Segment FOUR – Summit of Pingora!

The adventure continued to be amazing!

Poor Zach was still suffering from AMS, to the point where he felt it best for him to take a rest day in camp.

Greg & I thought we’d go and do a short route (K-cracks) on  Pingora,

the huge peak to the right in the picture. Unfortunately, there was a college reunion (of like 12 people)…yes, I’m serious!!!

So we decided to do the first two pitches of the East Ledges, and then the last two pitches of the East Face.  It was great… the ole /5.2/ from the 1940s….more like 5.6 which was fun:

         

Once those ‘easy ‘ pitches were done, we switched to the last two pitches of the East Face (or so we thought), they were to be moderates 5.7/5.8…hmmm…NOT!

Greg was in heaven as he LOVES crack climbing…and I’d have enjoyed it more, however I’m not good at crack climbing on a healthy day…but with a broken left baby toe, it was even less enjoyable. Thankfully the required cranking foot was my right which was in fine shape…but let me tell you, these were NO 5.7 splitter cracks! Haha.

              

We still enjoyed the climbing, and felt like we had definitely worked our muscles for sure!

Here we are on the summit of Pingora, (11,884 feet)…

    

We had an amazing day, the weather was incredible…

Let’s just say that ‘third’ class alpine climbing is NOTHING like it is in New Brunswick!

Segment THREE

Greg left for his NOLS contract assignment on June 13…after a 15 hour drive from Canmore to Lander, Wyoming…I was very excited to see him on July 20^th!

This is the NOLS, Rocky Mountain (RM) branch in Lander, Wyoming…This was NOT the day we arrived (it was much busier) … this is a quiet Sunday at the branch!

After a couple of rest days (in town), we (Zach, GH & I) were off to the Cirque of Towers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cirque_of_the_Towers  in the Wind River Range.

    

An unexpected late start had us enjoy a camp night at Big Sandy.

Such a beautiful spot.

Arrival into the cirque was breath taking!  The landscape was stunning!  Camping at 10,000 feet

In the past, I’ve always taken Gingko Bilobo, to help prevent AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altitude_sickness )…let’s just say, I’ll never forget again!

Wolf’s Head was our first objective, a beautiful line, it beckons us. A bit of a late start, and a snafu on the grassy ledges approach, made our timing both good & bad on the sidewalk pitch.  As the leader headed up,

the black clouds were ominous; we decided to see if any t-storms would materialize

sure enough, within 15 minutes we were engulfed

and the rain was beating down.

We took cover, as much as we could, but within an hour, it wasn’t letting up, our climbing day was over; we began our descent.

Within the next hour, sunny, blue skies…  we were dry by the time we returned to camp to make our dinner

    

Segment TWO

I’m a very lucky woman. I have a number of dear friends and they live all over the world!

Onto the second ‘away from home’ Summer 2012 Vacation, taking me to Canmore, Alberta

I first visited Canmore in 2009 with a colleague of mine, as we toured around Banff & Jasper. I fell in love with the little mountain town, so I was very excited to have friends to go visit there.

Zach would be joining us on ‘segment three’ (Cirque of Towers, climbing), so it was a great spot to meet up (in Canmore).

A good friend, Ulysse, also lives in Canmore and I was lucky to spend most of my Canmore time relaxing and hanging out with him, as he was recovering from a broken ankle.

Little cafés for breakfast, 

great lattés and delicious dinners (at Ulysse’s & at the Iron Goat), simply added to our awesome climbing at Grassi Lakes
         

Definitely one of the highlights of the trip to Canmore, was meeting & chatting with amazing Ice Climber, Will Gadd { http://willgadd.com/category/blog/ } helping to organize, & plan his trip East this winter…

Summer 2012

I seem to have dropped off the Blogosphere and I miss it. 

Lori at Life, For Instance (www.lifeforinstance.com) has had some amazing, thought provoking posts where my ‘journal’ blog pales in comparison…

hehe – it’s great to have a variety of blogs online…

Excuses, reasons…I could come up with many I am sure. We humanoids are good at ‘defending’ our actions {or lack of action}…so I won’t bother

Let’s just re-start!

It’s been an incredible summer. I’ve been blessed with road-tripping and meeting some amazing people. Shall I begin?

I’ve wanted to take my daughters to Niagara Falls for as long as I can remember – even when they were little, we’d talk about taking them when they were older.  Well, with Megan heading to high school this fall, the time was now.  Summer 2012 – Niagara Falls Vacation!!!

We were seeing major changes to our school district and the whole provincial education department as a whole…actually giving the students an extra day off for summer vacation…woohooo – -so we packed up early, and headed out:  June 22^nd….

    

Second Cup is a joyful treat and with our drinks in hand…we were ready to go

Boston was our first stop and after a delicious pizza from Bertucci’s (just down the street from our hotel in Peabody)

pooltime for the girls     

and a great night sleep! (amidst a huge storm)….we were ready for …

The New England Aquarium.  And it was great – the girls thoroughly enjoyed  it. 

Penguins…

Turtles…

Sting Rays…

And some pretty cool jellyfish…

We shared a lot of “Finding Nemo” singing it was awesome.

We were all excited about arriving in Niagara Falls

The falls were magnificent and we were all in awe!

We enjoyed ‘Nature’s Fury’

Journey behind the Falls

       

Maid of the Mist

And White Water Walk

and of course the Hershey store

We even enjoyed the drive together with plaza stops for espresso ice caps and lemonade…Ladies after my own heart

I love my girls and really enjoyed our solo E-trip!  What an amazing place!

stay tuned for summer vacation 2012 blogging & pictures!

a rainy afternoon latté

an rainy afternoon latté.

a rainy afternoon latté

Lately, I’ve been taking the time, away from the house to get out and enjoy quiet time with a book, my computer and a good latté…generally I go to my stand-by…absolute favourite coffee shop (Second Cup)…

It’s a great time for reflection, people watching and to concentrate on what I’m reading (which, right now is Yvon Chouinard’s newest release “The Responsible Company” http://www.amazon.ca/The-Responsible-Company-Yvon-Chouinard/dp/0980122783).

Closer to home is a small independent coffee house ‘The Jitter Bean’.  http://www.facebook.com/jitterbeancafe

I keep wanting to stop in, but their hours never seem to work with my schedule…my friend Amy posted on her facebook one night last week that she was at the café, which reminded me that I wanted to go.  I decided THIS week would be it.  We tried one morning, but they weren’t open when we stopped in… :S

Would I ever get to try this little shop?

It’s rainy today…a great day to settle in for a latté and a blog post right? What better spot to do it than at the Jitter Bean!

    

I tried their Irish Cream Latté…very yummy. I enjoyed their coffee. However, the ambiance is not nearly as welcoming as Second Cup.

The Jitter Bean has an open piped ceiling, and no barrier between the cash & the seats…however, they do have good coffee, albeit expensive (even more expensive than Starbucks or Second Cup).  Because of the open ceiling, it was quite loud, and didn’t have that peaceful atmosphere that I enjoy at Second Cup.

Regardless, it was a nice way to spend a rainy Saturday afternoon…and I even got to see some friends John & Dot, whom I’ve not seen for awhile…always nice to catch up!

Take the time to go where you want to go, and enjoy what there is to enjoy

40 Days at Basecamp!

What a great documentary!  I have been saying to myself as of late, that I want to get out in my community more often…I want to DO other things…so to DO things that are new to me or within my community…I needed to find out about them.

We have a community paper that is called “HERE”:  http://herenb.canadaeast.com/  .

It tells you about events coming up, etc.  While I was getting my summer tires put on, I picked up my free copy…and was browsing through it, when the title ’40 days at Basecamp’ caught my eye.

Being a climber (and having a husband who intends to summit Everest)..this title jumped out at me.  AND it was playing in Moncton at our own Empress Theatre (a quaint gathering spot, as opposed to a huge venue).

http://www.capitol.nb.ca/show_id.php?id=294

I was pleasantly surprised when Greg said he’d like to attend with me! WOOHOO!  I posted it on my facebook status, hoping to generate interest (as Moncton so rarely has climbing ‘things’ like this)….our friend Mike decided to join us!

I am sooooo pleased that we went. It was a very good film. We even enjoyed a Q&A with the director Dianne Whelan afterwards.   http://www.40daysatbasecamp.com/?page_id=21

Her exploration and visual descriptions of Everest Base Camp really showed the viewer what it was like. She compared the ‘hub’ of base camp as a “Beehive without a Queen”, as there are no rules that regulate base camp per se.

In the 2010 season (April/May), there were 800 people at Everest Base Camp – - this is NOT a ‘camp’ as I think of it. It is more like a small village!  Our friend Mike, really put it into perspective…when Dianne’s film was showing us Camp 4, THAT was what we were expecting the ‘base camp’ to look like …

So step out and see something new in your community!  Support local!