Merry Xmas

Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates.

Interesting, this mornings Marin IJ had this comics section.

Sorry the photo is so bad but it actually says Sunday, December 26th, 2010??? Did we miss Christmas?

Dylan's "favorite gifty" is a Woody doll from Toy Story that Popo and YehYeh got for him, though I had to track it down, pretty hard to find the week of Christmas.

Anyway, I got to ride the last 2 days. One with my Dad out Lucas Valley Rd, really nice through some big redwoods and then along the Nicasio reservoir. Then yesterday up to the top of Mount Tamilpias which is one of my favorite rides, lots of climbing, a lake, big redwoods and big view of the bay and SanFrancisco.

You can see east bay (Oakland), Bay Bridge, San Francisco and the Pacific Ocean.

Golden Gate and Sports Car

Today we headed into San Francisco to check out a restaurant that our fried Doug recommended called House of Nanking. The online reviews basically said that at one time the place was great but now it had gotten worse and the service was bad. Our experience was that the service was reasonable, the place is small so it is loud and they are trying to move people through quickly. The food was fine as far as I could tell. All in all an OK place to go.

We stopped for Dylan to check out the Golden Gate Bridge. It was pretty foggy but Dylan had a good time walking out n the bridge and looking over the edge.

While driving out of the city we were behind a car driving pretty aggressively, weaving in and out of traffic but not getting anywhere.
Here are Linda and Dylan standing in front of a cut section of the cable that supports the bridge.

The High Life

Living the high life. Breakfast in the room

Fancy pants organic local oatmeal for Linda and huevos rancheros for me. Fresh squeezed OJ and grapefruit juice to go with tea. Linda said her fruit bowl was really good, I stayed away from that.

My parents had a gift certificate for the Fairmont Sonoma Mission which they had not used in several years, not sure how long, but they did not think that they were going to use it. We had been thinking of going to Lake Tahoe to ski/board for a couple of days but gave up on that idea and so now we are living the "High Life" even just for a day and a half while "Popo" watched the little guy. I think my parents took Dylan to the "Miwok" village yesterday and today he is hanging out with my mom.

Jingle Bells and Cycling Accident in the News

Dylan getting into the Christmas spirit.

Mom, don't think that this means that we will be enrolling Dylan in lessons anytime soon.

On a completely different note, THIS seems sad. It's almost like how the star athletes in high school and college get special treatment, in this case it just has to do with cash money.

Dylan's New Bed

Just finished building Dylan's new bed frame and getting it set up with a new mattress. He is now in a big boy bed.

He opted for the Thomas the Train sheets over Cars and Toy Story which was kind of a surprise. Hopefully all goes well and we are done with the crib and his Pack-and-Play.

Yesterday I finally started working on a coffee table that I've had the wood for the top for about 9 years. The wood is from a shelf in a house in Colorado Springs that we did a remodel on when I was working for Charlie Patterson Construction. The shelf had probably been built before 1900 since it was a built in and the house was from the 1880's? It is a nice piece of 4/4 oak and I could not bear to let it end up in the dumpster. Even though I sanded it pretty thoroughly it still retains some of the original coloring from the stain and the pin holes from where the backing was nailed on will be visible along one of the edges. My friend Pat Barr who runs a metal fabricating shop is building the base and I need to go by and get measurements for mounting the top tomorrow.

Jaxon's birthday party, distress and a frozen river

This weekend Dylan's friend, Jaxon West turned 3. His parents went over the top in making the invitations and setting up a pirate party. Here is a shot of a pirate ship that Jason made for the kids to play in.

Jason also got to drink a bunch of beer (tough assignment) to generate bottles to stuff the invitations into, think treasure map stuffed in a bottle. Will post a photo of this later.

Dylan was quite upset this evening over really nothing. Here is one of the things that got him worked up. We give him sections of the newspaper as a placemat for eating and tonight he did not want to eat so he pretended that there was a snake in his placemat and was rolling it up. Next the snake escaped and so he got more aggressive about trying to keep it contained. He crumpled the paper up after rolling it, but being a whole section of the paper it would not stay crumpled which lead to a fit. Eventually we were able to get him to calm down by letting him put rubber bands around the paper to keep it crumpled and the snake from escaping.

Last, here is a video of Dylan playing with Aiden, the son of one of Linda's co-workers, at Upper East Fork when we were up there last weekend.

Complaining, EYES and Knee

Well, I had been looking forward to this Monday for a few weeks now. I was going to have Lasik this evening, but got a call last night and the doctor is sick, so now I have to wait till next month before I can get in again. I was really looking forward to not having to deal with glasses anymore. Kind of frustrating but I guess you don't want the guy making mistake of sneezing at the wrong time.

In addition, Dylan and I made it out o Ponderosa to climb on Friday and Saturday which means carrying Dylan up and down hillsides in the baby backpack. After 2 day of that it is very obvious that my right knee is pretty much never going to be the same as it was before I ripped it up 3.5 years ago. By the end of the second day it felt like someone was kind enough to stick a needle in it every time I would step down on it.

New FA? at Upper East Fork

On Friday Dylan and I headed up to Upper East Fork in the Jemez Mountains to climb with Chris E, his doggies and Matt Moore. I'd been putting some effort into a project on Monster Wall as had a couple other guys from Los Alamos. There are 2 ways to climb through the crux section and the first time I got on the route i was trying the holds to the right of the bolts which are nasty and thin. The second time I got on it about a month ago the right line of holds had chalk on them and it seemed way more doable. Nice moves compressing on an arete.

It took a month before I was able to make it back up to the wall and we were hiking in through snow which I was happy about because it had been too hot just 1 month ago and the wall bakes in the sun. I hung the draws after warming up and re-learned the moves. There is a long sideways move at the top that had me a bit worried and on the send I barely caught the hold but managed to bear down on it and fight through to the top. Here is a shot that Mat Moore took on his iPhone, the only camera we had, of the send when I was just above the crux. While there are several people that were hoping this route would be 5.14- since it is a relatively appealing line and would be one of the longer routes of the grade in the state making it easier on the body it is likely 5.13c or d, I'm not really sure which, others can decide when they do it.

Matt did the 5.12c, Godzilla Meets Bambie with ease on his second try, only one move kept him from doing it on his first attempt. Chris managed to do all the individual moves on the new route even though he has not really been climbing. Dylan had a blast playing with the dogs and making apple sauce (snow and dirt) and even got to swing a bit.

Now I don't know if either of the other two guys working this had climbed it clean or not. Since there were still quickdraws on it through the hardest section it is safe to assume that one of them was still working on it. So I think that the name of Mike Wazowski (the little one eyes guy from Monsters Inc) is a good name since it is on Monster Wall, for now anyway. Thanks to Josh Smith for bolting and cleaning the line several years ago even though he could not do it himself at the time.

Pictures, no Words

Thanksgiving Week

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.

We are having an entertaining stay in Austin for the holiday week.

Dylan did great on the drive out, even napping when we asked him to on the second day.

Our first day out here Linda and I headed to Riemer's Ranch to do some climbing with Matt and Katie (who is almost 6 months pregnant) and Thu and Natalie. I was experiencing an "I hate Riemer's" day, climbing like crap and in general not enjoying the activity though I did have a good time hanging out with friends. Katie nearly sent her second 5.11 ever, before she got pregnant she had only climbed 5.10, so the bigger she gets the harder she climbs, go figure, Linda could not climb after about 4 months. Linda worked out the moves on Learning to Crawl, which is a pretty stiff 5.12c with lots of powerful moves and no real rests. Matt finally laid to rest Super Cruiser 5.13b which he probably got on the first day he climbed at Riemer's maybe 3 years ago and claimed it was easy and would go down any try, well 3 years later and countless tries it finally did.

On Tuesday I did a 200km permanent, which was basically a combination of 2 local rides. One, the dam loop is largely in town with a handful of big (for Texas) climbs and the other, the Fitzhugh full on Flog is an out and back to Johnson City (home of Lyndon B.), called a flog because of the endless rolling hills.

On Wednesday, Thu got off work early and we headed out to the crag which is on land that he and Nat own, Flat Creek. Dylan and Noah had a great time playing naked in the creek and sharing food. The adults had a good time pulling on some steep rock and Linda worked out the moves on Scapegoat 5.12b and basically did it with 1 hang on her second try to lead the route. Thu came quite close to finishing off the 5.13b he has been working for the last few months and Nat got some good beta for the crux section of the route she has been working on. I on-sighted Amnesia 5.13a and Carl's Route 5.12c, it is always interesting finishing routes at Flat since there are no anchors. You have to mantle and top out, then rest and reverse the mantle and drop. We will probably be headed to Flat again tomorrow, hopefully, and with cooler weather.

Today is a big Thanksgiving party at Linda's sisters house with family and their friends. Since just about everything is closed today I got to make blue cheese hamburgers for everyone for lunch. I think we finished 6 pounds of meat, but there may have been 15 people.

I have some photos of the kids playing in the creek and Linda climbing that I will try to get up once I can downsize them.

Dylan's Tuesday

Well yesterday was an interesting day. We had Dylan's first parent teacher conference of the year. He seems to be doing OK at school, getting along with the other kids and such. He has some issue with listening to the teacher so we have been working on that. He does not like to go in from the playground when outside time is up, the teacher even tried to "leave" him out on the playground and take everyone else in, in the hopes that Dylan would get spooked being out there alone and come running in. Dylan just continued to play in the sandbox as though nothing was wrong.

We received a book that one of the teachers had made of a story that Dylan told her while on the playground and during early care. It is a story about a dog (who happens to be named Komo, which is the name of Chris, Jo and Trinity's dog) and Dylan and the dogs friend that Dylan made up. The teacher than wrote it down and illustrated it, quite well I might add, apparently she is an art teacher.

After the meeting Dylan had his 3 year old Dr's appointment. This one includes no required shots and Dylan was actually quite distressed that he was not going to get a shot. Since he is no longer allergic to eggs though he was able to get the flu shot which he was surprisingly happy about, though his eyes did get big when the needle went in. I wonder how often it is that a 3 year old asks for a shot and fusses when they are told that they don't need one?

Dylan with Buzz and a Weekend of Climbing

Here is a video of Dylan playing with his Buzzlight Year toy.

On Saturday we headed to Datil which should be too cold to climb at by this point, but instead it was too warm to climb in the sun. It seems as though it is going to be a warm and dry winter. Linda got back on "Straight on till Morning" which is 5.12c she had tried once a couple of years ago. She nearly did it on her second try this time around. It would only be her second route of the grade that she had done. Hopefully it will stay warm enough for us to make another trip out this year so she can get it done.

On Sunday I headed up to the Sandias with John Kear to try and climb a new route that was put up earlier this year called Daisy, named after the first ascentionists dog, that is reportedly 5.13. John had gotten on the route on Friday and worked out the moves but not been able to link it without falling because it was too hot, how can it be too hot at 10,000 feet in November? We warmed up by climbing a couple of pitches up a neighboring route since the hard pitch was the first off the ground. John then gave a great fight, squeezing for all he was worth and nearly puking and managed to send the route for the second? ascent and after watching him on it I was able to do the route first try as well. It probably is low end 5.13 and not mid range but still a great route. The second pitch is really fun and quite a bit easier on good hold up a steep red wall. Sadly the last pitch leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth as the rock quality deteriorates dramatically and it seems as though the first ascent party did not put much effort into cleaning it, though they may have put more time into cleaning it than the other pitches it could still use some more. All in all a pretty good day out in the mountains for John and I, and a really good route if you can look past the final pitch.

14th Annual Yank-N-Yard

I was joking around with some friends that with taking care of Dylan most of the time I actually earn about 25% of my yearly income in the couple of weeks a year we bring in reinforcements to watch him.

Well the second week of October was one of those weeks. My parents came out to help watch Dylan so I could help get everything ready for the Yank-N-Yard competition that was in it's 14th year. I got to spend maybe only 10 hours with my parents in almost 10 days while they were out, but w did have dinner and dessert for my mom's birthday.

Linda competed on Friday night Open qualifying and missed finals by one spot. Pretty great considering she is twice the age of most of the competitors and has very little big competition experience. Then on Saturday she easily won the citizens competition by about 3000 points which means that she did not even need to do all her problems to win, she could have counted just her top 3 and beaten everyone else counting their top 6.

After the citizens competition on Saturday the Open Finals happened. The link below is to a video put together of the finals.

Yank-N-Yard Finals Video by Alstin Films

Needless to say,with how much of a show it was Linda is kind of glad that she did not make finals. Pretty good competition all around. I managed to pull together about $8000 in raffle prizes for the citizens competition and the gym gave away $4000 cash to the open competitors.

Photos from Sitting Bull Falls

Here are some photos from our second weekend at Sitting Bull Falls. These first ons were taken by Matt Menotti who came out with Katie from Austin to meet us for Labor Day weekend. This is me hanging the draws for everyone on Counting Coup 5.12, which is one of the best routes of its grade in the state. Linda sent this on her first try one she gave up on the very reachy short person beta and used a real hod that made the moves shorter. This is at the start of the route just getting up to the rest before the hardest moves.
Her I am in the middle of the crux.
Counting Coup is a great route and very fun. Linda was quite pleased with her success and it started a string of days out climbing during which she climbed a 5.12 every day. including the next day when she did the 5.12a to the left in 2 tries.

This second group were taken by our friend Matt Moore who works with me at the climbing gym and the are on Kootenai Cruiser which is 5.13+ and I managed to do on my second try.

There is some physical climbing on underclings to get up to the hardest section.
Followed by a very physical clip,
And capped by a pretty long throw to a good edge,
Which I barely caught.
Then a ways to the anchor on easier 5.12 climbing.
Finishing off Kootenai Cruiser means that I've finished off the cliff, except for the undone project right out the middle which has some very viscous looking holds on it and will probably require someone with much stronger tendons than mine. Something about the shallow sloping two finger pocket and V slot mono that is only a pad on a 45 degree wall with poor feet is unappealing to me, though if we go back I need to try something....

Dylan's 3rd Birthday

On Friday the 22nd Dylan turned 3. We had a little birthday party for him, inviting his class mates and some of our climbing friends that have kids. We started in the park which was great for the little ones as they got to run around but was probably a bit cold for the adults since it has cooled off in the last few days. After eating a bit we headed back to the house for cake and ice cream and to make a mess. Here is Dylan and his birthday cake.
Among the guests was JaxsonWest and his little sister Bridgette. At 9 months Bridgette is really mellow and all the kids seemed to know to give her some space, she never got knocked over or anything and Dylan was even good enough to share toys with her...and the other kids as well.
We only let Dylan open a couple of gifts on Friday night and on Saturday night he got to open the present that Linda and I got for him.
Buzz could use a "to infinity and beyond" button. As it is it is one of 6 lines he says when you press a particular button and Dylan will sit there and push that button until that line comes up and then run around making Buzz fly and repeat. Dylan even read Buzz a goodnight story that night.

Some photos

Well it has been awhile. Here are some photos.
This was camping for the weekend A Datil with Mark and Debi. They have a cab over camper that Dylan loved, it is just his size when it is collapsed.
That same weekend Linda got stung on the lip by a bee that was trying to drink from her water bottle at the same time she was. Nothing happened the first day but the next morning it looked like she had gotten a botox treatment for lip enhancement.
We headed to SE New Mexico to climb at Sitting Bull Falls on the first weekend of September and meet up with some friends from Austin to limb then continued on to Austin for the rest of the week. Here Dylan and Noah are stealing Thu's food. Dylan will attach himself to anyone who has food and is willing to part with it.
After being in SE NM in the 95 degree heat with not a cloud in the sky, by the time we got to Austin the remnants of a tropical storm were just starting to roll through and it rained for about 36 straight hours causing tons of flooding. Later in the week when we headed out climbing it was back up to 90 degrees with 70+ percent humidity. Conditions that put you at risk of heat stroke with physical activity.

Here is a shot of Dylan attempting to brush his teeth.
And here is Dylan after eating a raw steak...actually waking up with a bloody nose and this is after I did a first wipe down.

Sandia Mountains Bolting Issues

Just got back from a meeting at the climbing gym to discus some issues that have come up about bolting in the Sandias. The ranger district want to put some restrictions on the placement of fixed anchors in the range. This was coming eventually on a national level but way put on the fast track locally by some climbers getting caught using a power drill which is illegal and the impression, right or not, that many of the new routes that have been put up were done so with a power drill.

What will ultimately come of this is that there will likely be an application process to put up new routes and the applications will need to be approved by the NFS. As climbers we can either participate or not. If we don't participate then we have no say in what we feel is appropriate or not and I also feel it is important to show the NFS that we as climbers feel strongly about our rights to be able to add new routes. On the other hand we could not participate, essentially saying that we don't care and let them run the whole thing or just shut down the installation of new fixed anchors all together.

It is safe to say that most all climbers would like to see new routes that they feel are worth while additions get established, but this is where issues arise. What one climber feels is worthy another may think is a waste of time. How one climber puts up a route another might think is unethical. The problem is that the NFS does not care about any of these things, all they care about is the number of fixed anchors and if they were installed with a hand drill or a power drill.

Needless to say we had a 2 hour meeting that involved lots of veiled mud slinging about ethics and what routes belong and don't belong and very little time dedicated to coming up with something to actually present to the NFS. We are lucky in that the local resource manger is a climber himself, it makes it easier to communicate and he understands a little better what climbers are after. . . I don't know guess I'm just a little frustrated that you get a room full of climbers together to try and solve some issue and all you really end up getting from at least half the room is a bunch of unnecessary posturing.

Bike Stuff

Last week Linda's new frame came in. Here it is partially built up. Mostly DA 7900, right now I have 7800 shifters on it, though there may be a compatibility issue that will mean we need to put the newer shifters on, though Linda thinks she likes the shape of the 7800 better. The frame has a seat mast that will need to be cut as well as the stearer tube which the LBS (local bike shop) will do when she goes in to get fit. The last thing I want to do is cut the seat mast to the wrong length, if that is going to happen I'd rather have the LBS be responsible.

Just ignore the terribly messy work bench, I usually manage to find all the tools I need. Walt this makes your shop look pristine.
On another note. On my lunch ride today I headed up to the La Luz trail head. This is a steep 2.25 mile road that averages 8% but with lots of stuff over 10%. It is nice to get a reasonably long climb in that is steep but it has always been unpleasant as well since the pavement is only good at the start and finish. There was a section of 1-1.5 miles where you could not find any smooth pavement, all potholes and cracks, the best place to ride was on the paint lines down the middle of the road at least while going up.

I've always thought it would be nice if it got repaved but at the same time scary since you could go so much faster on the downhill which on this road would not be safe, with the tight blind curves, drop offs and a fair bit of traffic. Well the city or county is repaving it, but as of now there is no pavement. The dirt is hard packed and they have been spraying the surface with water to keep dust down, especially where they are working. With the dirt surface the road is actually a lot smoother than when it was paved, but the decent is terrifying, particularly where it is muddy.

Which brings us to this next shot. This is after I cleaned the big chunks out and road back the climbing gym. Looks like I could use a bit more mud clearance on my Cervelo.
Anyway, hopefully the road turns out nice and people are careful and conscientious on the decent. I bet the local hill climb record gets broken with in a month or so.

4th of July and 1st Haircut

This last weekend we headed to the Dungeon with Scarlet. There were a whole bunch of folks from Albuquerque out there that we climbed with as well. Linda finally worked out a good sequence on the bottom of Moat Jump 5.12a with the help of Susana, and it seems as though she ought to be able to send it. I mostly ran laps on things since I've done most everything there, did three 5.13's after warming up. Dylan had fun as usual playing in the dirt and the stream. This time instead of using his harness we brought the real swing which he really enjoyed. Here he is being "watched" by one of the dogs for us.Dylan and I went to visit John and Carolyn last week before John left to guide in Europe for a month and a half. We hung out in Carolyn's personal training studio and climbed while Dylan got to use some of the training equipment, here he is on the rowing machine with John.
For the 4th of July weekend we headed to the Taos area to do some climbing. We met up with Betty and Eric. The Groth's where there as well, John, Liz and their girls Sarah and Michele. The girls were great playing with Dylan, her Dylan "belays" Michele (the younger of the two) while she pretends to climb.
The first day we climbed at Comales Canyon which is a fun crag with "vacation" grades (ie: they are easy).

Dylan is starting to get the hang of camping and is always excited to get into the tent, though he likes to run around and play without going to sleep until he is so tired that he drops mid-sentence. Here's Dylan getting ready for the sun to go down with Linda's headlamp.
The second day, after a very slow start and a kind of long drive we ended up at El Rito and got a few routes in before heading home. We just ran some laps on stuff on the Rad Wall.

Finally gave Dylan his first hair cut last week. Here is the "before" shot.....
and the "after"
We now have our little monk back.

Here is a video of Dylan singing a song about frogs, he misses a bit at the end but it is still pretty funny.

More cell phone photos

Here is an old shot of Dylan on his last day of school. You know, when the kids get sent home at noon. They had a nice pizza party and after lunch the teachers gave them ice cream...right before sending them home. Something tells me that the kids don't usually get the full sugar infusion right after lunch, unless the one giving it does not have to deal with the consequences. Here is Dylan "finishing" his ice cream.
We had a good weekend.

On Saturday Dylan and Linda went to the children's music class while Chris broke my legs on a bike ride up south 14 and the crest.

On Sunday we headed out climbing with John and Carolyn. We started out at Las Conchas in the Jemez Mountains with the hopes of getting on a couple of routes that overhang the creek which is a pretty cool setting. When we arrived it was 74 degrees and just before 11am. We managed to get 1 or 2 warm ups in, depending on the person, before it started to rain, then freezing rain and finally hail. Anyway that got us to run for the car at which point the temperature had dropped to 46 degrees and this at noon when it is supposed to be getting warmer. We headed down the hill to the Crystal Cave since it is completely sheltered, but it was not raining there anyway. This was both Linda and Carolyn's first times to the cave. I think that they enjoyed the climbing well enough. John worked on and came close to doing Minutia which is surprisingly long for how close to the ground you are the whole time. I did Minutia and the short (5.13-) version of the Leper. All in all we had a good day climbing.

The cactus on the approach to the Crystal Cave are in bloom. They are quite pretty.Dylan liked both areas. There is a great creek and meadow area for him to play in at Conchas. He enjoyed "feeding the snakes" (throwing small rocks) in the river. He had to run back and forth through the meadow to get pebbles from the trail and take them back to the river. The Crystal Cave is so steep that we could set up a rope for him to swing on just about anywhere. Eventually John just hoisted him up and tied him off to a bolt so he could swing and swing and nobody had to hold him.

Here is a dragonfly by one of the creeks we hung out near during the day.

Worst Customer Service Ever, Cycle Satation, Kona HI

We had a terrible rental experience though. The bikes were great but I've never experienced such poor customer service in my life. Even though they had the bikes available when we got in they said that if we picked them up we would have to have them back by the same time the following day which is absurd since that was the day we had them reserved for, so in theory they were planning on them being out all day anyway. We were told that there was a 2 hour grace period though. Then when we did go pick up the bikes we were told that there was only a 1 hour grace period, they can't even get their own policy straight. After that my parents and Linda rode the next morning kind of late, I rode later since someone had to stay back to watch Dylan. After finishing they were not going to make the 1 hour grace period and so took their time and ate some of the food that I had gotten while they were out. Eventually they made their way back to the bike shop to return the bikes and were lectured on how they really did not like to get bikes back late even though we had explained that they would probably be coming back late, even though this was still during the "day" that I'd reserved the bikes for in advance. They were also told again that it was a 2 hour grace period which they could have made if they had just headed back to the shop after riding but were 15-30 minutes late for. The guys was good enough though to not charge them for the extra day on the bikes, this was about the only thing they did right.
OK, so at this point we have 2 hour grace period and I was riding until sunset. Racing the setting sun along the Ironman course back into town was pretty cool. The next day we did our snorkeling trip in the morning and then, since we'd been told we had a 2 hour grace period, took showers and cleaned up before heading to the bike shop to return the bike I'd been riding. Well when we returned the bike the grace period had some how morphed back into a 1 hour time span and we were late, though 15 minutes early for the 2 hour and thus got charged for 3 days, since we had been previously charged for one day when the rest of the bikes were returned (though we could have made the 1 hour period if we'd just gone straight from the boat to the bike shop before cleaning up). On top of this we were charged a different rate for the same bike on the two charges???
Additionally when we were making the return, the mechanic, who I believe is an owner, was having a very heated conversation with another customer. It went something like this:
C-How long does the battery charge last on this (Garmin or something)?
M-Long enough
C-???
M-About 8 hours, it is great
C-Sometimes I am out longer than that.
M-You NEED to get faster.
Say what? He proceeded to tell the customer that maybe she should just quit cycling or something, this in front of other customers. Needless to say there was a bit of yelling going on and a promise to never return to the shop again which I can completely agree with and would recommend never going to this bike shop as there is another only a couple miles away that also rents bikes. I never went into the other shop but there is no way that they could be as bad and one of the locals that was working on the boat recommended them to us after hearing our tale of Cycle Station.

HI, Iron Horse, Durango, Swinging on Ropes

We've been busy lately. In May we had a Regional competition at the gym for the youth kids from NM and CO. Which was right after heading to Hawaii for another of my cousins weddings, this time Melissa. Now all of Uncle Ken and Uncle Calvin's kids are married off so now it is up to my mom's youngest brother to start marrying off his kids to give us continued reasons to head to the islands. Here is a shot of Melissa and her husband Mark.
Before the wedding we headed to the big island with my parents and spent a few days around Kona. Here Dylan is enjoying the view of an active crater in Volcanos NP with my dad for support.
On another day we headed out on a boat to do a snorkeling trip. I have to say that the snorkeling off of Maui is far better.
W also rented bikes and went for a ride on day. Very pretty riding the far end of the Kona ironman course and looping around through the Kahala mountains at the northern tip of the island.

See Terrible Rental Experience.

After our trip which included 6 different days with some flying and the wedding in a 10 day period we all needed a vacation, so here is Dylan relaxing with a book.
At the end of May We joined Lance and his fiance Sarah in Durango, CO for a weekend with some bouldering and to do the Iron Horse bike race, which Chris and Joanna also did. The race went pretty well for the 3 of us rock climbers, Chris finished 11th, Lance 30th and I 20th in the Cat 4/5 race with about 120 racers. The next couple of days we did some bouldering at Sailing Hawks and Turtle Lake which are pretty spots. We ran into a group from an ABQ bike shop, Fixed & Free at Turtle Lake and climbed with them for a bit. Dylan took a liking to this girl and her little dog. I think he looks pretty humorous with his dirt mustache.
In the last couple of months we've been taking a harness for Dylan with us to the crags. He loves to be hoisted up and just swing. He could spend all day dangling from the rope.
But alas the fun must come to an end so others can climb and Dylan likes to take a rest on the rope.
On another note,

My parents are 2 weeks into their cross country bike ride and in the middle of Montana. What am I supposed to make of this?