Ski of Dreams

After spending 36 solid hours stuck in our tent at high camp, we were treated to fresh turns all the way back to Paradise.

Such a Sad Sight

Mother Nature dumped about four inches of snow overnight in Northern Indiana. The wind has done more damage to the daffodils than the snow though. They had just started to bloom yesterday. They'll survive, just a little worse for the wear… and maybe not quite as pretty as they would have been.

Cow Skull & Ojo de Dios

This cow skull was my moms and now hangs on my back porch. The Ojo de Dios, or Eye of God, was my grandmothers, and my parents got it when she was gone. The Ojo de Dios are wonderful craft projects made out of 4 sticks or dowl rods with yarn wrapped around the sticks to make designs. This is one of the best I have ever seen and was made by a man grandma knew in Arizona, I think. But the colors were never what I liked. I am not a fan of the color orange. So it, too, hangs on the porch where it looks nice.

Chillaxin' at Meadow Run

Laura and I decided to have an easy day. So we spent the morning climbing a few lines at Lower Meadow Run in Ohiopyle State Park. We warmed up with alap on the Main Flow in verygood conditions. If you look back to my post fromJan 29th and compare thephotos, its pretty impressive how much ice built in just afew days.

























After our warm up, Laura wanted to try out her new picks on a mixed line. She topped out on the Main Flow andwent over and rigged a TRSeason Finale.She took her turn and made it up to her usual high point and came off. Not bad for her first go.























ROUTE NOTE: Although this line has beentop roped for years it has yet to see alead ascent.I've wanted to give this thing a whirl for quite a while, but thethuggish nature, poorrock quality and my inability to sack up has kept it as a someday kinda thing. Well I decided its time to put it to rest. So this time I decided to take gear with me and see if I could findreasonable gear to protect the route. Well I successfully climbed it and placed the gear on TR. I found 2 placements and 1 stubbie in 35'. Goes like this, first is the screw at the ice bulge (not necessary, but there),next isa #5 BD micro at 15'.Pump through the next 12' of crux to a good hook and a get the #.75 camalot. Finishatanchors.Falling while clipping the cam would most likely result in a grounder.Gonna take some EXTRA spinach to pull this one off.Laura went again pullingthe gear as she went up. She did way better this go. She made it up to the cam without falling. If she didn't have to stop to fuss with gear, I think she might've had it with no falls.I'manxious toto head back and give it a true attempt on lead.SEND or SPLAT! Either way the photos should be good! Since it was a mellow day for us, most of the photos are typical ass shots (we all knowhow much everyone loves those).I've tried to include afewof the moreinteresting!

Enjoying the blue hour at Bandon Beach

A shot of Jessica and I from our November trip out west. We had spent the day sightseeing and been in and out of rain all day long. As we drew near Bandon Beach just before sunset the clouds started to clear and it looked like sunset was going to be nice. And indeed it was! The sky lit up with glorious colors as the sun dipped below the horizon. We had a blast watching the changing sky and finding star fish and other sea life clinging to the sea stacks. After the sunset color faded from the sky we headed further down the beach to get closer to some of the sea stacks. From a distance they don't look very big but when you get close, WOW are they huge! I just had to get a shot of us posed in between these towering formations. It was a great end to a fun-filled day!

Dry Fork of Coyote Gulch

We arrived at the Dry Fork of Coyote Gulch trailhead mid-morning, which is an ideal time to start out for a slot canyon hike. Many (but not all) slot canyons are ideal to hike mid-day. Since very little light penetrates down into the canyons, mid-day when the sun is high can often be a good time to visit them. When we arrived at the trailhead we were a little disappointed to already see about a dozen vehicles parked there. Thankfully, though, this hike has 3 different canyons so people really get spread out and we only saw a few people along the hike.







































The 3 canyons along this hike are Spooky, Peekaboo and Dry Fork of Coyote Gulch. We hiked Spooky and Dry Fork, but opted out of Peekaboo because you literally had to climb a small cliff to get into Peekaboo and neither one of us wanted to do that. We had a blast in the other two canyons and felt like we didn't miss out on anything by not doing Peekaboo. The photo you see here was taken in Dry Fork, which was a super easy walk once we were in the canyon. The canyon bottom started out very wide and totally flat, and was sort of a gravel surface rather than sand so it was more of a stroll than a hike. After a while, though, the canyon did start to narrow and the bottom did get rougher with some rocks and small boulders that we had to step over. It was never very difficult, though. You can walk a long ways up Dry Fork, at least a mile (and probably more) but we decided to turn around after a while. We also hiked up Spooky Canyon, which was a fascinating canyon but got VERY narrow. So narrow, in fact, that I could only hike up about half of it because I couldn't fit through once it narrowed! Jessica was able to go further, so she checked out more of it.






















































Jessica and I posing for a shot in Spooky Canyon :-)

Stormy

On Saturday it was nice for around here so I took the ponies over to the big pen and let them play followed by a good brushing. Here is Stormy playing and standing to be brushed.