We take Mom, Dad, and Sarah on this great drive through the Jemez mountains from Santa Fe. It features cliffs, waterfalls, Ponderosa forests, a giant volcano caldera, a lush river with a great hiking trail, hot springs, a soda dam, blood red sandstone and a native American pueblo. Mom took all the pictures again.
Showing Mom around Santa Fe, I see many sights I don’t encounter normally. During the day we walk around the plaza area, then after dinner my dad, Sarah, and Ann join us for a traditional Friday evening gallery walk on Canyon road. Seeing most of this for the first time is fun for me, then I get to see it all again from Mom’s perspective through her pictures. Here’s a slideshow with some shots from each of us – can you guess who the photographer is?
We take Mom out to Diablo Canyon. I lead Post Moderate 5.9, which is long enough at 165 ft to challenge my stamina. As I did before, I blow the two-rope logistics and have (or get) to climb to the top again after failing to lower. I need to use more visualization techniques – not just how I get down, but how does the knot get up? Sigh. Anyway, Mom took a few nice shots.
Picking up Mom at the airport may not have been too Earth day-ish, but I walk everywhere else. Mom and I hike to Tribes for lunch, then I walk with Ann to Century Bank. The lobby at the bank is closed, so we walk up to the drive-through. “Sorry Miss, but you must have a motor vehicle for insurance reasons.” We look at Century Bank’s web page, which sports a variety of greenwash. Happy Earth Day!
I set out to hike ten miles to see how my leg holds up. The day could hardly be clearer, and the warm air smells like apples. I go slowly, and while my left leg feels a little more fatigued than the right, it doesn’t hurt! The Wyoming trip this summer seems possible again.
Click to load map
We planned our Petaca Point hike with hopes that conditions would be good for climbing at nearby Dead Cholla Wall, and they are perfect. We join one other couple, also easing back into climbing after a hiatus, to try some top roping here. As is often the case, reaching over the cliff edge to clip anchors ends up feeling more dangerous than leading, so I decide I’ll just lead the easiest route on the wall, Fun 5.7. Of course it turns out to be a mixed route, so Ann goes back to the car for gear. Meanwhile, the other couple drops a rope on the next climb, Games 5.10+. My lead goes well, egging me into some fairly big, exposed moves. We join forces with our neighbors M. and A. to top rope Games, as well as One for the Book 5.8+ and Corrido del Norte 5.11. This is a nice buffet of basalt climbing with slab, cracks, arete, and small edgy face climbing. Combined with the sun and ideal temperature, it makes climbing seem like a very good idea.
I can’t remember the last time I had such a terrible time leaving for an outing. The weather looks dreary, we’re slogging through our preparations, and neither Ann or I really want to go. “Just force it,” I say, “we need this.”
The sky looks darker and darker as we drive north until our final climb out of the Rio Grande gorge, when the clouds break up a bit and there is some sunshine. We end up having warm, still hiking conditions, blessed by the scent of sage and recent precipitation. The mountains are still snow-covered, making for a striking backdrop as we make our way to Petaca Point.
We try out the new shelter we plan to use on our Wyoming walk this summer, a Big Agnes Seedhouse SL2. It’s the lightest free-standing, fully enclosed two person tent we could find at 3.5 lbs. It goes up and weathers one short burst of rain without issues. It’s probably more delicate than most similar tents, but we’re getting used that with light gear.
In the morning we hike out in the full sun. The whole trip has been only 8 miles, but I haven’t had a hint of pain in my leg. That makes me hopeful.
Click to load map
I worked with visionsmith.com to use Geo Mashup to manage the geo content of this team of skiing, skydiving, BASE-jumping, paragliding maniacs. This site makes especially good use of Geo Mashup’s full post display and tabbed category index to create a highly interactive map for exploring the content of the site.
An autobiography by a Palestinian Christian who has been a tireless advocate for peace with Israel. It’s written in a simple but vivid style, and Chacour has some remarkable success stories that are a welcome relief from the usual Middle East news. He makes his own unshakable faith quite clear as the inspiration and grounding for his work. The beatitudes in particular are his resounding theme. It’s less obvious how he reconciles the source of his convictions with those of his Jewish blood brothers, much less the Moslems and Druze (this was a new one to me) of the region. The impression I get from this book is that the adoption of peace as a brotherly value is more important to him than the adoption of truth, an intriguing perspective.
