Binghamton Flooding

Nuff said

Listen Old Man

you hear?

Cheap Haircuts

In an effort to start saving money now, and also transition into a more low key lifestyle, I've been looking for low cost alternatives to my expenses. I had a slight victory this week, in the haircut department.

My hair gets pretty shaggy pretty quickly, and I find myself needing a haircut as soon as my bangs start to get in my eyes. Now, there is an even cheaper alternative to my method, which is to get a friend to do it for you, but I haven't found anyone willing to do more than a buzz, and I don't look good as a jarhead. So I expanded my options, and found beauty school.

Now, it seems like every town has a beauty school, where young women - and men - go to learn how to give manis and petis and cut hair. They are constantly looking for live test subjects, and will give haircuts for much cheaper rates than a salon. For example, if I went to a place like CuttingCrew, our local in Binghamton, a cut with a tip would run me anywhere from 17-20 bucks. At the beauty school? Ten bucks. All you have to do is sign a waiver saying that you won't bitch and moan if a young stylist to be messes up your hair. Or lops off an ear. Cuz it's hard out there, learning to cut hair.

So next time you're in need of a cheap cut, look up a beauty school.

New Wheels

So I bought a truck. It's a '99 Toyota Tacoma SR5 Xtracab 4wd. The idea is that I want to be able to live out of it full time after I graduate. So how am I going to go about doing that?

Well to start, I bought a camper shell, a Leer 148 for the extra head room. New caps cost anywhere from 1500-2000 dollars or more. I picked this one up used off of Craigslist for 100 bucks.



So what now? As I'm planning out the layout for the truck, I've divided it into four sections. First is the front seat area of the cab, which will be for driving myself and whoever is in the passenger seat. Second will be the seats behind the front seats, which I plan in turning into storage. I'm going to make a platform to level the bench seats and fill the space in between each row of seats, giving me an even platform to store gear. In this space, I see more of my living gear, clothes, blankets, etc.

In the bed, I am going to build a sleeping platform. I haven't quite figured out the exact design, but I want to build it around Rubbermaid containers, so that I have to sections; beneath the platforms, which will be storage for gear, like paddle clothes, cookset, etc. and above which will be the sleeping area, with whatever pad i decide on, sleeping bag, small light, etc.

Another thing I want to incorporate, if I can, is a solar powered battery. I want it to be small, but powerful enough that I can charge my cameras, power my laptop, etc. This way I don't have to poach power with an extension cord.

It's still in the planning stages, but this summer I want to start by weatherproofing the cap and building the platforms. We'll see how it goes

Updates, Where I See This Going

Hey guys,

I haven't posted in a while, other than to use a few posts as a dumpling place for pictures. Hopefully that will change. Summer is coming along, and with it, my job in New Jersey where some times the tedium lends itself to blog posts. I need to get in the habit of posting more, so I'll try to put three short ones up this week. The first one deals with what I am trying to do, and how I see this blog playing a roll in that.

I will be graduating college in approximately seven months, with degrees in history and political philosophy. As of yet, I am sure of only one thing; I don't want to go to law school, grad school, or into a career. So I am going to take some time and travel.

But at the same time, I have begun to seriously look at whitewater canoeing as a lifestyle, a vehicle that can take me into the next chapter of my life. Right now canoeing is an escape, a way for me to connect with the natural world in a very unique and special way. I think because whitewater canoeing is a niche area of a niche sport, that uniqueness is very appealing. But at the same time, I want more people to canoe. I think canoeing is absolutely the most legal fun you can have in this country, and I want more people to experience it. So where does that leave me?

I think I want to spend some time over the next few years promoting whitewater canoeing. I want to progress into Class V whitewater (I'm a noob IV right now) and as I progress I want to bring more and more people into the sport. Most of all, I want to get a canoe company that shares this vision and will let me help them with a marketing strategy to expand the industry. Will it happen? Who knows...time will tell.

But as I finish my last seven months of the relative security of college, I will use this blog as a means to detail the planning that goes into this endeavor. I've already bought a pick-up truck - there will be a post on that soon - and my next step is to outfit my truck so that I can live in it long term. Hopefully I'll be able to showcase each step along the way. Also, I'll hopefully be paddling more this summer, as I need the weekend to escape from the computer screen-filled week. And finally, I want to make this blog more personal, so that those who follow me on this journey actually feel like they might know me. We'll see how it goes.

Now, to motivate myself to actually keep up with this blogging...

What font is this?

Does anyone know what font this is?

In Memorium

Sorry for the month long vacation, and even more sorry to be writing this.

It has been a rough month for the whitewater community, on top of an even rougher year. After losing Jimmy O'Brien, a greater boater, and more importantly a great man, this spring, I was hoping we might have a quiet summer and fall. Unfortunately, that didn't pan out. The Gauley River has claimed three lives, including a Pittsburgh father who friends have told me was one of the nicer guys you'll ever find.

Unfortunately, the one that really hit hard was Carl Schneider. Carl was one of those guys everyone knew. His mustache was out-sized only by his personality. He was a teacher, a champion of the river, and a great person. I only knew him briefly, hanging out at the Yough and in the bar in Ohiopyle, but I wish I knew him more.

My condolences to everyone who lost a friend this year, on the river or off. Be safe out there.

http://jeffmacklin.smugmug.com/Whitewater/2010/Carl-Schneider-photos-from/14028365_TKJFA#1032322916_hLw4Y

Carl Schneider

Running Wild

There is nothing so beautiful as a wild river.
It is the most powerful force on earth.
It can be tapped, it can be managed, it can be harnessed, but it will always seek freedom.
I pledge to always let them run free.

What motivates us?

Recent discussion had me thinking, what motivates us to do anything?

People arguing about why we should canoe makes me think, if you spent more time on the water and less time bitching, you'd probably have more fun.

Just a thought

The Chronicles of Tupac & Biggie – Part II

I’ve been thinking more about the differences between East and West Coast living, in an attempt to determine which I like more. When I first started, there were aspects of the west that I truly loved, the laid back lifestyle, the vastness of it, but I was afraid I was too deeply rooted in East Coast lifestyle. East Coast, to me, is fast-paced. You drive 90 on the freeways to get to work, to go to a ball game, to pick up milk. You don’t drive slowly and take it in, you just get there. And there have been times in my life where I’ve been outside of the Northeast, and I was fed up with the “let’s just drive slowly and look around” mentality. And I’m afraid that’s what waiting for me on the West Coast. It’s not that driving slow, or the larger aspect, living slow, is wrong. I’m just too damn impatient.

Regardless, I decided to start writing a little bit about my perceived differences between the East and the West. And I decided to start with the beauty of each place. Reason? If I become more patient and decide to drive slow and smell the flowers, will it be worth it?

Beauty on the East Coast requires work. The interstates and highways on the East Coast don’t pass by many spectacular vistas; many just go through the industrial wasteland of the megalopolis. Take I-95 through Jersey and you would think the entire state is a wastewater treatment plant and refinery. Take 287 and you’ll think everything is under construction. But if you take a rural road, you’ll wind over rolling hills, alongside small streams in a, well, un-Jersey-like fashion.

Drive around on the West Coast and everything is big sky and mountains.
Snow-capped peaks of the Olympic and Sierra Nevada ranges dot the horizon, and the powder-blue sky stretches all the way back to Utah. Towering 6,000-foot peaks, higher than nearly every mountain back east, are just “hills” to the locals. Sometimes it is hard to focus on the road when you are surrounded by the spectacular.

The East, however, has its places. The Adirondacks are still stunning, and there are plenty of “scenic overlooks” on the highways that provide an ample view. The rolling farmlands of Western New York, punctuated by the occasional tree line or twisty trout brook, are beautiful to me. But most of the beauty in the East, I have found, is not large-scale. It is something you must get right up and see.

On the West Coast, you have those spectacular vistas, those beautiful mountain ranges, canyons, rivers, etc. But when you get right up to the land, the simple dirt that makes up those vistas, often you find that at close range, the view does not hold up. The scraggly brush and powdery dirt paint a beautiful picture from afar, but up close the brush strokes are too jagged, too barren to be great.

The East Coast, on the other hand, is much more suited for close inspection. Countless times in my travels out here, I have found something small, unique, and breathtaking. The interlocking trees on Fish Pond, the crystal-clear water of the Deerfield River come to mind. And then there is the Bog River. That has scenic vistas, some of the best in the East. But you have to work; it’s a five mile paddle and a three mile hike. But there is also a small scale that I love. There is a marshy bog with a twisting path to a granite erratics. And there is a sandy hill, where rain and the elements have washed away the vegetation. When I first saw it, I thought it was rather ugly, but when I looked closely, I noticed that the pebbles in the sand withstood the erosion of the water. The pebbles kept the sand underneath it from washing away, leaving small pyramids of sand standing like the spines of a porcupine. It took hard work getting there and a careful eye to see, but there is beauty on the East Coast.

And that is what I see now. I think the West has a lock on “spectacular”. It’s hard to find any other place where you can see the mountains, the snow, the rivers, the prairies all in one view. But the East, despite the built-up, industrialized nature of it, still has its beauty; you just have to look.

Whitewater Progression

Longer post; I'm still working on the family one.

I’ve been thinking a lot about whitewater, mostly about why I like it so much. I’ve had serious interests before, but nothing quite as addicting as boating. One of the big reasons I like whitewater is because you can so easily track your progression.

I was practically born in a canoe. As early as I can remember, I was in the bow of my father’s Curtis Companion, paddling up and down the twisty Bantam River, pulling errant golf balls out that fell in from nearby Litchfield Country Club. And I learned how to solo a boat on Saranac Lake during a summer vacation, paddling that same Companion along the shore to fish for perch. I soloed a boat on a trip for the first time two years ago, still paddling that same Companion. And I was content, I thought, to continue paddling on flat water, seeing beautiful places that required a little hard work in a unique craft to see.

Then I discovered whitewater. I took a class with my brother in June of last year. We learned how to paddle tandem on the Lehigh River. The first day on the river, I had literally never paddled a rapid before in my life. I had floated down a swift in the nearby Delaware River a few times, and waded a boulder garden once in Algonquin. I had seen rapids before, bigger ones than the Lehigh could ever produce. But the first time I sat in the stern of the boat, watching the river drop away, watching my brother literally go downhill, that was it. I was hooked.

I paddled a half dozen more times in that tandem, learning the lines and the basic maneuvers. I learned how much respect one had to give the river, because the river is stronger than you will ever be, and the river never gets tired. But I also learned how fun the river can be, how beautiful it can be, and how rewarding it can be.

In July of last year, I drove up to Albany one day and bought a solo whitewater canoe, a Mohawk Probe 11. It was old, only a few years younger than I was. But it was a great boat, strong and forgiving. That August, I paddled it down the Lehigh for the first time. The level was nearly twice what I was used to, but I managed to get down the river with a strong brace and no swims. It was at that point that I promised myself that I would canoe as much as I possibly could.

This year, I stayed true to that promise. I paddled the Lehigh so much that I have the rapids memorized, and could talk someone down the river over the phone. But by July, I felt like I needed a bit more of a challenge. It wasn’t that the Lehigh wasn’t a difficult river. It always presented a different problem to solve, and I have swum more than my fair share of times. But I needed to prove to myself that I could begin to do something different, more difficult.

I went to the Deerfield River in July. While most of the river is innocuous Class I, the Fife Brook section ends in the difficult Zoar Gap, a III+ rapid, the biggest I had paddled to that point.

I stood in the shoulder of the road overlooking the gap. I watched the river constrict and then drop into a chute, with two mammoth holes, nearly the width of the river, providing the bulk of the difficulty. Rec boats tried to pass through, but were constantly stopped and thrashed by the holes. But as I watched, I saw a line on the left. Punch over a pourover, keep the boat on the left, sneak between the hole and the river bank on the left. I decided that the line could be run, then I decided that I could run the line. Then I did.

After two more Gap runs, one successful, the other, well, see the video, I realized that it was the progression that I liked. I thought I was a solid Class III boater, so I paddled a III+ rapid. A few weeks later, I decided that I needed a river with multiple Class III rapids, so I went to the Lower Yough. I paddled that twice as well, with only two dumb swims.

I’m not listing these to rattle off a bunch of achievements like a jackass. I’m only pointing out that whitewater gives me a measuring stick that I really like. You know how good of a boater you are based on what level rapid you can paddle, and how well you paddle that rapid. For me, after a few clean runs on a river, I feel ready to push onwards, and when I ready, upwards.

With a few tweaks to my outfitting, a roll, and a bomber forward stroke, I feel like I will be ready to tackle some Class IV next year. I’ll be spending my time this off season working on those three things, so that I can continue to progress. I’m sure at some point, I will hit a wall, unable to paddle anything bigger without taking unnecessarily dangerous risks. But I don’t know where that level is. So for now, I can only paddle to that limit.



--Post Note: After having posted this, I proceeded to swim on the first rapid of the Lehigh, at its lowest level ever. Just goes to show the river demands a little humility.--

Lower Yough

Just a short post while I try to write a longer one about familial obligations.

Some pictures from the fellows at Outdoor Adventure Photography. Immediately previous to me in the first series is Joe, a great open boater. Previous to me in the second series is Sarah.

July 31 - Hour 10 - Page 21
http://adventurephoto.exposuremanager.com/p/3702/lower-p01-978661_16_1_6_33_4

August 1 - Hour 8 - Page 2
http://adventurephoto.exposuremanager.com/p/3691/lower-p22-985518_16_1_7_2_2

More paddling this weekend on the Lehigh!

Deadliest Catch

Short post before I head out for a(nother) weekend of paddling, this time at the Lower Youghigany River.

I will have a more detailed post about this later, but I want to get the secondary stuff out of the way now. Especially because this deserves more than one post.

What is that, you ask?

Deadliest Catch.

Now, I don’t watch TV. In fact, the only show I watch is Deadliest Catch. But this season and more specifically these last few episodes deserve some mention, because they have been incredibly touching/moving/heartbreaking/brilliant.

For those who don’t know, one of the main characters, Captain Phil Harris of the fishing boat Cornelia Marie, died this February of a pulmonary embolism. He had had one a few years earlier, and then suffered a massive stroke a week before his death. What was especially heartbreaking, however, was that it had looked to all involved in the days leading up to his death that Captain Phil would survive, and possibly recover.

I just want to write that the show did an amazing job of dealing with this sensitive and taboo subject. Never before had a television character actually died on screen. Sure we had the sitcom characters die, and sometime, when an actor passed, the on screen death of his character could be very emotional. And sometimes a real person would die in the middle of a production, forcing the show to deal with that person’s passing.

But never before had someone so real, so like us, died in front of all of us. And that was difficult to watch. Also difficult was how the older son, Josh, dealt with his father’s death, his younger brother’s drug addiction, and the completion of the fishing season. Maybe it’s because I’m an older brother that I felt so connected to Josh.

Anyways, this isn’t some stupid recrap, and the next post, which deals with something I noticed in the show won’t be so superficial. There’s a reason I’m bringing up the show, and its more meaningful, unique, etc. But I have to go paddle, so those thoughts will have to wait.

Cheers

California Thoughts

I'm sitting in a hotel room somewhere in Fullerton, California. The evening breeze is blowing in the sounds of young kids playing at the pool, and the distant hum of a generator coming across the street from the Cal State campus. Tomorrow will mark the end of the second week that I've been in California, and my last day here.

Somebody back home asked me what I thought of Cali. At first I thought I was too harsh, but I decided to really look into it. I figure my opinion is biased, but so is every opinion in some way. I'm biased because I'm on business, which is a double-bladed sword. I have no needs or wants at the present, because the ludicrous nature of a business trip means I don't have to worry about anything. Somebody does, but not me. Instead I have to worry about my business, which I do, constantly.

The other edge of that sword is that I spend nearly every waking moment working. I have logged 70+ hours the past two weeks. But on my day off, I went to LA, to get a feel for Southern California.

What I saw was a portion of this country to wrapped up in itself, too detached from the normality of the rest of the world. Or maybe that's my East Coast coming out.

For one thing, it is totally normal to sit in traffic for hours at a time. Traffic delays of two hours are common. Four hours happens probably once or twice a month. And this is an accepted cost of living here.

The living conditions here can be deplorable. Los Angeles has a high number of homeless people, but makes no effort to hide them by setting up shelters or keeping them in the barrios. Unlike New York, where the homeless are shuffled away from the more ascendant classes, everyone mingles together. So on a train coming back from Hollywood, you'll have a homeless guy, a crippled woman wrapped in a blanket on a crappy power scooter, a marketing copy writer (me) some construction guys, a lawyer, and a Hollywood executive. It's a decent cross section of society, all together, all heading the same way but going in completely different directions.

No one gave a shit. That homeless guy could have been a veteran, a firefighter. The crippled woman was somebody's daughter, maybe at one point somebody's mother. But who knows, because no one stopped to give a shit. Including myself. In LA, we are all too absorbed in the minuscule bullshit that makes up our daily life to care about anything or anyone that is beyond our immediate scope.

And that's why I'm bumming on LA. I'm not some detached moron who doesn't realize that scenes like this play themselves out in every corner of the world every day. And I'm not too impractical to realize that there wasn't much anyone on that train could do. Yeah, we could have pitched in and given that guy a meal and a shower, maybe really pitched in and gotten him a home and a job. But what about all the other homeless people in LA? California? The world?

This isn't a rant against homelessness in America. Nor is it a bash against the entire West Coast, as my love for Oregon, Washington, and B.C. is still very strong. This is more a picture. This is my attempt to render a scene of life in LA, and then try to determine why it bothers me. At the end of the day, this is simply a protest against the way we live our lives. We punch in, we punch out, but we are too wrapped up in the trivial distractions to focus on making the most of the very little time we have. The only difference is, in LA, they don't even try to hide it.

And one other thing. I said everyone on that train was going to the same place, but I didn't just mean Union Station. As human beings, we are guaranteed one thing. We are not guaranteed love, or kindness, or happiness, or warmth, or clarity. We are only guaranteed death. From the moment we are born, we are never younger, and death is never further away then it is at this instance in time. We might live 100 years. Or 100 days. So, my question for you is, with this one guarantee, this one certainty, what are you going to do?

Me? I'm going to canoe.

"Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well preserved body, but rather to slide in sideways, totally worn out, shouting, 'Holy shit, what a ride!' " Nolan Whitesell

Video from Deerfield

http://www.vimeo.com/13146243

As promised...

Deerfield

Just got back from the Deerfield River. We ran the Fife Brook section, which they call a Class II but was for all intents and purposes a solid I+. However, Zoar Gap at the end of the run, is Class III+. That didn't stop a bunch of rec boaters from trying to shoot it, most of whom got absolutely trashed.

I ran the Gap three times over two days. The first time was my best run. I chose the left line, hit an eddy, blasted over the pourover rock on river left, and managed to sneak in between the rock and the hole on river left.

The second run, well, was not so good. I got too far to the left, and when I compensated, my bow came out too far to the right, got caught by the hole, and I rolled into a rock. Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how you view it) I had the bow cam going. (Note: The video is a little large, so I'll have a Youtube link or something similar in its place shortly)

I was a little pissed that I had blown what was to be the last rapid of the trip, and knew I was going to be miserable if I had to drive from Massachusetts to Allentown to New Jersey that night, thinking about my little mistake. So I threw the boat on the car, drove to the top of the gap, and ran the damn thing again.

This time, I ran the line better. I got stuck in the hydraulic kicked up by the pourover rock, and did have a good deal of water in the boat, but I was able to punch out and grab the line. Video courtesy of Sarah:





All in all it was a great trip, and I felt that I was paddling at a notch above my previous level. Who knows, in a few weeks, I might give the Yough a try.

Planning for the Deerfield

I'm sitting in my apartment in New Jersey, killing time until I can go to sleep. Tomorrow I work, and then I drive.

I'm headed to the Deerfield River in western Massachusetts for some whitewater with a friend. I'm very excited to head out, see a new river, face new challenges, etc.

I have a list of stuff I need to take in my head, and I keep going back over it, scrutinizing each choice of gear. I've read NPMB and Cboats so much I'm afraid I'm going to get fired.

This is nothing abnormal. In preparation for any new trip, be it a day or a month, I read everything I can get my hands on about the location. I get excited thinking about what I might see, and trying to figure out the minute details, like how to get there, what to eat, and so on. That excitement helps get me through the week of anticipation, of wanting to be there now.

And in 24 hours, I will be.

More to come...