A Quick Trip

Some friends of ours from California had a son pass away and my parents were going to go to the funeral. My brother Jeff and I decided that we would also go. He had some work to do in Cedar City so I met him there and we drove together from there to St. George where we rode another must ride classic trail called the Zen Trail.

This trail is in the same area as the Bearclaw Poppy Trail we had ridden a few years previous and sunk into mud so deep we had to carry our bike about 4 miles.

This is a view from up on the cliffs of the four miles we walked our bikes.

After our ride we drove to Las Vegas to hang out with one of our cousins that we had not seen for a while. The next morning we drove to San Luis Obispo where we had grown up.

Montona de Oro State Park, one of my most favorite places on earth.

We rode our bikes around the tops of the cliffs with the beautiful blue sea and crashing waves down below. It was a surreal experience.

Jeff exploring the tide pools in his hipster shorts.

The Lone Star State

The stars at night are big and bright  . . .
We have received our initial set of orders with the Air Force. I have been assigned to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. The kids were disappointed to not get to go to Japan but they have quickly adjusted to the idea of living in Texas and are excited about all the new prospects. We have a choice as to when we move out there. I have to do my officers training in Alabama from mid-March to the end of April and we can move before or after that. Exciting times!

A Blast Up The Pass

I was born in Ogden, Utah and lived there for the first eight years of my life. When I was six years old my dad and older brothers decided to climb the enormous mountain behind our home. Not wanting to be left out I asked if I could join the mountaineers. I do not remember if it took any coaxing on my part to get my dad to let me go but I was allowed to do it. I have vivid memories of the climb which went right up the face of Ben Lomond (the mountain pictured above). It is a 9700 foot peak with views all the way into to Salt Lake and beyond on clear days. I remember that on the way down the mountain my dad suggested that we go down Ogden Pass rather than going back down the way we had come up. We consented and began a very long and nasty hike down. Several "shortcuts" took us through mountainsides filled with stinging nettle. These were the days before camelbacks and hydration packs so I think we had one canteen of water between the 5 of us. I distinctly remember being so thirsty I couldn't even conjure up any spit to swallow.  So now, 29 years later my brothers and I decided to ride up the skyline trail, which follows much of the path we had come off the mountain on all those years ago. As in childbirth, time had diminished the memory of the pain and anguish we experienced on the previous journey and we all agreed that it would be great fun.

We visited several sites of our childhood frolicking including this King's store in which Mike (the brother I am standing with) nearly severed his finger with a butcher knife he was playing with. Most of the money we ever earned as lads was spent on candy and worthless toys. We must have kept the store alive because as you can see it is now closed. As an aside, behind this King's store was a small field that seemed enormous when I was 5. One rainy day we walked to King's to buy some things for our aunt who we were going to visit. On our way home we cut across the field and sunk into deep mud. Some hilarious guy in a truck driving buy yelled out his window, "What are you guys doing, don't you know that's quicksand?" Having watched our fair share of Gilligan's Island Mike and I were well acquainted with quicksand and frantically began to trudge through it to the safety of the sidewalk. We arrived home covered in mud, barefoot and tear-stained but safe. Mike and I also took all of my mom's jewelry ripped up her pearl necklaces and buried it all in a makeshift treasure chest. Our map making skills however were not good enough to help us find the box again and it was lost forever. 

Here is our group before beginning the ill-fated ride; much like Gilligan's aforementioned three hour tour. Everyone was all smiles because we had no idea what we were in for. The fall colors were pretty though.

The smiles are waning as we are half way through a 1500 foot climb up a rocky switchback trail.

Shortly after the climb from HELL Greg's chain came off and wedged itself under his frame and we could not get it out. After about an hour he got it back together. Notice the sweat stains on the clothes. It was not a hot day but we were working hard.

I do have to say the ride was beautiful. Looking into Eden and Pineview Reservoir.

Just before the trail became impassible with our bikes we saw a heard of mountain goats. They are surprisingly large beasties. Right after we stopped and saw the herd of mountain goats I noticed that my shock on the frame of my bike had come loose and the screw that held it in place was missing. I had to McGyver it with an allen wrench and tape.

A view from the trail looking into Ogden.

The final ascent to the top. There were multiple times where we asked ourselves if we should turn around. I must admit that if I had not done the hike at the tender age of 6 I probably would have turned around.

The intrepid explorers on the summit.

It took us 5.5 hours to ride and walk to the summit and 41 minutes to get back to our car. The decent while much faster was not particularly fun because of the roughness of the trail and being worried that my shock was going to break. All of us with the exception of my oldest brother Jeff took at least one spill on the way off the mountain. My body is covered with spectacular bruises in places I do not recall hitting.

Exhausted we made our way to an old drive in restaurant that was in the old neighborhood. My older brothers used to walk here from our house and ask what they could do to earn a milkshake. The would do menial jobs and the owners would give them a big ol' shake. Genius!
Needless to say that while this trail is a "must ride classic" on utahmountainbiking.com I would put it on the "ride at your own risk" list. Not one of my favorites but it was good to spend a day with my hommies.

Who's on First?!

Today I received an email from the person in charge of making base assignments for the Air Force. She asked me to provide information about when I would be graduating and she would tell me which bases would have needs for a nurse anesthetist at that time period. I quickly responded to her request and twenty minutes later received a response listing four state side bases asking me to choose my top two. The first was Keesler AFB in Mississippi, second Eglin AFB in Florida, third, Lackland AFB in San Antonio, TX, and last Nellis AFB in Las Vegas, NV.  Of those choices we picked Florida and San Antonio. There was however a sentence under the stateside choices that said "If Misawa, Japan were available would you be interested?" My wife, Cami, and I stared at the question in absolute disbelief. We responded that we would absolutely be interested. The kids are thrilled with all three possibilities. We will find out where we will be assigned in mid-October. I will keep you posted.

Gooseberry Mesa

My eldest brother and I drove down to Cedar City to ride a classic ride outside of Zion National Park. We drove out with the assistance of Jeff's GPS to the trail head. It was about a thirteen mile loop with a lot of ups and downs and a lot of technical stuff along the trail.

The trail runs up on top of a huge mesa and hence the name. It was cooler on top of the mesa than down in the valley but it was still in the 90s.

Jeff has a tendency to maneuver easily over very treacherous ground but to take a spill over very smooth patches. This is a photo of one such spill. Notice the cactus just to the right of Jeff's rear end. A near miss.

A lofty seat in the sky.

One of the trail markers saying "Extreme Difficulty". The trail was very fun but the heat sapped your energy and made you feel tired.

The end of one half of the loop trail. There are several ways to do this trail and we picked the one that put some of the bowls and ledges and redrock playgrounds at the end and we were too wiped out to do much.

We decided that we needed to cool down and Jeff's son, Matthew, had been on a river hike in Kanaraville that we opted to try out. The hike started out on on a steep trail but then went through the water like a mini narrows hike. The red rock was beautiful and contrasted with the green plants along the river.

Jeff took this picture which looks to me like it could be a post card.

Jeff bustin' his swagger as he enters the canyon portion of the hike.

There are two water falls at the end of the hike. It was a great way to cool off and the perfect end to a great day.

Living With Norman Bates

In preparation to start clinicals in Blackfoot, Idaho I began looking for rooms to rent on craigslist. The only place I could find in Blackfoot was a listing for a shared room for $375 per month. I contacted the person listing it and asked about the living situation. I was told that the rent included a private room and a shared bathroom with use of the kitchen and laundry facilities. He said that there was another renter in the basement and that he lived in other upstairs bedroom with his two small dogs.  I asked what size the bed in the room was and should have been concerned when the response was " I will have to ask my mom, she knows all that stuff". I told the guy what my situation was and that I was not going to start until the 14th of June. He told me that I had better hurry and get some money to him because he was receiving multiple calls on the room each day. Armed with this information I decided that I had better travel up to Blackfoot in the first week of June to secure the room and then go home until the 14th. This I did. I arrived at the house which was very similar in appearance to the Bate's Motel.

The owner was a 30-something guy who was a little too friendly. He wanted me to sit and chat with him and commented on each item I brought into the house. The outside of the house was totally thrashed but the owner and his brother had redone the bathroom, kitchen and put in new carpet. My room had been hastily repainted and the closet doors were missing and the shelves had fallen out and had been inexpertly reinstalled with a significant slant. The door was quite a bit too small for the jam and the door knob was old and did not close properly. Luckily I had brought a locking door handle from my house to put in. I started to take off the old door knob when he came slumping over and asked why I was switching out the handles. I told him that it made me feel more comfortable to be able to lock my door. He said that no one else had ever wanted to put a lock on the door before. At the time I was thinking "Well I also don't want to wake up in the night to you standing over my bed watching me." So after securing the room and moving in my stuff I left and did not return until the 14th. Things were OK for a couple of days except for walking in on my new roomie and a girl he was trying to woo. On about the third day I got home at about 9pm. I walked through the back door and noticed that the table was set for two and that one place had been used and the other had not. My roomie was sitting on the couch in the dark glaring at me and said that it would have been nice to know that I was coming home so late. Bewildered I asked why he had been waiting for me. He said that he had made tater tot casserole and thought that we could have dinner together. I told him that I had stopped and eaten at Subway on my way home and had not expected him to make me dinner. He huffed and said that it would have been nice to receive a call informing him of my plans. I had a pretty creepy feeling that night as I lay awake. I got up and did a thorough scan of the room to check for any cameras that might be there or in the bathroom.  Luckily I did not find any. I went to work and recounted the story to my compadres who also thought that it was quite weird. They all made reference to the craigslist killer. The next night after work I went to visit a friend in Pocatello and did not get home until after 11pm. My roomie's dogs started yapping away when I came in and he came out of his room in nothing but his boxer shorts. He barred the way to my room with his body and started to ask me where I had been. As he talked to me he began stroking the hair on his chest. I almost barfed.The next day I let my boss know all the weirdness that was happening and he said, "We have got to get you out of there, I have thought for a long time that I should just rent a place for the students to stay, let me make some phone calls." By the end of the day he had found a place and told me that I could move in the next week. He went to a local furniture store and bought new furniture for the entire house including queen sized pillowtop mattress, washer and dryer, big screen TV, couch, recliner, dresser, coffee table, complete kitchen set it was awesome. Anyway I told my roommate that he would need to post his room for rent again as I would be moving out. He flipped. He went on a rant of how I had to pay for two months because I had mentioned being in Blackfoot for two months when I had emailed him about the apartment. I reminded him that I had lived in the house for a week and paid for the entire month and that we had no contract or even verbal agreement on how long I would live there. He went off on how untrustworthy Mormons were and how every Mormon that he has ever known is exactly the same. This went on for a while and then I finally bid him goodnight and locked my door. He yelled and threw things and turned his TV up really loud and made phone calls complaining about dishonest Mormons. Partly because I feared what would happen if I left my things in his house for the day, the next morning I woke up early and packed up everything and was gone before he woke up. I moved into my new place which is a beautiful two bedroom apartment surrounded by wheat fields. Things went along well for a few days and then my roomie started threating to sue me for July's rent via text and messages on my phone. He went as far as to say that he was going to go to the hospital and tell them how dishonest I am so that they will kick me out. Well, needless to say I do not live in fear of getting kicked out of the hospital and I have successfully blocked all future calls for the aforementioned roomie. However, should you find my cold dead carcass in some ditch look at my phone and all the texts are saved there.

 This is a picture of my new apartment and the view from the backyard. I have the entire upper floor of the house and the bottom floor is a completely separate apartment. My boss pays the rent and we are only responsible for the utilities. My boss is the most generous human being I have ever met.

A Little R&R

Cami and I were invited to spend a few days in Lake Powell by some of our friends. Our friend's brothers own a houseboat that they were letting us stay in. We went with four other couples and without any children. We had a phenomenal time and absorbed lots of sun and enjoyed the beauty of the surrounding area.

Cami and her sweet sun glasses.

This was my first trip to Powell and I was amazed by the beauty of the red rock and the green water.

This is our friend that organized the trip, she and her husband are awesome.

One of our party surfing.

Another friend getting some sweet air on a wake board.

A backflip off the top of the three level house boat, crazy.

Each night there was a spectacular rain storm with thunder and lightning and crazy wind. Cami and I are so lucky to have such great friends that would invite us to go with them. It was great to get away and be a couple again.