Britton's Adventure: December 2005

Day 183, Sunday, December 4

Went for a 10 to 15 mile ride with Karen this morning. I had a nice tumble down the edge of the trail but got lucky to catch my footing as soon as I did. If I hadn’t I’d have probably slid another 30 or 40 feet further than I did. As it was, the slope I managed to stop myself on was steep enough that I couldn’t get out on my own. I had to have Karen grab the bike which was trapped by one of my legs before I could even attempt to crawl back up the slope. Cool. Got a nice raspberry on my left leg as a result. Nice ride.

After the ride, Karen invited me over for dinner. She made the same shrimp jumbalaya she made back at Crater Lake where I met her. Fantastic! She also made some dense whole wheat bread which we had along with the shrimp jumbalaya. We sat out on her back deck and played cards ‘till sunset.

Day 182, Saturday, December 3

Karen and I went for a 20+ mile ride today, the grand loop at the Cuyamaka mountains. I definitely suffered from having the sore throat. After the ride I found myself with a constant cough and a still itchy throat. What’s more is that she, another of her friends and I are also going or another ride tomorrow morning. I’m sure I’m going to be hurting bad tomorrow afterthat ride.

Day 181, Friday, December 2

When you’re not accustomed to hanging around with children, rather when your immune system isn’t accustomed to it, and you spend the better part of a week with three of them, it’s a pretty good bet that a sore throat will result. Such was the case. Yesterday on my ride to San Diego, I felt the onset of a sore throat. Last night I didn’t help things by staying up with Peter and his room mate Dave until 3:30am. To make up for it I slept in late this morning trying to ditch what ever bug I’ve gotten. The main reason I want to ditch this bug in a hurry is that I’ve lined up another mountain biking outing with Karen Torgersen tomorrow morning. I’d hate to attempt to keep up with her with a sore throat.

Day 180, Thursday, December 1

Got everything ready to depart from the Chungs. Was planning on meeting for lunch with a guy, Bob Gay, who I met in Yellowstone but decided that having lunch with him would cause me to arrive in San Diego much later than I’d wanted. I took off from Vegas around 1:00 and arrived in San Diego at 7:30. It’s really good to see Peter again. I haven’t spent time with him for more than a year. Way too long.

I had to take one artsy picture of the dam

looking over the dam at the Colorado River down below.

looking back up Lake Mead, it's easy to see how much the water has dropped since the dam was constructed.

here is the spill way in the foreground with the dam and its generator intakes in the background

Hoover Dam is interesing because its spill way is actually separated from the dam and is, in fact, off to the side.

these are the intakes for the electric generators at Hoover Dam. Visible in the upper left of the picture is the construction for the new, high bridge which will completely divert traffic off of the bridge.

Day 179, Wednesday, November 30, 2005

Drove over to Hoover Dam for pictures. Spent the morning riding around on errands, trying to find a type of adhesive for the bike (Velcro) and a battery for my camera. Back to Chungs in evening for dinner and looking at pictures.
I'll be heading back to San Diego tomorow to spend a bit more than a week with my brother, Peter.

sunset picture looking East. This was way past sunset and a 1-second exposure

Badwater Flats at Sunset

leaving the sand dunes, I headed back towards Badwater Flats to get some sunset pictuers. This was on the way

how could anybody take a poor picture of this?

of all of my desert shots, this one looks the most like a watercolor painting

beautiful

I liked the monotone appearance of this shot

more of the dried mud flats hidden in the sand dunes

animal tracks over a slumped section of a dune

This depression of dried mud had been coverd over by the sand and gave the effect of some sort of fossilized animal lying burried

there were areas where rain water had collected and evavporated over counless years leaving cool plates of layered dried mud.

I loved the effects of the wind in sculpting the sand around all objects in its path.

many of my pictures in the dunes came out looking like water color paintings

there were cool little animal trakcs all ove rhte dunes. I'd love to come out here during the night to see all the animals active on the dunes.

One of the interesting things about Death Valley is that, unlike most other National Parks, there are very few established trails in the park. Guests are simply encouraged to park beside the road andd make their own paths! I parked beside the dunes and headed out onto the sand.

North bound through the park

Day 178, Tuesday, November 29

I’d initially planned on packing up my bags early today and heading back to Las Vegas with out further exploration of the valley. I had a complete change in plans. I decided to spend this morning playing around on the sand dunes by Stove pipe Wells.. Here too, I’d expected barren sandy expanses that might be fun to play on but which wouldn’t capture my interest otherwise. Again, I was badly mistaken. The dunes were exceptionally beautiful. Many of my pictures came out looking like paintings and I was pleased to find countless animal tracks all over the dunes. This evening I went back to bad water flats to take pictures at sunset. I drove back to Chungs in Henderson (LasVegas) after dark.

Heading North through Death Valley to Stove Pipe Wells and the sand dunes

just after sunset at the end of my day hiking Sindewindder. Sunset came at 4:30!

more of Sindwinder

this is a pic of Sidewinder canyon looking West. It was tough getting the exposure right on pictures in the canyon because there was so little light in the canyon and all of the interesting views were facing West (bright background)

two successive undercuts at bends in Sidewinder canyon.

there were numerous 10 to 15 foot walls I had to scale in my route up the side canyon. It's hard to tell it from this picture, but the wall here is damn near vertical and I'm holding my weight on the rock in my right hand and a smalll indentation in my left.

This is the entrance to the side canyon I hiked off of Sidewinder Canyon. The entire side canyon was this slotted. At times the walls were taller, I'd guess, than 100feet and the wallls were only shoulder width apart.

looking West over the flats in a section wher ethe sallt has formed in hairy crystals

The salt crystals grow in amazingly complex, hair-like strands and underlying mounds in some areas. In other areas, the salt simply forms a cap as flat and smooth as a table top

salt as far as the eye can see

me on the flats

walking out over the flats, the salt stuck to the bottom of my boots like snow would in colder weather.

badwater flats

The salt flats had incredibly cool forms. The ridges are areas where cracks have formed in the solid salt cap from the drying process and wet salt from the mud flats below has pushed up and dried

no caption needed

Can you imagine? 134 degrees?

If you couldn't read the sign in the previous picture, this is it

Check out the small sign on the cliff above my motorcycle

Day 178, Tuesday, November 29

I’d initially planned on packing up my bags early today and heading back to Las Vegas with out further exploration of the valley. I had a complete change in plans. I decided to spend this morning playing around on the sand dunes by Stove pipe Wells.. Here too, I’d expected barren sandy expanses that might be fun to play on but which wouldn’t capture my interest otherwise. Again, I was badly mistaken. The dunes were exceptionally beautiful. Many of my pictures came out looking like paintings and I was pleased to find countless animal tracks all over the dunes. This evening I went back to bad water flats to take pictures at sunset. I drove back to Chungs in Henderson (LasVegas) after dark.

Check out the elevation reading on my GPS. Pretty cool!

Day 177, Monday, November 28

Today I first went over to Badwater flats. Badwater is the huge salt flat that I’d initially associated with the park. I figured it was just going to be a huge featureless table of salt, desolately dry and unimpressive. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! The salt crystals grow in a multitude of intricate forms and are actually covering a large area of wet mud. I thought it was beautiful. After going to the Badwater flats, I decided to go hiking up a slot canyon, Sidewinder Canyon. I didn’t hike fully up Sidwinder because I went way up a tributary canyon. The tributary was very narrow and slotted and a riot to hike because of multiple technical walls I had to climb to get to the end of the tributary canyon. Several of the walls were more than 10 feet tall and I had to grapple my way up small outcroppings to get over the obstacles.

riding into Death Valley

dropping into Death Valley. my first hint that the valley would be beautiful rather than uninteresting

Day 176, Sunday, November 27

Left for Death Valley. I arrived in late afternoon and went for a quick ride through the valley. I’d not expected to be particularly impressed by Death Valley. I’d really expected a desolate, uninviting, barren landscape. Boy was I wrong. It’s beautiful. I’d initially thought I’d drive in tonight and drive back tomorrow. I can see that I’ll be staying longer than I’d thought. I went to the Furnace Creek Visitor Center to have them recommend a few hikes and then set up camp at Texas Spring camp ground.

Day 175, Saturday, November 26

Day spent with Chungs. I’ll plan to head over to Death Valley tomorrow.

Day 174, Friday, November 25

Yesterday I decided I'd check the rear tire of my motorcycle to see if I could tell why it's been loosing air. Didn't take long before I found the nail I'd picked up. Problem is that neither car tire dealerships nor motorcycle dealerships will repair tires. That's a pisser because this rear tire still has thousands of miles of tread left on it. I figure I'll mail the tire home and patch it after the trip is done. I spent the morning at the BMW dealership getting an oil change and a new tire. $300. Ouch. Spent the afternoon playing with the kids and talking with the adults.

Thanksgiving dinner with the Chungs. From left to right LeAnn, Draco, Thi, TongTao, Hiep, me, Mr Chung, Mrs Chung, Jasmine, Mei. Draco is Thi and TongTao's son. LeAnn and Jasmine are Hiep and Mei's daughters.

Day 173, Thursday, November 24

Thanksgiving!
The Chungs are definitely family to me. I spent more time at their house in MN than I did at any other house other than my own growing up. After the meal, we all hopped into their mini van and drove down town Vegas to see lights.

Day 172, Wedesday, November 23,

The camp host was right about last night’s temps. They were about as cold as last night on the rim of the Grand Canyon. As I was packing up my tent this morning one of the kids from a neighboring camp site came over offering a trout that he’d caught. I’d have loved trout for breakfast, but must admit that I was feeling a bit too lazy to stop and clean and cook the fish. I also didn’t relish the smell of fishy hands in my motorcycling gloves, nor the feeling of hands chilled to the bone in the process of cleaning the fish. The boy was visibly disappointed that I didn’t accept his fish so I thanked him profusely for the offer and explained that I “didn’t have anything to cook or clean it with.” It was a white lie, but in this case, it clearly made him feel better. Another reason I didn’t want to cook any sort of breakfast at all this morning is because the sub-freezing temps kept me hidden in my sleeping bed ‘till nearly 9am. It was definitely too cold for me to try handling all the metal utensils and cook ware to make breakfast.
I drove all the way back to Hiep and Mei’s house this morning. I had to stop twice today to put air in my rear tire which has developed a slow leak. I’ll plan to take it to the BMW dealership in Vegas on Friday morning for an oil change and to get them to re-seal the tire for me. I’ve also got to get some sort of hair cover for inside the helmet. My hair is now longer than it has been since 1988! It’s getting in my eyes when I put the helmet on.
It turns out that the Chungs were at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon today and got delayed getting home due to a flat tire. Since I got to their house before they did, I dropped off my trailer and headed over to look at the Las Vegas strip. Bright lights and lots of exhaust smell.

Day 171, Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Last night was even colder than the previous night. I couldn’t even have the tip of my nose out of the sleeping bag comfortably. I know that people sleep completely balled up inside their sleeping bags, but there’s still something in me that thinks there’s got to be a slight suffocation risk there. For that reason I always like to feel the cold air as I breathe in. Overly careful? Foolishly worried? Who knows.
I decided that this morning was as good a time as any to take care of some washing that needed to get done, washing both of clothes and of my red-stained cooler. The combined efforts delayed my departure from Mather Campground until nearly 1pm.
By the time I left, the weather had warmed up to t-shirt temps which was a welcome change. Back in Zion Canyon, Bob recommended that I stay at Dead Horse Ranch after leaving the Grand Canyon, and it was a great recommendation. $12 gets a tent site, free showers, and hot water in the bathroom and dish washing sinks (most campgrounds I’ve stayed at only have hot water in the pay showers.). I roasted a few hot dogs on a campfire that my neighbors had lit and sat and talked with them for a while before turning in at the early hour of 8. The camp host told me it’s supposed to get quite cold tonight and I wanted to get as much sleep in before the dropping temps started to keep me awake.