Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Still forever changed

I finally took him out today, the 2004 Ibex Corrida "Luxe Tour" bike that I call Roadie. Our rides are few and far between these days. Today I pumped up the tires from 10 psi - that's how long he's been sitting. I'm generally just a phone call away from listing him in the freebie classified ads, but every time we go out for a ride, I can't remember what about him made me think he was such a junker. He's a perfectly competent bike. I want to believe in him.

Also today, I picked up from the bike shop the 2008 Surly Karate Monkey that I call KiM. After dropping her off a cliff on Monday, I had to get the brake lever fixed. I also had them swap out her suspension fork for a rigid one. This weekend, I'll outfit her with skinny tires and my bikepacking gear, and shore up Roadie with a few new cables, brake pads, and a rack, all in preparation for the grand fall tour, the Golden Circle. I hyped up this trip enough to convince fellow enduro-nut John Nobile to come all the way out from Connecticut. I told him he would experience "real Alaska" (even though 90 percent of the route is in Canada), complete with wind, cold rain and maybe even a little September snow. We're setting out to relive our Tour Divide glory days on some of the most remote pavement you can find in North America.

Doing all of this started me thinking back to the Tour Divide. It's been exactly two months since I returned to Juneau. It's amazing to me it's only been that long. It feels like I've been "off the road" for ages, settled back into the mainstream of my life like I never even diverged from the flow. Still, little changes from the summer linger. A few ways I am different:

1. Every time I walk into a gas station (often to pay for the gas I just put in my car), I still find myself "casing" the place for bike fuel sources, zooming in on the Snickers Bar inventory and gummy candy selection, checking to see if they sell cheese curds and rare pieces of fruit. I find myself doing this even though I can't buy any of it, anymore. (Sigh.)

2. I'm significantly more fearless than I used to be. Take today: My friend offered to take me to one of Juneau's old mine sites, where you can wander three quarters of a mile into the slimy guts of a mountain. Pre-Tour Divide, the very claustrophobic, eternally dark thought of that would have sent shivers down my spine. But now, such an activity sounds very appealing, and I can't wait to try it.

3. Since July, I have yet to complete a ride that seemed either "long" or "hard" in my mind, even as different body parts screamed at me and told me otherwise.

4. Every time I zone out on bike rides, I "come to" with a jolt of that same panic I used to experience when I realized I hadn't looked at my maps in a while.

5. I still haven't switched out my iPod playlist, and I keep willing Cat Stevens to pop up between the Bad Religion and Modest Mouse.

6. I've developed a habit of stopping and staring off into the distance for a few seconds, for no reason at all.

7. I can't shake my monstrous appetite. Wish I could, but I've already gained back the weight I lost in the Tour, and now I spend most of my time being hungry.

8. I'm completely annoyed by how much stuff I own, and, yes, it still all fits in a one-room apartment and two car trips of a Geo Prism.

9. I'm less convinced than ever that adventure can't be a long-term lifestyle.

10. I've planned little, but I dream big, and these days, I dream in color.
Monday, September 14, 2009

Good morning sun

The air was thick and saturated when I rode home at 1:15 a.m. last night. I cut through the cloud, draped in the blissful silence and blue glow of the hours that are neither today nor tomorrow, the solitude hours. Water vapor swirled in the beam of my headlamp, collecting on my clothes until I was so wet that it might as well have been raining. I smiled and breathed in sweet, damp air until I could almost taste the perfect day ahead. The are a lot of standard definitions that Juneau weather isn't (fair, dry, comfortable), but one thing it is, is predictable. Fog in the night means sun in the light.

I will go to great, great lengths to experience the little tastes of stark clear skies that Juneau is willing to send my way - not because they're unique, but because they're transcendent. So I was upset that Monday just happened to be the day I had a long block of meetings scheduled in the morning, starting at 10 a.m., followed by my normal work day that promised to keep me locked in an office building for at least 13 hours. I was not about to let that beat me. I set my alarm for 6 a.m., four hours after I went to sleep, for no real reason besides the promise of sunlight.

Even though clear skies over fog is the norm, it still requires a certain leap of faith to slouch out of bed in the gray light of dawn, look out over a yard still obscured behind a curtain of fog, with the neighborhood beyond completely shrouded, and assume that you will find UV rays if you climb. But that's what I did - because I was short on time, with my bike, up the Eaglecrest Road - and that's what I found. It did not take long.

Gray low, spectacular high.

Eventually, later in the day, this will all burn off and everyone will get sunlight. But in the early morning air, atop a frost-crusted mountain, the sun seemed to still belong only to me.

I did a little bit of hike-a-biking, trying to connect pieces of singletrack along the ridge. I was walking down a steep slope with my bike on my shoulder, when I reached a particularly marshy spot and put my bike down so I could stoop low to negotiate it. But I slipped before I was all the way down, skidding down the slope about five feet and losing my grip on my bike, which was propped up on its wheels. It rolled at least 20 feet by itself before toppling and flipping over the edge of a rocky outcropping. I watched in horror as it bounced like a crumpled can and disappeared into a void. I bolted up and foot-skied down the slope until I caught up to it. Luckily, damage was fairly minimal. The fall bent the poplock, snapped the fork-lockout cable and housing, and broke the back brake lever. I played with the cable until I was able to jam it back in the lever enough to get the brake to work again, a little, so I could at least get down the mountain. But, man, what a stupid fall! At least my body wasn't involved.

Then it was back down to the fog, the gray, the 13-hour workday on four hours of sleep. But I felt victorious because I had been out there, in the sun, and no one could take that away from me.

I used my dinner break to head out to my new apartment to pick up a key and drop off a few things. Moving day is tomorrow, or whenever I have time to actually do it (more 10 a.m. meetings tomorrow, Wednesday and Thursday.) It will be my first permanent residence in five months. I have been dreading it in some ways, because I will be living alone for the first time in four years, and it is out there - a fair distance from both work and town. But this picture, this is it - my new front yard, Fritz Cove. And as I stood here today, looking at a fresh dusting of snow on Stroller White, I felt a new sense of peace, and anticipation. Change is good.
Saturday, September 12, 2009

It always rains on a picnic

On Friday, the weather turned beautiful (but still windy) and I got in an 85-mile ride. It was my longest ride since the Soggy Bottom, and my most solid bike effort since the Tour Divide ended. I felt pretty good. The Achilles pain is gone. I love the Herbert Glacier Trail. I don't care if it's "too easy." Smooth, wide gravel means I can pump the Karate Monkey up to 18 mph and weave through the moss-draped trees amid bright yellow devil's club leaves and imagine I'm flying one of those cruisers in that scene from "Star Wars."

Still, my mountain madness hasn't abated. Every time a ridgeline came into view through a narrow clearing in the trees, I couldn't help but stop and squint and wonder about the route to the top. I imagined ditching my bike and bushwhacking through the woods until I found a good drainage and clawing my way up to unnamed peaks. Same thing on the way home. The sky just became clearer and clearer until I was pounding into a 15 mph headwind through Lemon Creek, gazing up at Heinzelman Ridge until I nearly swerved into traffic, and thinking "Man, what am I doing down here?"

Throughout the day, between the bike ride and dinner and going to see my friend Christina star in the new Perseverance Theatre play, I stopped at home to check Geoff's progress in the Wasatch 100. The race was pretty exciting to "watch." Geoff dominated all day, holding off a six-time winner of that race, as well as a few other guys who are widely considered some of the best ultrarunners in the United States, and in the end obliterating the course record by more than an hour. He finished in 18:30, in a race that few thought would ever see a breaking of the 19-hour barrier. I'm really proud of him. I'm guessing this was the race of his life (no, I haven't talked to him.) Regardless of our history, I think I'm justified in being a "fan" of his. He may not like me anymore, but he really is an incredible athlete, and, anyway, both of our lives are going pretty well right now.

Sean and I hiked Mount Juneau this morning. We left under mostly clear skies, so much so that I put on sunscreen and sunglasses, and summitted an hour and a half later in a downpour. By the time we returned to the trailhead, clouds had descended to near sea level. Storms sink in fast here in Juneau.

I am planning my third Golden Circle tour at the end of this month, which I am really excited about. I still have to get back into bike shape (at the end of my Thursday hurricane ride, I discovered I had sustained a saddle sore, an actual saddle sore!) But it's good to have something to look forward to. Now if I could only recommit myself to my writing. Four weeks and I haven't even gotten through the first chapter.
Friday, September 11, 2009

Bikecstacy

Rain was hitting the window sideways when I suited up for my ride - polar fleece, plastic coat, hat, neoprene gloves, rain pants and Xtratufs. Dry feet are important to me these days, but I dislike wearing Xtratufs. I know it's going to be a rough day when I have to resort to Xtratufs.

I wheeled my bike out into the hard wind and driving rain, not stoked about riding but determined to at least try to rebuild my saddle callouses and spinning legs ahead of a planned Golden Circle tour at the end of the month. Too much hiking/running makes bikers' butts soft. Time to get it in gear. Just in time for beautiful weather - 51 degrees, 30 mph east winds, and a 100 percent chance of rain.

I put my head down and rode up to Eaglecrest because, well, it's a place to go. As I climbed, the wind picked up force until it was swirling all around in apocalyptic proportions. I clenched my teeth and plowed into the deafening roar as it pushed me left and right and I sometimes, I swear, backwards. Rain stung my cheeks and poked my eyes and I started to feel nervous in that way that I do when I'm out in weather that is clearly much more powerful than I am. Fog was streaming through the air like a fire hose. I swerved to and fro in the water blast, with my front tire scraping the toes of those stupid giant Xtratufs, just trying to keep it in line until it was finally time to turn around.

Gusting air pushed at my back as I bounded down the rough gravel, picking up a momentum that rivaled the wind speed. The parking lot below the gravel road was shrouded in a thick cloud, so much so that I couldn't see the pavement until I was on it. As I began to drop down the canyon, a roaring gust of wind barreled up from behind me until it was right on top of me, pushing me, faster and faster, until the wind and I reached an eerie sort of equilibrium. Everything went quiet. It was right at that moment that I blasted out of the fog, with a sweeping view of the canyon and the mountains across the Channel, through a curtain of sideways rain that made everything look like it was shimmering. All around me, tree branches were whipping; grass was flattened against the ground; and I was floating through a bubble of calm. I felt weightless, freed of all friction and resistance, riding in perfect harmony with the wind. My odometer registered 43 mph. My heart pounded. I sucked in fast gulps of air. My whole body vibrated, consumed by an almost overwhelming feeling of elation ... bikecstacy.

The best part about it is that it always hits when you least expect it.
Thursday, September 10, 2009

My new trail column

The Juneau Empire is bringing back its weekly Outdoors section after a yearlong hiatus, part of our effort to regrow the newspaper after a long, difficult period of cutbacks. Most of this growth has been hard - it means more hours in the cubical for me, more stress for my design team and more work in general. But the good thing about our new section is it gives me an excuse to write a weekly trails column, something I have always wanted to do. Juneau is surrounded by great trails, and information about them is limited (meaning there's not much on the Internet.) But I could write about a different one every week for a year, and not run out of places to write about.

Klas and I headed up Mount Jumbo today to do a little recon for my first column. Actually, he just wanted to get one more climb in before the Klondike Road Relay, and I didn't actually need to do any recon because I was just up there on Sunday. But when a friend suggests a fun outing, I'm not inclined to say no. Even when the weather is terrible, as it it was today - windy, rainy and mostly fogged in.

I always have a hard time making the transition from summer to fall in terms of clothing. This is the time of year that I keep dressing for summer and pay for it when I reach wind-blasted ridges, where air temperatures are in the 40s, soaking wet. I always come down with my worst bouts of hypothermia in the fall. Then I wise up and winter becomes quite the cozy season. But I finished up my first column, still unedited, and thought I'd stick it up on the Internet for Google to crawl, and maybe inspire someone else in Juneau to trek up this cold, cloudy peak.

Jumbo-vision: Standing on the top of Douglas Island

By Jill Homer

Juneau Empire

Do you hear that pitter-patter on your roof, the slow drip on the sidewalk? That’s the sound of autumn. It’s here.

Yes, I hate to be the one to deliver the bad news, but summer is over. And it won’t be long now — just weeks, perhaps even days — before the first termination dust coats Juneau’s skyline. After that, the mountains become significantly less accessible, so now is the time to bag those peaks you didn’t have a chance to summit when summer was hot and spectacular and you spent your days lounging in your swim suit on Sandy Beach.

I can already hear the skepticism: “Mountains? Hiking? Really?” So let me point out another obvious fact: You live in Juneau, perhaps one of the best places in the United States to be a hiker. “Discover Southeast Alaska With Pack and Paddle,” an obscure guidebook published in 1974, proclaimed Juneau “one of the few places where the casual hiker can gain entry into the mountaineer’s mystical world without the climber’s skills and trappings, and may better understand the mountaineer’s love of high places and his urge to journey into otherwise unreachable wilderness.”

If you have time to bag only one peak this season, I strongly recommend Mount Jumbo (also known as Mount Bradley) on Douglas Island. All of Juneau’s prominent peaks are stunning, but Mount Jumbo has the added benefits of being readily accessible, a shorter hike than most, with a well-established trail that crosses a range of scenic landscapes including rain forest, muskeg and colorful, autumn-hued alpine.

The trailhead is located on Fifth Street in Douglas. The first mile is a moderately easy jaunt through the rain forest on a fairly wide trail, followed by a walk across muskeg on single-plank boardwalk (Beware: It’s very slippery when wet, and almost always wet.) After leaving the muskeg, the route climbs steeply up an eroded, root-clogged trail. I have heard it compared to “walking up a ladder,” or “an endless Stairmaster.” The roots do provide nice steps and handholds, which help limit sliding as hikers gain a gut-busting 2,500 feet of elevation in the next mile and a half.

The trail leaves the woods about a half mile from the summit. From here, views of downtown Juneau become apparent, and on clear days, the numerous peaks that dot the Juneau Icefield also pop into view. The trail crosses a saddle and continues climbing up a steep, rocky drainage. Look for piles of rocks, or cairns, as the route isn’t always apparent. The final pitch is a scramble to a false summit, followed by a short drop and climb to the summit, 3,337 feet above sea level.

Rewarding the effort are spectacular views of Admiralty Island and Stephen’s Passage, downtown Juneau, Gastineau Channel and the Mount Roberts ridge. Perched high on the narrow spine of Douglas Island, Mount Jumbo offers what is perhaps the best 360-degree panorama in town.

The trail can be slippery when muddy, and clouds can choke out the views, so it is best not to attempt to climb Mount Jumbo in the rain. Budget at least three hours for the five-mile hike if you are feeling ambitious, and closer to six if you’d like to take your time (that is, take breaks.) This time of year, plan for cool temperatures and sub-freezing windchills, and carry rain gear. There is no snow on the ground, but wet vegetation can be slippery, so trekking poles also are a good thing to have.

But whatever you do, don’t wait. Winter is coming.

Mount Jumbo
Distance: About five miles round trip.
Elevation gain: About 3,300 feet
Difficulty: Strenuous.
Time: Three to six hours
Getting there: The trailhead is located off Fifth Street in Douglas. To get there, go straight on St. Anns Avenue and take a right on Summers Street, then a left on Fifth Street. The trailhead is sandwiched between two houses on the right side of the street.
For more information: Visit www.juneautrails.org.
Wednesday, September 09, 2009

I forgot how to ride my bike

KiM has been sorely neglected in recent weeks, so today I pumped up her tires and greased her chain and took her out for a quick jaunt before work. I headed a couple of miles out the Dupont Trail, which is marginally rideable when it's dry, and late-season vegetation provides a nice cushion for falls. I was timid, as usual, but for the most part we rocked it, hopping over roots and dodging boulders.

It's always invigorating to get back on the bike after a longish spell away, and between that the stoke I had left over from my semi-successful traverse of the lumpy trail, I was pedaling hard by the time I reconnected with the pavement. At one point I accidentally lifted my foot off the pedal (yes, a platform pedal), and when I put it back down, inexplicably, the pedal was no longer in the same spot. I pressed my foot hard into dead space, which threw my whole body off balance. I banked hard right, swerved wildly, overcorrected, and finally went over, scraping pavement and skin beneath a thick fleece pullover, and ripping a seam in the shoulder of a cotton T-shirt (Most of my clothing is still stowed away and my access to laundry is limited, so I have been wearing a lot more cotton recently.) Anyway, damage was minimal, but I jolted back up consumed with deep shame, wondering if that was perhaps the stupidest move ever made on a bike.

I didn't tell anybody about it today, and certainly wasn't going to write anything on my blog, but I figured I already rode my mountain bike across the length of the Rockies. I can own up to a stupid crash now and again.
Monday, September 07, 2009

Mountain bender, day 7

It had become a challenge at that point - seven days in a row of Juneau alpine; a week of hard hiking and crisp air and the transforming tundra and snow and ice and sun. I already had all the physical signs of a tough week - bloodshot eyes, a grumpy post-hike demeanor and mushy, sore legs that even at the tops of stairs protested loudly for all the mean things I was about to do to them. Could I really pound down yet another mountain? But then Abby stopped me after work Saturday and asked me how I felt about Mount Jumbo. She had never been to the top of Mount Jumbo before. And I realized that a Juneau alpine binge just wouldn't be complete without a little bit of Douglas Island.

I drank four cups of coffee in the morning, in hopes that it would power me through. We started up the mountain, and as soon as I got going, my legs started to come around. All of it - the root-step climbing, the rock scrambling, the skidding and sliding, the downhill pounding - is starting to become routine. My legs protest for the first few steps, but quickly accept their fate and continue the march to happy heights. Abby said my pace didn't seem too slow, although I did lose my balance quite a bit more often than usual, even for me.

According to my GPS and a little bit of guestimation on the peaks where I didn't use GPS, I ended the week with 48.5 miles of walking and 27,200 feet of vertical. In there, I accessed four ridges and four peaks, one of them twice. It was a successful week in the alpine, and a fun challenge. But I think I'm about due for a mountain hangover.