stopped was wondering what I was doing out on this deserted highway out in the cold. He offered me a ride and I told him my story as we drove off westward. Turns out that he was the night manager at the Stevens Pass Ski Area, and he was only going as far as Index. Now I had to contemplate my next move. It would theoretically be possible to hitchhike all the way to Seattle, but that could be difficult given that it would be after midnight, at best, by the time I got to Seattle. In my original plan, I would have been out in time to catch the Gold Bar bus, where I would be home free, but now I would have only owl transit service at my disposal.
My impromptu chauffeur suggested that I get a motel at Skykomish, and he knew of a good cheap place called the Cascadia Inn. That sounded pretty attractive, so I had him drop me off there--so much for working on Monday. I tracked down the innkeeper and he gave me a deal on a room for the "bunk" rate, $25! It was warm and I could take a shower. And I set my things out to dry.
I slept soundly and woke up in the morning and called in work and told them I was stranded at the moment, but might be able to come in later. The innkeeper had set out some muffins, oatmeal, and coffee in the communal room, and this made for a nice breakfast. I highly recommend checking out the Cascadia Inn if you ever find yourself stuck in Skykomish. Packed up my things and headed out. Before skipping town, I walked around Skykomish a little bit, it's an interesting town that you don't really get to see unless you leave the highway. I then walked over the bridge and stood by the defunct café, where there is a nice wide pullout with ample deceleration area.
I waited for about 20 minutes before getting picked up, by a woman named Beth driving a small pickup. She had been skiing all weekend and was heading back to Bellingham to teach a class at Western later in the day, she had a dog with her that was ¼ wolf. I talked her into dropping me off at the Everett Station Transit Center, since it was less than a mile out of her way. There I got a snack and waited half an hour for the next 510 to depart.
Arrived downtown about 1:30PM. I had to go back to my office to fetch my bike anyway, so I figured I would just head upstairs and make an appearance at work. I could change out of my wet boots (finally!), but I was still in my hiking clothes and was still carrying my daypack with snowshoes and ice axe strapped on the outside. I put in a few hours and got a little work done, including writing a response to the city's proposal to install a series of transit improvements on NE 45th Street in Wallingford when they repave it this summer.
At the end of the day, I retrieved my bike and rode up the hill to my house. I was only gone for about 36 hours total, but it seemed like I had come home from a long vacation.
© 2006 Owen Kehoe
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