Wedding Reception/Solstice Celebration/Return from Global Trek/Potluck - Kegger!

Come Join Us all Weekend Long!!!

Beginning Friday we kick off this joyous occasion for the reasons mentioned in the title or if you have something else to contribute, please do! Festivities will take place under tents in the backyard and we welcome you to join us throughout the weekend.

For those who have a limited schedule, the main event is Saturday, June 21st.  Joined by family and friends from near and far, we will exchange vows along Glacier Creek (behind our humble abode) at 4 pm on Solstice.

If you are able, please bring a dish to share or your favorite libation, though much will be provided by us.  Pack up the dogs, kids, significant others/hot dates, musical instruments, lawn games, friends/aunts/uncles/4th cousins (the more the merrier!) along with your appetite and thirst.

Room for tents will be available in the backyard, condos nearby are often available for rent and for those really up to suffer, Alyeska Resort is also nearby.

Be so kind as to RSVP so we determine how many kegs to order. Any questions, holler!

She Speaks

From the passenger seat of the truck, co-pilot/lady/wife speaks.  Below, she has crafted a few musings into a Top 10 List of highlights from our trip thus far. 

1.      The weather.  We departed the Last Frontier and somehow arrived at Skulls Hollow Campground just as the last snow storm of the season coated the landscape in white.  Since we were a week earlier than expected, we waited it out and were rewarded with sunshine and cool mornings and windy warm afternoons.  Tok enjoyed the cooler temperatures as he chased, unsuccessfully so, ground squirrels and rabbits at the campground.  As we pack up camp, we hear song birds and see bright green leaves sprouting on the trees.  We loved seeing how spring sprung around us the few weeks.

2.      Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me.  Josh and I share a love for this NPR show.  A weekly news quiz that routinely features notable celebrity guests with a host from whom no one and no topic is safe.  Laughter fills the truck cab as we listen to pod casts and cover thousands of miles of road.

3.      Bruises.  Brown, black, blue, purple, and green bruises are beginning to outnumber my freckles around my knee caps and along my shins.  My novice approach to routes, holds, and even the rock itself has humbled me as I clamber my way up and down, constantly earning more sore spots.

4.      The bath house.  Imagine a small enclosed salt water pool with waist deep water.  Now imagine, clad in your swim suit, looking up through open ceiling to sit in the pool under a gentle breeze, sunshine, stars, and even snow.  Imagine having a beer in your hand as you soothe your aching muscles in the warm water.  And finally imagine having the love of your life right there with you, pouring you another beer.  I found nirvana at the McMenamin’s Bath House in Bend, OR.

5.      Gourmet car camping over an open flame.  Sockeye salmon and eggs for breakfast. Chicken and bacon piccata with peas for dinner. Steaks with a mushroom cream sauce over potatoes.  We ate like kings at the campground.

6.      Friends and their toys.  Bikes, golf clubs, Frisbees, hackey sacks, slack lines decorated our camp site.  With three tents pitched (and a hammock strung), we had a mini vacation club among us when our friends arrived to climb at Smith Rock.  Music and stories filled the air.  The laughter shared lifted my heart.  I am so happy to have the people we love join us for portions of this journey.

7.      Family.  We began my introduction to the family with our first stop in Seattle.  We chased around new cousin, Shea, as he ran around the house randomly handing us toys as we caught up with his parents (and gracious hosts), Dave and Diana.  Following our climbing escapades, we drove to North Dakota to the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Reservation to meet more cousins, aunties, and uncles that I could keep track of in a single weekend.  Hailed as her new daughter in law, Mama Hendrickson, proceeded to introduce me to people everywhere- and seemingly the majority of the res are my new cousins in law.  Papa Hendrickson was up next at home in La Crosse, WI; and up next is the remainder of dad’s side of the clan coming for a braut cook out the weekend before we depart for Finland.

8.      Customs and Border Patrol.  I handed the agent Tok’s health certificate and rabies shot paperwork, and he did not even look at it and handed it back.  But, he was concerned about the dry dog food in Tok’s Rubbermaid container.  I learned that dog food must be sealed in its original packaging to get across the border. 

9.      Facing fears.  Despite a botched attempt to climb Monkey’s Face, I faced a lot of my own fears of heights and am learning to trust my gear on this trip.  With each foot placement, each crimpy handhold, my confidence grew.  Trusting myself to have a handle on a new route became a goal that I achieved by the end of our trip.  As Josh would say, I have room for improvement, and I hope that our continued climbing gets my ready for our next adventures (Thailand 2015!).

10.   Beer.  For those who have followed Josh’s facebook check ins, you know we sampled many a brew along the way. Stopping for beer passes the time as traffic clears, cools our hands from a long day of climbing, celebrates rest days, and simply allows us check out a new brewery’s best offerings.  Thanks to Josh, I am now very much a beer snob; not as much as I am a wine snob but getting there.  We surmised that all this beer drinking will help our livers balance the copious amount of vodka we will drink as our train travels take us through Finland, Russia, Mongolia, and China. 

So, ladies and gents.  More to come.  We depart on 1 May and look forward to continuing our check in and summaries as we access wifi sporadically along the train route.  

Bend Over

We have for the most part concluded our time here in Bend, our friends arrived and continued on their ways, as we are about to do as well.  Our friend Jake spent about a week with us climbing, drinking, and generally contributing to our merriment.  Meg aka Megatron arrived last Thursday and departed back to Alaska yesterday and we heard that this morning she was already back at work.

Over the last week our climbing increased significantly, both Christina and I getting used to the rock and gaining some strength along with the better weather I had promised her.  By the time Jake arrived we were in full swing.  Having the ballast required for a safe belay from Jake I ventured into more testing routes for everyone.  On one of the first routes at the new level while I was feeling good and in search of something more challenging for my partners I found myself on a route I had not done before but well within my comfort zone.  It had been a warm day, one of the first and about 3 bolts up I came upon a jug hold with high feet that required a large lunging move to the next good hold.  I brought my feet up high, crouched down and pulled hard.  Having told Jake to "Watch me" and not thinking anything would happen but my concern was more of being short roped during my dynamic move I found myself instead falling towards Jake with the large hold still in my hands.  The extra rope that he had provided was indeed not short roping me but added to the freefall ride I was now on.  The rock was no longer a concern so at some point I dropped it and prepared for the impact that was be the wall as I swung back in or the ground that quickly approached.  I thankfully met the wall, as did Jake just below me.  Unfortunately Jake's sandals did not offer much protection as he met the wall resulting in a small abrasion, though if you heard it from him he now counts only nine toes.  I counted ten, and a week later it would take him a second to remember what foot it happened to.  I was very thankful that Jake was there and the rope and equipment performed as advertised and I pulled myself back up and after some additional moves and without the jug hold that was once there I finished the route.  Jake and Christina opted not to do that route that day but we would return a week later and all send it without incident.

Upon the arrival of Meg we set forth on a epic challenge for Meg Jake and I to throw down some classics here at Smith.  Well outside the comfort zone for Christina and not wanting her to miss out on more than a day of climbing with us, we opted to climb both Zebra/Zion and then walk over to the Monkey's Face and do that in one day.  Christina would get some work done, and provide libations and snacks at the bottom of our last climb which would be at nearly 10pm.

The climbs would not go down easily for us.  Our start was a little behind schedule that afternoon, nothing too drastic but the hot afternoon soon quickly turned the first two pitches for me into a bit of a suffer fest.  My feet quickly ballooned and became quite painful making those leads a bit slower than I had hoped.  By the time all three of us made it up the first two pitches I knew we were in for a long day.  I scampered up the next pitch and brought them up at the same time to save some time.  Jake volunteered to lead the last pitch of Zion, though had conveyed to me a little more experience than what we saw and would later find out the extent.  He got up it nonetheless and got Meg and I up it safely enough.  Reaching the top just after 6pm we quickly got ourselves to the Monkey's Face and didn't waste anytime attacking it.  Upon getting to the top of the bolt ladder I had to turn the headlamp on and realized just how tired I was.  With a little struggle but otherwise solid progress both Meg and Jake joined me in the mouth of the Monkey.  The easy climb out of the mouth and to the rappel station is usually quite frightening but when its dark and you can't see the bottom it just isn't that bad.  My hands were to the point where I was having trouble opening and closing them on command.  A bit cold and a little dehydrated got me a little concerned.  The wind which was brisk on the way up was still brisk on the rappel down but also sent me spinning during the 180ft free rappel down.  On cool thing during the climb up in the dark was the full moon lighting up the surrounding land, it was also the night of the lunar eclipse which I'm glad we got down long before that happen.  By the time we returned to our campground the clouds had obscured the event.  Christina was waiting for us at the base of the climb with snacks and celebratory beers.  We would enjoy a very late dinner that night and good restful sleep that night.  The next day was our friends last day so a short climbing session was had, getting Christina and Meg up on the wall.  I got to sit this one out as my hands and feet were quite sore.

Today is a rest and recovery day, tomorrow we leave for North Dakota to spend Easter Sunday on the rez with family and my mom will be meeting Christina for the first time there.

Continued Fun!

Some photo evidence thus far of the trip.

The drive down in Alaska

Just a little catch up for us on our trip.  Been in Bend Orygun for little over a week now and have been enjoying ourselves nicely.  The weather has been a little lacking for what we were expecting but has improved and according to the weather guessers will continue to for the next week or so.  It snowed early last week, and other than the evenings being a little cool it has been tolerable.

I may have promised the wife warmer temperatures when I pitched the climbing portion of our trip but having left a week earlier that originally planned its only getting better.  The climbing has been going well, the crowds are not too bad and we both are getting used to real rock and all that it has to offer.  I imagine we will be hitting our stride on the walls here this week with conditions improving both outside and within ourselves.  The hands and feet getting used to being worked like they are.  We have a friend from Alaska arriving sometime early this week and another joining us at the end of the week.  Christina and I are looking forward to another two weeks here and the weather I promised should be here as well.  Perhaps even too much of it.  Its gonna get warm and quick.  I got to catch up on my vitamin D levels and my Chaco tan on my feet was fading fast.  Here's few pics from the trip so far!

Almost became Canadian, eh!

The trip down, was eventful. Made it but not without the showing the new wife how I do things. At least not when traveling alone.  I have now made the voyage with my truck some 7 or so times.  Couple firsts occurred on this trip, for one, I was with a significant other for the first time.  And that told the universe it was my opportunity to show her my stuff.  Besides having the trucks check engine light on for the entirety of the drive and breaking 260k very early on into the trip, I managed to run out of gas about 7 miles short of Tok.  In my defense I was traveling with a new roof rack that had a fair bit of our gear so wind resistance was a new addition.  On top of that the head wind into and out of Glennallen was substantial. Substantial enough at least to slow me down. Thankfully one of the precautions I took was the addition of a full gas can I remembered to fill in Palmer.  It earned its keep right then and there. That of course would not be the last time.  We had a long push into Ft Nelson Yukon and short of that also about 7 miles I ran short in the gas tank.  The can to the rescue finished us there.  Go gas can!  Also upon arriving to Ft Nelson I discovered that two of my tires were low.  One back tire and one front.  Aired them up and only the back tire continued to slowly go low.  About once a day is all it took. It would be fully repaired in Seattle.  Two nights, 3 days of driving and we would arrive to the border at Sumas Washington. There however we ran almost couldn't enter my sweet home of U S of A.  Why pray tell, thankfully not because I'm married, few may believe it, but because of some terrorist listed firewood almost kept me in Canada.  Figuring we had some room and could save a few bucks in Oregon I through a pile of firewood from the house on the truck.  This while not a problem for Canada the US thought otherwise. Afraid we were transporting spruce bark beetle in our strictly birch firewood we were forced back into Canada to deposit the terrorist wood.  Thankfully Canada being the lovely country that it is had a place not 10 (meters) from the border where a elderly lady would pick up daily supplies of firewood from a broker shack.  Everyday but Friday was her schedule for the troublesome firewood.  Back in line we got, and 45 minutes later we were US citizens again.
Our first real stop was in Seattle with cousins David and Diana and new addition, little Shea.  A pleasure to hang out with that they had us in their guest room for a couple nights while we adjusted and got some paperwork done for the upcoming international travels.  Took in some local brews, hospitality and Pacific Northwest rain, we have continued on towards Bend OR where climbing and more local brews are on the agenda. We arrived Sunday evening and partook in the local brews and climbed Monday with fellow Alaskan and Smith Rock guru Bruce.  Good day, little cool but getting back into the swing of things on real rock after a long sucky Alaskan winter it proved quite pleasant. Hoping for another day of the same we awoke to a light but steady snowfall.  For all of central Oregon. A early rest day has been taken.  A hot bath and shower along with a haircut for me we found a lovely local eatery with some equally lovely locals for company we look forward to a night of brews and a movie before retiring and hoping for better weather real soon.
And worth a note but not requiring elaborate explanation, I forgot the tent poles in Alaska, had to borrow a tent from Bruce, and have our poles mailed from Alaska.
The wife is gaining a good perspective of what she has gotten herself into though claims to still be quite happy and is stilling willing to continue the trip with me.  Go me.

Didn't see this one coming

The adventure blog has been pretty quiet the last couple years, not due to lack of fun stuff but in the last couple years I have embarked on a different kind of set of adventures through life.  And I've been a little lazy documenting it, that and I haven't taken cool pictures of cool places as much.  Whatever my excuse, its time to fire it back up and show off the new and improved typing skills and share the travels I am about to experience.
Since my last entry (Thailand) I have continued my work as a groundman extraordinaire and have taken a few smaller climbing trips to the states but I must say most of the action as taken place in the last year.  Within the last year my parents after 27 years in Alaska finally had enough of the long cold winters, (dad got a motorcycle, apparently not a winter one) and mom got tired of the bugs and they moved to Wisconsin.  I wasn't sure when I was going to see them again, that oddly enough is not on one of my adventure/climbing short lists. Or long lists.  No mountains, no rock and if I wanted that kind of humidity it should come with a beach and scantly clad ladies somewhere foreign, like Thailand.  But alas, the opportunity has come that takes me into the vicinity of Wisconsin, actually this one takes me encircling the world, so I guess Wisconsin was near there somewhere.  I for the last year, stopped being a groundman extraordinaire and started being a corporate stooge, picked myself up a corporate job in Anchorage where I was no longer able to wear the same pants for the entire week and the sweet smell of spruce eventually faded and the dirty spots of sap on my skin washed completely away.  It was a entry level position for a Native health care corporation that sat me in front of a computer clocking in and out and accruing leave that they would determine when for how long it could be use, they didn't have much to work with.  I saw this as my opportunity to use the college degree and noggin to earn my coin instead of just my body, in my thirties now, got to pace myself.  Well, after a solid year experiencing things where I never thought I'd find myself I can safely say, I don't care for it.  At all. While most definitely there, I'm not sure where would work out really.  Not sure my plans for when I return but thats something future josh can worry about.
Also within the last year, actually within the last two months, I have married an absolutely wonderful person.  It came as quite a bit of a surprise to most, if not all.  The date of the deed was the 31st of January.  I now have a Christina Hendrickson in (as) my life (wife).  This was a friend I met 4 years previously and maintained contact with here and there, our lives were on far different tracks and at the time destinations and methods of getting there also differed.  Thats how it seemed looking back at it anyway but thankfully my ability to predict the future pales in comparison to ability to accept something awesome placed in front of me.  The opportunity arose in where all the variables of  life (beyond the usual place, time, availability, and desire)  aligned with the stars and we started exploring the friendship that quickly became our relationship.  And it was good.  Really good.  With enough experience in life to not be too naive about the whole situation but enough to recognize something this good we quickly took the leap after about four months.  It took most everyone by surprise, we agreed it was about us and only us so telling everyone after the fact to us made sense.  Everyone who knows us were very happy for us, though the parents were shocked but happy for us nonetheless.  The marriage was done by a good friend of ours and the very brief ceremony was with a handful of friends on the coastal trail downtown Anchorage.  This summer upon our return we are planning a bit more of a wedding party during solstice with more friends and family.  And music and beer.  Hopefully the word has a chance to get out and the shock wear off.  I will inform all of the details later.  So, with the new wife is how I'm going to Wisconsin, I figured the parents and apparently the family, should meet her.  This of course is only part of the trip.
We have opted to drive down to the states in my truck, assuming the old girl makes it, I'll break 260k before crossing into Canada...  Our first place of fun and recreation (climbing) will be Bend Oregon for a week or so of climbing at Smith Rock.  After a week there we will continue eastward to Idaho for some climbing at City of Rocks, never been there but figured I should check it out.  After not quite a week there and hopefully meeting up with some friends we will do the long haul to Belcourt ND to introduce the wife to the family on the reservation.  Only a few days to spare but should be plenty we continue on to Wisconsin to meet the parents and the other side of the family.  This will be where we regroup for a week.  From there we will leave the truck (assuming she makes it) and the dog and fly out of the twin cities to Helsinki Finland.  From this point the method of travel will be by train.  A fast train will get us started to St Petersburg, and there we board the Trans Siberian Railway with stops along the way including Mongolia and after nearly 3 weeks we end up in Beijing.  A few days there and a flight across the other ocean back to Wisconsin.  And then a quick drive north so we can finish up planning and make our own party.
I'm sure I missed something in there, but this was the first entry which we hopefully be many, with pictures along the way, of our travels.  

Another Winter, Another Adventure

Well, I wasn't planning on using this on my Thailand trip but I have much to mention and facebook won't be enough. Not sure how often I'll have access to a computer but we'll find out.

So, it all started in Anchorage Sunday night as I made it to the airport with plenty of time to spare. There I met up with my two travel companions, Kevin and Kori, Kevin would be taking different flights our arrival times were within an hour of one another, a day and a half later. Though not the plan I had to check my bag in since my climbing gear had taken up substantial space and weight in my single bag to Thailand. This would be about all the planning I did for this trip. With the addition of a carry-on holding a few vital item, ipod, camera, toothbrush and a few documents I watch my bag go behind the check-in counter with the high hopes I might see it again in about 7,000 miles from here, though actual traveled distance would be more twice that. The flights went well, other than being insanely uncomfortable, I was able to sleep on and off during all the flights. Our layovers were rather short in the states, both in Salt Lake and Los Angles, which worried me for our bags, Kori had checked her backpack as well. Due to headwinds over the pacific and a slightly delayed departure from LA, we arrived in Tokyo at the same time our flight was scheduled to depart, this made for a mad scramble through a security check along with the rest of the passengers from our 747 (there was a lot of us). Apparently, the Japanese being a polite people, held the plane(s) for the hundreds of people who just arrived. As we quickly boarded and left the gate I had serious doubts of seeing my climbing gear during this climbing trip.

After 25 hours of flying, and oddly not much more than that in travel time we arrived at 1230am in bangkok on Tuesday morning. Without our bags. A quick trip through customs (the paperwork was handed out and completed on the plane) and without a single question, just a photograph, we were permitted to remain in Thailand for 30 days (my trip is for 35 days, I'll figure that out later). Speaking to a Delta agent in rough English (both of us, I was tired) I had to explain I didn't have an address to have our bags sent to, again, not much pre-planning was done. I got a phone number to call when got a place. After heading through security for the final time and about to figure out a taxi and money exchange, low and behold we run into Kevin, who had been there for only about half an hour waiting for us. Reunited we get money and taxi and head for the only place known who will welcome vagabonds like us, Khao San Road, a backpackers Mecca. After quite the taxi ride across Bangkok and getting our first taste of Thai driving, we were dropped off on a corner in we don't know where Bangkok, at 230 in the morning and given opposing directions to a hotel we found in a guidebook. Not encumbered by our climbing gear packs, we start to wonder down dimly lit streets where about half the shops are closed and the rest are serving alcohol to people who appear to have started drinking sometime around when we left Alaska. After circling a few blocksnot finding our hotel or one I feel like checking in at at three in the morning, we do finally recognize one from the guidebook and take our chances. 200 baht a piece later (about $6) we have a room with air-conditioning. A small room where the toliet literally doubles as the shower, the shower was on the wall above the toliet, and this was not the bode, I would learn about that later. Being hungry and thirsty and discovering the heat and muggyness of Thailand, we head out for some bottled water and a bite. I stayed in the room figure out where we were and plan for the next day Kori and Kevin quickly return with both. The food portion consisted of rice and veggies and some funky chicken bits on a stick, well, at least something like chicken. Original plan was not to partake in street food right away but no sense in delaying the inevitable I dove in. We then all went to sleep. For about four hours... Jet lag does funny things. We all rose with the sun and decided to find slightly better accommodations and get our bearing. Our MIA bags would not be making it to Bangkok until about midnight that day and we had time to let the airlines know where we were.

After getting our bearings and some daylight, we with the help of a local tourism info "station" we locate a suitable hotel, book airline tickets to Krabi, and two nights lodging in Krabi. This guy was amazingly helpful, we named our price and where we wanted to be and he made it happen. We checked in to the hotel which was just off a main road surrounded by shops and cheap apartments and we seemed to be the only ones there. The hotel itself was emmaculate. Gated, super clean, with a guard, which I guess made me feel better, and very quite which we found odd since two other hotels than we looked at were sold out, maybe just at our price. We dropped our stuff, I called Delta, which trying to give an address to someone whom English is not there first language and for where the address is a fair bit different than ours, I again had my doubts we would see our climbing gear on this climbing trip.

Having mentioned its hot and muggy here, I will also mention Kori and I have been wearing the same attire since Sunday in Anchorage. The plane rides would have been enough but since we're here and have nothing to change into I suspect my clothes will start to sprout anytime now. We make our way to the markets of Khao San road and after some haggling we come out with something clean, flipflops and another try at market food. After several hours of seeing the market and convincing tuk tuk drivers I like to walk and maybe later I'll see the sights of Bangkok we mosey back to the hotel where we go on a epic jet-lag sleep catchup bout. Though this did not happen right away, Kevin wondered back to the tourism guy to start thinking about his trip after Kori and I head back, Kevin would not return for about three hours. We would later discover he really wanted to ride in a tuk tuk, so did, and ended up way out of town and just kind of left. Much walking, a train ride to the end of the line, then another tuk tuk ride and finally some help from a South African he gets back to the hotel. Then we started our solid 12 sleep catch-up. The next morning we found our bags waiting for us in the lobby, which was a good thing since our flight to Krabi was that early afternoon.

Thai Airways is quite nice and for about $100 we made it to Krabi where no one really knew of our resort we were staying at. Its a little out of town and well within the jungle. After more baht than it probably should have cost we arrive to a very nice set of family run bungaloos. Again no one else is here, we've been told this is the busy season but apparently just not here. We'll make our way to the climbing areas tomorrow via taxi and longboat but before that I'm off to take a elephant ride through the jungle.