Mark & Emily's new Kayak Trailer!

I have been dreaming about having a kayak trailer for my bike for about 7 years -- at least since the day in the late 90s when i saw a Farington Chariot at a kayak shop in Sitka Alaska. I waffled for a while, but when i decided to buy the Chariot a few years ago, the company was gone. (Val at Bikesmith suspects that they lost the company in an insurance lawsuit because the web domain at one time directed to an insurance company.)

Then for quite some time i tried to build one, or to get someone to build one for me, with no luck. I spent a lot of time researching and planning it. The idea i have in my head is for two 20" or 16" bicycle wheels which are connected with a structure and some way of cradling the kayak, either a fabric hammock or a couple of lateral (running front to back) foam bars. The boat would sit with it's center of gravity on the axle between the wheels. Then it could be pushed or pulled like a cart, or attached to a bicycle. My friend David has talked of building a trailer with a very high axle so that one kayak or canoe can be put on top and the other suspended with straps below the axle.

The big challenge is a connection to the bicycle. I imagine the options to be:
* axle hitch like the BOB uses - i like this but it may not be stable enough.
* chain stay connector - may need an additional front wheel
* something that connects to a rear rack
* seat tube clamp on a rising tongue.

The long tongue connecting the trailer is of course a big issue -- if you have a tongue, it has to run 8 to 10 feet under the boat to the bike and then, i assume turning up to the seat post. The tongue is the key that makes the trailer expensive and awkward. However, i have a 'Sea-Kayaker' magazine which shows directions for an easy to make hitch which attaches to the nose of a kayak, eliminating the need for the long tongue.

But this has all been solved because recently my great car-free friends Emily & Chris got interested and decided to go halfsies with me on pre-made trailer. I was absolutely thrilled to get moving on this!

We very seriously considered this trailer at Bikes At Work, and Jim was very helpful.

After a long discussion we settled on a neat trailer from a great guy named Tony Hoar in Victoria BC. Tony is a brilliant engineer who builds bikes and trailers in his one person shop, Tony's Trailers. He is also a racer who finished LAST in the Tour de France FIFTY years ago (and still races!). I thoroughly enjoyed meeting him and working with him.



So, with great excitement today we assembled and test rode our new kayak trailer!! Although late January, it was a summer-like day in the upper 60s. I quite regretted not wearing shorts.

Assembling it out of the box.

Emily has photos posted too!

Tony's innovative connector

It's very long

Comparing the length with my BOB trailer

One cool thing about this trailer is that Tony made it so that it also converts to a grocery getter model.  You just use the quick release to take a section out of the tongue and drop a Rubbermaid(tm) container on the back.  You can ride it to the grocery store, disconnect it and use it for a shopping cart!

Learning the feel of the trailer on my first test ride.

It has a surprisingly tight Turning Circle

Emily rides by with the trailer on her folder

Already advertising for Tony!

This thing gets noticed! People comment on the trailer. They stop and ask questions about it. We handed out several of Tony's business cards today just while testing it! I'm going to carry a stack of them with me whenever i take the trailer out.

Emily's boat on board, i'm ready to Go on the...

First Ride!!!

We were both a bit worried about how this very long load would navigate on city streets, especially around Seattle's neighborhood traffic circles. But the trailer tracks very nicely behind the bicycle and could get around obstacles pretty easily.

Cruising easily around a neighborhood traffic circle

This is FUN!

One really nice thing about this trailer is that the kayak sits over the axle, which carries almost all of the weight. When loaded correctly the tongue weight is almost nothing, so your seat post, the flexible tongue and the hitch don't carry any weight.

There is a large compression strap which hooks over the axle and holds the boat tightly on the foam pad across the axle. Then another compression strap goes around the nose of the boat to hold it in the Y shaped yoke. A third strap goes around the body of the boat and the tongue. This supports the flexible tongue, keeps it from bouncing (mostly) and transfers the structure to the boat. The kayak itself becomes the structural beam of the trailer!

After getting used to riding with one boat on the trailer, we started thinking about stacking the second boat. I was a little nervous about the weight involved. Emily's neighbor Stella was watching this whole process and so Emily figured she could help.

Stella paddles up Ashworth Ave!

Somewhat reassured, we put my boat on top!

Two Kayaks.

We used an old car rack set up i bought years ago. The two foam car-top frames went between the boats and a bunch of compression straps held the two boats together very well. We put a lot of straps on them, i think we can leave a couple off. We probably only need two, front and back to hold the boats together.

Going up hill wasn't really difficult with one boat, but with two boats it was a bit harder. Otherwise the stacked trailer worked great!

fully loaded

And then i headed off to ride 9 miles on the trail by Lake Union, getting quite a few stares! It was getting dark soon so i didn't get to paddle today, but i rode up to the University and out to Ballard (where i bumped into an old friend, Liz!). 

Off to the lake

I was just getting the feel for the trailer. It rode very nicely... I could tell i had a big trailer, but it wasn't unwieldy at all.


The kayak gear, flotation vests, spray skirts, paddles, dry bags, food, clothing etc get stuffed in the cockpit. I figured i would put a spray skirt over the cockpit when it was on the trailer to enclose the gear, especially if it was raining.

You'd think that with two kayaks and all the gear that the weight (about 200 lbs) and the length (about 24 feet from front wheel to the back of the kayak) would be the biggest challenges, but they were really not that noticeable.

What did require my attention was the width and the bounce. At almost 3 feet between wheels it was sometimes hard to thread through Seattle's very narrow bicycle trails, i almost hit a wheel on a wall, a tree, and a couple of bollards. It would be nice if it had a bar in front of the wheel to deflect such an impact.

And while the weight of the load wasn't a problem at all on the flats (it did make hills really big!) the heft of the thing combined with the long tongue could get a good bounce going if i didn't have a smooth pedal stroke.  On my few attempts to go up a small hill it was the bounce that stopped me before the weight became unmanageable.  I was very glad i had clipless pedals and a full pedal stroke.


And on a personal note, I noticed a very strange phenomenon, a contradiction which probably says more about my personality than it does about this wonderful new trailer.

What i noticed was my reaction to bystanders' reactions. When i rode through a middle class family neighborhood like Ballard people were amazed. They would point and shout 'oh my god he's towing kayaks!'.

My reaction (usually kept to myself) was always: 'What's the big deal? Bikes can do anything. Move along, nothing unusual here.'.

But when i went through a more jaded, younger, hipper neighborhood like Fremont and i found that no one looked up, no one noticed, no one said anything, my reaction (usually kept to myself) was: 'WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU!!! CAN'T YOU SEE I'M TOWING A PAIR OF KAYAKS!?!?! PAY ATTENTION!.

29 Reasons Bush Won't Be Allowed to Lose

We've had almost 3 years of George W Bush. The election is a year and month away;  everyone is caught up in declaring whether they LIKE or HATE him, but few people are willing to see past that divide to analyze what is LIKELY to happen. Here's my 29 reasons why W is certain to serve a second term. In no particular order. This is not an exercise in doom saying, or promoting, rather, it is intended to shed light on the issues that honest Americans MUST confront if we want to defeat Bush.

Republican EC Advantage, Sound Bites, Head of State, Most People Don't Care, Charisma , Incumbency, Everyone Votes With Their Feet, It was a Tie, Patriotism, Mississippi & Kentucky, California & Texas , $Money$, Good Looking, Convention Schedule, Democratic Primaries, Clinton/Gore, Black Box Voting, Action vs. Proof, Running Mate, Media Control, Media Preference, People Hear Nothing Bad, The Dems Expect to Lose, Clinton crowd, Florida, Another War, Make Shit Up, Call Off The Elections, Blow Something Up

Details below

Seattle Coffee

One thing i did, back when i did an hour long talk about Seattle each week at the hostel, was talk about the variations in the coffee culture in the northwest. I would point to Portland, Seattle & Vancouver on a map and compare and contrast.

You see, in Portland people really like coffee (espresso) but what is important is that it is GOOD coffee -- they are highly focused on quality over quantity. North of us in Vancouver people like coffee. There is a corner in downtown that at one time had three coffee shops on 3 of the 4 corners! TWO Starbucks AND a Blenz (their local chain, very Canadian – you have to smile when you say it) but they are really focused on sitting down and visiting, so the coffee shops are nice places to hang out.

In Seattle people want their coffee, they want it now (3, 6, 9 even 12 times a day) and they don't care where. T-shirt shops have to have espresso bars, just about every business of any kind serves espresso. Not only is it very profitable, but it is essential for business! Certainly every grocery store does, every restaurant does and most bars do. Some is good, most is not, but QUANTITY is what is important!

You have to understand that this is NOT just Seattle, Seattle is just the big city in Washington (and probably where it all started) but if you go out to these little mountain towns, 40 miles from a grocery store, little towns that are all rough and tumble old logging towns which voted 99% for Bush, you will find 2 or 3 drive through latte stands!

Now i grew up, partially, in New England, where ice cream is a deeply important part of life, and quality is vital. All quality ice cream comes from New England and New Englanders eat 30% of the ice cream in the country! Out here the only way to get good ice cream is to hop on I-90 and don't get off until Boston. It just doesn't exist out here and on the rare occasion that a shop opens, it doesn't last long. But milky coffee. Now THAT is a major product!

The TV stations and newspapers long ago took to calling the Seattle Metropolitan area Latteland because of this single minded focus. It's a name everyone knows and many people use in regular conversation.

And it is lucrative! I know of at least 5 different people who started a coffee cart, usually outside on the street and within 2 years had expanded into one, or several, STOREFRONTS. It's that lucrative. One of the first, just a push cart in the park downtown back 15 or 18 years ago. Now the owners don't work, pay people to run the cart and they travel the world full time and live in a huge house in a super rich suburb.

Coffee cups are allowed on busses and almost anywhere else that food & drink are forbidden. It's a must! There was a hilarious dust up back in 97 or 98 when someone with the county government noticed that the industrial regulations on boilers seemed to… um… outlaw espresso machines. This was front page headlines for a week until the county council met to write in a special "Latte exception"

Howard Shultz, the New York (in Seattle saying someone is from New York is like saying they are from Hell, and not from the good side of the tracks!) financier who executed a hostile take over of Starbucks 10 or 12 years ago recently said, "When you are selling an addictive product, you don't have to worry much about the economy!"

The story of Shultz is an amusing one! ... you see three guys started Starbucks in the Pike Place Market. They had come from San Francisco where they started a similar shop called Peet's. They were roasting coffee, not pulling 'spro (many of the barista's in the 90's refereed to it as "pulling 'spro"). Anyway the latte thing was just getting started, they were more focused on good coffee roasting. Shultz, came to Seattle on a business trip and was impressed with the shop. So he started bugging them to bring him on as a partner... they kept saying no, but after a year or two they finally took him on. He started the company on this massive expansion, including buying Peet's in SF. As soon as he got the chance, he maneuvered the three founders out of the company, and as a consolation, gave them Peet's, which i believe they still run.

Starbucks is the only chain store allowed in the Pike Place Market, and it is only grandfathered in because it was founded there!

Of course Seattle's Best Coffee, which is a 30 or more year old roaster on Vashon Island that used to be called Stewart Brothers Coffee before they went nationwide, is now owned by Starbucks. Tully's is the other locally based international chain and unlike the other two, they started up SPECIFICALLY to become an international chain. I remember when the first store opened, i would bike past it often... still do. There are also a number of local chains... for the whole 15 years i have lived here there have been about 3 visible local chains at any one time (in addition to the big ones), but those three kind of change around, and are sometimes owned by the big ones. There are a number of local chains now, but two of note: one disguises the fact that it is a chain, and each shop is funky and comfortable and unique, but in fact two people own all 5 or so of them – they are pretty much the best places around these days. The other Cafe Ladro, started up with a major anti-Starbucks schtick -- they played it up to the max! "Stay away from the chains!" I think they have 12 stores now. Hypocrites!

Monorail Espresso is one of the originals and they moved from a cart to a storefront, but the storefront is barely larger than the cart was! Another good story is B&O Espresso, a small cart which opened up in the corner of a sandwich shop on Capitol Hill many years ago. The sandwich shop didn't do so well, so within a year or two the Espresso cart had taken over the whole shop, and within another year they had rented the storefront next door and expanded into it. They no longer focus on coffee, although it is available, but they are know as one of the premier dessert spots in town.

Many people enjoy the wild and crazy Coffee Messiah -- with the Caffeine Saves neon sign. It's another favorite of mine and almost next door to the evil Starbucks.

I should add that i do have a lot of choices -- i live 2 blocks from Broadway on Capitol hill, where there are AT LEAST 9 places within 3 blocks. And as i think about it... in 7 blocks there are AT LEAST 15 places to get a drink.

Most of Seattle is like that. Downtown, you can usually expect that on a 2 mile walk from Seattle Center to Pioneer square, you will average one per block, more if you explore closely. In many cases, a person owns an espresso cart just to service 3 floors of one 30 floor office building downtown. Really, that is their only job! So if you walk down a block in the central business district and see two latte stands, i guarantee that if you were to explore the office buildings a bit, you would find half a dozen or more on that same block! In fact, when a new building opens, the coffee cart(s) are always mentioned in the press release!

Back 10 years ago there were lots of nice coffee shops to just hang out it, but they are getting VERY rare as over 90% of people take their cup to go, and in many cases prefer to drive through -- very common. Most of the nice 'hang out' coffee shops have closed in favor of a few corporate shops or smaller, locally owned windows with no sit down area. Kids, and even recent college graduates who grew up here tell me that having coffee shops to hang out in High School was great – certainly something that was missing when i was a kid.

Cafe Paridisso at the south end of Capitol Hill was legendary. I loved it. It was the quintessential Seattle coffee shop! I think everyone was sad to see it go. I miss it terribly.

Lots of people take laptops to coffee shops these days (they ALL have free WiFi). I really enjoy chatting or reading in with a drink. I think it lends itself well to Seattle. A warm drink in a friendly comfortable space on a chilly rainy day: the windows fogged up so you can't see outside. Of course, it has hasn't rained much here in the last few years, but we can hope, right?

There are over 3,000 coffee carts or shops licensed (2,973 in 1999) in King County (about 3 million people). When i was in London in August 2000 the newspapers were discussing if 291 was "saturation" for that city of 9 million!!

To make your order properly, it has to be FAST and very personal. Baristas pride themselves on understanding each and every order, and i've almost never seen them bat an eye at the strangest orders. Many even memorize the regular customers' orders!!! Everyone walks up and spews out an order, often their standard order, but sometimes a variant, as if it were their name or phone number. I actually have my order printed on my cup – some places find this funny, occasionally annoying, but most places appreciate it. I did it because when i worked in Seattle Center in the mid 90s, Starbucks screwed up my order so often.

The number of shots always comes first, then the size, the type of milk, the type of drink then the additions... By far the standard classic is the double tall latte... since 'latte' is understood, it's always just called a "double tall". (2 shots of espresso, in 12 oz of steamed milk with foam on top). Now that can quickly become a "double tall decaf no foam vanilla latte". You get the point.

A shot is about one fluid ounce of espresso – that is, coffee created by es-pressing very high pressure steam through thick ground dark coffee. This is the true traditional Sicilian coffee that this all evolved from. In Sicily one shot of espresso in a tiny cup accompanied by a glass of water; usually the shot is drunk in a single gulp. But in Latteland the shots are mixed with a large cup of milk and sipped slowly all day long. The number of shots automatically included varies with the size of the cup and the location. Single, double, triple, quad, even quint, sextuple and i once heard octuple! One shot of good espresso has about 90 mg of caffeine, 8 oz good drip coffee has about 200 mg.

Next is the size of the cup – 8, 12, 16 or 20 oz, but in never called by numbers, always: short, tall, grande. The 20 oz is not as widely offered. Starbucks calls it a Venti, i once saw it called a fantico. I think we should settle on humongus, but i don't think i'm going to win that one.

You can also specify type of milk. This time of year big signs go up advertising the arrival of eggnog. "I'll have a double tall eggnog latte with whip". There are a variety of other milk choices... 2%, non-fat, breve' (half & half), soy milk. Pretty much every place has those. Some places have rice milk and i have seen goats milk in one or two places. A soy latte is a common order. From the mid 90s until a couple of years ago 2% became the DEFAULT milk, and if you didn't ask for something different, that's what you got. Luckily that has changed, but i am still in the habit of asking for whole milk. (I went through breve' faze for a couple of years, but i am not bicycling enough to justify that now!) I usually choose my espresso stand based on what kind of milk they use -- many are now using a local semi-organic brand, rather than the big national nasty brands. I prefer that.

Now add your flavoring, if you like. Most espresso bars have a wide variety, but the common ones are: vanilla, walnut, almond, caramel and hazelnut. These are really just an excuse to put more sugar in the drink, in my opinion. So now you could have a "single tall peach latte". Hazelnut and vanilla are the only ones popular enough to be part of a 'standard' order. Chocolate is a flavor you can add, but that is a special exception which will be covered in a later paragraph and again at the end.

Now append the base drink -- choices are: latte, mocha, americano, cappuccino, espresso & steamer. Steamers, or steamed milk, often with flavorings, do not seem as popular as they once were. NO ONE EVER orders a cappuccino!! An americano is a shot (or more) of espresso in hot water -- actually quite similar to weak drip coffee. ("double tall americano, please"). The one way to really raise your barista's pierced & plucked eyebrows is to order an espresso at an espresso stand. I think i have seen that happen maybe 4 times in 15 years. Many places actually cannot provide it! We call it espresso, the stands are called espresso and often have espresso in their name, but don't try to order it in Seattle! This is Latteland!

No, in Seattle everyone drinks lattes almost exclusively. In fact, i tend to believe that the caffeine addiction is really secondary, and warm milk, the true childhood comfort food, is what we are really after!! A latte and cappuccino differ by a technical ratio of foam to milk – i don't know the exact details. Of course the mocha is a type of latte – latte with chocolate syrup. And hot chocolate, or cocoa is a variant of a steamer (or of a mocha i suppose).

There are other special things that some people ask for. Sometimes people specify the temperature, some like it really hot and ask for that. Since the espresso machines have a thermometer, it is easy to ask for a temperature if you know what you like. 165 or so seems popular. I heard someone order a 180 once. I find it impossible to drink anything over 150 and my cup insulates well enough that it will never be cool enough to drink if i don't ask for it not-so hot (about 147 seems best). Most people don't specify. Because of the hot drinks, some people ask for a double cup in the order. "triple tall extra hot mocha no foam with an extra cup". Of course, many ecologically aware Seattlites have their own insulated cup which they use for their drinks. The iced latte, still not really accepted as legit, is a variant of this.

Of course you can ask for decaffeinated espresso, and many people do (helping to prove my warm milk theory!). There are a couple of standard orders based on this. The classic "double tall low-fat decaf latte" is called a "double tall no-fun" or a "double tall why-bother". I have OFTEN seen people order these with whipped cream!! Some people also ask for extra, or light syrup when ordering one, as most shops are VERY liberal with the syrup. A latte has a thick foam on the top and some people ask for extra foam, others for no foam, and every barista is an artist, making designs in the foam on top of a drink!

Finally there are all kinds of things that go ON TOP of a drink, depending on what kind of drink it is: there is whipped cream, chocolate powder, chocolate shavings, chocolate sprinkles, chocolate chips, cinnamon powder, nutmeg powder and more. Often the person who MAKES the drink (not the person who takes your order) will ask if you want whip –- kind of as an after thought. (You get a little less drink if you add whip!) SBC actually puts a chocolate bar across the top of many drinks!!

Most people are very polite and friendly when they order, but i once saw a guy demanding soy milk and really being a jerk about it. "It MUST be soy milk!!" A few minutes later the barista asked him if he wanted whipped cream and he said, "yeah, sure..."

Of course almost every espresso bar has a station where you can make your own additions and changes, usually with pitchers of 2% milk and half & half. Some places have shakers at this station that you can put on the various goodies. I find it useful to add some half & half to both cool down the drink and to make the syrup less overpowering.

Back in the mid 1990s i wrote a computer program which generated a humorous but not entirely imaginary random coffee order. I'll run it a few times here:

• double whole-milk hazelnut extra foam 150° latte no whip
  
• quad tall breve 165° mocha
  
• double grande whole-milk carmal decaf extra foam with whip
  
• quad grande 2% almond double cup mocha with chocolate sprinkles
  
• single 150° latte no whip
  
• breve extra hot double cup cocoa no whip
  
• quad tall breve vanilla mocha with whip
  
• grande low-fat vanilla iced latte with whip
  
• double grande eggnog latte with whip
  
• octuple grande carmal decaf latte with whip & cinnamon
  
• triple really amazingly big breve hazelnut latte with whip & chocolate sprinkles
  

Finally i should talk about my own order! tall whole milk 147 degree hot chocolate, no foam, easy on the chocolate. I have had long discussions with baristas on just exactly what to call a hot chocolate, or Cocoa. I like "Mocha hold the coffee", but i have never actually tried that. Many places just use Hershey's syrup, which is awful -- i avoid that and will get a steamed milk instead. A lot of places (including Starbucks!) have a finer quality and darker chocolate which i usually request – they still almost always put too much in. For awhile there was a trend of putting vanilla syrup in a hot chocolate, sometimes without asking. That was just plain NASTY! The best place i have found, is a place called 611 Supreme which makes a hot chocolate with fine 100% cocoa powder and NO SUGAR. It is fantastic. As i get older, i find i am needing to avoid having my cocoa near bed time. Of course chocolate does not have caffeine, but the theobromine is strong and even in the tiny amounts in a hot chocolate it can keep me awake. For example, it's 10pm and i would really like a hot chocolate now -- but i want to be able to sleep.

Armstrong's Elbow

I was out on my road bike this afternoon -- after spending all day re-installing Windows, AGAIN. Pedaling along the Arboretum bypass route i came to a spot a block or so from E Madison St where the road briefly narrows due to traffic calming (a great idea!). Right as i started to move left to avoid a pothole in the narrowest spot, a guy on a carbon fiber racing bike silently appeared about 3 inches off my left shoulder -- this guy thought he was in the pelaton and i was Jan Ullrich (i wish) standing in the way of his yellow jersey. It scared the daylights out of me. We each had to react fast and pull off hard to avoid a collision. Clearly both of us had good reactions and bike handling skills. If it HAD been the pelaton this guy would've gotten an elbow in the ear for sure. I said, "Jeeze, say something when you pass, i almost hit you!". What i didn't say, didn't even think clearly, was that i was pretty rattled by his crazy, dangerous maneuver. He looked at me and smirked and with a pretentious attitude said, "You wouldn't have..." I was an obstacle. It was all about him. He was just too good to be even talking to me. I told him he was crazy and dangerous. He rode off yelling abuse at me. This guy was as bad as the clueless SUV drivers who think no one else on the road matters. In fact, i bet he IS one of them.

Playing in the Street

I'm a bit ashamed to say that i used to listen to Larry King on the radio back in the 1980s. It was just for company, for noise in the background and it usually annoyed me a lot. I often agreed with his politics, but i didn't like how abusive he was, especially to people who disagreed with him.

One evening someone called up to scold him. "You always talk about playing Baseball in the street.", he shouted. It's true, Larry talked about baseball all the time and frequently talked fondly about the street baseball he played as a kid in Brooklyn in the 1940s.

Well, this guy wanted to abuse Larry and he said, "i know you're lying because you would've been killed if you'd been in the middle of the street."

Larry responded, but not very well. What the caller was completely ignorant of was that until the 1960s & 70s, streets were for PEOPLE. Before WWII there just weren't enough cars to make traffic jams and almost all residential streets, in cities or small towns, were PUBLIC SPACE. But the car-think is so strong that logic and education and all sense of perspective goes out the window. This guy must have thought cars and the massive publicly subsidized car infrastructure were hundreds of years old.

It's easy to make fun of him, but i worry more about the people who are less obnoxious but still making the same assumptions about the appropriateness and inevitability of car dominance. We all know it was decisions that people made that created the car culture, but so much of what we think, say and do is unconsciously controlled by that car-think. That is dangerous.

Let The Judge Decide

I was about to turn right off of Fuhrman Ave E northbound on to the University bridge. To my left, the northbound approach on Eastlake Ave E is a notoriously dangerous area, a small bike lane where cars frequently turn right in front of cyclists in the bike lane.

As i looked up a car turned right onto Fuhrman and drove off, while a cyclist, a guy in his 20s, lay on the ground yelling, "You hit me!".

I was on my way to an appointment, but i couldn't leave that alone, i made a quick U turn and pedaled as hard as i could after the car. At first i gained some ground, but after a block and a half he got through the traffic circle and started to accelerate quite a bit. I don't know if he knew i was chasing him, but he was going to certainly lose me at that speed. But he turned right on the next block and i caught up to him half a block later as he was parking his car.

He was a middle aged man in an expensive suit. I told him that it looked like he had hit a cyclist. He said that he didn't see anything. I argued with him for a few minutes. I kept saying that i didn't know what happened, but that the cyclist was yelling that he had been hit. I told the driver several times that leaving the scene of a accident was a serious offense in Washington State. He kept saying that he didn't hit the bike, although he did let on that he saw it before his turn and heard the yelling afterwards. I told him i didn't see it, i didn't know what happened, but that it wasn't his job to decide what had happened it was the police or the judge's job.

It took a couple of minutes, but i convinced him. He got back in his car and drove back the way he came.

I was really proud of myself how i handled it. I didn't scream and yell and call the guy names. I didn't even make demands. I stayed cool and appealed to his better nature. And in a way, i succeeded.

Not all stories end happily. The bicyclist had left the scene when i rode back by.

a new view of Rain

I would like to talk for a moment about rain. I live in Seattle - i have a RELATIONSHIP with rain. I hike in the rain, bike in the rain, walk in the rain and watch the rain. It rains while i sleep, work and play. I have grown to know the different names for the different kinds of rain and to be able to distinguish the different sounds of rain. I adore the rivers streams and rainforests. I live in the rain and thrive. I love the rain. I love watching it, hearing it and feeling it. I honestly believed that i had experienced all aspects of rain - but working on a farm is has opened me up to entirely new viewpoints on the rain.

Sitting in the middle of a muddy field in Germany planting onions in the rain makes me think about how much they NEED the rain, but only at the right time.
The farmer is never happy about the weather. If it is raining a lot, we can't do farm work - but if it doesn't rain, the plants die. If it rains at the wrong time, the plants will have problems.

It is spring so it rains in hard short spurts 2 to 10 times a day - often with small hail included. The clouds and rainbows are amazing. It is wonderful.

Olympic Hot Springs at Elwha

{Jan 2011-  Note that this was written in September 1998. I corrected some spelling and moved a few sentences around but otherwise left it as it was when posted on the web back then. I'm a little embarrassed about some of the writing. Also while i have been to Elwha more than 25 times (including 3 times i didn't soak), i haven't been there since 2001.}

How do you publicly write about a favorite "secret" place? This is a major conundrum. Elwha is certainly not unknown, but i'd hate for it to become even more popular than it is.

Olympic Hot Springs is one of my favorite places. I always just call it Elwha, which is the name of the road, the river, and the trail, but not the hot springs. When i first moved to Washington i desperately wanted to go there, and after a few failed attempts, i finally got there and loved it. I started a habit of going every couple of months during the fall, winter and spring. I've probably been there 15 times in the last 4 or 5 years. I hate to talk about bests, but i've been to Wind River hot springs near the Columbia, Scenic hot springs in the Cascades and Sol Duc hot springs nearby in the Olypmics. All are nice, but none can come close to matching the splendor and glory of Elwha.

It's hard to describe this magical place deep in the temperate rain forest. The forest itself is magnificent and the walk in to the springs is wonderful. The Hot Springs are a fantastic soak in natural mineral water right in the trees.

The Elwha road entrance to Olympic National Park is a few miles west of Port Angeles. Often during the off season the ticket booth is not opened. It's about 15 miles up the Elwha road from Highway 101 to the Glins Canyon Dam. At this point the road makes a sharp turn into the forest, and there is a big overlook above the dam. Low snow levels in the winter cause the road to be closed above here sometimes. There is even a gate they can close, although i've never seen it closed. It's a couple miles further to the road end and trailhead; by mid day on weekends there can be a lot of cars parked here.

The hike in is very nice, although some care is required. The trail is an old road -- 30 years ago cars drove all the way to the springs, thankfully that's no longer true. Most of the walk is on pavement, but the pavement is crumbling in places, there are a few trees across the road and in the past couple of years a couple of streams have washed out the road requiring a bit of rock hopping. It's a pretty easy 45 minute walk, gently uphill. This is cougar country so i avoid walking in or out at night. Occasionally, unfortunately, people will ride mountain bikes or 4 wheel motorized ATVs in. It's against park rules and is a problem, but the washouts have helped to stop that.

Olympic Hot Springs was once a Native American retreat.  They used it for thousands of years.  They tell stories of two dragons fighting (Elwha & Sol Duc). When the European settlers came in the early 1900s, they built a road back to the springs, built a big resort and ran the springs through pipes. I have seen photos of it and it was really hanging on the side of the hill, and it looks like an Olympic (no pun intended) sized swimming pool.  People would come for a week for medicinal reasons -- i think that would be very very healthy!  The National Park was created around the resort and it was grandfathered in. 

Over 40 years ago the resort burned and was removed, and the area returned completely to wilderness.  There is almost no evidence of it now, but the pools are still fed by pipes laid when the resort was built. The mud and stone pools are lovingly built and maintained by the locals, folks who live in and around Port Angeles who visit often. Thank them! The pools are clothing optional and pretty much everyone is naked.  For this and other reasons the Park Service spent many years trying to prevent people going there, even destroying the pools. Happily they have now embraced it. I think i've seen swimsuits only once or twice and frankly it seems weird.  (We have observed that it somehow seems MORE sexualized with a swimsuit!).

The flow-through on most, not all, of the pools is adequate to be safe -- the possible health danger is from fecal matter suspended in the pools.  I do try to avoid going if i have an open cut or anything.  There is a danger but it is pretty low, in my opinion.  It is much, much worse in the summer, when there are more people and less water... we usually try to go when it's cold, snowy or rainy anyway.  I think of the 3 dozen times i have been there, only one was between May & October. 

I like to go up to the Hot Springs when it is raining, or best of all when there is snow. I watch the snow level reports and head out if they get low enough. Being in the pools while it is snowing is the greatest thing!!! The springs are at 2,000 feet elevation, the trailhead at about 1,700. Two years ago, we went up intending to walk to the snowy hot springs, it was the end of November 1996 -- we didn't make it. We had to park at the overlook above the dam and it was a lovely walk through the snowy forest. We only got as far as the trailhead -- there was three feet of snow there. We couldn't get further without snowshoes.

The best of all was last March (1998), when it started snowing while we were actually in the pools!

Make sure you bring good walking shoes, a towel, warm clothes for the walk out. I bring something, usually a foam mat, to stand on when i change, it's easy to get very chilled after getting out of the hot springs. And a wool hat is ideal when soaking on cold days. Bring lots of water, and bring a garbage bag to collect your garbage, and any other garbage lying around.

THE POOLS
As of last spring (March 1998) there were 8 pools. I've watched these pools evolve over the last 5 years, some get hotter, others cool down, some bigger, others dwindle. Oh yeah, i made up the pool numbers. As far as i know they don't have any names.

These days the pools are stone and mud. Usually there are stones or logs to sit on, occasionally you sit on the mud bottom. Most all of them have a fast enough flow through to be safe. Most of the pools are a pretty good way from any cold water, so a cold plunge is hard to do.

Pool 8

Pool eight is by far the best pool of them all, but few people recognize this. Almost everyone walks right past it, and the people who do use it do so usually because they don't know there are more pools (ie they haven't been told to go to pool 1). The mineral content is quite high and it is a true spring bubbling up through the sand on the bottom. The water is very hot; it is so hot that you usually can't stay in the water for an extended time. One time in the summer i got 1st degree burns (like a sunburn) just from putting my feet in it! The pool is just above the trail, quite close to the bridge over the river. In just 1996 & 1997 this pool has gotten considerably bigger... (It didn't even exist before 1996!) but from the water temperature, i'd say it could still manage to get even a bit larger. The pool is just above the trail, but it is reasonably out of view of the trail. [Note: early 1999 This pool is now extremely large, and although still very hot, it is probably a bit too large.]
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 3 -- A few fairly shallow places, but mostly deep enough to cover shoulders.
SIZE: 2 -- Comfortable for five people.
FEED: 3 -- Bubbles from below!.
HOT: 3 -- Very [spring 1998].
STAY: -2 -- If you stay for several hours, you have to get up and sit on the rocks out of the water every 15 minutes or so.
ACCESS: 1 -- Close to the trail; but the rocks are very slippery.
PRIVACY: 1 -- The pool is close to the trail and is the first one you pass. It's also the first one everyone else passes!
FOREST: 2 -- Very nice! Good overhanging trees too.
PIPES: 3 -- No pipes, it's a real spring!

Pool 7

Pool seven is the only pool that is below the trail on the hillside down towards the river, it is to the left of the trail down a path. This pool is fed by a very large pipe which brings runoff from pools 6 & 8 as well as from the numerous tiny springs along the trail. The mineral content is low, and the water is cooler than most -- you can stay for a long time, unlike the hotter pools, but after an hour or two you do start to cool down. It is a nice, large, fairly deep pool, with lots of flat space around it that is easy to use to undress. Because of this it is also very popular and you'll usually have to share. This is the only pool that is visible from the main trail on the other side of the river. The great advantage of this pool is that, although not right next to the river, it is close enough to sneak down for a quick dip in the almost freezing water -- which is a wonderful experience. The path, such as it is, down the steep slope to the river is very rocky and is hard to do in bare feet (i usually slip into my boots or bring sandles) -- at the river you will find two house-sized boulders and if you sneak between them, there is a warmish pool to stand ankle deep in (it's runoff from the springs) and you can splash part or all of your body into the ice cold water staying fairly protected from the current. The river is very swift and very cold and you should be extremely careful to keep out of the current at all costs.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 3 -- One of the better ones.
SIZE: 3 -- Large.
FEED: -3 -- Big nasty runoff pipe!
HOT: -1 -- Lukewarm [spring 1998]
STAY: 2 -- Stay awhile!
ACCESS: 3 -- Good trail, flat soft apron!
PRIVACY: 1 -- Large and sometimes crowded, visible from trail across river.
FOREST: 1 -- In a clearing, but the river is beautiful too!
PIPES: -3 -- Big ugly pipe.

Pool 6

Pool six is right alongside the trail -- perhaps less than a meter away. It's back is a concrete wall from the construction at the old resort, but the hot water bubbles up through the sand from below -- making it appear at least, as a real spring. It is quite small, but reasonably deep and the mineral content is higher than most.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 1 -- Shallow.
SIZE: -2 -- Nice and cozy for two people.
FEED: 3 -- Bubbles from below!
HOT: 1 -- Nice [spring 1998]
STAY: 2 -- Hang out all afternoon and chat with the people on the trail.
ACCESS: 3 -- Directly next to the trail.
PRIVACY: -3 -- The pool is almost on the trail.
FOREST: 1 -- Trail opening takes you a bit away from the forest, but it is still very nice.
PIPES: -2 -- No pipes, but the concrete wall is from the resort.

Pool 5

Pool five is a fairly new pool, far above the trail on the hillside on wet, sulfur covered rocks, it is a slippery, difficult climb -- perhaps a 40 or 45 feet above the trail rocks -- but there is also a somewhat hidden trail up, which you should be certain to use. This is a nice looking pool with a feed from a stream (from a pipe not too far away) and is fairly deep. But there is a strange phenomenon with this pool: The top 25 or so centimeters are very hot, but beneath that is 20 or so centimeters of mud which is ice cold. Very uncomfortable. Mineral content seems very low, the pool is a comfortable size for 2 people, no more. Watch this pretty, isolated pool because if the temperature problems clear up, it will be a VERY nice one.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 1 -- Shallow.
SIZE: 1 -- Nice for two people.
FEED: 1 -- A stream (from a pipe).
HOT: - 1 -- Mixed nice water with frigid mud. Not usable. [spring 1998]
STAY: -3 -- Can't get in.
ACCESS: -3 -- It's easy to fall and hurt yourself climbing the slope.
PRIVACY: 3 -- Very private! The pool is almost not visible from the trail below.
FOREST: 3 -- Excellent and all around you!
PIPES: 1 -- Not visible, and the stream is nice.

Pool 4

Pool four is another very new pool, far above the trail on the hillside. It is a slippery, difficult climb -- perhaps a 30 or 40 feet above the trail on wet, sulfur covered rocks -- to the little pool. Since it is a new pool, it is still very small. I added a bit to the construction both of the last few times i was there and i'm sure it will grow over time. I am sure of this because other than it's size and accessibility, this is a very nice pool. It is very hot and somewhat isolated. Since it is rarely used, we recently found quite a number of spiders nearby, but we gently moved them away. It is fed by a series of pipes coming down the hillside and the mineral content is medium. It is worth spending some time there, and helping to build it up as this will soon be a favorite.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: -2 -- Very shallow, you have to lay down to get under the water.
SIZE: -1 -- Tight for two people.
FEED: -2 -- Pipes and broken pipes.
HOT: 2 -- Very hot; Hot enough that it hurts to first step into it; not so hot that you can't sit in it, but just hot enough to be nice. [spring 1998]
STAY: 1 -- You probably won't want to make this the only pool you visit... yet.
ACCESS: - 2 -- It's easy to fall and hurt yourself climbing the slope.
PRIVACY: 2 -- The pool is almost not visible from the trail below.
FOREST: 3 -- Excellent and all around you!
PIPES: -2 -- Pretty nasty.

Pool 3

Pool three is by far the largest pool. Several years ago this was my favorite pool but it has gotten slightly larger and considerably cooler over the years. Since this pool is fed only by run off from pool two, the enlarging of that pool is probably why this one is cooler. Now it is rarely used, and then mostly by kids. Sometimes it is nice to move from the hot end of pool two into this pool to cool down, but you can't stay long in this pool without getting chilled. The mineral content is medium to low. This pool is by far the easiest to access because it is just inches from the trail, with a large space to undress and just a step down into the pool.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 3 -- At the middle it is the deepest of all the pools.
SIZE: 3 -- Very large.
FEED: -2 -- The runoff from pool 2, but it cascades through a scree slope.
HOT: -1 -- Quite cool, perhaps slightly below body temperature. Good pool if you wind up at the Hot Springs in the summertime. The coolest of them all. [spring 1998]
STAY: -1 -- Can't stay long, you get chilled quickly.
ACCESS: 3 -- Extremely easy.
PRIVACY: -2 -- Right on the trail! Every passerby sticks their hand in!
FOREST: 1 -- Nice.
PIPES: 1 -- Not visible.

Pool 2

Pool two is in a pretty setting surrounded directly by a cliff. It is at what appears to be the end of the trail and completely in view of the trail -- which detracts quite a bit from the privacy. A scree slope approximately 1.5 meters high forms the front of this pool and the water cascades out of the scree slope into pool 3. This crescent shaped pool has grown considerably over the last few years, in 1992 it could only fit 2 people; i think it's far too big now. The mineral content is medium to high. The pool has two feeds, and one is a cute little waterfall where a pipe from the old resort spills out of the cliff about 70 centimeters above the pool; this is the only place in the Olympics that you can sit underneath cascading hot water. A large rock within this pool divides the pool into two different parts with very different water temperatures.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 2 -- Good, sitting leaning back will cover the shoulders. The left side is shallower.
SIZE: 3 -- Very large. Perhaps too big for comfort, certainly too big to sustain any good heat.
FEED: 2 -- It is still from pipes from the resort, but they are both hidden and very pretty.
HOT: 1 -- It's a mixture, the left side is far too cool, while the right side is too hot to sit in for long. [1998]
STAY: 3 -- It is actually a good pool to stay in for a while because you can move back and forth from the hot to the lukewarm.
ACCESS: 2 -- Right off the trail; the scree slope is short but slippery.
PRIVACY: - 2 -- Directly on the trail.
FOREST: 2 -- Good trees and ferns and mist, the cliff at the back is nice and a small cave is forming.
PIPES: 2 -- Not visible, but still feed by a pipe and not a directly by a spring.

Pool 1

Pool one is nice and secluded. It is up a steep hill and is almost as far from the next closest pool as the longest distance between any other pools, so one would think you would have privacy here, but is also, by far, the most popular and therefore can be crowded. I often avoid it for that reason and because the weird people who visit the springs usually gravitate to this pool. This also can cause it to have more garbage than the others. Nevertheless it is a very nice pool. And i have, occasionally, had some privacy here.

This pool, which can be a bit too hot, has a cold stream which can be diverted into the pool to cool it down and also to cool yourself off by scooping up water and splashing it upon yourself -- a very important aspect that is sorely missing from many of the pools. Also the mineral content of this pool is very low, the lowest of all the pools, which is somewhat disappointing.
RATINGS:
DEPTH: 2 -- quite good, sitting leaning back will cover the shoulders.
SIZE: 2 -- it is big enough for 5 or 6 comfortably and a tight fit for maybe 8 or more.
FEED: 1 -- is from a stream down the hillside that comes from an old pipe from the resort. Not great, but not the worst.
HOT: 2 -- very hot, but you can still sit in it for awhile. [1998]
STAY: 1 -- Would get the highest rating, but it is too crowded so it got a mediocre rating.
ACCESS: 1 -- longest walk, and up a steep hill, difficult, but not dangerous.
PRIVACY: -1 -- Most isolated, but by far the most popular and therefore crowded. FOREST: 3 -- Gorgeous view! Perfect.
PIPES: 1 -- Not visible, but still feed by a pipe and not a directly by a spring.



Litter, trash and garbage are a huge problem at the hot springs. Unfortunately a lot of horrible, brainless, people dump all sorts of garbage on the trails, in the forest, around the pools and even in the pools!!!!

One cannot visit Olympic Hot Springs without being totally nauseated by the garbage everywhere! There are even some fools who place candles on the rocks around the pools, let the wax dribble down around the rocks and then LEAVE it there!

Please, i beg you, do not leave any garbage: food wrappers, fruit peels or cores, cigarette butts, bottles, bottle caps, candle wax, towels, underwear, toilet paper or anything else. Pack every piece of it out.

I ALWAYS bring a garbage bag (and sometimes gloves!) and pick up lots of garbage before i get in the pools and maybe on the walk home. I encourage everyone who visits the springs to take the responsibility to do the same.



Every time i go to Elwha i have a couple of fantasies....

I dream of getting some heavy machinery in there and a work crew and pulling out every concrete block, every piece of garbage, large or small, every pipeline and other remnant of the old resort, the port-a-potty and everything, and then, as they pull out, pulling up and hauling out all of the pavement. Then building an actual hiking trail in place of the road... which would mean repairing much of that slope so the damage from the road is not causing it to collapse.

In fact, I dream of pulling out all of the pavement, and services not only back to the trail head, (3.5 km from the springs) but all the way back to the valley overlook at the bend in the road above the dam (about 7.4 km from the hot springs), and having the real hiking trail run from there. Once the trail was built, the trail could be designed so it was impossible for vehicles to negotiate it. No bikes, cars or brain dead losers would be able to use the trail.

I dream of tearing out the Lake Mills dam, which you pass on the way in, and allowing the valley (and the salmon) to function naturally. Further I dream of tearing out, not only the pavement and dam, but the entire Hot Springs road from Highway 101, to the new trailhead at the valley overlook, and replacing it with a singleline rail for a alpine train to negotiate. There could be a small covered station at the top and at the bottom, your fare would help support the trail and the springs, no one could go in after the last train and, we hope, people would not go in unprepared. Regular work parties could keep building up the pools using mud and stones and logs only... And best of all, no vehicles other than the train could possibly penetrate the wilderness!

But then i also dream of enforcing the litter laws too...

All Red Dwarf Episodes, rated

mrk.'s RED DWARF
EPISODE GUIDE
with ratings!

---

	EPISODE TITLE	SERIES	SHOW	AIRDATE	I'VE SEEN	MY RATING
1	The End	I	101	15-Feb-88	yes	88
2	Future Echos	I	102	22-Feb-88	yes	80
3	Balance of Power	I	103	29-Feb-88	yes	70
4	Waiting For God	I	104	07-Mar-88	yes	96
5	Confidence & Paranoia	I	105	14-Mar-88	yes	68
6	ME²	I	106	21-Mar-88	yes	71
7	Kryten	II	201	06-Sep-88	yes	73
8	Better Than Life	II	202	13-Sep-88	yes	89
9	Thanks for the Memory	II	203	20-Sep-88	yes	61
10	Stasis Leak	II	204	27-Sep-88	yes	81
11	Queeg	II	205	04-Oct-88	yes	64
12	Paralell Universe	II	206	11-Oct-88	yes	95
13	Backwards	III	301	14-Nov-89	yes	86
14	Marroned	III	302	21-Nov-89	yes	70
15	Polymorph	III	303	28-Nov-89	yes	70
16	Bodyswap	III	304	05-Dec-89	yes	74
17	Timeslides	III	305	12-Dec-89	yes	73
18	The Last Day	III	306	19-Dec-89	yes	92
19	Camille	IV	401	14-Feb-91	yes	85
20	DNA	IV	402	21-Feb-91	yes	72
21	Justice	IV	403	28-Feb-91	yes	71
22	White Hole	IV	404	07-Mar-91	yes	87
23	Dimension Jump	IV	405	14-Mar-91	yes	88
24	Meltdown	IV	406	21-Mar-91	yes	51
25	Holoship	V	501	20-Feb-92	yes	73
26	The Inquisitor	V	502	27-Feb-92	yes	84
27	Terrorform	V	503	05-Mar-92	yes	66
28	Quarrantine	V	504	12-Mar-92	yes	72
29	Demons & Angels	V	505	19-Mar-92	yes	79
30	Back To Reality	V	506	26-Mar-92	yes	94
31	Psirens	VI	601	10-Oct-93	yes	60
32	Legion	VI	602	17-Oct-93	yes	70
33	Gunmen of the Apocolypse	VI	603	24-Oct-93	yes	71
34	Emohawk: Polymorph 2	VI	604	31-Oct-93	yes	66
35	Rimmerworld	VI	605	07-Nov-93	yes	72
36	Out of Time	VI	606	14-Nov-93	yes	78
	Series seven SUCKS!
37	Tikka to Ride	VII	701	17-Jan-97	yes	31
38	Stoke me a Clipper	VII	702	24-Jan-97	yes	62
39	Ouroboros	VII	703	31-Jan-97	yes	59
40	Duct Soup	VII	704	07-Feb-97	yes	49
41	Blue	VII	705	14-Feb-97	yes	52
42	Beyond a Joke	VII	706	21-Feb-97	yes	62
43	Epideme	VII	707	28-Feb-97	yes	69
44	Nanarchy	VII	708	07-Mar-97	yes	51
45	Back in the Red 1	VIII	801	1998	yes	55
46	Back in the Red 2	VIII	802	1998	yes	20
47	Back in the Red 3	VIII	803	1998	yes	35
48	Cassandra	VIII	804	1998	yes	45
49	Krytie TV	VIII	805	1998	yes	11
50	Pete 1	VIII	806	1998	yes	43
51	Pete 2	VIII	807	1998	yes	44
52	Only the Good	VIII	808	1998	yes	60

Matanuska Glacier scramble

I am employed by Pacific Science Center in Seattle, but i get to work all over the country.  I travel with an exhibit owned by PSC, rented to other science museums.  The exhibit is called Mostly Music, it's about the science of music.  In January i got to drive a forklift in the snow down 6th Ave in Anchorage carrying a working 12 foot high guitar!   I'm in charge of unloading the 18 wheeler and supervising the local crew doing set up.  Then i repair what's broken and go home for the 3 month run of the exhibit.  I come back to tear it down.  I've been to Tennessee, Berkeley California and Anchorage Alaska.  Later this month (May 1998) i'm going to Hoboken New Jersey!

I just got back from Anchorage for the second time.  Since we had a very tight schedule, (the exhibit had to go by ship instead of truck) PSC sent Steve with me for some extra hands.  We worked through the weekend, and despite all predictions, actually finished in 4 days. We had both planned on spending an extra day or two in Alaska, to have some fun.  On Tuesday Calvin, one of our day workers was going to take us flying, but he stood us up -- big surprise!  I kind of felt all along that he wasn't going to come through with it but Steve was very disappointed.

Instead we borrowed Mia's car and drove out the Glen Highway to Palmer and beyond to the Matanuska Glacier.  The mountains, Chugach to the left and Talkeetna to the right, were AWESOME.  It was really neat driving along the area of  my NOLS trip, although i must admit i didn't recognize anything. (In 1992 i spent 32 days off trail on the OTHER side of the Talkeetnas and only a few hours on this highway!)

Glacier access, and the glacier itself, is privately owned, if you can believe that.  We paid our $6.50 (i  would sure rather that went to a government instead of an individual!) and drove through the riverbed towards the glacier.  We encountered a huge puddle, which after tossing lots of stones and
sticks and wondering, Steve decided was safe to drive through.  I had serious questions but he was in 4wd and just sped through... we were fine, and he had too much fun! 

We got to the glacier area and walked up towards it...  the ice on the pond below it was melting in the heat of the sun and on top of the slush was this paper-thin layer of ice, which  you could pick up, and even blow a hole in!  It was cool.  In the mud where the little streams of silt-saturated-glacier-water were trickling, there were many different shades of mud, all in beautiful patterns!  And the silt in the water in the river was the right crystalline shape to cause swirly patterns like the swirly ball at PSC....
wild!  I loved it!  Steve was enthralled examining, and collecting, the rocks. 

Then we walked up on to the black ice, and then the glacier itself.  Of course i slipped and fell immediately.  The glacier, like all the others i've been on, was stunning.  I love the little streams and ponds that are formed on the ice!  We walked farther and farther up the glacer, heading for a
giant heaving fold of blue ice. The surface was snowy and pretty hard, but there were places where we would post-hole 3 or 4 feet.

We reached the gorgeous blue ice, walked around it, and then beyond, marveling at the sensational pond of water with ice and snow on it -- this was frozen water, sitting on frozen water, floating on liquid water, sitting on frozen water!  Wow! 

I am used to be very prepared for such expeditions, in fact i am usually fanatical about being
over-prepared, but today i had on only had walking shoes (with good tread), corduroys and no
ice axe or anything. I did have a water bottle, but i still felt stupid.  Or rather, i felt like it was getting in over my head.  I loved the glacier, but i didn't like that feeling. We actually got ourselves pretty high up on a ridge, and Steve was getting summit fever, but clearly what we could see was not a
summit. 

We knew it was getting late, but instead of turning around and going back the way we came, we continued up the ridge, hoping to get to the end and cross over the the next one north and come down.  Of course when we got there we found that wasn't possible, but Steve decided to go down this tight, deep little chute -- i was scared and frustrated about being unprepared.  This was not a chute
like a rock slide or anything, it was a solid sheet of curved ice, that descended about 170 feet.  There was snow in much of the chute and we were able to self arrest with our feet, and in-fact were able to plunge step much of the way. 

About halfway down Steve stopped to take a photo of a second chute next to us; this one was shapped like a 'U'.  It went down and then back up again and the point we were standing next to was at the bottom of the U..  As my mind had completely left at this point i... got .... in ... the ... chute, for the
photo.  I bet it's an awsome photo (i haven't seen it yet.) but when it came time to get out, i was in big trouble. 

I had to cross a small wall of pure ice, about 3 feet high and 4 feet wide.  There was nothing to hold on to and on the other side was a 90 foot drop.  I was as scared as i've ever been and cussing myself for being unprepared and letting myself get into this.  I tried to climb the snow in the upslope leg of the 'U' so i could get to a more accessible place, but the snow just collapsed, so finally i just had to jump over and twist around in mid air and do a self arrest in the chute when i hit.  I did it, but it really scared me.