Hardwear Sessions

By Will Meinen

It's 11:14 on Wednesday June 25th, 2008. I check my Gmail. Nothing new. I check the Alpinist website for some newswires. I check the Mountain Hardwear blog for any updates. Ooo, an Alaska report. I read the story and look at the photos. Then I stare at the pile of papers on my desk that I'm suppose to process for my boss.

Click, Click, Clacker, Clack, Click. All I hear are mice clicking and keyboards typing at a rapid pace. Everyone around me is busy doing something. Busy little worker bees ensuring the shareholders a healthy profit margin. Filing, calculating, and double checking their work, in hopes of getting a good annual review.

It's 11:24 now. My life is wasting away in front of my eyes. And for what? A crummy paycheck that barely covers my rent and groceries in the over-priced city. I need to get back to the climbing life. This job sucks.

I open Microsoft Outlook and type up an email.

"Urban farming" is the hip new thing.

Maybe it's the economy. Or maybe Americans are just going through a "green" phase. Suddenly, urban farming is everywhere--it's in the news, in magazines, on television. Artists are getting on the bandwagon, too. Urban farming is so trendy that the New York Times even ran an article about hip young urbanites who replaced their lawns with home orchards. Composting is sexy now.

The urban farming concept is simple: grow good food close to home. Advocates of urban farming argue that the practice eliminates unnecessary fuel consumption, reduces our carbon footprints, and encourages good eating habits. For some families, a successful kitchen garden helps stretch the paycheck. Some families even manage to supplement their paychecks by selling extra produce at local farmers' markets.

In these hands, gardening becomes more than a leisure activity, rejoining the household economy. Before the 19th century, only the very wealthy could afford to keep decorative gardens. You and I would have spent our time digging around in our kitchen gardens, growing herbs, fruit, and other edibles to supplement our diet. Certain garden forms--such as the English cottage garden or the Italian courtyard garden--once existed not for pleasure, but for sustenance.

Today, advocates of "urban farming" hope to take us back to gardening's utilitarian roots. Whether we call them "urban farms," "kitchen gardens," "Victory gardens," or some hybrid of these terms, these spaces are supposed to produce useful things, like food.

By Janet Bergman

The owls woke me as they called loudly to each other, just a few feet outside of our loft window in New Hampshire. The sound of their cooing is eerie, but comforting.

Sitting up to look out the window, I think of my previous night's sleep, on the SFO-Boston redeye. After I climb a big wall I often have odd, unsettling dreams, usually having to do with sleeping in a portaledge or being umbilicalled to a hunk of granite for days on end. In this case, every time the plane jarred, I'd woken with an intense urge to put my carry-on backpack, which I'd stowed about four seats behind me, into a haul system and haul it up to me.

The loud nocturnal hunters, whom I had heard so many nights before, were so much more pleasant of a wake up in comparison. As I listened sleepily, the call of one of the owls, and then the other, fades. I picture one landing on a branch and hooting, and the other flying toward it in this all night game of tag.

Then I think of Freddie and I just a day before, climbing the 3000 foot Nose of El Capitan.

View Janet's photographs from the Nose

Jon holds up a photograph of Thor Heyerdahl.

By Jon Bowermaster

Tenerife, The Canary Islands -- A collection of seven islands 100 miles west of Morocco, the Canaries were named not for a species of yellow bird but rather a wild dog. The Latin Insularia Canaria means "Island of the Dogs." Romans gave them the name, due to an endemic breed of fierce dog said to live on the rocky, wind-swept isles. Some years later known as the Fortunate Isles (maybe the dogs had fled?), thanks to a reputation for an oft-pleasant climate. (The same year-round sunshine that today attracts more than 2 million tourists, most from the UK and Europe, to the commune of Spain.)

Until the 15th century the islands were otherwise occupied only by the cave-dwelling Guanches, who claimed the islands until slavers began arriving, capturing them and selling them on the continent. Other than some Stone Age tools, geometric cave etchings and a handful of ruins, it remains an essentially lost culture. They appeared only as small specs on the edge of navigation charts until conquistadors took possession of them, one at a time. The tiny island of La Gomera, for example, is where Columbus stayed on his voyages, and is still unspoiled today.

The islands are the tips of hundreds of volcanoes that first erupted from the seabed 14 million years ago. Teneguia on La Palma is the last volcano to erupt here, in 1971. Tenerife, the largest of the islands, is triangular -- 50 miles by 30 miles, rising sharply on all sides towards a 4,500-foot summit -- lushly vegetated in the north, sunny and arid in the south. Its biggest town, Santa Cruz, is lined with vacation condos and permanent home to 215,000.

It was to the outskirts of Santa Cruz that Thor Heyerdahl escaped in 1991, to escape the glare of fame that had built in his wake after nearly a century of innovative world exploration. Known worldwide for his exploration of the Pacific by wooden raft -- the Kon Tiki -- and early excavations on Easter Island elsewhere, he came to the Canaries to write and relax during his final days.

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Original German text by Edi Estermann, first published in the "Schweizer Illustrierte", Issue No. 23, June 2, 2008.

Translated by Patricia Bamert, with assistance from Cynthia Houng

Big stories begin with small coincidences. A coincidence that Ueli Steck switches on his phone once again on that evening, just before he gets into his sleeping bag.

Base camp, Annapurna South, Nepal, 4200m above sea level: It's Monday, May 19, 7pm. It is snowing slightly at the foot of this 3000 meter tall wall of granite. Ueli Steck, 31, from Ringgenberg (Canton of Bern) and Simon Anthamatten, 24, from Zermatt, (Canton of Valais), came to climb this wall. In the following days the climbing will start. Both are very fit and highly motivated. Dry meat and cheese for dinner - perfect. The chocolate cake is ready. But today there will be no dessert.

"One missed call," reads Ueli's Handy display. Horia Colibasanu, a 31 year old dentist from Rumania, tried to call him. At that moment Horia is up at Camp 4 on the ridge of the Annapurna at 7400 m. On Friday Horia, Inaki Ochoa de Olza, 40 (Spain), and Alexey Bolotov, 45 (Russia), climb over the east ridge towards the Annapurna Summit (8091m).

By Ueli Steck

Ringgenberg, Monday, June 2, 2008

Simon and I are back in Switzerland and we will try in the next days and weeks to get some rest and we hope that we will work up the happenings of the past weeks.

When we received the distress call form the Romanian [climber] Horia Colibasanu, it was clear for us that we would go up and help them. For us it was just obvious. We didn't hesitate one second. At the same time we knew that afterwards the expedition would be over.

Annapurna will be watching over the valley of the Modi Khola forever. We as human beings, we will have only one life to live for. I have been at the Annapurna twice. But I can go there another 20 times, if I wish to do so. But both of us, Simon and I, we would have never been able to live with the fact, that we didn't go up and help our friends in need.

We did our best. Unfortunately our help came too late.

But Inaki was never alone. Horia was near him all the time, helping him until he had to go down himself. When I reached Camp 4 I hoped Inaki would make it. But all the Dexamethason I gave him, all my efforts to keep him alive, failed. Inaki didn't have to die alone. This gives me consolation.

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By Pat Deavoll

Pakistan - Islamic republic, hotchpotch of federally administered states and tribal areas, land of vast physical contrast. Its an intriguing place to visit post 9/11.

My friend Lydia and I discovered this on a trip in July 2007, the original focus of which was to be the first to climb a 7000m peak in the northern region of Hunza as a team of two of New Zealand's best female mountaineers. We had strong financial backing and having generated some unexpected media interest, were driven singlemindedly towards our task. So it was with some surprise we found on arrival our interests piqued by the implications of being in a Muslim country in 2007.

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By Freddie Wilkinson

"There they are! She's almost to the second ice band.... wow! Is today their fifth or sixth day on the climb?"

If being an alpine paparazzi is your thing, it's hard to beat hanging out at basecamp on the Southeast fork of the Kahiltna glacier in Alaska. The SE fork is the starting point for virtually all ascents of the Alaska Range's big three: Denali, Mount Foraker, and Mount Hunter. On a busy evening in mid-May, one finds plane loads of guided West Buttress expeditions with their matching tents, private groups of gumbies trying to figure out how to light their stoves, and brooding alpinists sulking around "waiting for the forecast to improve". Basecamp is to Alaskan climbing what Ellis Island was to American immigrants: a snowbound customs house where the journey ends and the climbing begins. It all makes for excellent people watching.

And nobody gets more scrutiny then those attempting the North Buttress of Mount Hunter, a gleaming turret of ice and rock only two miles from basecamp.Through the National Park Service's high-powered spotting scope, you can sit back and watch a team's every move.

When Ben Gilmore, Max Turgeon and I arrived there two weeks ago, I immediately noticed a group of folks lurking around the scope and knew: somebody was up on the Moonflower.

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By Will Meinen

Growing up on a farm meant every spring the entire family would spend a day getting the garden ready for fruits and vegetables that would be ready to eat throughout the summer months. Back in those days we never talked about organic or sustainable. I guess it was just understood to be the smart thing to do.

When I moved to the city I was astounded at the poor quality and high prices I found at the grocery store, so I continue the family tradition and plant my own urban garden. It's not quite a big as the one on the farm, and it's been tricky dealing with the short growing season here in Calgary, but it still yields a great little crop and saves me a bunch of money.

If anyone else has ever thought of planting their own fruit and vegetable garden, I encourage you to try. It's quite easy to be honest. Here is my advice to anyone who wants to grow their own food.

Nature finds you in unexpected places. I often hike in Wildcat Canyon, a park close to Mountain Hardwear's offices. On Sunday, I went on a solitary hike and chose an unfamiliar shortcut. The path, a deer path that arched down into a drainage basin that sometimes holds vernal pools, was overgrown. Weeds and thistles obscured the horizon. A snake crossed the path, and then, later, small brown voles scurried for cover.

In that overgrown jungle, I came across a set of deer tracks. Here and there, the grasses had been tamped down, the weeds' thick stems broken by some large creature.

I heard a rustling by the path, and the tall grass started to quake. Coyotes live in Wildcat Canyon, and I hoped it wasn't a coyote.

By Cynthia Houng

In 1958, three English housewives went on a drive. Anne Davies, Eve Sims, and Antonia Deacock bought a Land Rover, and drove it all the way from London to Zanskar, then a part of Tibet.

The women drove 16,000 miles, and then traveled another 300 miles on foot. The entire expedition took 5 months. Along the way, the women met Jawaharlal Nehru, then the Prime Minister of India, climbed a virgin peak (now known as Wives' Peak), and crossed Afghanistan without an escort.

Ovaltine helped sponsor the trip. The company gave the women a small film camera, so they could capture footage for an Ovaltine television commercial. However, the women's footage was deemed "unusable," and Ovaltine filmed a substitute commercial in the studio. Fifty years after the expedition, Ovaltine has released film footage from the 1958 expedition, newly edited by filmmaker Martin Salter:

Ethan Pringle joined the Mountain Hardwear team in February. Rather than put words in his mouth, I'll just let Ethan introduce himself.

By Ethan Pringle

Born and raised in the Mission district of San Francisco, I was introduced to the wonders of nature before I could walk. My parents -- semi professional windsurfers and outdoor enthusiasts -- brought me everywhere. As an infant, I was in a backpack on hikes and on the back of my mom's bicycle on coastal rides. They took me on their adventure trips in the Sierras, on the wild California coast, and abroad. By the time I was five I'd been to Canada, Mexico, Australia and several Caribbean islands, places that most people don't get to visit in their entire lives. As a toddler, I scrambled over crags at Donner Pass and over rocky shores accessible only at low tide. I loved watching wildlife and enjoying the beauty of undeveloped land. My parents taught me to ski at age three. At six, I taught myself to snowboard on an oversize board and Sorrels - back then the sport was so new that child-sized equipment was unavailable. I became fond of being high off the ground, flying through the air over table-top jumps in Tahoe freestyle parks and even entered competitions - grommet division. At seven, I fell in love with Roller hockey. I played center on a championship team and was a complete 'rink' rat, spending every minute I could on my skates.

Then I discovered climbing. I first set foot in Mission Cliffs at age eight. Mission cliffs was and still is one of the premier climbing gyms in the country and happens to be only Four blocks from my home. We stopped in there out of curiosity on my way home from hockey practice. I was instantly hooked. To me climbing made perfect sense. I got my first pair of climbing shoes (5.10 Diamonds -- woman's shoes), and harness (Petzl Hirundos, pink). Soon afterward, climbing eclipsed everything else and Mission Cliffs became my second home. I still snowboarded, but my hockey skates got dusty and were forgotten.

By Nathan Friedman

I tiptoe my skis to the edge of the cornice, peering down to get a glimpse of what I'm about to drop in. As I look over the edge, our guide comes flying past with a quick "I'll see you down a ways" and launches the drop off the cornice. Three turns later and he flies around the corner and out of view hundreds of feet below us. I back up, gather some speed from the short approach, and drop off the cornice into a field full of snow with only a single track snaking down it.

By William Meinen

Classic Ice Climbs of the Rockies: Hydrophobia

It's usually around Thursday that I start to get squirrelly around the office and start making phone calls to find a partner to climb with for the weekend. My buddy Andy Gallant must have felt the same way because he called me before I had a chance to start my search through the Rolodex.

"Wanna try Hydro?"

"Let's do it!"

Hydrophobia is an ultra classic ice climb tucked in the Front Range mountains. The climb in and of itself is sheer and magnificent. A true marvel. The difficult access to the climb steps it up to a whole new level. 4x4 mandatory. Don't even bother trying it with anything less than 12" of clearance. A winch and tire chains are very helpful with the multiple river crossings and steep hill grades. With the climb and the access combined together it really becomes a unique adventure, hard to compare against anything else.

By Will Meinen

Last year while gearing up in the Yamnuska parking lot with Brandon Pullan, I noticed two older gentlemen who had just arrived in a sweet vintage Mercedes Benz sports coupe. As they got out and removed their alpine-coiled the ropes and circa '70 backpacks, I knew these gents had been around the block. Brandon was quick to inform me that it was none other then Andy Generoux and Urs Kallen. These were true legends in the Canadian Rockies, both with a huge list of significant first ascents.

Half a year later Brandon and I attended an Urs Kallen slideshow hosted by the Calgary chapter of the Alpine Club of Canada. Urs presented "The Bold and Cold 25"; his selection of his 'approved' alpine routes of the Canadian Rockies. Many of the routes were on my tick list. I talked with him after the show and soon he invited Brandon and me over for beers.

Several weeks ago Brandon and I headed over to his house with a case of cold brews. When Urs opened the door, he told us we could save our beers because he had a fridge full of fine imports already waiting for us. As soon as we stepped inside we each received two beers and headed into his 'climbers-only lounge'. As we headed up the stairs, he informed us he had not let many people in this section of his house. As the door opened it revealed a small room in his attic filled with archaic climbing gear, black and white photos of his climbing adventures and book shelves filled with enough climbing publications to fill a small library. Three chairs and a small round table sat at the end of the room. We all sat down and Urs Kallen told it like it was, over the course of our beers.

View Wildflower Photos

By Cynthia Houng

How many times have I driven down 108 towards Yosemite, and passed straight through the Sierra foothills? Focused on the mountains, we've seldom stopped along the way. When we have stopped, we've stopped to climb. I don't know the foothills the way that I know the high country. Until recently, I've largely known the landscape as a series of picturesque vignettes, glimpsed through a moving car.

This year, we picked up a book on wildflower walks in the Sierra foothills, and decided to start exploring. One sunny afternoon, we stopped at Knights Ferry, to walk along the banks of the Stanislaus River. We picnicked near the visitor's center, and walked the historic covered bridge, before venturing into a wonderland of wildflowers.

Blue lupines covered the hills. There were bush lupines, four or five feet tall, and there were spider lupines, a small, delicate type with spider-like leaves. A pair of golden eagles circled the water before returning to roost on the cliff. Here and there, we found patches of baby-blue-eyes, California poppies, brodaia (a lily-like bulb with small blue flowers), wild geraniums, purple vetches, and yellow buttercups. In the far distance, dark rainclouds hovered over the Sierras--a late winter storm, gathering over Yosemite Valley.

By Cynthia Houng

From a distance, the trees appear draped with lace. White lace, spun by expert fingers, then looped over the almonds' grey branches in exuberant swags. Up close, it's not lace, but thousands of tiny, delicate white flowers. The almond trees are in full bloom, and the bees are here.

Look carefully, and you will see stacks of small white boxes, no larger than a banker's box. White, rectangular, they house the honeybees responsible for pollinating acres upon acres of almond trees. If the bees do their job, the almond farmers can look forward--provided that the weather cooperates--to a nice, healthy crop. If the bees fail, then hard times are in order.

Almonds are a major cash crop in California, and 120, the road to Yosemite, is lined with almond orchards. Around Oakdale, the landscape changes, and almond trees and processing plants begin to appear by the side of the road. A full 100% of San Joaquin Valley's almond crop relies upon honeybee pollination. In early spring, local hotels fill up with beekeepers, some traveling thousands of miles, coming from as far away as Florida. Some 2,200 tractor-trailer loads of bees arrive in the San Joaquin Valley during the almonds' bloom period. Anxious growers survey the bees--and reject those that they deem too weak to perform their task.

Bees are expensive. The Almond Board estimates that "bee rentals" comprise some 20% of a grower's annual expenses.

Most years, the pollination business is fraught with anxiety. Almond trees bloom early, towards the end of February and beginning of March. Spring rains and uncertain temperatures mean that the bees may or may not have enough time to complete their task before the almonds finish their bloom. Too much rain, too much cold, and the bees sit idle in their boxes.

This year, however, colony collapse disorder has thrown a new wrench into the delicate process.

Will hobbles around in PT

See More Pix of Will and his Injuries on Flickr.

By William Meinen

I sat down the other day and reflected on the past year. I was trying to come up with a 2008 resolution. I looked back and felt it wasn't as productive as it should have been. A broken metacarpal at the start of January kept me out of the winter mix for 2 months. A broken tibia in the spring left me hobbling around on crutches and forced me to forgo most of the summer rock season. Recently during an apres ski/stunt-gone-wrong I ended up with a broken calcaneus and a cast on the other leg, putting myself back on my arse for another solid stint of reading old climbing magazines and drinking stiff cocktails. All in all I was out a total of six months this year due to injuries.

My resolution for 2008 was clear. I will be attempting to get a year in without injuries or broken bones.

It seems easy enough. We'll see how it goes.

Anyways, I thought I would take a moment and discuss the lessons I learned about getting hurt, and some things to do to help get you back in the game as fast as possible.

Have we mentioned that we love reader submissions? This week, long-time reader Matt Keebler shares his enthusiasm for Bishop. We thought you might enjoy Matt's photographs and story, and hope that you, too, will be inspired to share your story.

By Matt Keebler

Bishop in winter means different things to different people. To climbers it means bouldering season! Bishop is most popular late in January or February when the temps start to get warmer, but my favorite week is Christmas week.

From Left to Right: Field Sparrow (Howard B. Eskin), Rufous Hummingbird (Howard B. Eskin), Northern Bobwhite (Ashok Khosla), Black-Throated Sparrow (Brad Fiero), Northern Pintail (Howard B. Eskin), and Boreal Chickadee (Jeremy Yancey).

By Cynthia Houng

This June, the Audubon Society released Common Birds in Decline, an alarming study detailing the precipitous decline of once-common North American bird species.

"These are not rare or exotic birds we're talking about--these are the birds that visit our feeders and congregate at nearby lakes and seashores and yet they are disappearing day by day," said Audubon Chairperson and former EPA Administrator, Carol Browner.

View More Photographs from Read's Tower.

By William Meinen

Very early in my climbing career, as I pulled myself atop of the Devil's Tower in Wyoming, I was forever changed. Everything seemed different. The clouds were bigger. My hands had more character. I opened the summit registry to sign my name in the book with the rest of those who made it to the top. On the first page Todd Skinner had written a small paragraph before he signed his name.

It read something like this: "As climbers we have been given a key and are searching for the door. We may not know were the door is, but we know that it opens inwards. The search for meaning is not worth dying for, but is worth risking dying. Somewhere within this balancing act the door begins to open."

View Andrew's Photographs from Previous Seasons on Flickr.

The First Day of the 2007/08 backcountry ski season in the Wasatch Mountains

By Andrew McLean

There is a lot riding on the first day of a new ski season. Technically, you could call sliding over sand, rocks or grass in the middle of summer a "first day," but realistically, the first day should be your best bet on when you can start reliably skiing day after day, week after week. The first day also serves as a gauge of the of the overall ski season, with an earlier start always being better. Late starts (like this year...and last year) mean you are pinning all hopes on a strong mid winter and spring, which can be demoralizing if they don't come through.

For me, the first day of the 2007/08 ski season in the Wasatch Mountains was yesterday, Dec 1st. I could have conceivably gone out earlier, but once I start skiing, that's all I want to do and the idea of starting and then getting shut down, even for a few days, is more than I can bear.

View More Photographs from Freddie's Trip to India.

Mountain Hardwear athlete Freddie Wilkinson traveled to the Jangpar Glacier, in India's Himal Pradesh, to climb the Glacier's "crown jewel, Peak 5960." Attracted to the peak's "clean lines and elegant symmetry," Freddie set off for India with fellow climbers Pat Goodman and Dave Sharratt.

"Every alpinist knows that fate will only deal him a few special summits in his career," Freddie wrote. "I had to go."

Read more about Freddie's recent trip to India on Climbing.com's Pro Blog.

By Willie Meinen

As I load up my pack, my partner and I don't say much. The wind howls, and the snow blows. It's 3am. The weight of the climb ahead leaves us with a sentiment that isn't worth talking about. Drifts of windswept snow blow across the inhospitable landscape and cover up the glacial till beneath. My boot prints leave the only signs of life, and soon the wind and snow remove my short lived imprint. I feel very alone. I turn off my headlamp and try to adjust to the dark. The stars in the heavens above prick through the inky black canvas. I feel very alone.

By Micah Dash

My good Jewish mother always wished I had become a doctor or a lawyer. To her great regret, I became a rock climber. All of the energy that I could have put into a professional career was completely flushed down the toilet and funneled into rock climbing. She of course blames it on my father. Needless to say, when I go home to visit I feel a bit socially retarded. It's as if my professional life has been severely underdeveloped.

This summer after an all-free ascent of El Capitan's 3,300 foot Freerider, VI 5.12d, 33 pitches, I found myself on the road headed to my mom's house for a few days of R&R and maybe even some homemade chicken soup. But first I stoped for a shower, shave and to do some laundry. Showing up at mom's house completely "disheveled," as she would say, is unacceptable especially at 30 years old. It's one thing to live out of my truck but it's another to look like it.