Victor's Picture Gallery

Climbing Venusian Blind Arete on Temple Crag

Sun, 05 Sep 2010 10:00:08 -0700

September 5, 2010
For our second climb on the alpine climbing Labor Day weekend trip we headed south to Temple Crag in the Palisades area. We unfortunately were not able to get an overnight permit, we consequently aborted our plans to climb the longer Sun Ribbon Arete. Instead we did the Venusian Blind Arete car to car. The rock was much looser and the climb less straight-forward compared to the Red Dihedral. Felt more like an alpine scramble. I like to call it adventure climbing-- assuming that's what you call climbs where you're wondering if holds will fall off and questioning whether your anchor built on loose blocks would hold a real fall.

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Climbing Red Dihedral on the Incredible Hulk

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 19:23:19 -0700

September 2-4, 2010
Eric, Ben, Leo, and I headed to the Eastern Sierra for an alpine climbing Labor Day weekend trip. First up was the Red Dihedral on the Incredible Hulk. Upon seeing the clean granite monolith you realize why it is so named. While scoping out the climb for the next day we were surprised by the number of people climbing Venturi Effect and Positive Vibrations. The next morning we were happy to be the first ones on the Red Dihedral. Each pitch on the route had an interesting crux. The Red Dihedral pitch was very sustained and required creative stemming and use of the butt for rests. Don't miss the splitter fingers/thin-hands crack on the fifth pitch. The final pitches to the summit after the traverse were disappointing. Otherwise amazing climb on amazing granite.

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Mid-summer Skiing on Lassen Peak

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 07:31:13 -0700

July 17, 2010
I headed out to an ICO camping trip to Lassen National Park. Since I was up there I decided to escape from the group for a few hours to ski Lassen Peak. I scoped out the Southeast Face from the road and it looked good from the summit, but getting to the trailhead appeared to require a bit of hiking. Skinning wasn't really an option so I carried my skis on my pack as I hiked up the normal trail. Starting early allowed me to enjoy the fantastic weather on the summit by myself. The ski down was great! I made it down to the trailhead in 25min including a short traverse hike. The hikers staring in awe was a nice bonus. Yay for summer skiing!

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Climbing in Rocky Mountain National Park

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 05:19:54 -0700

July 7-13, 2010
Headed out the Colorado to check out the climbing. When I arrived the rain welcomed me for two days, then the rest of the days had chance thunderstorms-- it ain't sunny California. I managed to do a couple days of cragging and a long alpine route. Spent one day on The Book and another day on The Pear, both at Lumpy Ridge. The long alpine route was the South Face of the Petit Grepon which is an awesome 800ft tall spire. Because of constantly threatening thunderstorms we have to get a super early start. The good news: we were the only ones on the route, the bad news: the crazy wind. The Petit Grepon was fun, easy climbing with lots of exposure.

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Skiing Hotlum-Wintun Ridge on Mount Shasta

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 05:37:47 -0700

July 2-3, 2010
With such a big snow year we were able to plan a July Shasta ski trip up the straight forward Hotlum-Wintun Ridge. We found a drainage that was filled with snow allowing us to skin pretty much from the car. At about 10000ft there is a nice rocky area with bivy sites. We hunkered down from the wind for a few hours of sleep before attempting to get an alpine start the next day. From camp to summit was a long glacier slog. The slope gradually steepened to the summit, but was never too crazy. The ski down was pretty intense. 7000ft of skiing! It took 10hrs to get to the top (not including the bivy) and 3hrs to get down (including packing up camp). Skiing is efficient.

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Exploring Calaveras Dome

Sat, 26 Jun 2010 17:39:21 -0700

June 26-27, 2010
Leo and I finally made it out to the infamous Calaveras Dome. Checking out a place that is so close, yet so remote was very interesting. The lack of information about the area made finding climbs and route finding much more difficult. The first climb we did was Gemini Cracks on Hammer Dome, which seems to be the most popular climb in the area. Fun climb, but not as great as I was expecting. If the Gemini Crack pitch was on the ground it would be an awesome climb. We decided to walk off the climb to add to the adventure. We nearly epiced and do not recommend this adventure to anyone.

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Skiing and Climbing in the Eastern Sierra

Sat, 29 May 2010 13:41:11 -0700

May 28-31, 2010
We headed to the east side with climbing and ski gear in tow, looking for what conditions were best for. On Sat morning we drove over to Twin Lakes to check out Mt Walt. That plan was killed when early-bird-team-A found that there was no snow to be found. We all moseyed out to Virginia Lakes Rd where there was snow even down to their trailhead at 9700ft. The snow in the northeast bowl of Black Mountain was perfect corn. After a couple of laps we headed over to Travertine Hot Springs for a nice soak. Not getting enough hot spring action we headed to Buckeye Hot Springs after dinner.

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Climbing Reed's Pinnacle in Yosemite Valley

Sat, 15 May 2010 11:44:10 -0700

May 15, 2010
I headed into the Valley to check off a climb that's long been on the todo list: Reed's Pinnacle, Direct Route. Amazingly when we got there no one was in line to climb it. The first pitch was fairly straight-forward. The second pitch was definitely not what I expected. I thought it was going to be a perfect hand crack, instead it is sustained piton scar after piton scar. Made for interesting climbing off crappy gear placements. We opted to finish the climb by tunnelling through on the Regular Route. After returning to the bottom we saw that the Regular Route was open and decided to climb that as well. While we were on the main ledge I decided to do the nasty offwidth, Bongs Away.

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Where'd the Powder on Talking Mountain go?

Sat, 24 Apr 2010 11:21:58 -0700

April 24, 2010
With the mid-week winter storm in spring we thought there would be powder on north aspects. Some accident on 50 blocked the way into Tahoe Basin so we found Talking Mountain (near Echo Lakes) which has a treed north face. After skinning to the top we noticed the north aspect looked steep and crusty. One sunny 50 degree day was enough to melt the powder away. We skied down on variable crust. After making it down to Echo Lake we looked up and found a north east aspect that looked skiable. Turned out to be a great run on something between corn and slush. We practiced our skate skiing across Echo Lake and out to the car. The next day we headed to Kirkwood for their closing day. Unfortunate that they're closing with so much snow still...

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Skiing Waterhouse Peak

Sun, 04 Apr 2010 12:10:34 -0700

April 3-4, 2010
After an amazing powder day at Alpine on Wednesday, I had high expectations at Kirkwood. Unfortunately most of what we found was lumpy styrofoam. A few slopes had nice powder, but most of the mountain was wind packed. To end the day we headed over to Grover Hot Springs for a nice soak. Seemed to be less crowded than usual and fewer weirdos. On Sunday we headed over to Waterhouse Peak where the snow was much nicer than at KW. On our first lap we skiied a NE aspect which was heavy but decent. On the second lap we skiied a ENE aspect which was much lighter -- the freshly fallen snow probably helped. Yay for winter conditions in April.

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Skiing Angora Peak

Sat, 06 Mar 2010 14:56:33 -0800

March 6-7, 2010
We decided to ski Angora Peak after seeing that it is only 1.25mi to the top for 2000ft of vertical. Unfortunately as we were driving to the trailhead we were stopped by a closure gate. Turns out that the cabin owners blocked off winter access to the National Forest. Instead of driving to the other trailhead we decided to just walk the extra 3mi on the road. Guarded by the long slog, the powder in the north facing trees was fairly untracked. After an excellent powder run down, we readied for the long 3mi hike down the road, when a friendly local gave us a ride out to the closure gate. We spent the night at the Meiss Meadow snowpark and half of us headed to Kirkwood for the next day.

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Exploring the Eastern Sierra Backcountry

Sat, 13 Feb 2010 13:09:55 -0800

February 13-15, 2009
Decided to check out what backcountry skiing opportunities the Eastern Sierra offered for the long weekend. On Saturday we checked out the Sawtooth Range by heading up Horse Creek from Twin Lakes. What we found was a long flatish approach and mostly breakable crust. Not a pleasant tour. We got some consolation by soaking in Travertine Hot Springs later that night. On Sunday we headed south to the June Lake loop to try Devil's Slide on Mount Carson. Just east of the slide was a steep tree run filled with untracked powder! We rounded out the weekend with fast and fun spring skiing at Kirkwood on Monday.

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Backcountry Skiing Mt Tallac

Sun, 07 Feb 2010 13:00:33 -0800

February 7, 2010
Had another awesome powder day at Kirkwood. Missed the line up for the chinese downhill to Chair 4, but still managed to find fresh tracks all day. After spending a sleeping-bag-less night in the KW parking lot we headed to Mt Tallac for some BC skiing. The snow conditions were excellent and avy conditions were good. When we got close to the summit visibility went to crap so we decided to skip the final 100ft to the summit and head down. The snow was fantastic on the upper 3/4 of the mtn. Down low the snow was crunchier, but still very skiable. Skiied untracked powder most of the way down. Much better experience than the previous three times down the mountain.

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Duck Lake

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 13:32:17 -0800

Carson-Iceberg Wilderness
Sierra Club Snowcamping Group 4, Trip 1
January 30-31, 2010
For the first snowcamping training trip Group 4 headed out to Duck Lake near Bear Valley Ski Resort. We hiked 2.5mi down highway 4, up over the saddle of Inspiration Point, then down to camp with a nice view of The Dardanelles. At camp all of the students built snowshelters to sleep in. Our night activities included games involving light up balls and glowrings. In the morning the skiers convened to find a couple of powder turns down Inspiration Point. Great weather on the trip and great students. Everyone appeared to learn what it takes to camp and have a good time in the snow.

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Ludlow Hut

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 10:38:13 -0800

January 23-24, 2010
Leo and I started the weekend off early with an awsome powder day at KW. The new 4+ft of snow skiied great, plus we got to participate in an insane chinese downhill to chair 4. On Saturday we were supposed to meet at the trailhead at 10am, but because of some shenanigans on I-80 we didn't get started until 2pm. Disconcerting considering that we had 4ft of new snow to contend with and 5-6mi to go. I never thought I'd say this, but our group greatly benefitted from snowmobilers who broke about 4mi of the Rubicon Trail -- otherwise we would still be out there. After trodding along for 5 hours, half of which were after sunset, we finally made it to the hut.

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Backcountry Skiing Carson Pass

Sat, 16 Jan 2010 13:31:19 -0800

January 16-17, 2010
On Saturday Genti, Nuria, and I met up with Mason who showed us a variety of ski options in the Carson Pass area. We examined the Round Top-Sisters saddle only to find the south side thin and wind-scoured. After skiing down to Winnemucca Lake for lunch, we decided to check out Elephants Back. The first chute we explored had a drop off we couldn't see the bottom of so we found an easier option to the southeast which took us down to Forestdale Creek. Despite the distance we covered we didn't find much powder except for below Frog Lake. On Sunday the four of us joined up with Jenny and Jeremy for a quick run up Waterhouse Peak where we found fresh tracks within the heavy and tracked powder.

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Bishop Climbing

Sun, 10 Jan 2010 11:20:38 -0800

January 9-11, 2010
Winter is a hard time to get some outdoor climbing in, but I was able to make it out to Bishop for a few days of climbing. We spent Sunday in Owens River Gorge climbing at Big Tower and Warning Signs wall. Sunday evening we attempted to drive to Wild Willie's Hot Spring, but turned back after getting stuck in the snow. We decided to go to the much more easily accessible Hilltop Tub. On Monday we headed over to Happy Boulders for a bit of bouldering. I was surprised to see how many people (along with their babies and dogs) were at the area for a Monday. Definitely worth coming back to. The rock is a bit sharp so my hands were fairly tenderized by the end of the day.

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Climbing the Third Pillar of Dana, Great Pumpkin, and Aqua Knobby

Sun, 16 Aug 2009 10:48:58 -0700

Tuolumne Meadows
August 15-16, 2009
Leo and I headed into Tuolumne to climb a bit and hang with the AAC. Our plan for Saturday was to "warm-up" on Aqua Knobby on Pywiak Dome. We felt pretty good on the runout knobbiness and moved on to the more seriously runout Great Pumpkin on Fairview Dome. The fourth pitch involves a 60ft runout on 5.8 terrain-- meaning a potential 120ft cheese grating fall. Exciting. We spent Sat night socalizing with the AAC and the neighboring CHAOS group. In fact too much time socalizing. We woke up dehydrated and didn't get the alpine start we expected for our big day on the Third Pillar of Dana.

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Lassen NP with ICO

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 14:20:30 -0700

July 17-19, 2009
The Sacramento Sierra Club Inner City Outings group took 12 kids aged 7-11 out to Lassen Volcanic National Park for a three day campout. On our first day a ranger gave us all a talk about the history of Lassen. After a short hike around the Lily Pond, we had the kids set up camp. On the second day we took the kids on a short three mile hike out to Bumpass Hell and back. Afterwards the kids worked on their Jr Ranger Exam at the new South Entrance Vistor Center. On our third day we went out to Manzanita Lake for bird banding and bird releases. Our final planned activity was hiking through the Subway Cave. On top of all the planned activities the kids got to play tug-o-war, jump rope, hide-n-go-seek, and bug hunt.

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Climbing at Donner Pass

Sun, 12 Jul 2009 17:17:30 -0700

July 11-12, 2009
On Saturday we headed over to Black Wall to climb Rated X and top rope Finger Licker. Our day ended prematurely when Leo got rained on while leading Black September. In the evening we hung out with the AAC folks for their climb-munity event, drank beer, and grilled all sorts of good food. Sunday morning started out fairly depressing with rain and thunder at 6am. Fortunately a bit blue skies appeared and allowed us to climb at Showshed Wall. Leo and I warmed up on Telegraph Crack and Mole's Corner, then advanced to Farewell to Arms and Nova Express. We finished off the weekend with a nice picnic at the piers by Donner Lake.

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High Sierra Trail

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 18:30:43 -0700

75 mile Sierra Nevada Crossing
June 27-July 2, 2009
Bill planted the idea of hiking the High Sierra Trail back in 2007, but we never achieved a critical mass to overcome the complicated logistics. That is until Genti came up with a transportation framework that would get us back to the start from Whitney Portal. Thus the High Sierra Trail 2009 trip materialized. For our mission across the Sierra we gathered a biophysicist, three computer engineers, a environmental engineer, epidemiologist, geologist, and veterinarian. The mission was to start in Visalia, get to Sequoia NP, backpack across the Sierra, summit Mt Whitney, exit through Whitney Portal, and somehow make it back to our cars on the westside.

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Hiking Freel Peak and Job's Sister

Sat, 20 Jun 2009 14:39:32 -0700

June 20-21, 2009
With the High Sierra Trail trip only a week away we decided to go on a training hike. Freel Peak, the highest peak in the Lake Tahoe Basin, looked like a good hike to try. To add a bit of challenge we tried to climb two neighboring peaks: Job's Sister and Job's Peak. We started at Horse Meadow, headed up to Anderson Pass, and took the TRT up to Freel Peak. From Freel we hiked on the ridge to Job's Sister. With such a late start we skipped climbing Job's Peak and headed down the south slope of Freel Peak. The day after Leo and I headed to Lover's Leap to climb Pop Bottle and the newly controversial Fandango.

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Climbing at Owens River Gorge

Sat, 23 May 2009 20:04:20 -0700

May 23-25, 2009
For Memorial Day weekend I headed down to Owens River Gorge with Morgan, Jono, and Zeka. On our first morning we met up with Genti and Nuria and spent the day climbing Warm Up Wall. On the second day we started late and found a huge crowd over at the Great Wall of China. We reluctantly lined up to get on the climbs. After lunch we headed over to Gorgeous Towers. There we climbed the classic namesake arete route. On the final day we wandered into the Upper Gorge and ended up at Gotham City. We warmed up on Double Flipper and finished on a bolted crack called Dr. Evil. The route starts with a bit of face climbing, moves into a dihedral, then traverses a few moves on some slab, and finishes on a great double finger crack. Great route to end the awesome weekend.

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Weekend in Vegas

Sat, 16 May 2009 18:34:30 -0700

May 15-18, 2009
I've been to Las Vegas four times and this is the first time I've spent any time on the strip. Despite the cigarette smoke, price gouging, and aura of confusion, I managed to enjoy the debauchery that Vegas had to offer. I was here for my friend's wedding and we had a bit of a celebration for the bachelor's final day of freedom. No photos unfortunately. The outdoor wedding went smoothly considering the intense heat. Of course a trip to Vegas wouldn't be complete without a visit to Red Rock Canyon. On Sunday I climbed 'Frogland' and on Monday we climbed in the 'Black Corridor.'

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Wine Country Century

Sat, 02 May 2009 15:13:03 -0700

May 2, 2009
After a scramble trying to get registrations for the sold out century we find out that the forecast called for "chance showers". I interpreted that to mean a sprinkle here and there. That left me caught by surprise when we experienced a continuous light rain for 75mi of our ride. Whenever we stopped at the rest stops I would be shivering while trying to consume calories. The cold wasn't the only difficulty-- wet roads and glasses made navigation difficult. We totally missed a chunk of the ride. At first I thought Henry was crazy for being excited about riding in inclement weather. By the end I think we were all glad to have finished a century in the rain. Jackie should be espeically proud considering it's her first century. Can't wait to do the ride again in better conditions.

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Backcountry Skiing Mt Tallac

Sun, 19 Apr 2009 16:50:04 -0700

Back with a vengence
April 19, 2009
I came back to Mt. Tallac to see if I could ski it better than the last two visits; I made it down without falling a dozen times! Our late start caused the skinning to be difficult. The snow would break apart when we put pressure on it. Even still we managed to beat a bunch of boot packers who started an hour earlier than us to the top. The snow conditions on the way down weren't as good as I was expecting. Up top the snow was chunky, down lower it was better. The whole northeast descent was fairly tracked out. Kind of a bummer. Defeats the purpose of backcountry skiing.

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Skiing Echo Peak and Red Lake Peak

Sun, 05 Apr 2009 13:23:40 -0700

April 4-5, 2009
Leo, Genti, Nuria, and I headed up to Tahoe for a backcountry skiing weekend. On Sat we headed up Echo Peak, just north of Echo Pass. The snow conditions were a little soft for going up, but for going down it was fantastic. We should have skiied down the bowl directly SE of the summit, but we attempted to traverse SE on the ridge where we ended up in a narrow tree chute. On Sun we headed to Red Lake Peak, just north of Carson Pass. The snow was definitely towards the soft side; luckily we started a little earlier on firmer snow. Skiing down the east face was awesome.

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Backcountry Skiing Ralston Peak

Sun, 15 Mar 2009 15:37:00 -0700

March 15, 2009
Headed up to Tahoe for a weekend of spring skiing. Kirkwood delivered with good corn on Sat. The KW photographer got a few photos of us. Here's a nifty site which overlays where you've skiied on a map.
On Sun, Genti and I headed for the backcountry. Events seemed to conspire against us. I had a sore throat which barely let me speak and Genti forgot his skins. On top of that the overcast ruled out spring corn. We soldiered on and made it to the top of Ralston where it was windy and icy. It wasn't until we dropped below treeline before we hit softer snow. A fun ski descent, much easier than Tallac.

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Bradley Hut with ICO/TYM

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 08:43:52 -0700

March 7-8, 2009
I went on an overnight snow trip to Bradley Hut with ICO and the kids from TYM. We had a bit of drama on the way to the trailhead when one of the vehicles had a complete tire blow out. The car instruction manual came in handy and we got the tire replaced before AAA arrived. The hike in was relatively uneventful, just follow the road until you get to the hut. Our group made it in just before dark. In the hut we kept the kids (and adults) entertained with puzzles, games, and cards. The next morning we had pancakes and a bit of sledding fun before heading out.

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Backcountry Skiing Waterhouse Peak

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 15:52:44 -0800

February 14-16, 2009
President's Day weekend was a nice ski weekend for me. On Saturday, Genti, Nuria, Leo, and I found some fresh powder and made some fresh tracks on Waterhouse Peak. The weather on Sunday turned to crap due to a windy snowstorm. The storm was bad enough that Kirkwood didn't open chairs 4, 6, or 10 which made for a really crappy day. We redeemed the day by going to Grover Hot Springs in Markleeville -- well worth their $5 admission -- before heading back to the motel in Minden, NV. On Monday we headed back to ski the north peaklet of Waterhouse Peak aka "Powderhouse". When we got there we found that it was much more tracked out than Waterhouse. I still managed to make a few fresh tracks.

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Biking Cantelow Rd Loop

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 15:57:23 -0800

January 19, 2009
Jackie and I took advantage of the beautiful winter day by going on my favorite ride from Davis. Who knew that riding in the winter could be so nice. We rode past green vegetation, rolling green hills, and furry animals. The temperature was perfect. Getting up Cantelow Road literally wasn't a sweat. This ride is awesome because of the idillic setting and nice rolling hills.

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Snowcamping at Forestdale Creek

Sat, 17 Jan 2009 20:05:30 -0800

January 17-18, 2009
Group 4 of the Sierra Club Snowcamping Section made a trip out to Forestdale Creek for the overnight trip. Our massive group of 29 headed into the wilderness to learn the fun of snowcamping. Snow conditions were not ideal. There wasn't much of it and the little left was ice crusted. This made skiing in a bit awkward. Nonetheless our hardy students dutifully dug their snowtrenches. Most managed not to freeze when the lows hit 10F at night.

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Climbing Joshua Tree

Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:25:18 -0800

December 27, 2008 - January 3, 2009
Made it out to Joshua Tree for the annual New Year's climbing trip. The weather was the best I've ever experienced at Joshua Tree-- no wind and warm days. Got on all new climbs this trip and there are still tons more to do. I'm missing photos from the first 3 (out of 6) climbing days because I was too lazy to pull out my camera.

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Yosemite Valley

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 13:08:23 -0800

November 7-9, 2008
Finally made it back to the valley after half a year. Didn't climb as much as last time -- a decent amount considering that we got hit with a nice winter storm. On Sat morning we climbed at the Five Open Books area. Leo and I started on Caverns, which is an interesting adventure climb. On the fourth pitch you climb through the eponymous cavern. When we made it out of the Caverns the weather looked considerably worse. We decided it would be appropriate to climb Commitment. The first pitch is an amazing crack climb where you get everything from fingers to off-width. After enjoying the first pitch the drizzle started rolling in. The threat of the full on storm made us climb faster than usual. We got up all three pitches in an hour and ten minutes!

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Backpacking Emigrant Wilderness

Sun, 28 Sep 2008 16:42:00 -0700

September 27-29, 2008
Bill was introducing his friend Huyen to backpacking and I joined them on their trip to Emigrant Wilderness. The plan was to do a 33mi loop plus bag a peak in 2 1/2 days. After some footwear issues we realized that the plan was unrealistic and decided to summit Black Hawk Mountain instead. Scrambling up the granite section with amazing slabs and short cracks was quite an adventure. Getting up the final 400ft to the summit required slogging through volcanic scree. While atop we watched thunderstorms form in the distance. Getting down was going to be an adventure.

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Climbing Donner Pass

Sat, 09 Aug 2008 15:03:23 -0700

August 9, 2008
Leo and I headed up to Donner Pass for a half day of climbing. Warmed up on Jellyroll Arch on Grouse Slab. It appears to be a crack climb, but really is a slab climb with a seam under the roof for placing pro. After another slab climb, Cake Walk, we headed over to Black Wall to climb Black September. The 5.9+ rating was a bit intimidating; Donner Pass ratings are already a bit stiff, the plus just gives an extra pause. After finishing the climb, I felt that it is normal 9. The start had a bit of fingers, perfect hands through most of it, and a bit of wide hands at the top. Excellent climb.

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Leo's Birthday in Tuolumne

Sat, 02 Aug 2008 17:08:16 -0700

August 1-3, 2008
Headed out to Tuolumne for Leo's 30th birthday celebration, which was a great way to get everyone together and go climbing. On Sat a big group of us took over Cathedral along all the different variations of the climb. I climbed Cathedral Peak a couple of years ago, so to make things interesting I tried different a variation and only placed one or two pieces per pitch. After Cathedral we were tempted to climb Eichorn Pinnacle, but were worried that we wouldn't be able to make it to the Mobil station for dinner. After the heinous western descent, we rushed to the Mobil station for fish tacos, mango margaritas, and chocolate cake. The party moved back to camp where we had more drinks and Bojana's yummy cake next to the campfire.

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Rafting the American River, South Fork

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 12:17:11 -0700

July 27, 2008
Ricky's grandma and Jenny's parents were in town, so they decided to give them a taste of some of the extreme adventures we go on. We headed down the upper section (Chili Bar to Lotus) of the American River South Fork, which is a fairly mellow class III+. Our group consisted of 8 people and one dog in the raft, 2 inflatable kayaks, and one hard shell kayak. I was in the raft for all the major rapids. After the last class III rapid, Bojana let me hijack her inflatable kayak. It has been a while since I last kayaked so that was a lot of fun.

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Lassen NP with Sierra Club ICO

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 09:14:59 -0700

July 18-20, 2008
I volunteered to go to Lassen Volcanic National Park for my first overnight trip with the Sacramento Sierra Club Inner City Outings. Using concept of "get 'em while they're young," ICO is a good opportunity to teach kids to appreciate and enjoy the environment. Too many kids stay at home watching TV playing video games, or browsing the web. If kids don't value the natural world, there won't be anyone left to protect it. As you can tell from all the smiles these kids learned the joy playing in the outdoors can bring.

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Biking Alpine Dam Loop

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 15:23:38 -0700

July 12, 2008
Instead of staying in the heat and smoke in Sacramento, I headed into foggy refuge of the Bay Area. The weather was good for the Alpine Dam loop-- which I've wanted to do for a while. There is some debate about whether to do it counter-clockwise or clockwise. I've decided that the clockwise direction seems to be best. You get to ride down the awesome Seven Sisters and get another steep downhill to Alpine Dam. When you're done with the hard riding you're out in Fairfax where you can grab something to eat for the mellow ride back.

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Mountain Biking White Mountain Peak

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 14:51:25 -0700

July 4-7, 2008
Genti had a crazy plan to mountain bike up White Mountain Peak (the third tallest mountain in CA at 14246ft) starting from Big Pine off highway 395 -- a measly 4000ft above sea level. The challenge for the first day was to ride 18.7mi from Big Pine to Grandview Campground (8500ft). On the second day we would ride 22.1mi to Barcroft Gate (11700ft). And on the epic third day we would ride most of the final 7.3mi to the summit and all the way back to Big Pine. We completed 80mi of riding and about 5mi of hiking with a total of 13000ft of elevation gain, amazingly with no mechanical issues.

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Climbing at Wright's Lake Cliff

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 15:49:31 -0700

June 21, 2008
I've never been to Wright's Lake Cliff so Leo and I took a daytrip to check it out. The distinct cliff is steep and has well defined cracks. Not many people climb here so the rock is a bit licheny and mossy. While climbing the wind picked up and not long after we were hit by a thunderstorm. As luck would have it this is the one time I forgot to bring my windshell, so we hid out under a boulder till things died down. Nice climbing area. I'd like to come back to climb Velvet Gloves on Black Beauty Wall.

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Lover's Leap

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 15:20:31 -0700

June 14-15, 2008
Headed to Lover's Leap to get on some climbs I've been wanting to do for the past two years (which isn't saying much since I only went once last year). Ended up climbing The Line, Scimitar, Psychedelic Tree, The Groove, and Hospital Corner. A nice set of climbs ticked off, but now there isn't much left on my Lover's Leap ticklist. The great thing about the Leap is that all the routes are fun and easily accessible so they're worth repeating. I'll have to head up there some more, although the new $10/site camp fees make it less attractive.

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Yosemite Valley Climbing

Sat, 31 May 2008 17:05:55 -0700

May 30-June 1, 2008
After the rain spoiled my climbing plans for Memorial Day weekend, I sought redemption by spending the following weekend in the Valley. My luck turned in a different way when we were unable to find a campsite. Rather than waste time worrying about it we headed to El Cap Base to climb a couple routes. While climbing Little John, Right we met some folks who were kind enough to let us crash at their site. Awesome! The next morning we headed off on a very late start to Royal Arches. We planned on climbing fast-- simulclimbing as much of the route as possible-- and managed to get to the top in a respectable 4hrs. We also made it back to the bottom of the climb via the North Dome Gully descent in about 2hrs.

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Climbing at Indian Creek

Mon, 12 May 2008 13:11:57 -0700

May 10-16, 2008
Got a taste of what hard Indian Creek crack climbing is all about. The climbs are steep, strenuous, and sustained. With a bunch of borrowed cams I was able to make my way up a decent number of cracks. The routes were so strenuous that it was hard to do more than a few per day. That's even with our rest days hiking in Canyonlands NP. No major epics occurred. Just some minors ones like nearly getting a couple of #1 cams stuck, retrieving a stuck rope, and clawing my way up Jane Fonda's Total Body Workout (gotta love a climb with a name like that).

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Climbing Red Rocks

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 08:41:05 -0700

March 21-30, 2008
Headed out to Red Rocks over spring break. The adventure was pretty epic, so I'll just list some highlights. Steep, slick, super fun, varnished black 3rd pitch of Dark Shadows; 10 raps down Solar Slab without stuck ropes; Old-school-nut-only ascent of Romper Room and Doobie Dance; Meeting Peter Croft at the bottom of Ragged Edges; Leaving the trailhead at 1pm, climbing Olive Oil, and getting back before dark; Seeing no one on Crimson Chrysalis from the parking lot at 10:15, then climbing the route in under 4hrs; Circumambulating Kraft Mountain through colorful rock and slot-like canyons.

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Glacier Point Ski Tour

Sat, 01 Mar 2008 15:19:51 -0800

February 29-March 2, 2008
I was worried that our group was going to be a massive 15 people, but it naturally dwindled down to the final seven. Despite the small group we still had some problems with footwear and sickness. Luckily no famine. We feasted on our four course meals every night while staring at the stars. Anyways, we base camped at Taft Point and on our middle day visited Glacier Pt and Sentinel Dome. The trip was a great success until the very end where we got busted by the Park Rangers at the trailhead.

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Snowcamping at Crocker Pt

Sun, 17 Feb 2008 12:39:20 -0800

Yosemite National Park
Sierra Club Snowcamping Training
February 16-18, 2008
For our second Sierra Club Snowcamping Training Series trip, group 4 decided to go out to Yosemite. We started at Badger Pass ski area, then headed up Glacier Pt a ways before turning north towards Crocker Point. The trail itself was very mellow and well tracked. At camp the snowdepth was about 3-6ft. On the second day our group daytripped to Stanford Point and afterwards also visited Dewey Point. Each offered slightly different vantage points over the valley. The rest of our downtime was spent sledding and skiing down the hill at Crocker Point.

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Backcountry Skiing Mt Tallac

Sun, 10 Feb 2008 14:57:29 -0800

Desolation Wilderness
February 10, 2008
When I did this trip last year I had a really hard time because I thought I sucked at skiing. Maybe that's a bit true, but I'm pretty sure I've gotten a lot better since then. Well anyways the trip was still hard one even after a year of experience. Tallac is a strenuous skin up and technical ski down. Better snow conditions would have made it easier. I'd only recommend doing this route after some fresh powder or in spring corn. We had wind crust and patches of powder to throw you off balance.

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Forestdale Creek

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 11:39:47 -0800

Sierra Club Snowcamping Training
January 19-20, 2008
For the first Group 4 SC snowcamping trip we headed to Forestdale Creek just east of Carson Pass. We started at the Red Lake trailhead and hiked the rolling terrain of Blue Lakes Road on crisp, crunchy snow. Upon hitting Forestdale Creek we headed SE to find a place to camp. With the forecast calling for high winds we attempted to find a sheltered camp. We tried our best, but were still hit hard by the winds overnight. I woke up several times in the middle of the night to howling winds and wondered whether the tarp covering my snowtrench would tear apart. Luckily it did not.

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Joshua Tree

Mon, 31 Dec 2007 16:57:54 -0800

December 26, 2007 - January 1, 2008
New Year's at Joshua Tree last year was a blast and I decided to spend another new year's there. This year was less windy, but much colder which cut down on the motivation to get an early start on the frigid climbs. I only had one climbing goal and that was to climb Walk on the Wild Side. We were so determined to climb it that we started early on a cold and windy New Year's Eve. The first pitch was miserably cold, but we pulled through to finish the rest of the climb in the sun. The rest of our time was spent climbing random stuff or hanging out at camp building shanty towns.

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Canon 17-85mm f/4-5.6 IS Lens Test

Fri, 07 Dec 2007 17:05:50 -0800

Davis, CA
After two years of wanting the Canon 17-85mm f/4-5.6 lens, I gave in and purchased one. This versatile lens features image stabilization and an excellent range of focal lengths. After testing the lens I've found the image quality to be pretty good. There is noticeable distortion from 17-22mm which can easily be corrected in post-processing. The lens is not very fast, but if necessary a prime lens would be better choice.

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Pigeon Point Bicycle Tour

Sat, 10 Nov 2007 18:02:28 -0800

Palo Alto -> Pigeon Point Lighthouse Hostel -> Santa Cruz
November 10-11, 2007
Our excellent ride began in Palo Alto under overcast skies. It wasn't long before the sprinkles would begin. After crossing Skyline Blvd on Old La Honda Rd, then dropping into the other side of the peninsula, the weather changed for the worse. We found a bar in La Honda and decided it was a good place to take shelter and stop for lunch. The bar was quite interesting; outside there were people throwing axes at a target, and inside there were people watching a home video of a wood chopping competition. It was like dropping into a different world.

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4-Q Lakes

Sun, 04 Nov 2007 13:09:32 -0800

Desolation Wilderness
November 2-4, 2007
Bill, Peggy, and I unwittingly headed into Desolation Wilderness for a cold night out. Our hike started at Wright's Lake, over Rockbound Pass, past Lake Schmidell, and finally to 4-Q Lakes. The night was fairly cold, but we didn't realize how cold until our hike out. All the ponds that were liquid the previous day had a layer of ice about 1cm thick. Must have been fairly cold that night. After checking the temperature statistics for the night it was reported to be in the teens at South Lake Tahoe airport. Brr...

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Flagpole Peak

Sun, 21 Oct 2007 12:42:06 -0700

Desolation Wilderness
October 21, 2007
The forecast called for a sunny day-- along with gusts of 20mph. Not ideal for climbing. Jeremy and I couldn't let the beatiful day go to waste, so we looked for some scrambling routes to spend the day on. There weren't too many options in the Tahoe area and settled on Flagpole Peak. After climbing Flagpole Peak we wanted to give a shot at free soloing Thug Lite on Gangsta Wall. The climb looked reasonable from the bottom, but we got turned back by the layback section fairly high up.

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Eagle Creek Canyon

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 13:23:28 -0700

90-Foot Wall and Eagle Lake Cliff
October 14, 2007
Our original plan was to go to Lover's Leap. While driving, Jeremy and I decided to head to Eagle Lake Cliff instead. Eagle Lake Cliff has a good concentration of top ropable hard crack climbs. Good practice since I haven't climbed anything harder than 5.9 in months. We started out at the sunny and empty 90-Foot Wall, climbing Holdless Horror, Fallout, and Ripoff. The crowds started moving in so we moved onto Eagle Lake Cliff. At the cliff we climbed Seams to Me, and Trust is a Must. Both excellent climbs. The first focusing on crack/layback and the second on smearing/stemming.

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Monterey Bay Aquarium

Sat, 13 Oct 2007 12:34:31 -0700

October 13, 2007
A good friend was in Santa Cruz for the weekend so we headed over to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The tanks were all filled with impressive creatures. My favorites were the octopus, cool coral, amazing jellyfish, and the sex-shifting sheephead fish. At first I just thought the sheephead fish looked cool; after reading the description I found out that all sheephead fish start out female and change to male depending on the male/female ratio. Even cooler.

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Climbing in Sequoia NP

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 15:39:42 -0700

Chimney Rock and Little Baldy
September 29-30, 2007
Jeremy, Jenny, and I attempted to avoid the bad weather by choosing to climb at Sequoia NP. We started our journey by heading down to Ricky's parent's orchard in Wood Lake. Our first morning started late after enjoying breakfast and good company at the orchard. Once we arrived at Sequoia we realized that the good forecast was not to be; fog appeared and progressively worsened. Despite the poor visibility we decided to climb "Pop a Top" and "Crystal" on Chimney Rock.

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Whitney Region High Sierra Climbing

Sat, 08 Sep 2007 19:02:18 -0700

Pee Wee Route on Mt Whitney and Fishhook Arete on Mt Russell
September 8-11, 2007
The Whitney trip was amazingly planned half a year in advance. The plan was to hike in and camp at Iceberg Lake, climb East Buttress (aka Pee Wee Route) on Mount Whitney the next day, Fishhook Arete on Mount Russell the day after, and finally hike out on day 4. The problem with planning so far in advance is unforeseen problems; Jenny and Jeremy got sick after traveling to Mexico and weren't able to make it. Leo and I were sad not to have them with us, but the lure of the Fishhook was too strong.

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Marin Headlands

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 15:42:29 -0700

Miwok Trail to Rodeo Beach
September 1, 2007
Robin, Leo, and I all for some reason or another had to be in the Bay Area for Labor Day weekend. We decided to go out on a day trip to the Marin Headlands as a training hike for our Whitney trip the following week. The hike wasn't srenuous enough to actually stress our bodies but it was a lot of fun. All along the hike we found old military base ruins that make great playgrounds. We even found an old cannon battery which would make for a pretty decent urban climbing gym.

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Lunar Eclipse

Tue, 28 Aug 2007 03:33:42 -0700

August 28, 2007
I attempted to take some pictures of the lunar eclipse. Kinda pointless since you could get way better pictures online somewhere. Here they are anyways.

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Tuolumne Traverse Weekend

Sat, 18 Aug 2007 19:44:50 -0700

Matthes Crest and On the Lamb
August 17-19, 2007
This weekend in Tuolumne involved two long traverse climbs, lots of timing coincidences, and of course a weekend in Tuolumne wouldn't be complete without some car troubles. On Saturday we climbed Matthes Crest completing the entire ridge from south to north. The ridge is about 3/4ths of a mile, so my feet were hurting really bad by the time we were done. On Sunday we decided to take it easy on a shorter climb. Instead of doing a right to left traverse, we decided to do On the Lamb which is a 400ft left to right traverse 300ft up on Lamb Dome.

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Arroyo Seco River Adventure

Sun, 05 Aug 2007 13:15:48 -0700

Ventana Wilderness
August 3-5, 2007
Instead of moping around for the weekend I decided to go on a mysterious river walking/canyoneering/rock scrambling trip. I figured this would be a good opportunity to take a weekend off climbing to let my shoulder heal. Little did I know that we were up for a grueling weekend of pain. The general plan was to hike up a road to Escondido Campground and hike down the river and back to our car at Arroyo Seco Campground. Sounds simple enough...

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Tuolumne Meadows

Tue, 31 Jul 2007 13:01:25 -0700

July 27-30, 2007
I thought I was going for a nice weekend of hiking and climbing in Tuolumne. The actual trip went really well. I hiked to the top of Mt Dana. The next day I climbed Hobbit Book and Shagadellic. Then I finished off the weekend by climbing Tenaya Peak via the Northwest Buttress. All in all a good weekend, that is until the disaster occurred on the way home.

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Deer Creek Park Bouldering

Sun, 22 Jul 2007 17:26:21 -0700

Rocklin, CA
July 22, 2007
Some friends mentioned that there was some good bouldering at Deer Creek Park in Rocklin. Since I was bored and needed to get out of the house, I decided to check it out. The main bouldering area was easy to find. It's facing Pacific St.
I hopped on good number of reasonable routes at the main area. It was a hot day and I forgot to bring chalk, so the problems were a bit harder than they should be. I'll have to come back and send that finger crack.

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Seattle Road Trip

Thu, 12 Jul 2007 19:00:44 -0700

July 9-14, 2007
With no specific plan in place we decided to head north on some kind of road trip. After 1700mi of driving we passed through Eureka, CA, Newport, OR, Portland, OR, Seattle, WA, and Corvallis, OR. The highlight was definitely making it to Seattle and spending two days there. One thing I could have done without was the drive up the coast. I saw a lot of cycle tour folks going down the coast and that seemed like the better way to experience it. Good times and lots of laughs.

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Palisades

Sat, 30 Jun 2007 05:11:20 -0700

U-Notch to North Palisade and Swiss Arete to Mount Sill
June 27-30, 2007
Nothing like a week in the mountains to help clear the mind of its worries. Our ambitious plan was to head into the Palisades, climb four 14ers, and Temple Crag on our 5 day trip. Although our odyssey did not succeed in completing our crazy plan, we did tackle two classic sierra routes to the top of two 14ers.

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Cindy's Graduation / Botanical Conservatory

Sun, 17 Jun 2007 18:36:10 -0700

June 17, 2007
Looks like my sister graduated before me. Probably means I need to get out of here soon. Oh well congratulations to Cindy!

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Sierra Century

Sat, 02 Jun 2007 12:21:15 -0700

June 2, 2007
I considered signing up to ride the Sierra Century for the past few years. This year I finally committed and signed up. A great year to start since the new and improved Sierra Century had 10000ft of climbing! (Was supposed to be 12000ft but they cut out a 10mi section of the route. Thank goodness!) I was originally going to do the ride by myself, but luckily I caught up with a group of friends. The ride was great, the only flaw being that the rest stop on Jesus Maria was about 4mi too late (see elevation profile). I ran out of water and was bonking due to lack of energy reserves. A random rider gave me a GU shot as I was bonking and it made a world of difference! Thanks mystery rider!

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Memorial Day Tuolumne Weekend 2007

Sat, 26 May 2007 15:22:23 -0700

Climbing and hiking extravaganza
May 25-28, 2007
Spent a weekend climbing, hiking, and enjoying good company. Leo and I started the weekend early on Friday by climbing South Crack on Stately Pleasure Dome and West Crack on DAFF Dome. Saturday was our big hike to Cloud's Rest. Our tough group wasn't detered by the snow cover on the trail. At the top we found excellent views of the valley. On Sunday our group took over Low Profile Dome. We spent the whole day undisturbed while climbing out the crag. On our final day we climbed Northwest Books on Lembert Dome. Oh and I can't forget the great times drinking mango margaritas and eating fish tacos at the Whoa Nellie Deli.

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Benson Hut

Sun, 08 Apr 2007 13:16:54 -0700

April 7-8, 2007
To celebrate Genti's old age, Nuria planned a nice trip to Benson Hut. Little did we know-- our trip was actually a death march. Those who have never been on skins experienced a trial by fire. Everyone passed and managed to make it up some fairly steep slopes toward the top of Mt Lincoln. But that was only the halfway point.

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Bryce Canyon and Zion Canyon National Parks

Tue, 27 Mar 2007 15:40:58 -0700

March 27-28, 2007
A Grand Canyon ranger discouraged us from climbing in Arizona since it was all poorly bonded sedimentary rock. Instead of sticking around in AZ we headed north to Utah. I thought Bryce Canyon would be a nice destination both because I've never been there before and also because of all the beautiful pictures I've seen of it. After arriving at the visitor center at Bryce we encountered a disaster: it started dumping snow! But what I thought was a disaster turned into a blessing. For short moments the skies cleared up to reveal snow covered hoodoos. Cold temps and more snow were expected that night so we decided to move into Zion after taking our obligatory pictures.

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Grand Canyon Rim-to-Rim

Sat, 24 Mar 2007 15:18:00 -0700

March 24-26, 2007
As part of my usual trip planning we started out with a half-assed opened ended itinerary. Our only real goal was to hike down the Grand Canyon and back up. Luckily for us after 14 hours of driving and a night on the rim, we scored a two night permit at the Bright Angel Campground. We hiked down the exposed and scenic South Kaibab trail. This trail doesn't have water so they only recommend that people hike down it. After pounding our feet for 7mi and down 5000ft, we were glad to find a decent campsite.

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Ridge Lakes

Sun, 25 Feb 2007 10:12:17 -0800

Lassen National Park
February 23-25, 2007
For the second Sierra Club snowcamping training series trip, group 4 planned on heading to Helen Lake, but due to the powdery conditions we decided to head to Ridge Lakes instead. Skiing down Lassen Peak will have to wait for another day. Ridge Lakes, which is closer than Helen Lake, turned out to be a good choice because breaking trail was quite tough, even harder once we left the road and headed uphill. After arriving at camp the weather went from beautiful, to overcast, then to constant snow. We got over 2ft of snow during the time we were out there, but still managed to enjoy the trip.

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Mount Tallac

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 15:18:45 -0800

February 17, 2007
Decided to give ski mountaineering a try by taking my skis up Mt Tallac. The most direct ascent starts from Tallac Springs, which also means that the route has the steepest average grade. Getting up was fairly difficult since it was my first time using skins on steep terrain. Getting down wasn't any easier due to the crust covered powder. Not too friendly for the beginning telemarker. I fell dozens of times and managed to get 5 or so good face plants. Ben even got a video of some of them.

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Round Valley

Sat, 03 Feb 2007 18:28:53 -0800

Sierra Club Snowcamping Group 4 Trip 1
February 3-4, 2007
Since the snow was so well packed and with a strong group, we managed to make it all the way to Round Valley before 2pm. Once we got to camp everyone was hard at work on their shelters. I went for a quick T-trench but after hitting a rock a few feet down, it turned into a shallow I-trench. Later in the evening we went for a night hike to Peter Grubb Hut. I was jealous of the skiers who skied down Castle Peak. Oh well next time.

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