Ambient Noise

february wind.

2009-02-10T20:34:00.000-08:00

Been another minute since i updated this thing. Things have been pretty busy, especially at school. Lots of little projects in each class have been converging and forcing me to stay on my toes. It's been pretty fun though. Since the new semester started and classes switched around i find myself having a foundation laid out and actually teaching rather than stressing what i'm going to do the next day.

So two weekends ago i headed up to the mountain on super bowl sunday. None of my friends in Portland were really down for heading up to the mountain... football... ehh. I'm usually not down with just cruising by myself, but i ended up having a blast. The weather was amazing, a little on the chilly side in the morning, but then the sun came out. There were absolutely no lift lines due to the game. I'm used to riding with my friends out here cruising around the mountain finding little natural jumps, hips, cliffs, trees, etc. to ride. No one's really down for hitting the park, but it's cool because i have a blast riding the other stuff. Back in ohio all we do is ride park/street. So because i was riding by myself i decided to lap the park all day. There were two jumps back to back, a low line, and high line (smaller jump/bigger jump) the low line was maybe 25 feet, and the high line was 35-40ish? After feeling out the speed situation, started spinning the high line jumps. It felt real good to get some jumps in, i miss riding with the dudes back in ohio, where all we do are these kinds of freestyle maneuvers. The jumps led into the halfpipe, so it was a ton of fun, and quite the workout. After a solid three hours, my legs were jelly, and i laughed as i had difficulty moving around when i got home. I took the hood river route back to the peninsula, and stopped in hood river to grab a bite to eat.

This past weekend started by heading up to the varsity basketball game on friday. Nick was going to be up this weekend with his family. This weekend was another clam tide, this time i was a lot more prepared than last. I actually had boots that fit, rather than trying to squeeze my size 12 foot into a size 9.5 boot... ouch. The weather was amazing and the tide was in the afternoon.
I met up with Nick's family and friends, and we were rolling pretty deep, like 20 of us or something crazy like that. It was so easy to spot the clams this time, Nick and i got our 15 limit in like 20 minutes. Afterwards, we helped everyone else get their 15 limit.
We got back to Nick's place and decided to collect some "steamers". Apparently you can grab these little mini clams out on the bay, and i didn't know till a few days ago that i can do this in my backyard. Usually Nick's family would take a boat to Long Island to collect the steamers. However, with Kim's bayfront property we drove to my house, put on the boots and headed out.
We walked out with little mini garden rakes. The clams like to hang out in gravel bars. So basically you take the rake, rake through the gravel, and they're hanging out right there... easy enough.

Nick and i walking out as the sun sets behind us.

Nick raking.

This is a photo i took from the other day, before i knew what these guys were all about.

Sunday i went back out during low tide to try and collect some more clams. I got two, then a rogue wave came and went over the tops of my boots. My feet were soaked and i was sad, so i said screw this and went home...

I have been doing out on the bay recently and taking a lot of pictures when the tide is out, now that i have some boots. Here are some of the photos from these adventures...

Real nice day on the bay.

Sun setting.

An old decaying log.

These next few i took last night at around 9pm. I took my tripod, a flatten cardboard box, and my camera of course and got some neat photos leaving the shutter open at various time intervals.
(be sure to click on the photos to see the detail, and stars in the background)

Lastly, Sans left me a comment saying they need pictures of kiki. Well if you read this thing sans here you go.

Kiki being an idiot and trying to squeeze into the smallest cardboard box...

Good job...

mlk day.

2009-01-19T19:29:00.000-08:00

So last weekend i had intentions of heading up to hood for the weekend. However, the rain that was drenching the peninsula was also soaking mt hood. I decided to stay up on the peninsula for the weekend. Nick was up visiting with his family. Saturday we tried to go out to waikiki in hopes of catching some waves. No dice. Driftwood was out floating everywhere and it looked like crap. I ended up meeting back up with Nick and his family later on to learn how to collect razor clams.

So even before i moved out here i heard about this razor clam business when i was talking to my principal about the school program. So there are a bunch of rules/laws about collecting these special clams. A season only lasts three days per month. I'm not exactly sure what months warrant a season, but i do know that they are winter months... You're only allowed to collect 15 clams per day.

When the season does open up for the weekend, the peninsula swells in population something like 20,000+ people depending on the weather. It was raining real hard, and super windy so i didn't take too many photos. Here's a shot of a bunch of people. I guess it's like this allll the way up and down the peninsula.

Alright so first off you get super suited up, especially if it's raining. Full on rain gear, rubber boots, and most importantly your weapon of choice, a shovel or a "gun". The gun is made of PVC with a thumbsized hole near the handle.

You walk around and hit your gun or shovel on the ground. Basically if there's movement below the surface of the sand from a razor clam you'll see a little volcano/crater form. Next you take the gun and plunge it into the sand down as far as you can get it. Then you take your thumb and cover the hole so that no air will escape. This creates a suction effect so that when you pull the gun back out of the sand the water/sand stays in the gun. Once out of the sand, you let your thumb off the small hole, and the contents of the gun falls out. If you're lucky, you got one of these guys.

I think i only ended up getting six of the possible fifteen of the day. Because it was raining, the craters were super hard to spot. The fact that it was miserable with the wind and the rain aided us in retiring early. Back at Nick's families cabin i was treated to an epic dinner of various seafood. Afterwards i was shown how to clean the razorclams, and various suggestions on how to cook them.

So a student from school asked me to be his mentor for his senior project. He was determined to get the project cranked out during the week. So he, and a student in my construction class headed down to the shop afterschool to work on creating a trashcan hut for the city of Ilwaco to add an aesthetic look, as well as keep various wildlife out of the cans. We worked pretty late both monday and tuesday and finished the project up on thursday.

Wednesday i took the day off from the project because the weather up on the peninsula had been amazing. Mid 50s and sunshine combined with an amazing surf forecast... Darren and i headed out in the cold water to catch some waves. I soon realized i need to pick up some gloves because my hands were absolutely freezing. I realized how out of shape my upper body had gotten since the last time i went out... I manged to catch a real good ride, and fun times were had as the sun set.
Looking south toward North Head and Cape Disappointment.

Sunset just north of North Head.

Thursday night i stayed up late, bundled up and went outside to experiment with some settings on my camera and took photos of the moon over the bay. (be sure to click to see the detail of the stars and what not)

Friday i made my way down to portland to meet up with Nate. We got up early saturday morning and made our way up to the mountain with a fairly large crew. Nate and Sara Phillips from Holden went up in Sara's car with her dog Loki. Myself, Katie, Tim, Evan, and Sarah went up in the brovan.
So there was the crazy inversion up at the mountain. The clouds were lower than usual for this time of the year. This resulted in clear skies and unseasonable warm temperatures. It was in the mid 50s and spring riding was at its best. We had a blast taking runs all over the mountain finding little hips, bumps, chutes, tree jibs, polejams, etc.

The view of the mountain from Portland.

View of the mountain between gvt camp, and meadows.

View rolling up vista.

Above the treeline up at Meadows.

Loki.

Tim trying to eat old jerky.

Sunday most everyone was busy, so Katie and i headed back up to the mountain later in the day to catch the sun heated snow. More good times were had including frequent runs through the pipe.

Today, i enjoyed myself back home on the peninsula. I slept in and decided to do some spring cleaning. It was crazy how nice it was outside... Mid 60s and sunny. It was warm enough to be in a tshirt, so i opened the windows to get some fresh air in the cabin. Later on in the day i went down to the ocean to take some pictures self portrait style.

winter break.

2008-12-26T22:50:00.000-08:00

yeah, yeah, i know. it's been forever since i updated. i'm not sure if i can promise this update to live up to all the hype... but i'll start typing away i suppose.

so rewind to last friday, well even before last friday, let's say that week. i returned from my brothers wedding to a snowy seattle, and the first of seeing how people drive in the NW in poorly plowed snowy roads. the entire week at school everyone was sure we'd have some sort of delay or day off during the week. i learned that it doesn't take much to cause a closing or delay on the peninsula, but each day it didn't snow or ice hard enough to close the schools. thursday looked to be our best bet, but i woke up to schools being open. i figured friday would go by fast enough, i even packed a lunch for friday when i heard while playing WoW from Lois (the school's secretary) that we had a 2 hour delay. i got a call soon after from the teacher above me on the call pyramid. i thought it was cool that we get to sleep in at least! morning came and i got a call at like 5:30am from the same staff member that schools were closed. i thought it was odd because the forecast called for like an inch of snow tops. when i woke up and looked outside it was beautiful and sunny, and there was about 3 inches of snow on the ground.

i got a call from darren asking if i wanted to go snowboarding somewhere. i wasn't expecting much, maybe just find something to dork around with, a hill to cruise down, or something. i stopped by darrens and was content with just riding down the hill by his house, but he suggested trying to find something to ride. i hadn't really explored the peninsula too much for street stuff because i heard it never really snows up here. sure there's a couple rails up by the schools, but that requires a lot of work to make happen, and darren had never had any experience with that kind of stuff. we ended up driving toward what looked like a decent hill (probably as big as boston mills) in hopes of taking some turns. we drove on this backwoods road which i had no idea went as far back as it did. the hill was way too grown in with trees, even around the powerline structures. we came to a dead end, a sign about some goose hunting grounds part of the state parks. we got out and walked up hill to what looked like a maintenance facility. after exploring i saw some potential for some fun to be had. i think darren was skeptical. anyways after we set the thing up, it turned into a blast of a session. reminded me of riding with the dudes back in ohio.

darren shot this tailpress of me. fun times.

later friday i embarked on the voyage to portland. i soon realized that roads get pretty treacherous as the elevation rises. what should have been a little over a two hour drive easily doubled as trees fell on roads, and people swerved into ditches, shutting down 26 for an hour.
we woke up the next morning intending to get a late start and avoid the traffic to the mountain, as well as the pass picture line. nate had arranged for us to stay with leia at the burton demo center in government camp. basically in the summer, when government camp turns into a mad house of ski and snowboard summer camps burton has this place where the kids can go to hang out, play wii, watch snowboard videos, and demo next seasons gear. the first floor is the shop/lounge, the second floor is an apartment. leia has always been super nice and let us crash on a couch or the floor which makes getting up to the resorts a breeze the next morning.

(alright so i haven't been able to take any decent photos with my DSLR, these were taken from my crappy point and shoot.)

the drive up

sunrises on the drive up

government camp blanketed.

the burton demo center.

icesicles

so the season for hood was looking pretty bleak for awhile... it was thanksgiving and there was no snow at all. people kept saying how odd it was that there was no snow. then last week it started snowing. a lot. i think as i'm writing this 110" has fallen since last week. it's not showing any signs of stopping either. they're calling for 1-3ft by sunday morning of new snow.
we headed up to meadows to get some late riding in. i had never ridden hood in the winter, so it was a new experience for sure. i'd like to think that i adapted pretty well though. we rode together as a crew, we would find something to hit then stop and watch everyone hit it before moving onto the next part of the mountain. it was a blast riding with everyone. leia and her roommate christy came up with us as well, and they were shredding! we rode for a few hours before the light faded away into the night. we went back to the burton house, and nate made some amazing dinner. i crashed pretty early as we were planning on getting to meadows as lifts were opening. we had another amazing day of riding, and i started to figure out my way around the mountain, as well as pushing my riding in this new environment.

we came back to portland sunday afternoon and it was chaos. the city was getting paralyzed by snow, and there was nothing they could do to stop it. i decided to brave the roads and try to make it back up to the peninsula, which was a challenge in itself.

i spent a few days up on the peninsula letting my muscles recover, and just all around relaxing. went into school one of the days and got some work done. received a new project, so spent some time figuring out how it works. i made plans with kyle (one of nate and evans friends who rode with us on sat/sun) to ride meadows on christmas day. it seemed like we were the only ones still around for christmas. we made the voyage to hood early thursday morning and were blown away to find the resort blanketed in waist deep snow in most spots. we were like the eigth chair up the mountain and had endless amounts of untouched snow in front of us. it was surreal riding such deep snow. as the day went on, things started getting tracked out more, but we found some way fun things to ride.

we headed back to portland, grabbed some chinese food for dinner, and retired to kyles house. the plan was to ride this morning, but they mountain received roughly 4 inches of new snow... not spectacular, and it didn't help that i did not stretch yesterday, so when our alarms went off at 6am, we both seemed to hit off rather than snooze.

i'll be meeting tony and cody who are flying in from ohio to ride out here for a week. we plan on taking a trip either up to baker or down to bachelor. ride hood a bunch, maybe surf up here on the coast for a day, and overall just relax the rest of my break.

(here are a few random SLR shots from a few weeks ago that i enjoy)

the walk to short sands beach in oregon.

short sands. light breaking through the trees.

chris about to stand up at waikiki.

updates.

2008-11-10T21:40:00.000-08:00

So it's been a minute since i last updated. I've been keeping pretty busy with school, but i suppose the greatest reason for the lag was the fact that Jesse Mason was up hanging out here for a week. Jesse's taking this crazy road trip all across the country. I was his first stop, and he made the drive up from LA in one shot, 18 hours or something close to it. Pretty nuts. He got in two Thursdays ago real late at night. He caught up on sleep and met me at school two Fridays (Halloween) ago. I gave him the tour, introduced him to the principal, then we headed down to the old shop to play around. Afterwards we ran up to Long Beach to deposit my check before driving on the beach down to check out Waikiki.
We were planning on Saturday to go for a surf at Waikiki, but after watching Darren and Travis try to fight the strong incoming tide, we decided against it, as did they. We went down to Astoria to explore the city and a few sights. A couple weeks ago i was shopping down in Astoria and heard an overwhelming noise off in the distance that sounded like a hundred sea lions barking. We decided to check out the piers and sure enough the lazy sea lions were hanging out on the docks.

Lazy Sea Lions.

Haaaaa

For those of you who know Sans well, you know that he would fit right in here... Cheeseburger Walrus...

Afterwards we headed down to Fort Stevens. As we were checking out the ship wreck the tide was going in and out. As the water drained out we went to check out the wreck. Jesse joked around and said if the water came back he was going to climb the thing. I didn't think it would fill back up as we had been safe for a couple minutes. Sure enough a wave was closing in. Jesse overestimated, or so i thought, and climbed like halfway up the thing. I laughed at him and thought i would be fine like 3 feet up. Then the water splashed up against the wreck and went up over my feet... Jesse looked down at me laughing his ass off...

Shipwreck as sun sets.

Neat.

Stupid wave that rolled in...

We stuck around town for the "nightlife" after checking out a few places we met up with a crew of people with similar interests and tagged along. Supposedly everyone was beat from Halloween the night before, so the city was a ghost town. Nonetheless it was still cool hanging with the people we met.

Sunday Waikiki was too big again to surf. We decided to head down to Portland to hang with Nate. We met up at Nate's house, picked up a few things at ikea, hung out on Hawthorne st. (equivalent of Coventry area in Cleveland), got some dinner at ChaChaCha's (super affordable, amazing authentic burritos) and headed back up north.

Monday after school Waikiki was going off! Chris, Darren, Travis, and a couple rangers were all out sessioning. Jesse was determined to give it a shot even though it was pouring rain and he had a 2mil wet suit (as opposed to our 4/5mil suits (twice as thick)). After staying out for about ten minutes he paddled in and attempted to shoot some film of us. The waves were big and heavy, and had good form. I was catching some of the better rides I've had, but Jesse was only able to stay out for a few minutes amidst the pouring rain.
Tuesday, Darren and I went back to Waikiki. This time Jesse decided to film. The waves were super small, and you really had to fight to catch a half ways decent ride. We both got a couple good rides on film. I'll have to throw them up on YouTube or something...

The rest of the week we pretty much hung out after school. During the day Jesse was going back and forth between Astoria and here interviewing a few people for his trip/documentary.

Rainbow in my backyard, cute, i know...

Oh yeah. I got a kitten a couple weekends ago. I figured Kiki has been super lonely not being able to hang out with Artemis (my old roommate/current sister's roommate's cat). I went to the humane society and picked up a little Hemingway kitten dude (they've got 6 fingers/claws which makes their paws look gigantic). At first the dude wanted nothing to do with us or my place. He hid behind the couch for almost two solid days. He slowly warmed up to us. Now, he annoys Kiki constantly, and it's hilarious. They hunt each other, Lazarus (that's his name) does all these sneak attack missions all the time, etc. They're good buds, and he's always down to hang with me.

On the prowl with Lazarus.

For those of you who know Kiki well, you'll find this next shot amusing, and know that Kiki is not very happy...

Poor Kiki, and poor Special Friend.

We've got the day off tomorrow for veterans day, which is nice because we never got it off back in Ohio, plus it doesn't hurt that it's my birthday. I think a bunch of us are planning on heading down to Oregon to surf, if Waikiki's no good. Probably hang out in Astoria for a little bit, and enjoy a nice relaxing day. Wednesday after school i head up to Seattle for a conference. I'll be able to hang with my brother and a few friends I've got in the city amidst the conferences in the morning. Should be a good time!

waikiki.

2008-10-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

This past week flew by because of the half day conferences. Basically, Tue-Fri we had periods 1,2,3 or 4,5,6 till 11:30am. Students were released to go home, and we had either conferences or meetings depending on the day. This gave me a bunch of time to hang out with the staff. I met up with Kelli who is the art teacher to talk about a printer Marc's about to order for us. We also talked a bunch about the screen printing we're getting into.
I was also able to get a chance to figure out the stupid minute detail that prevented me from getting the CNC router to work. It's now up and running, and I'll be spending the coming weeks figuring out what's the best settings for different programs.
The weather this week was amazing. Upper 60s lower 70s and sunny. It worked out great with the surf. We were able to hit up Waikiki on Wednesday for one of the best sessions I've had in Washington. The waves weren't really that big, but it was super consistent and smooth. With the lack of force because the waves weren't huge, you really had to ride the face of the wave rather than the white water from the resulting crash of a wave.
After the success of Wednesday's session we were looking forward to Saturday morning. High tide was around noon, and if we got out there around ten we figured it would be set up perfect. The forecast called for BIG swells on the main ocean, but we figured we'd be protected.
As i was on my way to pick up Darren i received a text from Michael (he works at the ranger station right by Waikiki) saying it was HUGE, that driftwood was smashing up against rocks, and the crashing of the waves sounded like thunder. Because i was already on my way, Darren and i decided to check it out anyways.

This is when Waikiki is unsurfable.

Doom wave rolling in part one.

Doom wave rolling in/crashing part two.

Crashing against the rocks.

The clouds broke and the sun came out.

Crashing waves.

Darren took a couple shots. It almost looks like I'm superimposed.

Balancing on the logs.

Today i received a text message from Michael saying Waikiki looked amazing. Soon after i received another message from Travis saying he was heading down. I picked up Darren and we met up with Travis and his girlfriend. It was a lot bigger than Wednesday's session, but nowhere near as crazy as Saturday. The waves were big enough to give us a scare. Travis caught this one wave that was crazy. He like drooped into a huge wave, then a wave came from the side after bouncing off the cliffs, and formed this super wave. He carved the inside of the first wave while this like abyss pit formed from the union of the two waves. We like went up and around the pit and dropped in just before the two waves smashed closing out, and escaping death with a smile on his face. Definitely the gnarliest ride I've ever witnessed. I dropped in from the top of the biggest wave I've ridden and felt like a million bucks hanging on for the ride. We were having too much fun to stop and snap any pictures.

harvest weekend.

2008-10-19T20:17:00.000-07:00

So last Tuesday the weather was looking super nice out. Michael, Darren, and I hurried down to Indian Head in Ecola State Park to try to get an epic Oregon surf day in. The swell had a different plan for us. Instead of the waves being super mellow, like every time I've surfed Oregon, they were big and heavy, and had this tumble effect that followed each wave. I've never gotten into a situation with surfing that has been out of my control, but one or two of the waves that caught me in the tumble were enough for me to chill out on the "outside waves" and stay inside catching some smaller waves. We were able to catch a couple good wave, and even though the trip was not a total success, it was nice for the change of scenery. We watched the sun set, and headed back up to the peninsula.

Saturday i had every intention of sleeping in. Stayed up a little later Friday night, was prob going to lazily wake up around 10am or so... I woke up to my phone ringing around 8am. Kim, my landlord/neighbor was calling. I rolled over and went back to sleep. About ten minutes later there was a knock at my door. I got up and threw some clothes on to answer the door. No one was there... My phone started ringing again, and Kim was asking if i wanted to go harvest some cranberries. Now, i had been attempted to be recruited by two different teams of harvesters a week ago, but i wanted to lay low after the weekend from visiting Ohio. There was a team that consisted of a teacher from my school, a student in my 8th grade class, and others. The other team was Kim, and Steve McPhail (the guy who has the pickle ball court in his barn). From the sounds of it they needed me to help out, hence the morning wake-up drill, ha.
Anyways, i decided to go since i was out of bed already. I drove down to Steve's farm and was fitted for those like super tall like waist boot things (i can't remember the name). Then we ate some bagels and i was taught the ropes to harvesting cranberries. I took these pictures when we were taking a break, so didn't really get to get a chance to take any action shots...

So this is what a field looks like initially. There's about a 2 1/2 foot drop in to the field. The cranberries are planted (this particular field was in the process of being re-planted) and when ready to be harvested look something similar of a small vine.

At about 5am Steve activated his network of pump systems, which pump water from this 20 foot deep pond, and flood the fields (this day we were working two fields worth). The water comes up about between knee and thigh height on me, higher on other folks. You've got to be careful when walking around, if there's any sort of trench, especially around the outer rims, you could fall victim to the bog.
Next, Steve drove around in this contraption that shuffled the cranberries to the surface of the water. This field was the second field we worked on, and was way easier because the wind blew most of the cranberries to one end.

Next, we took these containment systems that are commonly used in containing oil spills in water. It's basically a float, with a sheet of plastic that is held about 6 inches beneath the water. We start at one end of the bog and work our way to the other. During this time we use push broom type tools without the brushes (so basically an angled board) to push/pull the cranberries away from the shore. We are careful to lift the containment system over any sprinkler heads.

Roping the cranberries in.

Though, this may not seem like much, in reality this is 6,000+ pounds of cranberries.

This was a picture taken while we were switching trucks on the other bog. Once the cranberries are pulled into a corner, and escalator type system pulls the cranberries up and into the truck. During this process we stand in the middle of the circle and push the cranberries towards the escalator. As the surface area of the berries begins to spread out, you pull two points of the circle together to make a smaller circle, and a piece of the containment system link is removed.
This bog produced around 12,000 pounds of cranberries.

The truck being loaded up. Done with this bog.

A lot of cranberries, and Bob. It was Kim, Steve, Bob, and myself as the core workers, with Steve's wife switching out the trucks and driving to the Ocean Spray processing plant. About half way through the day we stopped and ate lunch. I had some of the best chili i think I've ever eaten, rolls, salad, and all the Ocean Spray you could drink.

This is Baloo. The entire time we were working Baloo would try and get us to throw whatever he managed to find around so he could run and retrieve it.

He had way too much energy.

At one point he brought me a rock. I threw the rock into the bog, and he honestly did not give up looking for it for a solid hour. At the end of the day we threw objects into the half drained pond. Baloo would launch off of about a 5 foot wall into the water.

All in all, it was an awesome experience. I had a lot of fun with the guys, and it was way more laid back than i think it would have been with the other guys.
Every year Kim, Steve, Chris Jacobsen, and others go down to Costa Rica to hang out and surf. Someone in Steve's family has a place down there. Anyways, Tom, one of my fellow workers would be into going if it was during out spring break. Everyone's considering holding off till then, which means, if they do, i'll be heading down to Costa Rica with them...

Today, i decided to run down to Astoria to hang out for a bit. I found out that if you're a teacher you get 15% off your ATT cell phone bill, so i went to the store to hook that up. Went into downtown Astoria and hung out at a local coffee shop while glancing over my contract to see how much coach's get paid, as they're looking for a head and assistant middle school track coach for the spring... After the coffee shop i decided to check out the Astoria "column". It's like a light house, but on top of the tallest hill in Astoria. You can climb up to the top, and get a crazy view of everything around. Unfortunately it was closed for repair. But you're still pretty high up from the base of the tower that you can get some good shots of the surrounding area.

Looking across the Columbia River, and the bridge, and Washington.

Looking south at the Oregon countryside.

Another view.

This is the column, but it was closed.

Picked up some groceries and headed back up the peninsula. I picked up Darren and forgot to grab my booties when we went out for a surf. My feet were soooo cold. We met up with Michael, and i stayed out for awhile. But the cold water, and the fact i kept slipping off my board because i didn't have my booties led me to retire early.

It's conference week this week, which means everyday except Monday we have half days... Not exactly sure how this business works, but we'll find out.
Jesse Mason is taking this crazy 2 month road trip from LA all over the country. He's going to stop up here for a few days, he's thinking hopefully be up here around the weekend if he can get this project done in time. It'll be cool to hang.

interview

2008-10-14T23:04:00.000-07:00

Matt over at Autumn Line interviewed me the other night for their blog. It was fun reminiscing. Check it out.

http://www.autumnline.blogspot.com/

chilly weekend.

2008-10-12T21:05:00.000-07:00

This past week flew by pretty quickly. It was homecoming week at our school, so a bunch of activities and shortened periods helped, i'm sure. I helped supervise a bonfire on the beach as part of the events they were having each night. It was pretty funny because noone could get the thing started. It was this massive pile of pallets. Probably the biggest bonfire i've been to. Once this dude got it going, it was pretty ridiculous. Cool watching the fire with the sunset over the ocean as the background.

It also got pretty cold out here this weekend. It's usually been in the 60s for the past couple weeks, but this cold spell rolled in and drops the temps into the lower 40s at night. I'll have to spark up this wood burning stove here soon if this continues.

Friday went by super quick because of a pep assembly, and the normal early release schedule. Chris Jacobson stopped by to hang out and chat for a minute. His hand is out of the cast, and he'll be back to normal in another couple weeks. Probably no bungee boarding for a minute, haha, but it'll be rad to surf with Chris again.
After the staff meeting i headed to North Head to walk around and take some pictures till Michael got off work at 4:30. We headed to Seaview approach and went out for a little bit, but it was pretty much mush, and no getting to the outside.

Saturday Travis and i took a trip down to Indian Head in Ecola State Park in Oregon. I forgot to take some pictures, but the scenery was amazing. There was a "shoulder", kind of like a half cove that the swells formed off of. The waves were super smooth and mellow for the most part. I had some difficulty adjusting to the new board, but once i started getting the hang of it, it was a blast to maneuver it around. It wasn't quite as crowded as Short Sands that day Nick and i went down, but then again, the weather is getting colder as the days pass.

Today, i slept in till around ten. Hung out around the house and graded some papers. Learned that Michael's car had broken down and he had the day off work because of it. We decided to check out Seaview in the afternoon.
So i guess the next couple days are the lowest the tides been/going to be for another 6 months or so? It was weird seeing it out so far, we got in the water and waded out till we were about chest deep, then hit a sandbar and kept walking till we got in the water again. My car was so far away, definitely not what we're used to. Michael and i paddled and tried to work our way to the outside where the waves were breaking in a line and looked super fun. However, the harder and more exhausted we got from paddling, it seemed like we were not making any progress at all. We kind of gave up for a minute and just sat around on our boards. We decided to give it one more shot. We made it past the breaks, but then the ocean turned into a lake with no swells in sight. Every once in awhile a real good set would roll in. Out of nowhere i started getting real nautious. I think maybe the combination of the ocean just being real weird and tossing us around, with how far we were out, made me sick. I decided to bail and paddle towards shore. Not the most productive day, but it was fun to get out nonetheless.

Here's a few photos i took at North Head with my phone and a Holga filter application. I have some pictures on my SLR too, but haven't looked at them yet.

Ohio and Back.

2008-10-08T21:17:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was a blast. I got out of school on thursday and headed down to crash in Portland for the night before flying out. Hung out at the Holden office with Nate and Katie for a minute then grabbed some food at ChaChaCha's. Woke up the next morning and headed up to the airport. I arrived in Cleveland around 6pm and got picked up by my dad. Hung out at my parents for dinner and caught up with how everything's been going. Borrowed my brothers old car and headed towards Kent. At this point noone really knew that i was going to be in town. I got a call from Zach asking what i was getting into after he heard from Brian who heard from my sister that i was going to be in town. I found out Julia and Sans were up working at Susans so decided to head up there before it closed. It was pretty funny having Sans nonchalantly walk by the door and say "oh hey what's up" before a soild second went by when he dropped the mop and was like "wait a second..." haha. After hanging with them for a minute, decided to drop by Tony and Cody's with Sans. There was a similar reaction when i walked through their door... Went up to the Zephyr and hung out with a bunch of people. It was real good seeing everyone. I was surprised how many people were out, including the twins who were in town for Josh's wedding. Went back to my old place and crashed there for the night. It was rad hanging with Artemis.

Saturday woke up and skated for a little bit at the Ravenna skatepark. Met up with Julia, Brian, Rebbecca, Tony, Cody, Josh, Ian and Bob at El Camp. Headed up to the premiere afterwards. It was a super good time. All smiles turned out way good. Kevin worked so hard on it and everything came together so well. Seeing the final version of Technicolor was rad. Mark and the Porters rule. It was awesome seeing the usual premiere crowd, Pete was hanging out. Just seeing everyone from Ohio in general was a great time. I got to lay down some three doors down vocals too... Hit up the after party for a minute before driving back to my parents house and flying back to Portland on zero sleep. Hung out in Portland with Nate and Evan, then came back up to the peninsula and passsssed out.

Tuesday i got back in the water, and holy crap... Waikiki was surfable. It was kind of crazy and all over the place, but the waves had some pretty good form to them when you caught a good one. Aside from Michael, Darren, Travis, and i there were about four other people out there with us. Everyone was saying it should have been way better but it was still a good time, and we got a good session going. I hopped out of the water for a little bit to snap some pictures. Waikiki is perfect for photos because it's a cove and you can walk out on some logs/rocks so that you're parallel with the rider. The photos turned out pretty well for the first time shooting surfing.

The backdrop of Waikiki, waiting for a set of waves to roll in...

Michael dropping in...

Travis

Michael

Michael

Michael grabbed the camera and i got a shot... thanks Michael.

weekend fun.

2008-09-28T19:41:00.000-07:00

This weekend turned out to be a blast. After the staff meeting on friday, i bailed from school and met Darren on the coast. The weather was perfect. After suiting up, we saw that the sea lion dude was still around from thursday. Poor guy was either sick or injured. I thought that there would be someone to notify or something out here, but i guess the park rangers had already been notified... Just before we were about to jump in the water Nick rolled up. We all headed out, and it was fairly fun. I personally thought the swells were breaking cleaner on thursday, even though there was all that mess from the storm. Nick agreed that it wasn't that great, so we skimmed around for awhile, and just enjoyed the weather.

Saturday woke up around 9am, and rolled up to the beach around 10am. Nick had a laid back lesson to teach. Turns out one of the girls was originally working in NYC, and worked on some high level in the trade center towers. When sept 11 rolled around, she was 15 minutes late to work from being out too late the night before... crazy...
After the lesson, Nick and i headed out to the "outside". Waves were breaking super well. Darren ended up showing up out of nowhere joining us. He was susposed to be at vancouver all weekend. The swells ended up getting pretty big... Darren and i got broke off a couple times dropping in to some 7-8ft waves from the top, haha.
After being in and out of the water for about 4 hours, Nick and i decided we were going to take his canoe to a few of the inland lakes. We stopped at my place to grab a quick bite to eat, and talk to Kim about windsurfing. We went over to his place, and threw the canoe on top of his car. We were headed to "Island Lake" and "Lost Lake" as shown below:

View Larger Map

We cruised Island Lake to the northern end. Then stopped and walked through the woods to Lost Lake. It was super peaceful back there. Nothing but wildlife hanging out. Saw a bald eagle, and a redtailed hawk flying around. After surfing pretty much everyday for a week, my shoulders were killing me on the canoe trip. Nick wasn't in much better shape, haha. My feet have also been taking a beating. There are a bunch of blisters from Travis's size-too-small boots. The tops of my feet have been doing some kind of muscle thing where it's actually kind of hard to walk at times. It has something to do with all the surfing, but just hoping it goes away.

Looking North at Lost Lake

Tree.

Paddling south on Island Lake.

Today, Nick and i decided to take a road trip down to "Short Sands" in Oswald West State Park. It's just south of Cannon Beach and about an hour away. You park off of Hwy 101 and hike about a quarter mile to the beach. The beach is like Waikiki in that it's a cove protected from north and south winds. Immediately upon arriving i saw just how many people there were. It was definitely different than Long Beach. I'd say about 80% of the people there were there to surf. Most of the crowd was younger, and in general it was super laid back. It also helped that there were a bunch of surf babes, ha. The weather was spectacular. After suiting up and heading out i noticed how clear the water was, it was crazy compared to Long Beach. The waves were so clean and amazing, just super smooth and easy to catch. Even though i was intimidated at first with surfing around other surfers, and trying my best with proper etiquette, it turned out to be super chill, and more than enough space for everyone. It was interesting seeing the variety of surfers. From young to old, long boards, to short... There were some dudes that were shredding, including Nick. He let me borrow his 7'6" "hybrid short/long" board. It was amazing... catching waves super well, and having the maneuverability of a shorter board. The entire day was a great experience, and probably the best day I've had surfing yet.
On the way back we stopped in Cannon Beach, and Seaside to stop at a few of the shops and look at boards and other various equipment. Hit up Freddies in Astoria, and purchased all the "trail mix" supplies for my manufacturing class. Crossed the bridge, and headed back up to the peninsula. Good times.

Creek leading out to Short Sands.

People hanging out.

Overlooking Short Sands, cheesy photo, but thanks Nick.

sunsets and sea lions.

2008-09-25T20:54:00.000-07:00

The week flew by, it's already friday... School has been getting easier, as far as planning goes. However, i was informed that classes are not semester long, like i thought they were, rather a whole year. I was planning my classes to be a semester long, so after talking with Marc, we came to a solution. Switch manufacturing and engineering up so that next year when i start and advanced level course, i'll have two classes worth of students to pull from. Having construction tech be a year long actually works to my advantage, so i plan on keeping that the way it is.

It was pretty miserable all day. Got a call from Michael that Waikiki was blown out again... Both him and Travis decided to take another day off. Darren and I decided to head out to Seaview approach anyways. We knew it was going to be huge, and probably impossible to make it to the outside. It was definitely pretty wild when we got out. Super choppy and random waves every direction. About half an hour later, the clouds were starting to somewhat break, and soon enough the sun came out. The conditions got way better, and the surf turned out to be a lot of fun. On the way in for a break we spotted a sea lion sleeping on the beach. We went it to take some photos and it scared the crap out of us when it woke up and started barking at us, ha.

Weekend should be fun...

Walking back out for round two. Thanks Darren.

Darren strapping up.

Sea lion dude taking a nap.

waikiki & sunrises.

2008-09-24T19:19:00.000-07:00

The past few days have been a blast. Darren, Micheal, Travis, and myself have started making a habit to meet a certain time afterschool and go surfing. Nick hasn't been out because things have been super busy down at the refuge. It's awesome that we've gotten a crew together to push each other. Travis gave me a pair of his old boots, and it makes such a difference in the water. He's also been letting me ride his old 7'6" which is a ton of fun.
Today a storm rolled in around lunch time, and as predicted brought 30+mph winds. Thus, making the surf huuuuge. The normal Seaview beach approach was probably unsurfable with 15+ foot waves. However, when the winds and tides are just right, a cove called Waikiki becomes surfable. Because it's a cove, the waves push at a constant rate and most barrel perfectly. This is all what i've heard... After Michael got off work at the ranger office, he checked it out, and said the winds were too much and was washing Waikiki out. Darren and I decided to head down anyways to check it out. The winds were so strong it made walking hard, along with the sand blowing into our eyes. We snapped a few pictures and decided to take the day off and rest up because tomorrow is sussposed to be perfect.

If only the tide was a little higher and the winds more NW...

Cape Dissapointment lighthouse in the background.

Yesterday we had a new teachers meeting in the morning. I woke up a little early, and decided to be proactive and take some shots of what sunrise looks like in the morning. Today the Denford CNC Router came in. Should be fun playing with that thing once we get it all set up.

Various photos from the sunrise.

weekends.

2008-09-21T20:02:00.001-07:00

The weekend turned out to be a real good time. Friday after school came back and just hung out at my place. Was thinking about checking out the game up at the high school to "show support" but realized at 8pm that the game started at 7pm, oh well.
Saturday got a wake up call from Jules to come out and surf. It was at 9am and i totally couldn't wake up for some reason. It's cool though because there were plans of an afternoon session. I casually woke up ate some breakfast, and headed to the shop to hang out. Once we got out, we realized the waves were sooo sick. On the "outside" (where the waves start to form) some of the swells were pushing double overhead or about ten-twelve feet. Getting past these waves to the outside proved to be a challenge, but once we were out we had a chance to take a break. Once we were out there saw a bunch (or maybe the same) of seals, and a dolphin dude jump out of the water. Catching the waves from the outside as big as they were was somewhat of a challenge. My success rate was probably 50% but there was one i stood up on from the top that felt amazing. After being out for close to three hours we were all beat. The kind of beat after a good snowboarding session. Jules, Nick, and myself went to the local thai food restaurant, and got the "super sized" dishes.
It was Jules last night in town before heading back up to Victoria, BC for the winter. Before locking up the shop, he gave me a shirt, and pretty much let me have one of the softtop boards for the winter. Just needed to throw a couple fins on the bottom and it's good to go. I can't thank Jules enough for all the help he's given me oer the past few weeks. Without him there'd be no way i would have gotten out half as much, and learn as much as i have. I plan on heading up to Victoria for a weekend, and going up to Whistler with Jules sometime this winter.
Today, i went across the river to Seaside to pick up the fins i needed from Cleanline. I would have stopped in Astoria for their sunday market, but it was raining a bit. Picked up some groceries and headed back up to the peninsula. Made dinner, and took the canoe out.

It was super calm out on the bay.

Random funny picture i took on the roadtrip out here...

Pickleball/Bungee boarding round two.

2008-09-17T21:44:00.001-07:00

Last night i was pretty tired from rowing out to Long Island, but decided to go out with Kim to Steve's barn to play some pickle ball. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickleball Steve's barn is pretty amazing, the downstairs woodshop's got everything... the upstairs has a full pickle ball court, basketball hoop, jam space with a drum set, guitars, etc. I guess way back in the day Steve used to have a 6ft miniramp, then his barn burnt down. But he says he wants to rebuild a ramp, and he's got more than enough space to make it happen.

Today school was good as usual, things are starting to get a lot easier. Also got an email with tracking numbers for the CNC Mill that's on its way. Randy Bloom stopped in to my room first thing in the morning rambling on about how he's been in town for so and so many years and he never made the paper, but i've been here two weeks... ha. There was a full front page article in Chinook Observer's Life section about the whole bungee surfing thing, with a bunch of photos.

Talked to Chris at pickle ball about going out today, so got a call just as school was getting out. Jules, Nick, and Darren were across the river. But Chris and i went out regardless, Steve joined us a little later. The waves were pretty big today, and it was high tide when we went out. Initially the challenge was making it over a few short waves to get to a big break, then do a slasher, or launch off the wave. We were all getting tossed left and right, especially Steve. He went head over heels a few times, ha. I managed to get a real good BS slash on this wave that was pretty far out. Steve took off, so Chris and i kept at it, experimenting with different angles/directions. Chris was going out just as normal when he took a spill that didn't look any worse than others... When he got up he was holding his hand. After a few minutes of trying to figure out what was wrong, i went out to grab the anchor, and we brought everything in. He's pretty sure he broke his hand, and went to go get it checked out. Sketchy...

Anyways, here's some random pictures i've taken.

Cool sunset colors from my backyard, looking east.

Cool sunset colors from my backyard, looking north.

Foggy morning with some birds in my backyard. Tide heading out, or coming in?

Took this when i rode my bike up to the northern end of the peninsula.

The bay, about 5 miles north of my house. Oysterville harbor to the left.

Not sure what lighthouse this is. Leadbetter State Park.

Sandollarz...

Canoe + Bungee/Banshee Boarding

2008-09-15T18:08:00.000-07:00

I came back from school today, and the tide had peaked about an hour prior. The winds were only 8mph out of the SW. Decided to take the canoe out and try to make it out to Long Island. I was able to get into a good rhythm there and back. I think it was about a 5 mile roundtrip?
Took some photos with my phone from about halfway out...

Looking back towards my place.

Looking towards Long Island.

Cruising...

So last tuesday when i met Jules and Nick at this mexican place that has all you can eat tuesday nights, i learned of this new "sport". Thursday after we got done surfing, Chris pulled up with the system in the back of his car. So basically it's this system comprised of a super long braided bungee cord attached to a boat anchor. You wade out in the ocean till you're about waist deep and plant the boat anchor in the sand. Then two people walk/stretch the bungee system towards the shore. It actually gets real hard to pull the cord in after awhile. The further you pull it, the faster you get going. So someone holds the short handle, and anchors themself in the sand while you put down the skimboard and get your footing right. You say when, and the person holding the anchor handle lets go. Initially there's not as huge a pull as you might think. But then about a quarter way out, you get launched. They say speeds around 30mph? You get going pretty fast... maybe faster than 30... So when you're getting launched this fast you have to make sure you have your weight just right or you end up hitting a wave wrong, and it straight launches you... I'm sure without the wetsuits, we'd have some pretty bad sand burn. Overall, it's a super good time, especially when you get a session going.

All of the photos were taken from Damien's blog @ http://damianmulinix.blogspot.com/

Stretching the cable with Chris.

Little further...

Jacob getting straight jacked.

Good times...

Intro

2008-09-14T22:35:00.000-07:00

So i decided to start one of these things to allow friends and family a chance to check out what's going on out here in the NW. I'll try to update this thing frequently with photos and stories. I'm sure i'll get lazy about it, but when something cool happens, or i take a good photo, i'll be sure to throw it up on here.
So as most of you know i moved out to SW Washington.
I technically live in Long Beach, WA and teach at the southern end of the peninsula in Ilwaco, WA.

To give you an idea as to the whereabouts of said location...

View Larger Map

So yeah,
This past weekend was pretty cool. Saturday i decided to head down to Astoria and then up to Fort Stevens State Park. Before crossing the bridge, i stopped in Chinook to drop off some recyclables and saw a few photo to be had.

Kids don't float.

Looking towards Ilwaco harbor...

Bird dudes hanging out.

I made my way across the bridge and towards Fort Stevens. It's definitely one of the cooler parks i've been to out these ways.

An old shipwreck that's lodged into the beach.

Ship heading out to sea from the Columbia River.

Looking at Astoria, and the bridge from the bay side of Fort Stevens.

View of the ocean off of the North Jetty. I hear it's a pretty solid place to surf, if the wind breaks off the jetty just right. While i was here i saw a kite-boarder launch his kite, and cruise out.

After Fort Stevens, i cruised around Astoria and stopped at a pretty low key coffee shop. From what i hear Astoria has a pretty good art and music scene. I'll have to spend some time to get to know the area better. Don't get me wrong Long Beach is amazing. But as far as meeting lady folk go everyone says the best bet is to "import", ha.

Anyways, picked up some groceries and headed back home. Grilled some tuna, and made a salad after picking lettuce from the garden. Afterwards, went for a drive on the beach, as it was lowtide. Attempted to watch the sunset, but the crazy fog on the beach was in full effect. Perfectly sunny and not a cloud in the sky, in town, but as soon as you cross onto the beach you are engulfed by heavy fog.

My backyard as the moon rises over Willapa Bay at low tide.

Even later at night, still low tide.

Today i woke up to Jules calling me asking if i wanted to go surf. I grabbed a quick bite to eat, and met him and Nick at the shop. We rode our bikes to the beach, suited up, and headed out. I took the longboard out today to mellow it out a little. It helped with paddling out to the "outside" (past where the waves break, where the surf is the best, which takes some work to get out past the bigger waves). Upon reaching the "outside" i saw something out of the corner of my eye. A wave washed over top, then it surfaced again. This seal dude was looking at me like "what are you doing here", and i thought the same back at him. We had our moment, and he disappeared under a wave. I was stoked to catch a legit wave from the "outside" and ride it all the way in. After a few hours we headed in. Good times.

I'll post some photos from weeks past sometime this week.