Bacheolor party = excuse to bike tour and…

My favorite Cousin, X-opher, had his Bachelor party down in Newport Beach over the weekend.  To get there I had the choice of a 150mile drive on the interstates, and through LA traffic (At 3:30am on our way home there was a traffic jam… there is always something there).  I certainly didn’t feel like driving both ways through LA traffic, and taking the train round trip seemed expensive.  The next most logical step was bicycling 240 miles around LA.  There were not convenient mid route stops, so I opted to borrow a Ibex trailer, and camping gear from Sam, screwed around packing and ended up leaving at the crack of 10 am.
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Mount Lemmon Descending Videos

For the 8th week in a row I will be be riding up Mt Lemmon.  I always get pretty stoked on this climb.  It’s 21 straight miles of climbing, then descend a little and go up some more.  The grade is really consistent, which makes it great for intervals, riding easier, strength training, and just riding in general.

Another cool thing is that you go from Cactus forest at the bottom to snowy/ ski hill at the top, and everything in between. 
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E-Bay – Driving Marathons

A friend of mine recently sent me a ‘few things’ to post up on e-bay for him.  As a past Canadian professional road champion he’s got a lot of cool, one off custom clothing that you will never be able to buy anywhere else.  The past 3 days I have locked myself in (unfortunately) my parents, ahem, dining room and now have the majority of his stuff posted up on e-bay.  Because of the time of year there will be some great deals, so make sure to check my auctions next weekend as there will be some fantastic deals.
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the Subie’s final waltz?

Plan A: was to hit the road and make the 6h out of the desert in the cool of Sunday evening.
Plan B: was formulated until I woke up Monday morning having not made plan A. But I was showered, had slept 9h, and my belly was full of some Ames Famliy BBQ. Not to mention that I spent 2h in the pool, ‘cooling my core’ temperature, and otherwise cavorting with my homies Emily and Colin.

Before I even got to Vegas my butt was cramping, probably a combination of the worn out seat, and the racing. Subie, is possibly due for a timing belt change, and as a precaution I purchased the required belts, and ratchet set.. sitting as preventative measure in the shotgun seat.
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Justin Marriage : the stag

Everything was steaming along fine in our deck renovations. Once Kev and I had finished 3 weeks of procrastination and started work. We also fabricated and painted cupboard doors to complement last winters back-splash.

Long story short, I was 2 days late, and starting to scheem up very complicated methods for ‘biking’ (car ride, train, bus, fed-ex) the 500km to Justin’s (yet to be organized) Stag in KW. Tracy who was (thank muchas) flying my suit up to Thunderbay for the wedding, called to see why I hadn’t dropped my shoes off, and then suggested ‘wouldn’t it be easier to car pool with me to Toronto tomorrow?’
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Canada Rocks

Well it’s going, and fairly quickly. I headed back to B.E.A.U.tiful Bakersfield, and repacked my life possessions. Which I was dismayed to find has swollen to the size of 2 full subaru loads. 1.5 of these were stowed in Evil’s storage unit, and the other half load (which is about a quarter load more than I need) I couldn’t be bothered to sort through, and brought with me, just ’cause.

So 10pm I gassed up and hit the road for the 19h drive up to Victoria BC. 4.5h in and I made Sacramento, found the WalMart, and rolled out my sleeping bag in front of the Subie. 4h later the sun woke me up, so I moved around to the shaded side of the subie, and slept 3 more hours.
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Nat vs. Wolverine

Assault on Wolverine

woke-up, packed my gear, kitted-up in the Lifa, and then read, and cooked lunch. At lunch I was informed the hiking wolverine takes 3h in the summer, and will take me 5h today. So with 4h to hike, I was told to wait for tomorrow, so I left. But of course forgot ‘my’ trekking poles, since I didn’t put spikes in my shoes, I figured poles would be smart.
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Back Country Skiing

It looks like 2007 is shaping up to be a busy one as I’m planning (but not limited to): train for the Olympic nordic ski team, climb Denali, bike tour South America , guide in Italy, race bicycles, bicycle tour to the Arctic, race Idita Sport, build a house, build a canoe, go on a longggg canoe trip…

Last weekend I just skied, and saw 7 more moose. Which is what you’ve gotta do up here in the AK.

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