Writing therapy : Stinkin' Hippies

So I understand that's how people concerned by environment are called by Hummer drivers.

I was surfing the blogosphere yesterday and ended up on a blog I won't name here. The only thing I will say about it is: the author was hosting a pseudo-debate that I was interested in until my contributions were censored - which happened to be right after I dared disagreeing with the author.

Anyway. Yesterday, the author of that blog was bragging about parking her SUV in the "reserved for green vehicles" spot, as a way of protesting against the construction of a green building. 

What??

I mean, who is against environmentally conscious constructions, or cars?

Even if you believe that global warming is just "God hugging us a little closer", if you deny that there is a human contribution to global warming, I thought that everybody agreed that we need to do something!

What is wrong with encouraging people to drive green cars? You have your SUV and the constitutional right to drive what you want when you want and where you want. Is that all there is about it? Nobody is telling you what to drive, but since you're dumb enough to drive that gas guzzling rig, you'll have to walk a little more. 

And they're right, but you probably haven't realized it:

The more people drive fuel efficient cars, the less people will need oil and pollute. I know you are no stinkin' hippie so this last aspect probably doesn't mean anything. But less oil means (tell me if I'm wrong) energy independence sooner, no need to invade oil producing countries (so that would be saving trillions of dollars to your country that could be injected in the economy for example?), less exploitation of the people in these countries, less innocent civilians (including children) killed because of these greed-based conflicts.

But again, you probably don't care about what's going on outside of your town/state/country. 

So my last point might be the only one that will resonate: if you drove a green car, you'd spend less money to fill the tank. And wouldn't you like to have some spare cash to send for McCain's campaign? I heard he needs it.

Busy thinking and planning

and not doing much these days. It's nice and warm in here, and cold and wet out there. I can't wait for the winter to REALLY begin.

Canyon Lake

The sun is rising above Canyon Lake, on Sunday, Spetember 28th.

And I take this picture before disturbing the quiet waters with my filter-pump. I'm also enjoying a few minutes of solitude before the camp wakes up behind me...

As usual the trip didn't go exactly as planned. The Norwegian connection and I took along a new crew so we thought it would be wise to just plan on an easy road rather than following the Romney ridge.

It turns out Princess J had never been hiking, let alone backpacking, and besides the fact that she could not carry much, she was quite a demanding person. It made things a little harder a some members of the crew became maybe a little impatient at some point, especially Junior, who happened to be her tent-mate.

But overall the experience was a good one. 

The hike to the lake took us about 4 hours following Canyon Creek trail, a few miles west of Hamilton. It starts easily on the flank of Romney ridge, then winding through the trees along the creek. The slope progressively steepens to become a quite strenuous climb when carrying heavy backpacks.

We never saw the Canyon Falls, which were probably dry or very small at this time if the year.

We were relieved to finally see the dam that closes Canyon Lake on its east side. 

The lake was half empty. On the west side, there was Canyon Peak, our original goal, about 1500ft above us.

Since our group was not too enthusiastic about going any further, we decided to set the camp on the side of the lake and enjoy the last rays of sun.

For dinner: pasta, creamy mushroom and salmon, and bread and cheese. We had food for maybe 5 days! No wonder the bags were heavy! 

A little cherry bounce, marshmallows in the fire, and a perfect weather to look at the stars...

The next morning, same pace: a lazy breakfast as the temperatures - slowly - climb up, we pack the bags and start our hike down.

Even if we didn't reach our initial goal, it ended up being a nice little week end in the mountains. I don't think I'll ever get tired of this.

Are we going this time?

The week end is (finally) in sight... and looks nice! I feel I haven't seen the sun for the last two weeks. Work, then rain, then.. work again! Powder sugar on the top of the mountains on Monday was a pleasant surprise. But maybe not ready to go skiing yet.

The trip I missed on Ajax was apparently a little rough, very, very icy. Am I ever going to get the pics? I don't know.

It might be the right week end for that trip the Norwegian Connection and I have been postponing for more than a year now... NC was VERY ambitious last summer and said he wanted to climb all the summits of the Bitterroot visible from the valley before leaving. All we did  was maybe 2 or 3 hikes (...). Time is flying, we're all busy, so he revised his plan. 

Now it's down to 1 hike! And we've talked about it all summer trying to find the moment where we'd both be in town, and ready.

Our plan is to climb and follow the Romney Ridge, between Canyon Creek and Blodgett Canyon, all the way to High Lake. Camp there, maybe try to go up Canyon Peak (maybe not) and then hike back via Canyon Creek. Last week was rainy and stormy, but what about this week end?

It might be a little chilly.

And we might not make it all the way since 1) we don't know what the "trail" is going to be like, 2) we will start late on Saturday since we have to say goodbye Friday to J-Boogie who is leaving us for the Ugly Man.

Well, I'll just say this is the plan and we'll see what happens.

titidi...

Looks like the announced trip is not going to happen. I let the guys leave without me today, because I ended up having important "social obligations"... and a little bit of work to do as well...

Oh well. I should get pictures from their trip though. Small consolation.

Back on tracks

The last time I skied this year was on July 13th. This means that on saturday, I'll have taken 2 months off. What a good time to get back on my favorite transportation mode!

I know it might not be the best snow of the year (hopefully) but I hear it calling me already. Last year's total was 35 days. This year, I will try to do better, and in any case go at least 32 days.

So Saturday, we'll head to the Big Hole, spend the night on the shore of Ajax Lake, and plan on skiing Ajax peak (10078) on Sunday. I'm going to have to reopen the ski shop...

King of the Bitterroot

It's funny how this picture makes me feel discombobulated... I have to stop and look at it remembering where I took it to remember that, no, it is not upside-down.

I am actually sitting on top of Trapper Peak, 10157 ft, looking down at Cave Lake. You can see it if you look between the cloud on the right and the cloud at the bottom. Behind, a  ridge looking like a wall, separates Trapper Creek from the North Fork.

The hike up the highest peak of the Bitterroot is not a difficult hike. It climbs for about 4.2 miles, with an elevation gain of about 3800 ft from the trailhead, but, even though the start is scary, every steep fragment is followed by a little plateau, allowing us to recover before the next big effort. The end of the hike requires a little bit of scrambling on sometimes moving rocks - but again nothing terrible. Of course, one has to consider then who one hikes with: it can totally change the difficulty of the hike... 

Well my super-fit friends (I haven't found nicknames for all of them yet so I won't list the members of the happy party I went hiking with), who had just done an olympic distance triathlon the day before while I was probably watching TV laying on the couch, made my day a little harder since I had at some times a hard time keeping up with them.

The effort was worth it, despite the big cloud cover:

Here is the bowl between North Trapper Peak (to the left) and the East Trapper Peak (to the right) that I hope to ski before I leave the valley...

Here a little clearer view of the East Peak, and closer, the false peak preceding Trapper Peak, were most of the scrambling happens.

And finally, when the weather was cooperative enough, we could get a quick look at the Bitterroot Wilderness to the west of the peak.

The chilly temperatures chased us quickly from the summit. Fortunately, since the only two muscles I have happen to be my quads,  my downhill hike turned out to be much faster and smoother... And of course, by the time we reached the trailhead, the sky was (almost) blue and the sun shining. So we did what anyone else would have done in the same situation: we went to the Brewery.