Thanskgiving Trip – Vermont and Ohio

Theresa had some down time in the between seasons as there's not a lot to do at the Mountaineering School in November. It was a good chance to go visit family. Vermont was great, but always frustrating. I had hoped to see Jeff, Mark, Steve and some other relatives, but I didn't even have a … Read more

First XC ski trip of the season

Tom and I drove up to Badger Pass (our local little ski area) today and got our first short XC trip of the season in. The road to Badger is still closed, but we went up to check on the XC ski building there and “familiarize ourselves with the XC ski rental gear and nearby … Read more

Autumn is here

In the last week the park as exploded with fall color. It's still nothing like a hillside of maples out east, but the change is still beautiful and exciting. I'm hoping to add some pictures that Tom and I took later sometime.

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I got the job! We got the lot!

And you thought we might be hunkering down in Yosemite before this… Dave B. offered me the position at the mountaineering school a few days ago. I've been doing little happy dances every few minutes. No, those aren't epileptic. We are still trying to get together and iron out details like when I'll start and … Read more

Still there?

Surprising that you're still reading these since we haven't managed to update the site in so long. So, there are a couple of new things going on in our lives.

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Updated Birthday Challenge for Tom

I finally committed to doing the Valley Rim Tour on June 6. This will no doubt be a stunning hike but for the fact that some will be in the dark. One cool thing about is is often on the hike you can look across at where you're going or where you've been. It's a long hike – significantly more than 50 miles with over 10,000 feet of total vertical rise.

I also have this idea that I will try to get people to pledge to make donations to the American Safe Climbing Association. For more on that, click on the “Read More!” link or just email me with yer pledge.

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Birthday Challenge

Today is the 33rd day before my 33rd birthday, and time to begin my birthday challenge.

Tom's challenge is to hike 41 miles along the Valley rim for his 41st (although I believe the current planned route is more along the lines of 50 miles). Our friend Rachel replaced 26 bad climbing bolts with good ones for her 26th birthday, and Hans has the mega 40th birthday challenge going. And you can find out more of the really crazy stuff that people have done on birthday challenges here – a whole website devoted to birthday challenges.

Here is my challenge:

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