Dan's Outside

2003.03.12

***Giant Sequoia National Monument
– “How do you protect the largest trees on Earth? Trees that were heading skyward when Europe was still in the Dark Ages? Don’t harm them in the first place” [Backpacker]
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March 12, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.03.12

2003.03.08

***Study of Antarctic Points to Rising Sea Levels.
New evidence from a rapidly warming part of Antarctica suggests that ice can flow into the sea much more readily than had been predicted. By Andrew C. Revkin. [New York Times: Science]

***The Photographer Who Found a Way to Slow Down Time.
Eadweard Muybridge’s Yosemite photographs would have secured him a place in the history of photography even if he hadn’t gone on to create his famous “motion studies.” By Edward Rothstein. [New York Times: Arts]

***Ancient Dunes vs. Exotic Trees.
A philosophical tempest has erupted in San Francisco over a proposal to remove 3,800 trees to re-establish the sand dunes. By Patricia Leigh Brown. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

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March 8, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.03.08

2003.03.04

***Scientists find mounting environmental, social, economic effects from oil drilling in Alaska
– “The report, an 18-month effort costing $1.5 million, offers the most comprehensive look so far at the cumulative environmental effects of oil drilling in Alaska. It is expected to provide ammunition to all sides in an ongoing debate over whether to expand drilling into areas where it is now banned, including the adjacent Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.” [SFGate]
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March 4, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.03.04

2003.03.03

*** Restoring a Forest Goes Slowly, and Advocates Seethe.
The restoration of the Bitterroot National Forest has become the focus of a dispute between environmental groups and the United States Forest Service. By Jim Robbins. [New York Times: Science]
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March 3, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.03.03

2003.03.01

***March begins
– and the signs of spring are appearing in the San Francisco Bay Area. Trees are beginning to produce leaves and flowers, the hills are green, and I’m starting to think about backpacking.

***Skyline trail a pleasant stroll to soothe the soul
– SFGate‘s Tom Stienstra describes another nice local hike: “It is the Skyline trailhead at Wunderlich County Park, a short drive north of Sky Londa. I’ve had Sundays here this month where I didn’t see another soul — despite thousands of people out biking, hiking and horseback riding at the half-dozen parks and scenic roads in the surrounding hills.”

***More articles from the SFGate Outdoors page

• REI store comes to San Francisco
• Saving Mount Diablo
• Getting a lift with season passes – better deals on season lift tickets.

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March 1, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.03.01

Dan at Giddy Giddy Gulch

Dan at Giddy Giddy Gulch on Mt. Shasta, 2002.
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February 27, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on Dan at Giddy Giddy Gulch

2003.02.26

***About that ski trip
– It was a classic mad one-day Sierra up-and-back run. I got up at 4:00 am and hit the road for my buddy Owen’s place in Pleasant Hill around 4:15. We loaded the skis and other gear into his vehicle and left for the mountains around 5:30 am. I managed to stay awake most of the way to Northstar near Truckee.

By the way, we’re both music geeks – Owen is on the music faculty at Diablo Valley College and I teach electronic music and other music courses at De Anza College. So, the audio environment on our trips to the
Sierra tends to be a bit, well, unusual. We arrived at Northstar and drove through the parking area with John Adam’s latest recording blasting like your basic low-rider. People didn’t seem to know what to make of this as we drove by.

I took a one-hour telemark lesson from Ivan at the Northstar nordic center – actually the first ski lesson I’ve ever taken even though I’ve cross-country skied for something like 3 decades. I figured that it would be a good idea to pick up some quick pointers rather than slowly figuring out the whole thing on my own. The telemark lesson and nordic trail pass got me onto the lower runs at Northstar for about the same cost as a regular lift pass, plus I got to use the XC trails for an hour or so at the end of the day.

My skiing background is that of a fairly proficient kick-and-glide xc skier. I’ve done this long enough that my instincts kick in automatically when I put the skis on… as long as they are cross-country skis. The tele’ thing is different – those darn skis don’t have any kick, but they sure can turn. By mid-afternoon I felt pretty competent on beginner downhill runs. I could actually stop and turn where and when I wanted to. Cool!

With two hours remaining I ditched my tele’ gear and picked up my skinny skis and did about an hour of cross-country track skiing. It felt good to do this since I feel totally competent on XC skis, in contrast to my still-developing instincts on tele’ gear.

At 4:30 I found a nice sunny table at the nordic center and called my 13-year-old son to tell him what a great day it was and how much fun it was to ski and how warm the sun was and how beautiful the mountain was… which was really my way of telling him that he shouldn’t have backed out of this trip!

We met a DVC colleague of Owen’s at a Mexican restaurant in Truckee before the drive back to the Bay Area. Traffic wasn’t half bad for a Sunday evening and I managed to get home just before 11:00 pm. Just enough time to grade some papers and get 5 hours of sleep before getting up to go teach my Monday morning classes.

No pictures this time – too busy skiing.
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February 26, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.02.26

DenaliToklatRiver

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Toklat River drainage in Denali National Park. July 2002.
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February 24, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on DenaliToklatRiver

DenaliSavageCreek

View from Savage Creek Campground in Denali National Park. July 2002.
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February 24, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on DenaliSavageCreek

2003.02.22

***Skiing tomorrow
– I managed to finish grading a huge stack of papers tonight and it looks like I’ll be able to squeeze in a one-day trip to the Sierra tomorrow. I’m planning to take a telemark lesson at Northstar and then either practice tele’ techniques the rest of the day or else do some afternoon cross-country skiing.
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February 22, 2003 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on 2003.02.22