http://www.RealAdventures.com/vacations/184882_articles-california.htm Check out some of the recently updated travel & vacation listings on RealAdventures. Be inspired, go explore! en-us Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:24:24 GMT Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:24:24 GMT http://www.RealAdventures.com http://www.RealAdventures.com/vacations/184882_articles-california.htm 100 100 http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1183986_Deep-Sea-fishing-off-California http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1183986_Deep-Sea-fishing-off-California Articles California Thu, 17 Jul 2008 16:07:57 Fishing report from the RIPTIDE -
Fishing report from the RIPTIDE



Ahoy there one and all!
We are defiantly into our summer season and the rock fishing has been steadily improving.
As an example, Wednesday we had 15 limits of Rock fish with some nice vermilions, Brownies and great olives and blacks mixed in to fill the sacks.The Ling cod were also cooperating quite nicely.
There was one customer on the bow who had his own rod doubled over looking like a pretzel working up a fish so I grabbed the gaff and stood by awaiting the arrival of some denizen of the deep to emerge.
Man, Let me tell you it was a good thing he had his drag backed down and worked the line expertly when the fish wanted to make several of its mad dashes back towards the bottom.Working his rod around the bow to be on the port side as there was a bit of a drift which was working to our advantage for fishing. Well after watching Jim working the fish and wondering who was going to win this battle when I saw emerging from the deep not one ling but 2 nice lings coming up! So, I had to decide which I was going to gaff.
All the while screaming for Zack, who was busy in the back with the other customers, which were having a great day as well. When he realized it was me he grabbed a gaff and came up to get the second ling. Fortunately they both were hooked good and were tired from the struggle with Jim and his rod to get to the surface. Not only were the two lings tired but Jim was pooped and had to sit down and admire the pair of 10 pound lings laying at his feet as Zack and I had to chase down a couple of more around the boat.

My Friend Peg from Wisconsin is out for her annual fishing trip with me. This women was not about to be out done. So, She hooks a toad as well!! Peg has been fishing with me for 35 years and has that innate ability to always figure out some way to out fish everyone!
So, here she is also having one of those epic battles with the fish making some nice runs and working the fish up. Pegs ling is emerging as a hitchhiker holding onto a nice 12 inch black rock fish tenaciously. Well of course I was standing there, ribbing her about whos but was getting kicked with the gaff. Sticking the fish and popping him over the rail she knew she had done it once again. Putting everyone in the sack with her catching the whopper of the day!

Looks like the summer is shaping up nicely for a great season of fishing for everyone!
Grab your rod and lunch and give Smitty a call to get in on some of the fun!
Thanks!
Smitty



Details & Reservations: Deep Sea fishing off California
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1156841_California-Beach-Vacations http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1156841_California-Beach-Vacations Articles California Fri, 16 May 2008 16:05:02 California has over 1,000 miles of some of the best beaches in the world. The beaches are so popular because they offer rugged, natural scenic beauty and for the active, ocean waves on the California coast provide an incredible surfing experience. -
California has over 1,000 miles of some of the best beaches in the world. The beaches are so popular because they offer rugged, natural scenic beauty and for the active, ocean waves on the California coast provide an incredible surfing experience.


California has over 1,000 miles of some of the best beaches in the world. The beaches are so popular because they offer rugged, natural scenic beauty and for the active, ocean waves on the California coast provide an incredible surfing experience.

The best place to go to the beach is in California. The sun is shining brightly most of the year. The beach is full of beautiful, white sand that you can sink your toes into and lay back on and catch some rays. You can watch your kids have the time of their lives running away from the waves, building sand castles, and just running around enjoying themselves.

The best part about the beach is the fact that the most you'll pay for is a beach towel and maybe parking, but other than that, it's free and available to everyone! There are amazing beaches in North California, Central California, and South California, each with their uniqueness, but all are a spectacular idea for beach vacations.

In the northern parts of the state, you will most likely not be swimming, but rather taking some awesome photographs, seeing fantastic sites, and otherwise enjoying the wonderful scenery. Unlike the crowded beaches in the major metropolitan areas of California, northern beaches have tons of wildlife, animals and birds that are living in their natural habitat. This is great for kids to see, and they will definitely enjoy it.

Top beaches in northern California include Humbold County, Monterey Bay, Santa Cruz and Santa Barbara.

Do you love to surf? Beaches in the middle of the state of California are great for people who love surfing. The waves will crash into the shores, allowing you to get some great exercise and to learn a new sport, or to even watch the pros ride the waves like roller coasters. You can also enjoy scuba diving, para sailing, fishing, and rockclimbing. These beaches are cooler than the others because of the fog, but the fog is usually cleared up by the afternoon. There is also tons of wildlife on the Central beaches including whales and sea otters.

While in Southern California, you can enjoy some of the most popular (and surprisingly, some of the most private) beaches in all of the state. If you enjoy many people on the beach to get to know, or to have fun peoplewatching, then you are in heaven. Southern beaches are also the home of many celebrities. While the other parts of the state are known for their beautiful photographic opportunities, but you could unleash your inner paparazzi and maybe catch some rare photos of celebrities.

Be sure to check out the beaches in and around San Digeo including San Diego, La Jolla and Mission Beach. Closer to the Los Angeles you will find Manhattan Beach, Huntington Beach, Redondo Beach and Santa Monica.

And in Orange County there is Laguna Beach and Newport Beach.

Maybe, if you have the guts, you can go up to the celebrity and maybe get a picture from them. Southern beaches are also great spots for surfing, and other beach activities such as beachcombing, beach volleyball, building sand castles, do other sand art, snorkeling, bodyboarding, and obviously swimming.

The Pacific Ocean invites you to play along its beaches. The tides will continue to rise and fall, and the waves will continue to rush in and pull back. Will you be there to enjoy yourself? If you are going to visit one of the many theme parks in California, or the redwoods, or other great natural displays of beauty in California, then why not head to the coast, and enjoy yourself throughout all of the state, at one of the many beaches throughout the state.


Details & Reservations: California Beach Vacations
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1025524_What-s-new-in-San-Francisco http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1025524_What-s-new-in-San-Francisco Articles California Fri, 07 Nov 2003 00:11:00 San Francisco is a city of many attractions. There is also a new Asian Art Museum and behind the scenes tours are now being offered at Pacific Bell Park baseball stadium where the San Francisco Giants play. - US $100 - 1,500
San Francisco is a city of many attractions. There is also a new Asian Art Museum and behind the scenes tours are now being offered at Pacific Bell Park baseball stadium where the San Francisco Giants play.


What's new in San Francisco

New attractions in the city with the Golden Gate Bridge

By Phyllis Steinberg


It has been three years since I was in San Francisco and there were so many new and exciting things to do and places to visit that I wanted to tell Realadventures all about them.

The newest attraction which is a must see in San Francisco is the Asian Art Museum which opened in March. It is located in its new home at the City's Civic Center. The museum's core is a permanent collection of more than 13,000 objects, spanning 6,000 years of history and representing the countries and cultures throughout Asia.

The museum's new site was created through the rehabilitation and adaptive reuse of the city's former Main Library, a 1917 Beaux Artsstyle building recognized as one of San Francisco's most important historic structures.

Stepping back in time and across the continent of Asia, the museum contains three floors of treasures that you will enjoy viewing. Be sure to allow at least three hours to go through this massive collection of items. You'll see a decorated box of the Maharaja from the 15th century from Pakistan, an Elephant Throne from India, a crowned Buddha and throne from Burma and more at the new Asian Art Museum.

If you like baseball, a visit to the new Pacific Bell Park is a must. The old Candlestick Park where the San Francisco Giants previously played is now used for concerts and other activities. Pacific Bell Park opened in 2000 and the ball park now has a tour program.

What fun! During the nearly two hour adventure through San Francisco's waterfront landmark and home of the 2002 National League Champion Giants, I along with a small group of tourists, got to learn how the unique ballpark was built and also was able to see many of the facilities in the ballpark that only the players and staff get to see.

The tour started with a short film which told the history of the Giants franchise. Then we were able to go inside the big league clubhouse, sit in the visitors dugout, step on the field and visit the player's locker room.
We also were escorted into one of the sky boxes where big corporations watch the game in style.

The tour is for all ages and quite fascinating. The tour guide was so knowledgeable. There wasn't a question about baseball he couldn't answer. Pacific Bell Park is a beautiful baseball stadium and easy to reach. I took the subway and the train stop is right in front of the baseball park.

The San Francisco Ferry Building has reopened with a dramatic renovation . The ground floor is designed to become a gourmet market and arcade comprised of 47 shops featuring many of the Bay's artisan food producers as well as restaurants and cafes. Spend the afternoon looking at the various products and craft items then stop and have a lunch. There are things here that you simply won't find anywhere else.

I also enjoying trying new restaurants. I've really never had a bad meal in San Francisco, but I like to search out new places and this trip I found a wonderful and modestly priced restaurant. It's called Aziza and the chef is Mourad Lahlou, a native of Marrakech. Lahlou's Morrocan cuisine is top notch. A selftaught chef, Lahlou creates beautifully plated dishes with the heart of homestyle food. Organic and locally produced ingredients are prominently featured on a thirtydish menu that contains Lahlou's unique creations and modern versions of Morrocan classics.

I tried the Chef's five course tasting menu ($39 per person) which encompassed the entire range of the menu. My tasting meal began with an organic green lentil soup with a lemony tomato base, which was a shear delight. Then the chef brought out new star spinach and feta fingers, a bastilla of baked phyllo dough pie filled with saffron braised chicken and spiced almonds, draped in powder sugar and cinnamon. They were savory and sensational. For my main course, I chosen the steam saffron scented coucous with stewed lamb, a specialty of the house, which was equally tasty.

The restaurant opened in 2001 and is worth a visit. On weekends the restaurant also has a belly dancer performing. I was there on a Monday evening so I didn't get to see the show, but the food was more than enough of a reason to seek out Aziza.

Not new, but tried and true is the Charles Nob Hill restaurant on Jones Street. This elegant 10table gourmet restaurant is expensive but still remains one of my favorite places to dine in San Francisco. At the top of the hill on Jones Street, this small elegant eatery serves nothing but the best in style. The chef always gives you little extra dishes with his compliments and when you leave you get a little black box filled with truffles. Need I say more?

Campton Place Hotel is another elegant place to dine. With roomy and comfy booths and tables spread out with plenty of privacy, this place is great for a power lunch. I ordered lobster salad but the presentation was almost too beautiful to eat, but I succumbed and devoured the entire presentation.

If you are planning to stay in San Francisco and have never been there before, I highly recommend the Mandarian Oriental. My view of the city from the 47th floor was spectacular. The service was also outstanding. Mandarian Oriental Hotels, wherever they are located, always deliver a first class experience. There are a bit on the pricey side, so they are not for everyone.

More moderately priced is the Kensington Park Hotel, just steps from Union Square and all the fine department stores. Macy's and Saks Fifth Avenue are walking distance from the hotel. The staff is friendly and the rooms are adequate. The hotel is not airconditioned, but you seldom require air conditioning in San Francisco. I enjoyed my stay at the Kensington. I especially liked that I could use a computer for free anytime I wanted. Many hotels these days charge for that service.

Photos by Phyllis Steinberg

Details & Reservations: What's new in San Francisco
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1025517_Destination-Wedding http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1025517_Destination-Wedding Articles California Mon, 03 Nov 2003 00:11:00 Young couples are now planning their own weddings. This young couple decided to have their wedding in the heart of wine country in Sonoma County.They sent out their wedding invitations and included the many attractions in the area. -
Young couples are now planning their own weddings. This young couple decided to have their wedding in the heart of wine country in Sonoma County.They sent out their wedding invitations and included the many attractions in the area.


Destination Wedding Sonoma County
A wedding in wine country

By Phyllis Steinberg

The bride was from St. Louis. The groom was from Toronto. The bride and groom had jobs in San Francisco. Where was the wedding?

Not in St. Louis. Not in Toronto. Not in San Francisco. The bride and groom, Julie Selhorst and Mike Paul both 32, are part of a nationwide trend of young couples who decide to plan their own wedding.

&8220Young couples are getting married at an older age than in previous years. That's the biggest change we see in the catering business. Parents used to plan the whole wedding for their children. Now the children want to be involved in the planning of the wedding, right down to the selection of the menu to what type of music and what song is played as they walk down the aisle,&8221 said Eric Kaufman, one of the owners of Executive Caterers, a catering company who has been in business for 30 years in South Florida.

This young couple decided wine country in the fall was the most beautiful season to be married and they traveled to Sonoma County, about an 90 minute ride from San Francisco, to do some research on the subject.

What they learned was there were more than 60 wineries in the area and many of them had banquet halls where they routinely held weddings.

They chose the Trentadue Winery in Geyserville, a short distance from the blossoming Sonoma town of Healdsburg, that is tucked between three lush valleys, in the heart of wine country, 65 miles north of the Golden Gate Bridge on highway 101.

Since there was no hotel big enough to accommodate the more than 150 guests, the young couple went on a site inspection of the various lodgings in the area and nailed down the prices of each, obtaining special prices for guests attending the wedding.

Then, they did some sightseeing and compiled a list of activities for wedding guests to do while in the area.

And for the community savvy guests invited to the wedding, the couple set up a web site for guests listing all kinds of helpful information for those planning to attend.

The destination wedding plans for guests came when they received their invitation in the mail. The wedding invitation contained all the various types of lodging, activities in Sonoma County and directions to the winery.

The groom and his parents stayed at the Hotel Healdsburg, built in 2001, with rates from $305 for a deluxe king to $725 for a onebedroom suite. The ultra modern 55room hotel is built in the heart of Healdsburg in the town square. Everything about the hotel is understated. Even the entrance is quietly tucked away on the side in a courtyard.

One of the Hotel's biggest claims to fame is Charlie Palmer, Executive Chef, who opened the Dry Creek Kitchen Restaurant in the hotel.

Palmer is the executive chef and owner of Aureole, a Manhattan classic restaurant with a worldwide reputation. In fact, Zagat chose Aureole, as the number one restaurant in New York for American cuisine. Following his phenomenal success at Auerole in New York, Palmer opened Astra and Kitchen 22 and 82, Metrazur in the city and then opened Charlie Palmer Steak in Washington D.C. and Las Vegas.

The Dry Creek Kitchen focuses on great and simple foods highlighting Sonoma County's fresh ingredients with an everchanging menu and indepth wine list of exclusive Sonoma bottlings. The restaurant is open for lunch and dinner and provides catering for Hotel Healdsburg's groups and events. I enjoyed my meal at the Dry Creek Kitchen, especially the Butternut Squash Soup.

Another type of eatery I enjoyed with modest prices was the Bear Republic Brewing Company, located just across the courtyard from the Hotel Healdsburg. The brewery has huge tasty salads, a complete menu of burgers, pastas and great beers plus a children's menu.

There were many other choices of lodging in Healdsburg as described in detail by the bride and groom. I chose the Camellia Inn, a Victorian Inn at 211 North Street, located about four blocks from the town square. The Camellia Inn, Bed and Breakfast, was built in 1869 and was purchased in 1981 by Ray and Del Lewand, left their native home in Los Angeles and gave up the freeways for a more secluded life in the country.

The Camellia Inn with its inlaid hardwood floors, graceful chandeliers and decorative friezes were simply papered and painted by the Lewands, retaining the character of the period in which the house was built. The Lewands used tones and shades of salmon, reminiscent of the camellias blooming below the tall windows. Continuing with the theme, each room is named for a variety of the camellia. All the furnishings are antiques, true to the era, with Oriental rugs throughout the home. There are nine rooms, all with private baths. I enjoyed my stay in the Tiffany room, which rents for $229 per night. The room had a Queen sized four poster bed, gas fireplace, wicker loveseat, and whirlpool tub for two. Also included in the price was a delicious buffet breakfast served from 830 a.m. to 10 a.m.

While in Healdsburg, I strolled around the town square with a beautiful park in the center of the square. I visited the unique antique shops, boutique clothing stores and bakeries.

I also enjoyed a visit to the Healdsburg Museum which contains an impressive range of artifacts and documents related to northern Sonoma County history. Some outstanding examples are Pomo Indian basketry, 19th century weapons, tools, textiles and crafts.

Another fascinating point of interest is the Healdsburg Sonoma County Wine Library where there are more than 5,000 volumes, including rare and out of print works, some dating back to 500 years on the wine industry and the heritage of grape growing and winemaking in Northern California.

The drive in the countryside was a scenic one, with beautiful vineyards and wineries located everywhere I went. Wineries invite visitors in for a tasting and employees at the wineries are quite wellinformed about the various varieties of wine.

There were also vineyard tours, wine seminars, picnics in the park and at wineries and seminars in food and wine parings for those who were interested in learning more about wine.

The Russian River meanders through Healdsburg and offers opportunities for boating and swimming. There is also a 9hole, 60acre municipal golf course, bicycles for rent and hotair balloon rides.

Healdsburg is a turnofthe century American town where wedding guests as well as vacationers can enjoy a delightful vacation away from the hustle and bustle of big city life.

Photos by Phyllis Steinberg


Details & Reservations: Destination Wedding
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024361_A-Slice-Of-Life-On-The-Dawn-Patrol http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024361_A-Slice-Of-Life-On-The-Dawn-Patrol Articles California Sun, 01 Jul 2001 00:07:00 An Ode to Life, Love, and Telemarking in the Early A.M. -
An Ode to Life, Love, and Telemarking in the Early A.M.


a s l i c e o f l i f e o n t h e d a w n p a t r o l

by the corona kid... aka David Huebner

So what do you do when you're a ski bum snowed in two miles for the winter?

Me

Four twenty a.m I drag myself out of bed, the cat "Porch" is rather disturbed by the light, I can tell he's just thinking, "whoooaa, what the heck man?" But settles right back to curled up sleep. What the heck is right, as if I'm the kind of person who gets up at four twenty in the dang morning, but yeah, I'm motivated, heading for first tracks up high, north facing, steep, and dry, widely spaced trees.

By moon light, head lamp on my head but off, I skin up the road, and wow, what a night, er morning, no hint of sun yet, the sky is dark and the stars are bright and my poles squeak incessantly and my bindings, and skins and skis do too it is really cold, I'm on fresh groomed. Turn the corner to head around the lake, and it is like my life rotating ever on in this granite and snow world, thrown to the wind, wherever the breeze carries me, and I glide on under the light of a half moon plenty bright.

There's the sign, and the trail breaking begins...bringing the tips of my skis to the surface with each step in shin deep snow. I read the terrain by the open areas, the bright spots, avoiding grim talus fields and dark dense forests I've never skied up this spot before.

The feeling of just doing something and not really knowing what exactly you're doing is the true feeling of being out there beyond the easy comfort zone of ordinary existence the sort of go with it, fly by the seat of your pants attitude that I give to the backcountry lifestyle. There are people who would plan for a day and drive for another and spend a morning organizing for something like this. Here I am under the moon, before dawn, doing it with nothing but my day pack with a bottle of water and my camera around my neck. And living in the mountains allows this. Not to say uncaring is a good thing I know what I know and I use that to get me farther. Slowly and steadily pushing the line.

I top out on the bench, run into the summer trail and feel back at home, I've hiked the trail bunches in the summer. Soon the regimen steps up a notch as the climb up to the gully begins. There it sits before me, light blue spreading from the eastern horizon now and I look up at my objective, the beautiful main gully loaded with powder.

Yeah, ten dozen thousand switchbacks and steep straights later I stand on top looking at a dream line, and the sun is approaching, and my legs are feeling weak from the climb and I drink some water, and snap a few photos, and my soul just soars loud and clear and far. Looking across at the crest I see back at myself and what I'm doing and that this life I live is beautiful, perfect, pure, there is no word, or combination of phrases, or language that can explain my feeling of standing there alone on a mountain, having stretched myself to a new height, a new level of euphoria, and right there and then I utter my standard "boatdrinks" to compliment my past, my city life long gone, my three years ago thought that no way in a million years could I ever be standing here doing what I'm doing now, that never would I be a bum, living free.

Snap a few buckles, pull the skins, flex the toes, the legs, quads still shaky, blown out, and look down on heaven. Pulling goggles over my eyes taking off pole straps and carving in the snow RCL D.P. with my ski pole...first tracks of the season for this slope, laid down on dawn patrol. The sun pokes over the crest just as I focus on my line, so I look up, take it in, another "yeah" and "boatdrinks" to the air and I'm off, like a drop of water down a bumpy slide, flowing, and fast, and soft, dry, deep, past pines, around pines, off rocks, ooohh such sweet soft landing and down into the main gully, pulling out like I'm on a wave, for one last swing back down the second fall line and out to the skin track and a few more turns and cruising back the way I came, and god, smiling big now, as the sun works its way down the peaks, fresh powder all over me from the knee deep and the deeper landing face shots, and just the overall sense of going big and pulling it off. A thousand vertical feet from pushing off I reach the flat again and head down the rocky, bushy, aspeny slope I skinned up.

My morning has begun it is eight a.m. when I put my skis back in the rack in the store, walk to my room, change, and get ready to wait tables at breakfast.

Jan

When I get up, Jan doesn't, she's in a different cabin, her little house, and she's in the so called nonmotivational groove. After five a.m. Jan wakes up and goes out on her porch and splits a little wood for her fire to warm her place up. In her mind this is a clothing optional use activity.

Once the fire is stoked she lies in bed and loves it. Sleeping in. Later, maybe an hour and a half, she looks out her window at a 12,000 foot peak, as the sunrise is beginning. She goes back to sleep briefly and wakes up as light is in full swing on the peak out her window. She gets out of bed for good, grabbing clothes from the closet so she doesn't have to get out of her warm bed until absolutely neccesary. Once up, she heads to the kitchen, as she has been for the past fifteen winters. Burnt out on the mountain scene yet? Nope, she's not, still doing it after all these years, and this year has been easy for her so far, and she's happy about that and just plain happy at the water ouzel going off out on the creek behind the store as she approaches the kitchen. She can't think of a better life, and I can't either at this point as I rip down the powder almost two thousand feet above her. The water ouzel sings a beauty this morning she thinks.

Jan gets a fire going in the cold dining room, gets out preparations for breakfast, turns hot water on, gets the coffee machine going, which she has abstained from for months now, the hot water boils, and a cup of tea wakes her up to yet another beautiful day in the mountains. The kitchen is cold and quiet. Back to her cabin to organize for a bit being one of us who has a lot of stuff and just never quite the space to put it all. She brings her room back from the edge of hysteria and then returns to the kitchen and fires up the grill. Today pancakes, eggs, and bacon, for 10 guests.

She thinks about whether she really wants to keep doing this, after so long, and yet it doesn't feel like it has really been that long, and where would she go? Home right now is The Promised Land, a paradise, and she feels it, especially in her morning tea, getting ready for breakfast in the cold quiet kitchen as sunlight paints the snow covered peaks orange and yellow, and the Grandfather tree sways ever so slightly only in the tips of the top most limbs as the cold air rushes into the valley.

She knows her home, these trees, the creek, the pond, the lake. She loves her home. She knows and yet she also continues to debate her 15 years spent living in the same canyon. She wonders if a beautiful woman like her will finish her life in the mountains single? She wonders if all those she knows who have left, and apparently "moved on" are somehow living a more fulfilling life.

She steps outside briefly and sips her tea, she knows I'm out, gone up high early. She smiles because that is what we do here. She knows that really at that moment, watching a wild natural world awaken all around her with a rushing creek for constant background, she would not want to be anywhere else. She thinks that living day to day, moment by moment, in the rush, flow, and feel, is the way to live. She tries to not really put much thought on anything but how beautiful the moment is.

She walks back into the kitchen and gets to work, starting the bacon, adding a log to the dining room fire, dealing with no running water the garden hose running our system froze with the three degree overnight low. Nothing's ever easy she thinks.

I walk in, and she's got the operation in full swing, still no running water, hose is in the sauna, drain's frozen too. As I step in the door my smile runs from ear to ear, she turns, flashing that great smile she has too and asks, "So, did you do it?"

"Yeah baby, yeah."


Details & Reservations: A Slice Of Life On The Dawn Patrol
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1023979_The-Sunset-House-At-Carmel-By-The-Sea http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1023979_The-Sunset-House-At-Carmel-By-The-Sea Articles California Tue, 27 Mar 2001 00:03:00 Visit Carmel, a tiny village on the Monterey Peninsula which inspires both wonder and skepticism. -
Visit Carmel, a tiny village on the Monterey Peninsula which inspires both wonder and skepticism.


Carmel...it's that tiny "Hansel and Gretel" village on the Monterey Peninsula which inspires both wonder and skepticism. The wonder comes from its incredibly dazzling location and the storybook quality of many of the structures on its narrow, treebedecked streets. The skepticism comes from publicity about some of the town's idiosyncrasies and one of its former mayors, plus the feeling of some people that such fanciful architecture and imaginative style could only be programmed as in Disneyland. The truth is Carmel has been "Carmel" for longer than most of its critics have existed. Its full name is actually CarmelbytheSea (one of the triad which includes Carmel Valley and Carmel Highlands). It began as an artist colony, still is, and makes no apologies or compromises for its eccentricities and overabundant charm. There are still no individual addresses (directions are given via main and cross streets, and mail is picked up at boxes at the Post Office) the magnificent and beloved trees are well protected, and sidewalks can be seen skirting both sides of them there are no street lights to mar the beauty of a coastal evening (flashlights are allowed as an aid to avoid the aforementioned trees and their roots). Its transcendent quaintness may threaten some who are comfortable with today's uniform and sterile communities but Carmel is an original... it expresses its own very unique character, which has been molded and perfected through many years by the singular personalities of its inhabitants.

There are numerous places for a guest to stay in Carmel, ranging from B&Bs in vintage homes to small hotels that have existed for much of Carmel's history to old motels that have been renovated into specialized lodges. You won't find any large chain hostelries here, but there are certainly accommodations with personalized amenities and service for almost every taste.

Details & Reservations: The Sunset House At Carmel By The Sea
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024344_My-Dusy-Basin http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024344_My-Dusy-Basin Articles California Tue, 27 Mar 2001 00:03:00 15 Days of Backpacking in the High Sierra -
15 Days of Backpacking in the High Sierra


b>by David Huebner
Under the late day blue sky and clouds of July 31st, at South Lake, Bishop Pass trailhead, I headed out to Dusy Basin, with 60 pounds of junk on my back. It's hard to find words to describe the hike to Bishop Pass, as every little pond of water, still as glass, reflected like a million mirrors the sunlit peaks, each arete casting a shadow on each gully, with me so small below, just with a pack and ski poles and a few books, headed out alone to a remote high basin. The sun was set when I reached the Pass at just over 12,000 feet, looking across at the massive Black Divide to the West, and broad Dusy Basin with its ring of summits directly in front of me. My xerox map guided me down a forever two miles in increasing darkness, until the first lake appeared, and I turned off, in the absolutely faded early night, looking for a place to camp, for the next 15 days.

And my back didn't ache because I'd been to 13,000 feet twice that week on Mt. Dana, and before that my Yosemite Bum pack weighed a good 80, and in between those I'd just lived my usual summer running around Rock Creek Canyon, and the rest of the High Sierra, doing whatever.

The stars started coming out as I saw a lake in front of me, and desperately looked for a flat spot to camp, I had contemplated the fate of walking around rolling granite glacial terrain all night till I collapsed, but fortunately I was saved. In a field of Elephants Head, I put up my blue lil' home, had some tea, and slept the sleep of the dead.

The morning was the sun as it lit the basin long before it showed its bright eye over 14,000 foot Thunderbolt Pk. and burned a blazing spot on the wall of my tent. I woke up, got up on one elbow, rubbed my eyes, and looked out my door at Isoceles Pk. The mountain is a granite spire that for all its High Sierra qualities has a bit of Patagonia in its demeanor. Boiling water for oatmeal, cranked back in my crazy creak, I sipped tea and just marveled at Life.

High peaks, broad basins, big granite, rushing creeks, and endless talus. I think there's a saying, "The world is your island" or something, or maybe I'm just making it up in my own head, but I felt like I was the island in a world of nature.

That first day I hiked back up to Bishop Pass and wandered up Mt. Aggasiz. The summit view was one of the best I'd ever seen. From Ritter and Banner all the way to Williamson and Whitney, the deepest valley in North America at my feet, and Telescope Peak high above Death Valley off to the southeast. I sat there and looked down on Dusy Basin, which looked massive, wide open, all granite, a few lakes, and just a scattering of trees and it occurred to me that I would have the next two weeks to explore this wild place, to climb the wild peaks, and to just live the wild life.

The second day I swam in the lake that was in front of my camp. The water was warm for an 11,300 foot high lake, and I just laid out on a granite block and let the sun work its magic. No one was around. I didn't hear a single sound other than the wind, and the lapping of the lake. The bird calls were infrequent. I laid there and I was totally satisfied, totally at peace. I didn't need more.

The next morning I went out to climb Columbine Pk., following talus to Knapsack Pass, and then a wonderful second class ridge to the summit. Now I had the full frontal view of Dusy Basin. Looking right down on my tent, and down on the lower basin as well. I could see the Muir Pass area off to the northwest and if I turned around I could also see into Palisades Basin, the backside of North Pal dominating, and off to the Middle Fork of the Kings River. At this point in the day, the sun was bright and warm, and so I felt obligated to partake in a favorite tradition of mine. No, not nude climbing, but shirtless, at over 12,000 feet, scrambling along a rocky ridge.

I came down off Columbine Pk. and looked over at Isoceles. I figured, ah what the hell, I'll climb it too. So I scrambled up the sandy chute on the southwest face, and traversed class four terrain around a steep class five granite spire to the crest of the East Ridge. A level, class four, traversing ridge, going around pinnacles, and across hand traverses, it's very jagged, with steep faces falling away on both sides, and you're hanging it out into the open space. Then I reached the summit slab, just this walk up low angle block that peaks at the high point. I was the first person to sign the register in two years. Sitting there, now on top of the very Patagonian monolith that towered above my tent, I understood the mountain rhythm. I made an interesting decision in choosing to down climb the southwest face. I took the path of easiest travel, angling ever so carefully down the ever steepening, very exposed face. In the midst of certain moves, like down climbing a short lieback, that feeling, if anything slipped, if that boot I had frictioning on that corner, or that hand that was holding that edge, goes, I'd be dead, that terrible thought, tried to push its way into my mind. No painful fall, no heroic recovery story, just plain grim reaping death. I know when I get in those positions that I've pushed my limit, that I'm walking down the line of my physical ability, and that if I can just push on through I will have carved new ground on the other side. Taking the line just a step further.

Down climbing the southwest face was chock full of serious positions. Reaching across and around a block to find two big inviting hand holds completely loose, with nothing but air and far away talus between my feet. Reaching successive small ledges and having to stare straight down at the ground and contemplate the slab, chimney, blocky descent below me and somehow keep it mentally together.

I was overjoyed when my boot hit sand at the bottom of the face. I jogged down the sand and out across talus and took a photo of the face because I knew mentally I'd never remember much about it, the adrenaline memory wash all I would have was a deep feeling that I pushed my limit, bent my line, and purified my existence.

I cruised over the talus back to my tent, hurried down to the lake, jumped in, got out, laid on a granite block and just breathed. Easy and deep, and gave thanks for still being alive. Feeling relief, accomplishment, overwhelming joy, as I laid there on my granite block and let the sun warm my cold but sun burnt body, I stared up at the clouds, watching them build, and wondered if it was going to storm.

It did storm, and while I was sitting in my tent waiting it out, having tea, I flipped through R.J. Secor's guidebook to the High Sierra. My ascent route was not among those listed for Isoceles Peak.

Lazy day mornings and afternoons were the norm. Kicking hacky sack in front of my tent, or going off to explore the basin. One afternoon I grabbed my slippers and headed around the corner from my camp spot and found several amazing boulder problems, all very moderate, as I'm rather a mellow moderate climber. I subsequently spent a few afternoons climbing on the best bouldering walls I've ever seen. Not even chalking up to work a problem, with just the birds, crickets, and lapping of the lake as my back drop. It seemed my existence in the basin was peaceful anonymity among a sea of granite, and a lil' sticky rubber to keep me among the living.

One clear morning I got up, ate a pop tart and a clif bar, and took off for Knapsack Pass again. This time a little bump to the south of the pass was my goal, for a quick morning climb. I reached the pass in no time, and even found some incredible cracks and liebacks that I messed around on along the way. Up along the ridge I was in pure heaven. Following class three flakes on the crest, the moves up solid granite and slabs were just effortless and smooth. I reached the summit and found a small film canister size register, placed in 1980, by the legendary Andy Smatko and Bill Schuler. Apparently, as I sat there reading the register under early morning sun, it was Bill's thousandth summit in the Sierra, so they named it Tausende Gipfel, or Thousandth Peak. Mine was the fith entry in the 19 years the register has been there. I down climbed back to Knapsack Pass and ran talus till in ran out in a beautiful meadow. With my long hair, knapped, and dirty, flying behind me, and god damn my shirt was off again, I felt that I was sharing in a bit of the past of Sierra climbing.

I decided that climbing for me was an egoless, carefree experience in the essence of freedom just gettin' along a ridge line, and feeling the mountain's power through each move. I realised that truly the joy of climbing peaks and bouldering around in the backcountry, mostly in boots, is why I moved out of the city and into the mountains in the first place. I walked along the glacial polished granite, with 12,000 to 14,000 foot peaks all around me and saw myself as a grey bearded bum in fifty years, nothing different, nothing the same.



The thunderstorm cycle was relentless, almost every afternoon. Mid way through my stay, it snowed for seven hours straight, leaving the basin and peaks covered with an inch of snow. During the snow storms I would sit in my tent and meditate on things. Read books, from Kerouac's Pomes All Sizes, to Dostoyevsky's Notes From Underground, to Thomas Mann's Death in Venice, to Goethe's Faust. Write crazy prose and poetry and haiku. Poke my head out mid storm to snap a photo and get a look about, and then just relax and have tea.

It was very intense camped out by myself, as I found deeply who I was and what I cared about, and it has stuck with me. My 15 days in Dusy Basin changed my mind. My city mind, city boy mentality, buried deep down after some time living in the mountains, was erased forever. I no longer heard the bird calls, I listened to them. The granite passed under my feet, through my hands, and I just sat there. My heart beat to the sunrise and sunset, and my soul flourished on Life in the basin.

Amidst all the opinions that my way of life is complete failure, and virtually devoid of anything materialistically successful, I now see so clearly what it is that inspires me about my bum life. I just close my eyes, or maybe look at a picture on my wall, take a deep breath of the high mountain air where I live, and smile because there is nothing tangible about my life, there is nothing materialistic, there is nothing successful it is all philosophical and within the moment, it is all pure being.

On the 15th morning, I packed up, and with everything ready, sat down, and meditated a farewell and thank you to the basin which had filled me with such new depth. I'd found a perfect way of life. But I didn't care, I just smiled, and walked to the rhythm.

Details & Reservations: My Dusy Basin
RealAdventures | California Articles

]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024364_Be-A-Bum http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024364_Be-A-Bum Articles California Tue, 27 Mar 2001 00:03:00 The Merit of Living Free -
The Merit of Living Free


by David Huebner
One day a few years I ago I said "I quit." Ten years down the drain, medals, trophies, thousands of dollars worth of prize monies, all for nothing. I wasn't going to be a professional, I wasn't going to be a success. I was going to be a bum.

I didn't know how I was going to get around to being a bum, but I knew that was what I wanted. Everyone that I knew, or nearly, was telling me it was the biggest mistake of my life and I would regret it when I was older. That I was giving up a talent held by so few that it should be worth that on its own to continue playing. I was a cellist, spending 5 hours a week at least in orchestra rehearsals, a couple hours a day practicing, a cello lesson every week, and the time in between reading, writing, playing pool, trying to surf, and above all, skiing, or mostly, thinking about skiing. I was going to high school, eleventh grade, and doing homework was pretty low on the list of priorities. On an average year I would get in about 25 ski days.

And what a beautiful 25 days it would be, maxing 'em out from 900 to 430 a lot of the time at Kirkwood on family vacations. Pushing myself to catch air, ski powder, jump turn tight chutes and carve the hell outa groomers. I was judging my skiing against anyone and everyone else on the mountain...people who were getting in 6080over a 100 days a year. I didn't give myself the handicapp of living in L.A. I just went out and skied as hard as I could and eventually was able to keep up somewhat with the pace of the expert skiers on the mountain.

Those 25 days got me thinking. About "what if?" What if I just quit cello, moved to the mountains and skied a 100 days, then how good would I be? I figured then, that it was too much to leave behind, too much to store on the back shelf of memory. So, the summer of 1997 I got on a Greyhound bus from downtown L.A. with my skis, an ice axe, some clothes and a little stereo headed for the Promised Land.



It was June and the skiing was basically done in Rock Creek Canyon, but I headed out anyway for peaks and bowls I didn't even know, with no map and no idea except that "that bowl looks like a good ski..." After June, while working at Rock Creek Lodge, I started climbing, hiking, and wandering around. I started living in the mountains like no one can who's visiting from the city. My heart slowed a bit, my blood thickened to the altitude, and my ideas soared far beyond the constricted fantasy of simply being a ski bum. I was now a mountain bum. I took incredible joy in the fact that I owned crampons along with my ice axe and had actually used them and needed them several times. Some of the things I did that summer still amaze me, I just flew by the seat of my torn Banana Republic Chinosmy climbing pants, and the encouragement of fellow worker Todd Calfee. "Oh sure, you can climb that. If not just turn around."

Todd was a resident bum of the Lodge scene already, and had done more climbing and hiking in the Sierra than I'd ever even thought about. He'd grown up minutes away from me, and had even been beaten up by a gang not a half mile from my house. I showed up in Rock Creek Canyon, and he was the next door neighbor I'd never knew.

His words of encouragement carried me up three class four routes solo, one of them involving a 45 degree snow climb, as well as numerous other technically easier peaks. One afternoon, about 230, I ran off to the summit of the highest peak in the canyon, Mt. Morgan South at 13,748', summiting in just under 4 hours and running back in about two and a half. Round trip distance was over ten miles. with 4,300 feet of gain.

Too soon the summer ended and my last year of high school rose up to bring me down from my mountain high. So I spent one more winter watching storms rage in my rear view mirror, or out the kitchen window, or from the parking lot at school staring at Mt. Baldy. I studied even less, hardly touched the cello, and skied some 30 plus days. I hauled my heavy alpine gear to the summit of Mt. Baldy once, ditched school to ski a foot of desert powder at Snow Summit, and stood outside in rainstorms trying to find that soul of the mountains again. Trying to feel the rhythmbeat. Once school ended, I was gone. I sat through the "keep quiet or you'll be kicked out" graduation ceremony, then bowled crazily all night at the patdownsearchsecured Grad Nite before hopping in the car with my bro at eight a.m. and heading back to Rock Creek Canyon, and back to the mountain life for good.

This time El Nino had been good to us in California and my ski season stretched until July 8th, making a rare if not first descent of a 55 degree face six miles back in the canyon. After that I finished climbing all the major peaks in the canyon, several of them more than once, and plans were made to move to Telluride, Colorado for the winter.

That winter, first ski town winter of my life, brought me enlightenment, and flow. It was the year I abandoned my alpine gear and started teleskiing. A pair of T2's, Riva II's, and some Karhu Outbounds, and I was finding flow in the bumps in the trees on a mountain so completely different from Kirkwood or any other place I'd ever skied. Everything was tight, the bumps were fast and sometimes pretty big, and always steep. The town was expensive, full of cool people, and happening like I'd never experienced before.

Thursday's at The Roma, or sitting around an afternoon pitcher at The Buck watching early season flakes blow down main street, or poaching The Peaks spa. I felt like I was actually living The Life I'd originally moved to the mountains to live. I had friends who were pro mogul skiers, competitors at the U.S. Extremes, and some rippin' telemark skiers.

One thing I didn't have all winter was money. $1,400 a month for a two bedroom, one bath pad half underground under a house two blocks from main street sucked half my monthly earnings. Even with three of us living there. We had cable but it never left the Weather Channel, and the sound was hardly ever on. The classic scene was us sitting around with the stereo on watching The Weekly Planner muted.

I worked as a driver for Telluride Sports, picking up skis that needed tuning from all their shops, driving them to the central tune shop, and then dropping them all back off freshly tuned in the morning before the lifts turned. I didn't have any scheduled days off, but I was free from 9430 every day. I tuned skis at night a lot of the time as well to round out a solid 40+ hours a week.

Later in the season I picked up a part time second job stocking shelves at the Village Market, heart warmingly referred to as the Village Markup. Two nights a week I was up until at least 2 a.m. stocking shelves, then getting up at 630 to drop off skis, then skiing all day and tuning skis at night. It was tiring to say the least, but I skied 50 days straight to start the season, and left Telluride with 900 bucks, 103 ski days, and a solid start to my life as a bum.

Before I left, I saw a couple of great shows, which is another part of Telluride that goes off incredibly. Buddy Miles came through town, and so did the Original PFunk, or Parliament Funkadelic. Seeing the sweat drip off a screaming Buddy Miles from twenty feet away, in a small underground bar(The Moon), will live on as one of the coolest moments of my life. "You all remember Jimi Hendrix?!?!!!", as the band starts into a jamming, long, soulful rendition of All Along The Watchtower. It was a scene that seemed to hearken back to the days of Kerouac, listening to Bird Parker in a small club or bar in New York, or some such jazz bop incarnation, where the music is the people, is the sound, is the rhythm of life, yes, the beat. And Telluride definitely has beat.

Todd and I left Telluride headed back to the Promised Land of the Eastern Sierra and Rock Creek Lodge once spring rolled around. We got there and it started dumping. 18 days straight we skied backcountry powder. Lines I'd looked at in the summer, or not even really seen were now ski runs and I was hooked. Skinning from my doorstep to lap up 5% alwaysuntracked powder seemed truly magical. We'd saved this money all winter, this great fortune of 900 bucks each or so, to take the entire summer off and go on a 90 day exploration of the wild Sierra backcountry, staying off trails as much as possible, climbing peaks, and just plain hanging out.

I skied my last day the end of May humping a load in for the local guiding agency, and it was my 122 ski day of the season.



As it turned out, our big summer trip couldn't go off as Todd got a strange virus and had to head down south to L.A. to get tests and such for months before they figured it out. So I was on my own. We had all our food ready so I wasn't short on supply, just means of transportation, as I have no car to this day. Pretty much I spent the whole summer parasiting off the Lodge, helping out for food, onceaweek showers, and a place to sleep that was the size of a notsorich person's closet, and going places with workers(who had cars) on their days off.

A new guy Nate Einbinder, fresh escapee from San Diego looking for a place to climb mountains, as well as year round employee Ted Pauly, who'd ditched the Palo Alto grocery store produceguy life a year ago for the mountain style, and another new guy Greg Forrest, a good climber from the Southeast, and I, did a lot of scrambling and camping and general bumming all summer. Greg and I would go climbing in the Owens Gorge or at Iris Slab or ponder an alpine route to do like Bear Creek Spire's North Arete(III, 5.8). Ted, Nate and I would go searching for the dharma on a nearly 12,000 foot peak within a couple hours hike from the lodge, or go on dozens of other wild adventures.

End of June I spent 7 days illegally camped in Yosemite Valley, hiking and bouldering, before hitchhiking home through Tuolumne, where I spent a couple nights and hiked up a couple peaks. Several times Ted and I, or Nate and I, or the three of us, camped at Mono Lake, eating at the gourmet Mobile Station(by far the greatest gas station on Earth). A couple times we hiked Dana and traversed to the Dana Plateau via an awesome short third class ridge. I spent 15 days solo in Dusy Basin in August, and Nate visited for a jaunt up Mt. Aggasiz.

One afternoon Nate and I went out for a short scramble up a nearby peak after he was off from work. We got to the base and stared up at the little headwall of rock that sits south from the summit off a ridgeline. I'd climbed some fun, interesting lines up the headwall in the past and was eager to try a new one that might be a bit harder, so we headed for the more vertical cleaner side of the headwall and followed a ledge/ramp system that started third class and progressed to fourth class with a brief spot of fifth as we traversed with nothing but air and eternal rest one slip away.

We had no idea whether the line would go as we traversed toward the edge of the headwall, and down climbing was a horrible thought. We rounded the exposed corner and were astounded with what we saw. A perfect fifth class dihedral for forty feet to the summit ridge. Bomber holds, stems, hand jams, all 500 feet above Ruby Lake, shining between our feet, and the line went. Not only did it go but it was perfect, beautiful climbing the best unroped line I'd ever climbed. Nate's first fifth class free solo ever.

Towards the end of the summer, Ted, Greg and I got an idea to do two fourteeners in two different mountain ranges in two days. Ted had never tied into a rope or worn rocks shoes, but we decided to do the Swiss Arete(III, 5.7) on Mt. Sill (14,162'), and then hike the road to the top of White Mountain(14,242') the next day.

With loaded packs, and no stove, just some bagels, cheese and a couple massive salami sticks we hiked into the Palisades all the way to Gayley camp, starting in the mid afternoon. The next day we cruised up the Swiss with Greg and I switching leads in our mountaineering boots, and Ted flying right along with us. Ted soloed with ease the lower fourth class sections of the arete and led us down the fourth class down climb descending the north couloir route. As Greg and I looked over the edge of the down climb, staring at snow covered icy ledges and rocks, we very seriously considered rappelling. Ted just started on down and yelled up, "Really it's not bad." Greg looked at me, "Ted's doin' some crazy shit."

We had run the arete out in three pitches. We hurried back to camp in a slight thundersnow storm, ate some more salami and bagels, packed up, and jammed out, getting to the cars about 930 pm. We ate at Denny's and decided to stay a night in Bishop at the cheapest dive in town, The Sierra Gateway, where for 40 bucks we scored a room with three queen sized beds lined up side by side. We felt like we were pretty much swingers, "You're so money baby!", and also very ready for "Fear and Loathing in Bishop". All in all the room was ok, except that the showerhead was putting out water similar in force to a sandblaster.


The next day, after Big Bubba's Breakfast, and returning rented gear to Wilson's Eastside Sports, we headed for White Mountain. It's a road to the top, but gated seven miles from the summit. My feet were still sore from hiking so much distance in my mountaineering boots the previous day, that I decided to hike in sandals. We summited 49 hours after the adventure began in the Palisades, and the summit view is the best I have ever seen. The three of us just layed out on the roof of the building on the summit and soaked in some rays with a couple hundred miles of the Sierra Nevada on one side, the Eureka Valley Sand Dunes behind us, and wild western Nevada on the otherside, with the White's continuing on in front of us.



After that, summer was pretty much over for me except for a few portering gigs and a terrible guiding experience on the Mt. Whitney trail which I won't even go into as it is far too hilarious and detailed to fit into this piece. I spent some time in L.A., then flew to New York on the last buck I had for a couple weeks to visit my brother and a good friend I hadn't seen in years. Manhatten is a busy place wild, crazy and expensive. My friend Jimmy lives large with a pad in midtown while my brother Eric commutes from "North of Harlem" on the A train. I didn't get much sleep while I was there...it seemed I was always getting back from a loud club or bar about four a.m. thoroughly pleased with the great music I'd seen and heard, and then waking about nine a.m. and doing it again.

I was eating at the fanciest restaurants with Jimmy, and seeing the sights, sounds, and people of midtown and downtown Manhatten. Cafe Wha? was a regular occurence for us. We went up on the World Trade Center. Ate at Jekyl and Hyde's, Mars, Carnegie Deli, played laser tag in Time's Square, all glitzy and yuppie, seemingly different from Kerouac beat days.

My wallet would enjoy some respite hanging with my successful strugglingartistrippingpianistoccasionalskiing brother, and we would see the slightly cheaper side of life in Manhatten.

Walking in the park near his pad on the tip of Manhatten, or enjoying a round of drinks with him and a bunch of his Julliard School friends before partying back at the pad. Both he and his girlfriend Bridgette have big nice apartments, and we enjoyed a few quiet nights at home. One night though, Eric, Bridgette, and I headed down to the East Village and saw this wild African polyrhythmic drummer Milford Graves do a solo show in a cramped bar.

Somehow the massive lines outside fit into this small live music joint, and standing tightly, we watched Graves play a different rhythm with each hand, employing quite an array of instruments, his entire body covered with bells and hollering in what sounded like an indigenous language, which was simply as he explained, his own creative outburst. The sound felt like waves washing over our heads, overwhelming in its intensity, as we all tried to find a beat in the sound and only occaisionally could we latch on to what Graves was himself hearing within it all. After Graves walked out, splitting the sea of us onlookers like Moses, we headed to a favorite Saki bar that was down below street level, and had low ceilings and low lighting and drank a bottle of 32 dollar Saki ("Mu" it was called) between the three of us, and then made the long ride home on the A train.

The trip to New York was fast forward readjustment to the big city for me. It'd been over a year since I'd been in a city with over 4,000 people. My mom had to buy me a couple sets of "city" clothes before I even left L.A., because I didn't have anything except mountain bum polypro and dirty tshirts to wear. Two weeks in the Big Apple was enough at that point, as the crush and grind of it all, as well as my empty, completely wasted wallet had me gearing to return home, sort slides, and sleep.

I spent the rest of my time in L.A. giving some family and friends slide shows of the summer, and then headed back to Rock Creek Lodge for the winter.



This time winter was late, and purely backcountry. About mid January I got my first turns, and by the end of the month I had my first face shot day "Across The Road" as we call it, on the steep Grandfather Gully and the M Gully. By the first week of February, I started a tradition of Dawn Patrols, which I later found was an idea/term Alex Lowe had coined in the Wasatch working for Black Diamond. Two mornings in a row at 11,000 feet, I skied perfect soft powder in north facing treed gullies pitched about 35 degrees.

We call it "The Shoulder" and it possess some of the best powder skiing terrain I've ever seen. My second dawn patrol up there I headed above The Shoulder to the dividing ridge which looks over into the rest of the canyon. The sun was just rising, and standing on this incredible ridgeline at about 11,300 feet, with a thousand feet of perfect powder waiting beneath my ski tips, I realized once again that this place, the back of beyond, the backcountry, this lifestyle, everything, is the only way to live. I was in awe to say the least.

Before that morning, thoughts had run through my head about going somewhere else the next winter to grab some serious powder days, but I realized that right before me was better powder and terrain than most ever get. The only track on the slope was mine hogging the main gully from the morning before. I dropped into the little open bowl at my feet, swinging twenty or so perfect turns in beautiful shin deep powder to the top of a new gully, flew down it in tight fast tele turns, caught a sweet seven foot air mid run, stuck it clean, and flowed through perfect turns to the bench below and back to the lodge. The clock, when I got back, read 815 a.m. I walked around waiting tables in the restaurant with a fresh powder smile on my face as everyone else was just getting up.

The next dawn patrol was the most adventurous. I summited a nearby nearly 12,000 foot peak and skied wind buffed powder for 2,000 vertical feet off its north side. I got back to the lodge about 915 a.m.

We skied "The Shoulder" several times during the season, most often before breakfast, and always in knee to waist to even face shot deep powder. We always got first tracks.

One particular dawn patrol, Todd and I headed up Across the Road, and then down canyon to try to find a gully we'd been thinking about skiing. It was grey, somewhat stormy, and the snow on the sunny exposures was crusty and firm. We reached our desired gully with its prominent cornice and north aspect, and snowflakes were blowing heavily out of the southwest. After poking around the cornice for a while, and with beacon on, I dropped in.

The line was stable and as I got further into it the snow got deeper and deeper till it was waist deep and I was flying. I pulled up and out of the way but still within view of Todd and watched him get plastered with waist deep powder. We were in ecstasy. We finished the run out to the road, and skinned back to the lodge as the storm intensified. By mid day it was insane dumpage. Some six inches of new were on the ground at the lodge and it was snowing like crazy.

Nate was visiting as part of his continual road tripping around California and it was his first day on tele gear. We broke trail up "Across the Road" and the snow was easily a foot deep and dry to the bone. We couldn't believe it. What had been crust hours earlier was now deep powder. Up beyond the top of the slope we continued to a run called "Marilyn's" for its short wide open slope, good for somewhat beginners like Nate. Still not really anticipating what was to come, Todd dropped in to show Nate what to do. Just alpine turns and Todd was waist deep in powder. We started to freak out.

I pushed off and it was insane. Nate made it down and was lovin' life. We came to the top of Across the Road and each picked a line. Absolute powder hogging insanity followed as we went choking our way down the run in overhead fluff. We got to the skin track and it was snowing a couple inches an hour. Another run and more of the same. Another, and Another. No one else for miles.

The next day on the radio we heard that Mammoth Mountain received six inches. The lodge received 12, and "Across the Road" picked up over a foot and a half. The storm lasted about ten hours.

"Man, your lifestyle is so much different from anyone else's. It's like you live in a different world up here." Nate told me the next day. No rent, no grocery bills, no lift lines. Just us bums in our shacks, skiing backcountry powder all winter.



In the spring I got to ski with a local legend Marty Hornick and a friend of his, Adrian. Marty skis on an old pair of Karhu Extremes, old Asolo three pin bindings, and new Alico two buckle leather boots with a bit of plastic in the cuff. We climbed up from the lodge to ski a line on the Wheeler Crest that Marty calls "The Silver Saddle". An obvious line from Bishop, it starts high on the southern end of the crest and runs down to the Pine Creek road. We skied it at the beginning of April and got 4,500 feet of skiing in perfect corn.

"We were kind of hoping you'd be a hard core right wing republican so we could mess with you all day." Marty says as we're starting out. "Yeah this lawyer friend we ski with, he's that way and we fuck with him all the time," Adrian says, "what really gets him is when we tell him about the time Marty slept with a man." That gets laughs all around, good ol' ski bums, still liberal and dirty after all these years.

We climbed up a drainage that's seen one track all year and it was just layed down the previous week by a local die hard named Will. We kicked steps steeply out of the drainage to a col on the crest. Traversing from the col we got to the top of a south facing slope that leads to a massive saddle which sends the line more northerly and down into a broad gully. The saddle is truly silver in beauty and aesthetic appeal, and the views are tremendous.

Perfect corn turns with Bishop far below to the left, Mt. Tom straight ahead, and the High Sierra Crest running far as the eye could see to the right. In simpler terms Nirvana. Marty was flying down the line nearly too fast for my trigger finger. I was laying down massive carving tele turns, just sleeping at the wheel and riding the arc of my skis. Adrian was popping humorous jokes at every stop in his dry serious way.

I was saying at one point how much I like taking photos and such, and Adrian chimed in with, "I prefer sketching, actually," with a serious tone, "I mean, sometimes it takes a while and you know, people have to be kind of patient, but I feel it's really the best." The guy is a crack up. He also suggested filming an extreme saucer descent of the line for the Best of Banff Mountain Films. "Yeah, put that in the Best of Banff , that's the kind of shit we want to see!"

A thousand foot hike out and cold beers finished the day. A classic line. No one else for miles.

Later in the month I headed into a nearby drainage looking for a cool chute I'd seen on an earlier ski tour, and found it, climbed it to the summit of the peak, signed the register which dated back to the first ascent of the peak in the '40s, and noticed no one had signed in during any ski season. This reminded me of a line I'd read in a magazine not too long before, that most of the great routes in America had been skied already. Yeah, right. I skied right from the summit, down a steep face, and into the rock walled, 25 foot wide, 4050 degree chute that banked back and forth for a thousand feet and out into a wide open slush bowl. The "Porch Couloir" as I've named it, is a beauty, but of course, now that it's been skied, all the great chutes are done so you might as well stay at home, prop your feet up with a Budweiser, and watch football.

After that I headed off to carry heavy loads for the local guiding agency on a six day ski tour starting at North Lake, going through the back of beyond, and skiing off the summits of Mt. Goddard, Scylla, and Mt. Solomons before coming out at Lake Sabrina through a terrible 1,200 foot bushwack down a creek. It was six days spent skiing some of the most dramatic terrain in the world.



I sit here now, midMay, drinking a beer in my shack in the woods at Rock Creek, after playing hacky sack to Led Zeppelin, and covering a section of the creek from dry rock to dry rock right down the middle, and I think "how could this be the biggest mistake of my life?" I decide it can't.

I think there are too many sad, stressed, depressed people out there crankin' through the traffic on the 405, or the Bay Bridge, or running to catch the A train into mid town in time checking their watches every five minutes and it's always five minutes later and they're going to be another five minutes late if they don't hurry things up...etc...

For me, that lifestyle is hell. Pure hell. My hair would fall out, my stomach would ulcer, and I'd be on prozac seeing a therapist once a week. Well...I guess that actually is Life for some people? I gave up a great talent, a great ability for playing the cello. But now, instead of suffering through city life, I can do exactly what I want, when I want, and play my cello for fun, not money, not recitals. Now I can live for me. Now I can ski, every single day of the winter climb and hike every single day of the summer.

It seems nearly everything in the stereotypical society that most of the population lives in is simply controlled by, or a product of, the pursuit of money. This article in fact falls under that description. But why can't the world operate simply out of people's passion? A tree is worth so much that we can't simply let it live for its beauty? Is beauty not itself worth something? It seems the world buys, the world builds, and the world reproduces more because it can, rather than because it should or wants to.


The bum life, the pure way, can also be very easily thrown into a stereotypical graveyard in which we all write the same words, preach the same sermon, and try to attain the same ideal. Of course, once you live in the mountains, you realize the bum can never be summarized, can never be grasped. It Is The Life, it Is The Dream, but each bum does things differently, each lives as a bum for a different reason, each will choose differently how their future unfolds. People are the same in the city, but made completely different by one simple factor Money. Bums don't do a damn thing in the pursuit of money. Everything we do is our passion.

As Kerouac so wonderfully stated, "Art is short, Life is long". Be a bum, be free, be wild, crazy.



Details & Reservations: Be A Bum
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]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024366_First-Descent-Porch-Couloir http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024366_First-Descent-Porch-Couloir Articles California Tue, 27 Mar 2001 00:03:00 Breaking New Lines At 12 Flags Peak, CA, 4/29/00 -
Breaking New Lines At 12 Flags Peak, CA, 4/29/00


by David Huebner
Anyone who's spent time skiing the backcountry knows how on just one ski tour you can spot a lifetime's worth of lines and summits to ski "Hey, look at that chute!" it happens all the time, so I figured I'd just head on back to one of those lines.

It's an ordinary day in my High Sierra wonderland backyard. The sun's warm, the sky's deep blue, and I'm gliding up over spring corn looking for a sweet chute back in the far reaches of Tamarack Lakes drainage I'd spotted earlier in the season.

Twelve Flags Pk. is the hill the Porch Couloir scribes its way down, and you won't find it listed in the annals of Sierra climbing guides just a bump on a ridge from the West , but quite awesome from the quiet, hidden, East side, with this particular line curving its rockwalled way down the mountain for a thousand feet.

I start up the chute, which is well shaded and firm, not likely to soften. Good snow for kicking steps, but still the climb burns, up up up am I still going up? my legs pant and moan a bit as I finally top out on the 13,400' summit. A new summit is always awesome, what a view, the Sierra all white and jagged, and a nice warm dry summit rock to sit on and scan the register. Dating back to the first ascent in the 1940's, the couple dozen entries aren't during skiable months, or anyone writing that they are planning on skiing down. So I sign in and glide off right from the summit rock on my somewhat symbolic pair of Karhu Bardinis (which, other than being named after a great guide and hero, are an awesome ski).

I skitter down a 200 cm wide, off fall line slot through the rocks off the summit ridge to get into the bulletproof 40 degree upper face. After a couple hundred feet or so I swing right, over to the top of the chute and start making my way down.

Ranging from 4050 degrees, and varying from 1530 feet wide for a thousand feet or so, the line unfolds beneath my chattering edges like a Kerouac Blues Chorus. Rough, edgy, sometimes effortless, euphoric, completely inspiring and enlightening, occasionally crazy as I swing into a sheltered corner and hit a soft spine of powder for 6 shin deep, sloughing jump turns before hitting the bulletproof ice again.

From one riff to another, out of the narrow exit I traverse over into the late day sun, and glide out a set of long slush turns before dropping into another bulletproof 200 foot rock walled chute to the iced up surface of Tamarack Lake.

Skiing down the Tamarack Lakes drainage to get back home, I traverse right several times and lay down sets of perfect fall line slush turns kind of like Bird Parker might bop from one musical idea to the other with undulating transitions stringing together brilliant flashes of clarity.

By the end of it all I'd put in a long day of skiing, with 4,000 feet up and down over several miles. With folks out there doing more rappelling than skiing to get down some first descents in other mountain ranges, I look at the back of beyond backyard o' mine and ask, "Why?"

Details & Reservations: First Descent Porch Couloir
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]]> http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024394_Writings-From-Within-Dusy-Basin http://www.RealAdventures.com/listings/1024394_Writings-From-Within-Dusy-Basin Articles California Tue, 27 Mar 2001 00:03:00 Thoughts Recorded High in the Sierra's Dusy Basin -
Thoughts Recorded High in the Sierra's Dusy Basin


by David Huebner

Day 12
Right now I lie sunning myself, in this warm high alpine sunshine, as the busy world of the earth, the natural earth, goes about it's morning around me. The crickets are clearly involved in a war of some sort, flying, buzzing as loud as miniture helicopters, landing, hopping, and taking off buzzing again while I seem to be a suddenly new feature on the horizon of the working ant that always has somewhere to go, and other ants to talk to, seemingly greeting always with an "Ah, how do you do?" Very formal, discussing such matters as what they've hauled in that dayhow much more it weighed than they do, etc. and while the anys mingle and scurry about, the mosquitoes are all to happy to see me, the few of them that are still alive after the snowstorm we had the other day, as I present a wonderful blood sucking feast, lying out here sunning myself as the flies and beez soar through the air, desperately in need of an Air Traffic Control Station in their crowded world of buzzing crickets, annoying mosquitoes, gnats, themselves, and me, in case I should stand up, I might end everything. And beyond my little sphere of hearing, I see flowers of yellow and pink and purple and the mountain heather, like a thick, spikey, carpet, and the grasses, all, everything, gently swaying in a gentle almost gone breeze. I look at the granite rock in front of me, part of which I'm lying onon my stomach nowcomposed of it's millions of crystals decomposing, turning slowly, ever slowly, into soil. Some of the granite around where I like was polished by the glacier so smooth it reflects the sun, and refuses traction, other areas are broken such that it seems a mighty hammer was brought down on a solid block slab, fracturing it geometrically, now lying there, shattered as if they were broken yesterday. Boulders, little, big, and tiny lie scattered in places, where the granite surfaces out of the earth like a whale and is polished here and there. I lie sunning myself in the midst of all this commotion. Buzzing loudly, flybys, nibbling mosquitoes and ants, blowing grasses and flowers, and the movement of a glacier melted thousands of years ago. I lie here and pose the question Why is this not considered a "successful" lifestyle? Is what I am doing considered "vacationing", escaping from the "real world", from "reality"? It is. I know it is. But I don't believe that at all. I am living more validlylying here on my granite sun boardthan the most successful business person or politician or whomever considers themselves "successful contributers to our Society". The reason I say I live more validly is because I lie here as part of the earth, as a part of the natural processes going on around me. I can't escape anything here, I am at Nature's mercy. If, like during the past week, Nature decides to have it snow, I need to huddle in my tentcook in my tent perhaps, put on warmer clothes. In the city, if it snows, you gripe only because of the traffic it causes, it's nothing to you personally. Turn up the heater for crissake! But in the backcountry, one is forced to live with Nature, because of Nature, and in utmost respect of Nature. All these busy bugs and insects and flowers and lakes all have things to do, they are like humans only that they don't have to build and creat a world for themselves to live in, they simply use what they can, and adapt. I lie here unmoving, as a silent observer of Their World. This basin that I've been living in for 12 days now is not mine in any way, it is Nature's and all her little workers' world. I am not saying that humans aren't of Natureof course we are. For now, i've returned to my correct place on the wild earth since I don't need, I don't kill, and I continually live in respect of all that is around me. Gone are the days in which most of us were forced to live by nature. Those humans which forever live in the city have lost most of their connection to Nature, if not all. Really they have simply buried it under the cement sidewalks, traffic lights, double yellow lines, skyscrapers, apartment complexes, and parks of their Concrete Jungle. (Don't even get me started...)But if any one of them were to be placed, say, in this basin, and had to live here, by Natural Laws rather than those of Judges and Trials and Juries which do nothing except create more laws, they may feel their born connection with nature, and may in some way, dig what has been lost to subways, the honking of cars, and the filling of schedules. All is not lost for the Western human race. But alas, of course, there no longer is enough wilderness left, for everyone in the world to live as validly as I do today. People can't start fleeing the cities and setting up tents in wild basins or else these places will no longer be wild, they will be trampled and trashed and commercial and Nature's pure creatures will be killed, and flowers will wither and all will be suburban wasteland.

All I am trying to say is that those of us who do take to these high places, and climb mountains, and fish streams, hike trails, traverse ridges, swim in 11,000 foot high lakes, ski powder bowls, chutes and trees, and more, live equally a "successful" life, if not a more "valid" life as the millionaire business man or the middle class family. And under that same reasoning, the poor family of the ghetto can be as equally as successful as the rich family of the uptown.

I am a person of the Mountains we all are people of the Earth but it is only us of the wild places (mountains, deserts, grasslands, rainforests, beaches, tundra, etc.) who live truly with the Earth, rather than in spite of it.

That is all, I must get up before my bum is redder than Indian Paintbrush.

Day 14

So, maybe not, but maybe so, this my last night in Dusy Basin. I'll of course have to do a full food inventory in the morning, as I may stay another day, but tomorrow's 14, so I should probably hike out if I cani end up staying another day. But what an incredible two weeks it has been so far! Amazing how fast it seems to have gone, but I guess days of sitting in the tent under storm, and days sitting in the sun, and days climbing mountains, all go fast. Such pleasure filled days. Such relaxation, contemplation, and philosophy have filled my mind and soul like never before. It truly is a test of one's self, living in the backcountry alone like thiswith the exception of the couple days Nate was hereforminus those days even10 days purely alone out of my 13 going late afternoon towards 14. I think it is a worthy endeavor to undertake, to find what really lies in your heart more days than not I've reclined in my Crazy Creek chair and taken in some rays. So whether or not deep down I enjoy the risk of climbing can't be said. I equally and whole heartedly enjoy both. I do love climbing, I love the movement, the feeling of scaling high ridgelines and difficult peaks. Maybe if more of these peaks around me had easier ways off them I would have climbed even moreor if I had a rope. But five peaksAggasiz(2 times), Columbine, Isoceles, Mt. Sill, and Tausende Gipfelis pretty satisfying to me. I'm merely a relaxed, carefree mountaineer, who enjoys no ego, no hardman attempt at being "a climber", tho a climber is what I am. I'm also a skier, an occasional runner, obviously a hiker, sometimes a fisherman, purely a musiciancellist, desperately(as all are desperate) trying to be a writer, poet, photographer. All of it leads to one shining Holy Grail, the illusive though awesomely rewarding in its search, and really it's not illusive at all, you just can't physically grasp it or give it a name so to speak but it's all for the mountains, the flowers, the ridges, the deep valleys, the meadows, the creeks, the summits, the snow (Powder ah yes!), the clouds, the stars, the granite slick rock basins like this one. The holy Grail is the whole experience. The whole freedom wind, laughing, smiling, experience. When it all comes together, and even when it doesn't the early morning peak, followed by exploring around meadows and tarns and lakes and slabs and boulders and trees and flowers and birds and frogs and ferns or the all day climb, prefaced and prologued by reading, writing, exploring, eating just watching the sunrise and set, eating when you're hungry and sleeping when you're sleepy. Being active if you feel it, being lazy if you don't. This Life is a whole new philosophy. I think of Thoreau on Walden Pondbut it is different or is it? He likely felt what I feel, and searched through Transcendentalism and Existentialism for a pure philosophy and found one to his liking. For me, I'm satisfied with simple existence, for that is what this is. Happy Being. Because I don't want to be one of Thoreau's "Mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." I want to be the morning glory always happy at first light of day, and sleeping cozily when the sun goes down, knowing that tomorrow will be the same, though unique.

So suffice it to say, that I exist fully in the mountain rhythm. My heart beat is slow and steady, and I breath with ease. I smile at the morning sun, and tip my tea cup when it goes down. I am purely a happy man. Thank You my sweet Earth. And who knows I could still be here tomorrow night...and i was...


Details & Reservations: Writings From Within Dusy Basin
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