Just an amazing and inspiring book about energy, climate, and the world we live in. I hope everyone can read it some day, and I wish it was half as long, but, overall, it's great. My favorite quote:
"This is not about the whales anymore. It's about us. And what we do about the challenges of energy and climate, conservation and preservation, will tell our kids who we really are."
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Lava Lake
I'm going to try to document and archive some of my biking experiences....roughly chronologically.
I got my first mountain bike late in high school. I'll never forget the bike because it was a fluorescent green RD Coyote 3. I thought the bike was so light, but by today's standards, it was a tank. Any way, I had this new mountain bike and I wanted to ride it in the mountains. I was discussing my thoughts on possible rides at work (I was a "grocery bagger" at the time) with the new-guy, Travis, and he mentioned that he had gone mountain biking a few times. I convinced him that Lava Lake would be a great destination because it was only 3 miles and I remembered the trail as being relatively smooth. He agreed, and a few days later we were unloading our bikes from the trunks of our cars at the trail head.
Now, over the years, I've learned a few important rules for planning a first time ride:
(1) either talk with someone that has personally ridden the trail or read about the trail in a book,
(2) if (1) is impossible, hike the trail first,
(3) if 1 and 2 are both impossible, be prepared to not ride at all.
(4) make sure biking is legal on the trail.
Of course, Travis and I pretty much broke all these rules. We failed to notice that part of the trail was in a wilderness area, where mountain biking is not allowed. I failed to remember that the trail is extremely rocky with large stones embedded in dirt and sticking out everywhere along the trail. For the first few miles, we basically just pushed our bikes or rode 5 feet before hitting a rock.
You would think that after just a few hundred feet of this misery, that we would call it a day. Of course, we were way to stubborn and stupid for that. We basically slugged along much further than any reasonable person would slug, and we finally made the wise decision to stash our bikes and simple hike that last little bit. The view from the lake was spectacular, but the ride back to the car was unbelievably abbusive. It took 3 solid weeks for my prostate to forgive me for that ride. It took me 5 years before I was ready to try moutain biking again.
An interesting side story is the guy I went riding with, Travis. Travis was a little younger than I, probably 15-16 at the time of this ride, and never really became friends. In fact, I think that this ride may have been the only thing we ever did together outside of work. Travis appeared to me to be one of the most 'normal' people in world. He had normal blond hair, normal blue eyes, normal height and weight; he never said much, but he always had a smile on his face. Any way, a year or two later I learned that he was incredibly mysogonistic and a heavy drug user. The moral of the story, as always, is to not judge a book by its cover.
I got my first mountain bike late in high school. I'll never forget the bike because it was a fluorescent green RD Coyote 3. I thought the bike was so light, but by today's standards, it was a tank. Any way, I had this new mountain bike and I wanted to ride it in the mountains. I was discussing my thoughts on possible rides at work (I was a "grocery bagger" at the time) with the new-guy, Travis, and he mentioned that he had gone mountain biking a few times. I convinced him that Lava Lake would be a great destination because it was only 3 miles and I remembered the trail as being relatively smooth. He agreed, and a few days later we were unloading our bikes from the trunks of our cars at the trail head.
Now, over the years, I've learned a few important rules for planning a first time ride:
(1) either talk with someone that has personally ridden the trail or read about the trail in a book,
(2) if (1) is impossible, hike the trail first,
(3) if 1 and 2 are both impossible, be prepared to not ride at all.
(4) make sure biking is legal on the trail.
Of course, Travis and I pretty much broke all these rules. We failed to notice that part of the trail was in a wilderness area, where mountain biking is not allowed. I failed to remember that the trail is extremely rocky with large stones embedded in dirt and sticking out everywhere along the trail. For the first few miles, we basically just pushed our bikes or rode 5 feet before hitting a rock.
You would think that after just a few hundred feet of this misery, that we would call it a day. Of course, we were way to stubborn and stupid for that. We basically slugged along much further than any reasonable person would slug, and we finally made the wise decision to stash our bikes and simple hike that last little bit. The view from the lake was spectacular, but the ride back to the car was unbelievably abbusive. It took 3 solid weeks for my prostate to forgive me for that ride. It took me 5 years before I was ready to try moutain biking again.
An interesting side story is the guy I went riding with, Travis. Travis was a little younger than I, probably 15-16 at the time of this ride, and never really became friends. In fact, I think that this ride may have been the only thing we ever did together outside of work. Travis appeared to me to be one of the most 'normal' people in world. He had normal blond hair, normal blue eyes, normal height and weight; he never said much, but he always had a smile on his face. Any way, a year or two later I learned that he was incredibly mysogonistic and a heavy drug user. The moral of the story, as always, is to not judge a book by its cover.
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