Mountaineering Class Post 2: Snow Camping and Musical Shenanigans

Last weekend was the first overnight field trip of this year's Washington Alpine Club (WAC) Basic Climbing and Mountaineering class. It was the first of two snow camping outings we will have, this one being near Snoqualmie Pass. Planning started two weeks ahead of time for the students, as we got assigned our 4-person groups as well as a CD designating our musical genre. From that music, we were encouraged to incorporate costumes and plan a themed dinner "cook-off", to be judged by the instructors.

Saturday started early, at the trailhead getting our packs checked by 7am. Our packs were heavier than most of us would normally backpack, as we were carrying climbing gear, extra clothes, and snow gear like ice axes, shovels, and pickets. My pack weighed in at 44 pounds.

We hiked up about two miles in the snow before setting up our tent snow city. It was my first time snow camping! My tent-mates and I dug a platform for our tent, and then in addition to stomping, they decided to roll the surface out flat.

After we were settled in, we started a full day of educational station rotations. My first round of the day was kitchen building. Here's the untouched hillside, and an instructor drawing a rough layout map in the snow before we started.

Again, since I have never camped in the snow, the idea that you can just build things with this infinite and malleable material was a revelation. I mean, I've built a lot of snowmen, but not large-scale, useful snow structures. We got a good start on the kitchen, with the perimeter and all eight tables at least started.

My second station was belay. We learned how to set up quick belays in the snow, seated, or using your boot and ice ax.

My third station was ice ax arrest. Here you can see the slope where we practiced. We basically threw ourselves down the glissade shoot and then walked back up to the top, over and over. After going down in glissade position (seated, feet-first), we also had to practice going down head first on our stomach and backs. I have to admit, this pushed me outside of my comfort zone a bit. The instructors gave good instruction and were very attentive to our form, but still, flying down a steep, slick mountainside upside down with a sharp implement just sort of freaked me out. I got more and more used to self-arresting, and it slowly went from terrifying to exhilarating.

There was a lot of potential for getting snowy/wet/cold at this station, but luckily it was nice weather and I stayed comfortable. In fact, we seriously lucked out with the weather on Saturday as the precipitation held off and the sun shone through.

The last station of the day was ascending and descending. It sounds easy, like don't you just walk up and down a mountain? But there are definitely useful techniques to help make you more efficient and safe on steep terrain in variable snow conditions.

Then it was time to get into costume and start making dinner! I hadn't seen the kitchen since the beginning of the day, and couldn't believe the transformation that the other groups had made.

In addition to the eight tables, there were benches, a buffet table, a stage, snow sculptures, an archway entrance and entry slide.

 

We started cooking for our own student group, making enough for a taster share with the 20+ instructors. What we didn't know was that the instructors provide appetizers! That was one of the best snack experiences I've had in a loooong time- to be so hungry from the active day, and suddenly stumble on a bunch of amazing food. There were raw oysters (shucked with ice ax), artisan salami, cambozola cheese, chips, salsa, guacamole, caprese skewer, and homemade brownies to name a few things.  

My group's CD was Nirvana's Nevermind, making our theme genre "grunge". So how the heck do you cook a grunge-themed dinner? All of our literal food associations didn't seem very healthy, filling, or appetizing. So I suggested that since grunge originated in Seattle, we go with a local, Pacific Northwest culinary theme. Thanks to my awesome group, we pulled together a pretty amazing meal, mostly cooked ahead of time. Homemade clam chowder with razor clams that a teammate had dug himself on the Olympic coast; salad with garden kale; local bread with butter and thin-sliced garden radishes; smoked salmon; local chocolate.

The other groups all got super creative too. The salsa group had made tortilla soup; The disco group had fondue in a double-boiler; the reggae group went Caribbean-inspired.

 

The costumes were awesome as well- wigs, full polyester suits, flowing flamenco skirts. No wonder our packs were so heavy! We were probably carrying as much weight in costumes and good food as actual gear! My group dressed as Nirvana plus Courtney Love. 

The final piece of the contest was the dance-off. It was pretty surreal to have a speaker blasting music, and a stage, all with a dramatic mountain backdrop. From sharp salsa moves to mosh pits to hilarious lip syncs, it was a pretty entertaining and surprising series of performances.

That night, we got a good 4-5 inches of fresh snow. On Sunday we were up bright and early again, and back to our rotating stations. It was another full, challenging, and fun day of learning, but this time with deeper powder to wade through, and snow falling on and off.

By the time we hiked out Sunday evening, I was quite happy to still be warm and dry. I was feeling good, but fairly tired and ready to take a shower and dry my damp gear. Overall, I was so impressed with the quality of the instruction, the great organization of the group, the good attitudes of my fellow students, and the combination of safety, efficiency, fun, and creativity that every one brought. Looking forward to the next snow weekend!

Mountaineering Class Post 1: What is the Basic Climbing Class?

I've been a backpacker for over a decade, but I was ready to take my outdoor knowledge to the next level and add more technical skills. In March I started taking a Basic Climbing and Mountaineering class through the Washington Alpine Club (WAC). The class is described as "a basic but comprehensive introduction to the technical mountaineering skills required to travel safely over snowfields, glaciers, and high-angle rock."

When I started the class, I didn't even know what perlon was, or why I would need a personal anchor, or how to use a prusik. But I feel like I've learned a ton already. With classes on Tuesday nights and field trips on Saturdays, and attendance mandatory to both, we can cover a lot of material. It's a good pace though- challenging and stimulating without being overwhelming.

So far we've had four Saturday field trips. The first was to Mount Si, just outside North Bend. That was a bit of a fitness test, to see how we'd do hiking four miles up with 3,200 feet of elevation gain with 30+ pounds on our backs. We have a strict packing list, and here we are in the parking lot for pack checks.

And then, once we got to the top, it was good practice to stay dry and warm for the rest of the day. I've hiked Mt. Si lots of times, but usually in warmer weather, or I eat a snack and descend. But this day in March, it was snowing and we still had hours of standing in the snow as we did rotating workshops. 

We had a map and compass workshop, and practiced knots. My favorite station was emergency bivouac, where we basically made a huge cuddle pile. And we must have been doing something right, because that was probably the warmest I was all day.

Saturday #2 took us to a man-made climbing rock called Spire in Spanaway (outside Tacoma). Spire was a great place to practice basic climbing skills, like climbing in mountaineering boots, rappelling, belaying, ascending using a hand-line, and practicing using our personal anchors.

We had other non-rock stations, such as roping up for glacier travel, which just happened on the grass. The goal was to flake the rope, divide it, and get our 4-person team all properly tied in and personal prusiks attached in under five minutes.

We also had another really cool station rotation where we learned to ascend a rope using a Texas prusik. This is how you would get yourself out of a crevasse if need be. We all climbed at least 25 feet up in a tree, inching our way up toward a bag of candy on a high branch.

On Saturday #3 we went back to Spire, but this time turned everything up a notch. Instead of just belaying, we learned how to tie off a fallen climber to completely escape the belay system. For every rappel, we had to practice with our right and left hand, as well as with and without an ATC.

We ascended the rope into the trees again, but this time with our backpacks. We roped up for glacier again, but this time practiced passing protection and using commands to travel as a rope team.

By the 4th Saturday, we were ready to move onto real rock. We headed up to Mount Erie outside of Anacortes. We again had rotating stations, and worked on getting more comfortable with the skills we were already working on. We had a good chance to climb a variety of routes, and rappel bigger faces than we had done before. It was a beautiful spot to spend the day, with a stunning view looking south down the Puget Sound.

We were lucky enough to be on the edge of the rain shadow, and while it poured rain just east of us and in Seattle, we barely got a sprinkle all day. It was cold though, and the wind was howling. We did a lot of yelling, but it was still nearly impossible to hear calls from the top of the cliff like "rope!" or "off belay!"

We also had an anchors station. The class doesn't teach us necessarily how to build anchors, but how to at least check anchors for safety. 

Oh, we always go out for beer after class and field trips. It's a great group of people- both the students and the dedicated volunteer instructors. I'm looking forward to learning more and getting into more backcountry settings. This coming weekend is going to be our first overnight field trip- snow camping. Stay tuned!

Silent Grace (Amidst the Chaos)

I've been trying to write this blog post for over a month now.

It started when Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared, and left the world with a profound and unsettling mystery. I didn't follow the news obsessively, but definitely more than I usually do. My brain just couldn't wrap itself around the idea of a jetliner vanishing in 2014, and apparently others have tried to explain The Obsession over missing flight MH370.

Then there was the massive and tragic mudslide in Oso, Washington, destroying homes and claiming 41 lives. There are still three people missing, and area flags still flying at half-mast.

I found out that my bees did not make it through the winter, putting my backyard death toll in the tens of thousands and a sad way to start the spring.

Shortly after that, my sister's car got stolen with her one-year old daughter inside. The police responded really quickly, and they found the car just seven minutes later with the baby still sleeping inside. Everything turned out fine, but it was shocking and scary and a reminder of how quickly life can change. It gave me an uneasy sense about things not always going as they should, and our helplessness to prevent catastrophic events.

The absolute worst recent news is a dear friend getting diagnosed with cancer. It was out of nowhere- she's a perfectly healthy young woman. Again, my brain just can't quite comprehend it. When I think about it, I'm more angry than anything, at the unfairness and randomness and plain stupidness.

Usually some who likes to talk about everything, I'm too mad and bewildered to find my own words helpful. But I do like to read other people's words. My friend Tessa Hulls just finished a solo bicycle trip in Ghana. From the road she wrote:

"There is no such thing as passive riding here: the whole day is spent ceaselessly watching the road and shifting my body weight and trajectory to weave my way through all the various obstacles, and sometimes I have no choice but to just swear loudly to myself and brace for impact. My bike is being an absolute trooper, though. Forward motion is meandering at best, and my progress more aptly resembles the loping curlicues of figure skating, only with less sequined V-necks, and with a hell of a lot more dodging of wayward goats. 

Two days ago, I had what was probably my favorite moment thus far. I was at the very end of my riding, and was just barely limping myself to the village I was trying to get to. Then, out of nowhere, a man in traditional Muslim attire (flowing robe, that hat I don't know the proper name of), starting bicycling alongside me. He joined me with a smile and a nod, and he had some sort of music-playing device tucked away somewhere in his robes, and it was playing the same song on repeat. He kept pace with me for about three miles, and we parted ways with him worldessly pointing to a small turnoff, and smiling one last time before branching off. Small moments of silent grace, friends. They're why I do this."

I'm not saying that it's been a terrible past month. There have been a lot of fun and wonderful times too. But it has just been a potent reminder of how we cannot control life, only our reaction to what happens. So I've been doing what I can to feel grounded. On my bike, moments of bliss before dodging a card door; hiking and panting up a wooded hillside; staring out the bus window instead of at my smartphone; checking how the greens are growing in the garden; the focused lines and hum of my sewing machine; big hugs, arms wrapped tight with no words; quiet tears and glass of red wine; cooking for friends, like this Shallot Chicken, letting a sauce reduce and watching in a daze as the sprig of tarragon wilts away. I don't know what else to do right now, and so I continue to move forward, even if it's meandering and unsettling, and find my own moments of silent grace.

Winter at the Beacon Food Forest

I first got involved with Seattle's Beacon Food Forest a little over a year ago. Back in December, I wrote an overview of 2013 volunteering with the project. Since then, there's been three monthly work parties this winter. Considering those are usually some of the coldest and wettest months, the turnout and productivity was astonishing. Here's a look back:

January was shockingly warm and beautiful. Plants were planted, trenches dug, stone walls built, ground mulched, tools cared for.

My personal area of most interest is the compost, and in January we prepared the site for the first official compost bin. We leveled and woodchipped while the carpenters finished constructing the lid for the 3-bin compost system.

Lunch was sunny, musical, and delicious, and at the end of the day we realized there had been 150 volunteers. Incredible!

The February work party felt like a more typical winter day with its chilling cold and foreboding clouds. Again, amazing volunteers came and contributed a ton of work. In addition to planting nursery plants, we also started seeding some seeds. I was helping with compost again, as we chopped compost materials and started building up the piles. Then the sky opened up right at lunch time, and it POURED. We huddled under the pop-up tents, drank tea, and accepted that sometime you just have to get wet and muddy.

The March work party was right before the vernal equinox, so it was technically still winter. The weather was pretty nice- not too cold, and only the smallest spatterings of rain. Then it got sunny! I couldn't understand why my face felt so warm when I got home, and it took me awhile to realize that I had gotten a little sunburned! 

 

The Beacon Food Forest recently installed several beautiful educational signs throughout the site. Extra special about this work party? The artist who designed the signs came up from Portland to be there! Illustrator Molly Danielsson is an artist with a background in science, and specializes in visually representing complex and sometimes technical ideas. Her explanations of biological processes from compost to urban forests are awesome.

Olympic Coast Weekend

While the rest of the world was thinking about the Olympics in Sochi, I was plotting my escape to Washington state's own Olympic peninsula. I was waiting for the next opening in razor clam season as my perfect excuse to drive to the coast. These big clams can only be dug in the cooler months, and only after the Department of Fish and Wildlife tests marine toxins to determine they are safe to eat.

There are several beaches on the southern portion of the peninsula with abundant clam populations where you can dig on approved dates. The best time to dig is 1-2 hours before low tide.

 

From Dept. of Fish and Wildlife Website

Last Friday, low tide was around 6pm, so that meant that my sweetie and I had to leave town a little early to get to the beach in time. It was still light, and we had no trouble finding the clam holes and catching our limit (15 clams each).

It was a gorgeous evening- calm, clear, mild, and with a stunning sunset. Our hard digging work was rewarded with burgers and beers at a nearby pub before heading to the campsite. We had to blanch the clams to take the shells off, and then get them into the cooler. Did you know the Jetboil pot is the perfect width and depth for dunking razors clams?

In the morning, we still had to clean the clams. The clouds had rolled in and the wind picked up, and a seagull eyed us relentlessly from his perch 15 feet away. One of us did the cutting open while the other scraped the guts out. It was sort of a ridiculous process to do at a campsite on a winter day, with one bucket of guts and one bucket of clean rinsing water. We had to keep hot water on the camp stove to dunk our freezing fingers. But we knew it would be worth it to have a cooler full of clean, delicious local clams.

It was a fun day of road tripping north up the peninsula. I had never been on Highway 112 toward Neah Bay, and it's a beautiful stretch of road as it hugs the shoreline out to the very corner of the state. We made it to the Shi Shi Beach trailhead in the late afternoon. It's a couple miles hike in, and while I don't usually backpack in rubber boots, I'm glad I wore them for this crazy muddy trail.

This section of the coast is breath-taking. Shi Shi is wild and rugged and you realize that it has looked that way for hundreds or thousands of years. The Point of Arches sea stacks are so unique, and the tide pools are plentiful. It was a little disconcerting though to see how much garbage was on and off the beach. I thought at first that it was from visitors not packing out their garbage, but then I realized that with the buoys and big blocks of styrofoam, it was more likely that  the debris had been washed ashore. If I ever got back there, I am definitely bringing a garbage bag to haul off some of the trash.

It rained during the night and all day on Sunday. That didn't stop us from walking around and exploring, and in fact the mist added to the ambiance. I must be a Pacific Northwesterner, because I found myself saying things like, "Wow, we got so lucky with the weather! We saw stars on Friday, and it didn't even rain on Saturday!"

We hiked out of Shi Shi and took a short side trip to Cape Flattery, the most northwestern point in the contiguous United States. By that point, it was dumping rain. Luckily, much of the muddy trail is boardwalked. Unluckily, I wanted to take more pictures but was worried about damaging my camera in the downpour.

As we left Neah Bay, we decided that more coffee was in order. It was cold, damp, and we still had a bit of driving to get to Port Angeles, not to mention to the ferry and back to Seattle. The next town was Clallam Bay, so we figured we'd take whatever we could find, even if it meant a gas station. We stopped at a little shop on a corner of town, which appeared to be a hodge-podge of mini-mart, gallery, and ice-cream shop. I didn't see an espresso machine, and thought maybe this was not going to fit the bill. I asked the lady if she had coffee, and she exclaimed in a sweet Australian accent, "Why yes! But only French press and pour over. I carry beans roasted nearby in Sequim by a father and son team. Are you a light roast or dark roast person?" Needless to say, it was a really good cup of coffee, one of those welcome surprises when you are on the road and don't know what you will find.

Back home we set to work making a big clam dinner before the rest went in the freezer. We fried some clams as an appetizer, then made a northwest version of pasta a la vongole- a delicious pasta tossed with a white wine-butter-garlic clam sauce. Next up will be zucchini-clam fritters and clam chowder. Yeah for catching and eating your own food!