Duck Hunt

The original.

Balti-More More More!

Two weeks ago we visited Baltimore, home of the Orioles and "The Wire".



Our visit was spent at the waterfront. Here we went on tours of the Baltimore Maritime Museum.

<---- a Coast Guard ship 'Taney' that took part in Pearl Harbour,






<---- 'Torsk' the submarine with the mouth painted on the bow,








<---- and beds on torpedoes. And there was a lighthouse that had been removed from sea and brought to Baltimore.

And a little boat called the 'Chesapeake' that must have had some local significance, but the tour was starting to get boring at this point.







Another boat. a little taller and a little older.





We will have to make a special trip to see the National Aquarium another time.

From this bay in downtown Baltimore we took a water taxi to further out in the bay were there was another district with restaurants and shops that was also very nice. It was a nice relaxing place to visit, and at barely an hour from our place it is worth returning too when we want to get away from Dubya.

Nanny state

On my commute to work the city has painted big white marks on the trees closest to the trail. Because f this I should not have been surprised when I went out to the single track system and saw signs warning about the dangers of falling and steep slopes.

A week of rain

Last week was wet here in Arlington. My bike route turned into a canoe route. I captured these photos and videos of the two water falls I ride over and the tunnels I ride through on my daily commute. If I ride within a couple hours of rain they are flooded as shown here. These shots were trapped Thursday.








By Friday when it had been raining for a 3 days straight, the water falls were more raging and the tunnels had less air space. Crossing the waterfalls submerged my hubs, passing through 1 tunnel submerged my wheels and water bottle. The second tunnel was a narrow part of the river so it was very fast flowing sending rooster tails of water over my head.






That was a perfect way to finish off a week at work.

Weakerthans

Tonight we saw the Weakerthans (ex. 1, 2), a fine Winnipeg band. I hoped to see a couple Winnipeg Jets shirts in the crowd..... I am not sure most people there had heard of Winnipeg before. I think that because of the complete lack of response to their "I hate Winnipeg" song. They didn't play my favorite... thank god for downloads.

The venue is great. The Hip played there on Friday night, also to a sub-capacity crowd. We wil have to watch the line-up at this place.

'Guardian' nature photos of the year

Some great photos at the Guardian

Harpers Ferry

We visited an old historic town Sunday called Harpers Ferry. It is at the fork of the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers where Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia meet. The town is within Harpers Ferry National Historical Park, and most of the buildings in town are preserved as museums. This used to be a large gun manufacturing and pulp town and therefore switch hands a lot during the Civil War. Most talk and information signs around town are about all the glorious glorious battles that took place here. The most famous person from the town is John Brown, an insurgent slave abolitionist.




There are a couple great hikes from the town that get you quite high up for some good views of the rolling hills behind Harpers Ferry. For the first time when approaching a trail system that is designated as strenuous, they were right to call it that. It was a very steep and rocky trail (PDF). From here there is also whitewater rafting and kayaking. We discussed this before going but decided it would be too cold, it is late October. But no one told Virginia, it is still reaching high 20s most days.



We drove to Harpers Ferry, but you can get there by bike on the W & OD trail from DC (about 110km) or by train (Amtrac). The drive to Harpers Ferry (we took the scenic route) passes through wine country. We went by quite a few wineries. We will have to make a trip out of that some other time.

Bird

On my way to work the other day a bird swooped at me from the side and flew into my bike spokes . Horrifying.

Food

Only 3.5 cents of every dollar goes to the farmer when food is purchased at the grocery store, according to the Sustain AgriFood Network versus the 80 to 90 cents on the dollar that goes to the farmer when food is purchased at a farmer's market.

EV Fierro

This silently whizzed by me today. Notice the solar panels on the hood and trunk.

Fort Hunt Park

Went to Fort Hunt Park for the company picnic yesterday. A nice day for some hotdogs. The park was an hour ride from home almost George Washington's house (we were here Independence Day) in Mt. Vernon. I was able to get there completely on bike trails along 4-Mile Run Creek and the Potomac River. This is the fort on the other side of the river from the park we were in.

The Storm AR

On the weekend of September 29 I re-entered the world of adventure racing. It was a short road back in. 3 weeks before the race started I did an Internet search for the AR scene in the area and came across this race in Cape Charles, VA. I checked out the message board and connected with some folks looking for a person with experience to race with them. This late in the game I figured I would have enough experience to fool a couple first timers.

We planned to meet at their beach house just before race check in Friday, then go register. Things started going wrong before that even happened. They had been delayed in New Jersey and were not expected to get to Cape Charles VA until after midnight. So i checked in for the team, did the 2 gear drops with my gear and went to their beach house which was supposed to have a hidden key. No key. So i broke in. Made a bed and fell asleep. During my slumber my teammates arrived at the gear drop zones, packed their boxes and made their way to the house by 3am. 6:30 I woke up and went to the kitchen where I met my teammates for the first time.

After loading up the car (and watering the garden briefly) we climbed in our motorized transport and went south to Cape Charles, the start line. We got there 15 min. late (7:45) for the start..... though the emails and website still say 8 am start. At this race the maps and co-ordinates were handed out at the start line, and our set had already been taken away by the race director. Even though they know what our team had gone through the night before just to get there. Anyway they found a set for us and we were on our way.

The race route went something like this. I hope to have pictures up in a couple weeks (photos taken by teammates with a film camera - it will take time)

After a brief orienteering section we were herded onto buses and driven 45 "painfully holding the pee" minutes to the start of the boat section. A short paddle out to sea dodging the bullets of duck hunters (they were really pointing their guns right at us and firing!!) and we beached ourself and walked 1 to 2 hours on the beach (I can't remember, but it was long) dragging our boats. After the beach we headed into water behind the barrier islands. This was interesting.

On the maps there were 3 areas called 'mud flats' that we were going to have to paddle through (in our planned route). The mud flats were green with a straight white channel down the middle. So they looked as though they would be marshy or dry land with a dredged canal running through for boats. When we go to the first area marked mud flat we came into a huge open body of water. What was green was blue. This caused a bottle neck as team came out of the reeds into the open water. After some quick triangulation I knew we were in the right spot and continued on the planned route. We gained a lot of time here as people tried to stick to the 'canal'. we cut through the open water to some short cuts and to a second mud flat. Again wide open water. Seeing a mud flat by the end of the paddling section that would shave off many kilometers we cut our way through the waterways to this mud flat.

The tide had gone out. It was now a mud flat.

My boat was light and shallow enough that I could paddle and scrape my butt on the mud and clams. My teammates had to alternate between walking on water and towing and paddling with their butts on the bottom. Hooray, other teams we had caught followed us this way!

Then it was a couple hours in the saddle. The area is criss crossed with roads at every mile. I should have ridden my new cross bike. I will know for next time.

Trekking. At night. My favorite. The TA was in a tomato field (sandy field with tomato plants growing out of bags of soil). We found all 10 CPs in order. But the forest was killer on the legs. The ground was covered in vines with giant spikes. By the end of the night anyone in shorts had hamburger meat exposed from the knees to the ankles. During this section I caught some fierce poison ivy. My second time this summer. At first I (and people at work) thought I had been bitten by a brown recluse because of the wound in the middle of the big blotchy patch on my arm. After seeing a doctor Friday he was convinced it was an insect bite, but not a spider. I realized Saturday it was poison ivy when my arm started to ooze.

Back in the tomato field there was bonfire where my teammates warmed up and I plotted out the remainder of the course. We were back on the bikes for another exciting ride through the roads of back-country Virginia. After criss crossing the highway (and a stop for coffee at a diner) we were back in the boats for a quick paddle to the next and final orienteering section. We took a while to get going in this one because we found it hard to judge the distance between check points. But finally I dropped the compass and just followed the contour lines and we finished the CPs in a snap. It was back to the kayaks for our paddle to the finish line.

There we met the one last volunteer waiting for us. We were last to cross the line. And the only ones at the after race party, once we showed up. But after assessing penalties for missed CPs we were 20th out of 28 finishers, with 10 more teams that did not cross the finish line at all. My virgin teammates were thrilled.

Then it was a fast drive home and now I am here. The end.

Happy Ecological Debt day

October 6 – the day when humanity has consumed all the resources the planet will produce this year.