I see the light

I can see the proverbial light. You know the one at the end of the tunnel. Wait... guess that's not a proverb but the saying remains; I(we) can see the light at the end of the tunnel! Thats right we crossed the 75% mark, and it actually feels like we're on the home stretch. With a little over a month of fundraising time remaining we have less than $1,700 to raise. As always, a big THANK YOU goes out to all the donors to date!

The fitness aspect has shifted a little bit for the both of us. We're now spending more time spinning or wheels on the bike rather than slogging on the stairs. Naisha and I have been riding to work, while I admit she has been more diligent then me. However, in my defense I don't have the incentive of a digital camera from my employer for bike to work month! A holiday weekend approaches and hopefully the weather cooperates for us. We wish all of you the best for the extended weekend, get outside and take advantage of all that great Washington "clean air". =)

Half way up the mountain- 7200 feet!

Today we hiked up Pebble Creek trail. This hike is on Mt. Rainier! This is the first time Gavin and I have set foot on the mountain since we decided to embark on this adventure. Last night after I got off of work, we packed up our stuff and headed toward Ashford, WA. Richard, Gavin and I stayed at Whittaker’s  Bunkhouse; we thought it might be easier to do the 2 hour drive to Ashford the night before so that we didn’t have to leave the house at 5 am. The Bunkhouse is owned by Lou Whittaker, its a cute little lodge. This morning, we woke up with what we thought was enough time, ran down and grabbed some breakfast then headed over to Whittaker Mountaineering. For this hike we needed actual plastic mountaineering boots so we rented them. We went over there and it took me 4 different boots and 20 minutes later to find the right ones and even then I wasn’t sure if they were fitting right. Apparently they are suppose to fit a bit big and feel loose around the ankle. To me they felt like clown shoes and I was really worried that I wouldn’t make it up the mountain in them. Finally we got on the rode and about 6 miles into the park we hit snow! The higher we got the deeper the snow and thicker the clouds! At Paradise we couldn’t even see the top of the mountain we were standing on. We threw extra clothes on and joined the group. The beginning of the hike started out kind of awkward with those darn boots on. Shortly into the hike we took a quick clothing break. I definitely needed to remove some layers. It may be snowing and the wind really blowing but I’m still hauling a 31 pound pack up a mountain. At this point Richard was realizing that his pack was a bit too heavy so he poured out a gallon of water we was carrying. Once everyone was situated and ready to go we started to trek our way up to Pebble Creek. The trail was pretty much nonexistent, I have no idea how the guys knew where we were going it was a complete white out. Half way into the hike we stopped to take a quick snack/water break. Richard was still feeling like his pack was too heavy for him so Gavin (being the great son that he his) took one of the gallons of water from him. At the end of our break they did a quick mountaineering lesson. They taught us how to rest step and pressure breathe. Two tools that will help us use less energy when we’ll be close to the top when the air is thin. They wanted us to practice these things up the next leg of the trip. The next part was straight up hill, they claim its the steepest part of the whole mountain. At first my “rest steps” weren’t restful but painful. Come to find out I was doing them totally wrong, once I got it figured out it really does help. Going up the steep hill made the mountaineering boots feel great! They really help with kicking in those steps! At one point we’re going up “avalanche shoot” and we got stopped because the people at the front of the line were slipping and sliding. I was so busy watching them that I hadn’t looked at my surroundings. I turned around and it looked as though its pretty straight down, I would definitely slide for a long ways before I could stop. I couldn’t see more than a couple hundred feet so who knows really how far down it was….its okay it didn’t scare me. I just kept my eye on the next step ahead of me and I made it up avalanche shoot like a pro! Once we reached our destination, you couldn’t really tell where we were. Definitely no creek around, it was buried under about 6 feet of snow. Still couldn’t see the top of Mt. Rainier and apparently she would have been right in front of our faces. We layered back up because the wind and snow were blowing and ate some lunch. Then we headed back down. This was the fun part, however, a bit crazy. We didn’t have to follow the trail, we just when down! I did lots of slipping and fell a minimum of 4 times! :) It was fun, It would have been great to be able to take my snowboard down it! I felt like a turtle though! They told us, “nose over toes,” you’re suppose to lean way over so that you don’t have too much weight on your back side and slip and fall. I works but the snow is loose from all the fresh stuff they got over the last week. We all made it down with no injuries! The sun tried to come out but never made it. I could totally have kept going it felt great to be getting real mountaineer training! I loved being out on the mountain. After the hike a group of us all met at the Copper Creek Inn for some lunch and blackberry pie. It was delicious. Then it was back to Whittaker Mountaineering to return the boots and a 3 hour drive home. Once home we weight Gavin’s pack to see how much it weighed after taking the gallon water jug from his dad…it weighed 40 pounds! Go Gavin! :) The biggest lesson learned to today was to wear sunscreen on the mountain even if its not sunny….Gavin has a lobster face to prove it!

 

May is bike to work month!

For my birthday this year Gavin got me a new road bike! I was super excited about it. Because he didn't know what size I would need we ordered it on my birthday and it didn't come until May 11th! BOO! When I knew that I was getting a bike I signed up for the bike to work compitiion. My floor has a team this year, "One well trained Giraffe." All I have to do is ride 4 days in the month of May. Growing up in Montana I rode my mountain bike all around as a kid. I had never been on a road bike. So on May 11th, the day we got back from Montana, we got my bike out and started practicing around our neighborhood. I did fine on the side streets and got a bit anxious going down the busier street with a bike lane. I'm not use to there being cars when I'm on a bike, Montana doesn't have many! ;) So after about a hour or so of practicing we headed back home. I had to work the 12-14th and I wanted to ride my bike at least one of those days. Gavin didn't want me riding to work just yet, he thought that I needed some more practice. So we had the intention of me practicing after work on the 12th and 13th but sadly that didn't happen but I was going to ride anyway! So on Friday, May 14th I made my first trek into work.....with Gavin by my side! :) He's such a sweet husband, he took me to work on my bike to make sure I would make it okay then he had to turn around and head back home. But, thats okay, for those of you that don't know yet, Gavin is planning on riding the Livestrong Challenge (100 miles) on June 20th. The ride to work was pretty uneventful. It was about 5.5 miles (the short cut but less safe route) and took about 35 minutes.I made it to work on time!  So for the ride home after work, Gavin was going to meet me half way. This time I took the longer route which follows the Burke Gilman Trail all the way to 8th Ave then I have to ride up 8th Ave hill home; 7.5 miles but much safer! I was doing pretty good going by myself, I had just gone through the three UW stoplights and was at the last crosswalk which didn't have a light when the car didn't stop. Now don't worry I didn't try to go but I was really upset that they didn't stop and must have gotten a little sidetracked and forgot that I needed to be paying attention to my balance. For the next thing I know I was falling over toward the side of my bike that still had my foot in the straps and WABAM I'm on the ground! OUCH! The guy next to me flew off his bike to help me. I told him I was okay just REALLY REALLY embarrassed. After recieving a bruised knee and ego I got back on the bike to meet up with Gavin. 

 We made it home, I even made it up the 8th ave hill (long but not steep) without stopping there was some whinning involved but no stopping! So in total on my first day riding to work I rode 13 miles, it took me a total of 1 hour and 35 minutes. Thats a good workout I suppose. Lou Whittaker one day told us that any type of excerise is good: walking, stair climbing, biking, or hiking. YAY!

On Saturday, Gavin and I met up with our friend Jim and tootled around a bit on the bikes, it was gorgeous outside. I think for this day our total of riding miles might have been around 16. I'm not going to go into details because there really weren't any. I plan on riding to work tomorrow, hopefully it goes well!

Montana Adventures!

  This weekend my little sister graduated from college! Congratulations Kayla! We are proud of you. She graduated from Montana State University, where Gavin and I graduated from. Her graduation was a great excuse to head out to Bozeman and my home town of Gardiner. Unfortunately that also meant that we had to miss the first training hike on Mt. Rainier. Richard was able to join them up to Pebble Creek. We’ll have to hear about how it went when we get home. To make up for not being able to join Pebble Creek, we brought our packs and hiking gear along with us. We went out for a hike today up Eagle Creek in the Gallatin National Forest right outside Gardiner. Its only about 3 miles up the Jardine road. Our goal for this hike was to get out and hike at a high elevation. Gardiner is around 5400 feet and the beginning of the hike was around 6200. The road heading up Eagle Creek is still closed from the winter so we started at the gate and walked the road. My sister decided that she didn’t want to hike so she took her mountain bike. There is a trail that cuts across all the switch backs that we took. The trail was a gradual uphill climb but not too steep. It was weird hiking out in the wide open; we are so use to the dense trees. My sister made it about a mile up the hill and decided that she couldn’t make it any farther so my dad took over on the bike. To prove the he could make it back up to where the road connected he pushed through! 

 

 

 

 

At the end of the trail we restarted back on the road to continue up another half mile to Casey Lake our destination goal. A couple of feet up the road we ran into some bear tracks! They appeared pretty fresh too! We are guessing that the bears were a grizzly and maybe two black bears that went through there. We think they where there last night during the rain storm. After seeing the tracks we were a little nervous that the bears were still around. Megan and I continued up the road ahead of the rest and I saw something move in the bushes ahead of us. I leaned over to Megan and whispered, “Megan don’t move!” She jumped thinking that it was a bear but I was pretty sure it was just a skunk. :) haha Sure enough it was a skunk, it started running down the road, I tried to catch a picture but I was too slow. Once at Casey Lake, we snapped a few photos. The elevation was around 7200 feet. So we made about a 1,000 foot elevation change but we had our packs at 30 pounds (Gavin carried a 5 lb can of paint) and hiked for 3.5 hours we think about 6 miles. We walked down a different way; down the road and off roading it by cutting through the switch backs. My dad cheated and road the bike the WHOLE way down! I mean all the way home! He almost hit a deer riding the bike too! It was quite entertaining. The worse part of the day was that I found two ticks on me! EWWWWW!

Tiger Mountain Trail=16 miles!

Sorry for the late post! On Sunday, Gavin and I, along with 19 others hiked the Tiger Mountain Trail. It started at Tiger Summit #3 (TM3) along I90 and traversed its way back to highway 18. You have to remember the last time we went up TM3 was when I had my nervous breakdown! This time was so much better! Gavin and I packed all our stuff up the night before, making sure everything that we almost forgot in the past was by the door. When we woke up all we had to do is get dressed and finish putting the final things in our bags. We continued our usually hiking routine of stopping at Starbucks first. No stressing, we made it to the meeting spot early! Everyone met at the highway 18 trailhead then we all piled into half the cars and headed over to TM3 trail head. To the top of TM3 its 3 miles straight up. Our packs for this hike were 30 pounds, the heaviest we've carried them! Going to the summit of TM3 was not too exciting because we had just done it a couple of week before. However this time there was no ice and snow at the top. We didn't spend much time at the summit of TM3 since we still had 13 miles ahead of us. Plus, it was incredibly windy with not much of a view due to the clouds. So we started down the other side. I never noticed the trail last time we were up there, didn't know you could go down that way. The trail heading toward highway 18 was much narrower than the big trail going up TM3; we are in the backcountry now! It was really exciting to be on unmarked territory, it was beautiful back there. It felt like we were miles away from anything!

This week I tried putting Nuun in my Camelpack. I really like my water this way and was trying to keep nice and hydrated since this was a long hike. About 3-4 hours into the hike my bladder was so full that I thought I was going to explode! I kept on going thinking that our lunch break had to be soon, and then I heard the leader say it was one hour till lunch. I turned around and told Gavin, "I don't think I can make it an hour...I don't know if I can make it 15 minutes!" So we asked the caboose leader if we could make a quick stop. Another guy, John, took my pack for me and continued down with the rest of the group. I found this huge old stump and climbed up to it. Once I finished my business I started going back down to the trail, heading a different way than I went up. I was walking around that huge stump and the roots must have been over grown because then next thing I knew my foot was sinking between two roots and I was tumbling face first. I tried to catch myself but the ground broke beneath my hands as well. I did a complete summersault and stopped just in time before I hit a tree. Gavin was laughing his butt off! He said it was like watching a movie in slow motion. At first I thought I hurt my legs but I shook it off and ran down the trail to go get my pack from John. Once I caught up with the group, they had stopped to let us all catch up. Once we were all together again the leader stated that lunch would be in 10 minutes. UGH! I could have waited that long! So we get to lunch and low and behold there is an outhouse! So I had a wilderness bathroom experience for no reason! Oh well….many lessons learned!

So for lunch, everyone was suppose to bring food to share with others, have a huge potluck then hopefully have less weight to carry the rest of the way. The smorgasbord was amazing! There was fruit, cheese and crackers, wine, Starbucks coffee, cookies, casseroles, and the best hot dog I’ve ever eaten! After stuffing our faces and enjoying each other’s company we had to pack up and get going. We still had another 4 hours or so to go. The rest of the hike was pretty soggy. I did fall again…this time just a quick slip down in a really muddy spot. There were others that slipped as well. I was feeling pretty good by the end till 1.9 miles left, where we hit a gravel road the rest of the way down. That is when my feet started feeling the pain of the day. We all made it down safely, threw everyone in the cars drove back over to the other trailhead to get people back to their cars and off to home. When I got home, I went straight to a hot shower then horizontal on the bed till the next morning for work. My feet were throbbing, I was afraid I was going to have to call in sick because I couldn’t walk! :o) But in the morning I felt pretty good, had to hit up the Ibuprofen for the sore knees but overall felt great! It was the longest hike we’d been on in a long, long time with the most weight ever and we conquered it like true hikers!