Here I am, back in Joshua Tree- a place I have been in the Spring and Fall since my return from New Zealand in 2006.  Crazy.  I never imagined spending much time in the desert- much less living in one of these moisture parched landscapes.  I grew-up in a place that has more fresh water than anywhere else on earth, with wet, rainy summers and cold, snowy winters.  Here in the Mojave desert it's been in the high seventies in the day, and mid-thirties at night.  I have seen exactly two drops of precipitation since I arrived- and that startled me (I though a bird pooped on me).

So how did I end-up down here . . . again . . . on a more permanent basis?  Well, I was offered a position as a full-time field instructor with Odyssey Wilderness Programs, who I was working for this past summer, as they started a new therapeutic rock climbing and backpacking program in the park.  A new program means lots of risk, but lots of opportunity to contribute to the structure of courses and the curriculum as well.

I started by driving a van down from Bellingham, stopping to climb Mt. Ritter in the Eastern Sierras on the way down.  High winds meant it was hard for me to hold onto the rocks as I scrambled from the saddle at just over 12,000ft. toward the summit, and tiny pebbles and bits of sand blew into my eyes behind my sunglasses.  My book said the peak had a nine mile approach- round trip.  Unfortunately it was nine miles one-way, with five thousand feet of elevation gain- a bit more challenging than I thought it would be, though not terribly difficult and with reasonable weather despite the wind.  An amazing sunrise with spectacular lenticular clouds, coupled with some ice axe and crampon work across a snowfield and up a steep couloir made for a great day.  After returning to the van I had a five hour drive to Joshua Tree.

Odyssey's Office is in a beautiful Spanish style house on a hill overlooking the Morongo Basin.  One of the neighbors is Bev Doolittle- a famous artist whose house- which looks like a cross between a space station and a carniverous fish- is a work of art in itself.  As for myself, I've made a home in downtown Joshua Tree, a couple blocks from the road that enters the national park.  A very low rent and reasonable cost of living mean that I actually live in a house, rather than a cardboard box, and believe it or not I actually sleep on a matress rather than a thermarest. 

My days-off have been spent rock climbing, meeting locals, and cooking with my three roommates.  So far I've led two courses- one backpacking course with a single student, and a rock climbing course with three students.  If all goes well, I'll be on a two-weeks-on, two-weeks-off schedule until March, when I hope to return to Bellingham, Washington for another round of living the good life in that perfect climate with abundant mountain recreation.

Ah, and did I dress-up for Haloween?  Of course I did- only this time I didn't go as a homeless outdoor educator as I do on a day-to-day basis.  I was inspired by my mother's description of the costume of one of the preschoolers at her school- I went as a bottle of Heinz Ketchup.  People here in Joshua Tree take Haloween- as well as other holidays- pretty seriously, so I was happy that I was able to fit-in by choosing such a senseless outfit.  I was also able to host a house warming party, which had a spectacular turn-out and offered my roommates and I meals of potluck leftovers for nearly a week.  Maybe we should throw parties rather than go grocery shopping?  

So my time here has been very good, and I'm feeling fit and healthy after hauling around a pack laden with water and eating organic rice, lentils, and quinoa for weeks at a time. 

I hope you all are preparing to gorge yourselves on incredibly large foul and various canned-goods!  I'm borrowing an oven from my neighbor and preparing to go all-out.

Cheerio!
Glen

Geesh, what a season!  The weather is turning cool again, and I suppose that's a sign that it's time for me to migrate.  But before I scamper off to Joshua Tree National Park in Southern California for my next stint of work, here's the fatty on what I've been up to from August onward. 

After returning from British Columbia I led my first trip with Odyssey Wilderness Programs aboard the Resolution- a 26 ft. longboat schooner.  We sailed through the San Juan Islands for the next 14 days, making stops here-and-there to resupply and visit with therapists in the field who met with students about their therapeutic progress.  I always learn a dump-truck load about myself on these trips, and I find that being involved in a therapeutic program isn't just beneficial for "clients", but equally beneficial for me.  My ability as a leader is constantly tested and adjusted, and the way in which I communicate- verbally or otherwise- is challenged.  I love this work because it challenges me mentally, physically, and emotionally while forcing me to learn about new environments and pick-up new skills.  And in the end, whether or not students make meaningful changes in their own lives, I think that I am positively changed myself.  Good stuff.

But after two weeks of full-on challenge, it can be a bit difficult to adjust to ordinary life once more.  So during my twelve days off after my boat course, I tried to capture challenges that floated my way.  Two planned mountaineering trips fell through, but I joined up with some friends for a little bike ride up the Mt. Baker Highway.  I ride a bike often, but I would not call myself a "cyclist", and neither would the cyclists who saw me huffing away on my mountain bike as I rode the 124 miles from Bellingham's ocean front up to Lake Anne at over 5000 ft. and back.  I had a lot of respect for my friends who had invited me along, who completed the ride with smiles on their faces as I feigned mine despite the taste of lactic acid in my mouth.

The weather remained good, so it was back up to Mt. Baker the next day to hike the Skyline Divide Trail with sweeping views of Mt. Baker, the Twin Sisters, and Mt. Shuksan.  And then around the east side of Mt. Baker for a backpacking trip along Baker Lake through old growth Spruce and Cedar more than ten feet in diameter.  After the trip I headed to Seattle for an interview with Lakeside School where I was applying for a position as an international trip leader for high school service learning projects, and then it was time to head back to work.

My next course proved to be more challenging than the first, with a larger group size, one less instructor, and a more physically demanding course as we backpacked the Olympic Coast and the Hoh Rainforest of Olympic National Park at the foot of Mt. Olympus.  Two weeks later and I was surprised to find myself back in Bellingham, which was awash with young people as students arrived for a new school year at Western Washington University.  I headed back to Seattle to work the corner for my friend George's boxing match, to see my cousin who I hadn't seen in over ten years, and to explore the city.  Then down to Bend, Oregon I went to see my friend Dave, where we went climbing, cliff jumping, and hot-springing.  Then back toward Seattle, stopping in Tacoma to see my friend RJ and meet Charloette who I would climb Mt. Rainier with.

Rainier was more of a challenge than I had thought, with the glaciers gaping wide this late in the season, making the going slow as we belayed eachother across broken icefall and crossed ladders over crevasses placed by a local guide service.  Wind speeds grew steadily as the sun rose, blowing rocks and chunks of ice from adjacent slopes, and occasionally blowing us off our feet.  We completed the final glacial traverse and sat for a few minutes on a ridge leading to the summit crater before we decided to head down.  The sun threw light of all shades over the landscape, and I again had the feeling of being an astronaut in a foreign land.  Rainier will certainly see me again in the future.

And now I am preparing to pack a van and head south to Joshua Tree so I can begin working winter backpacking and rock climbing courses for Odyssey Wilderness Programs.  I have a two-weeks-on, two-weeks-off schedule, so if any of you are interested in paying a visit, come on down!  It will be warm and sunny!  (compared to where you all are coming from anyway).

Yikes, that's enough.  Take care, and make sure to value that low-elevation air,
Cheerio,
Glen     

After trying to stay in one place since April, having work fall through and more work fall through, and examining the concerned expressions of roommates as I consumed damaged canned goods and produce with a famished fervor, it was time to explore all possible options for keeping myself fed and housed.

After a flurry of e-mails, and another whirlwind of paperwork and trips to the fax machine to send-off resumes and copies of certifications, I got an e-mail from Thom Henley who I had led a trip to Indonesia for in February. He offered to have me on as a volunteer worker at a camp he was constructing for international youth in Kitwanga. After some research, I found that Kitwanga was located on the Skeena River inland from Prince Rupert British Columbia, just a bit south of Mt. Edziza Provincial Park and the Stikine River where I had worked the year before with Alaska Crossings. With visions of salmon and mountains dancing in my head, I said yes and packed my bags.

En route I visited my friend Ian and his girlfriend Jen on Vancouver Island. We went backpacking for a day in a fog covered alpine landscape before we decided that the views were better down below and headed to lower elevation for urban explorations. Then it was on to Vancouver (the city- not island) to meet Thom and travel north by car to his land on the Skeena. The land was incredible. Perhaps the single most beautiful piece of privately owned property I have ever seen. The Seven Sisters- an impressive granitic range I liken to the Tetons on steroids struck into the sky on one side. Glaciers poured down into old growth cedar, fir, and cottonwood before the forest flowed to the edge of a field rampant with white daisies. On the other side Frog Mountain- still capped with snow in early summer- stood over the Skeena River which cut a vertical bank and rid the land of a row of balsam poplar trees that once anchored the soil but blocked the incredible view down the Skeena's riparian corridor. And standing elegantly along the border of the land were a series of structures: A storage “shed”, which was more the size of a small house- was built with a chainsaw in five days by “Mr. A”, a Thai man who I led the Indonesia trip with. There was a gorgeous dining hall made from large timbers fit together with pegs, an outhouse, and a series of tent platforms for canvas wall tents like those used by prospectors at the turn of the century.

Thom explained the new projects. A water tower, solar and wind power, shower facilities, a pantry with stone walls, and a new outhouse. I thought back over my previous construction experiences building water gardens, erecting fences, and of course constructing lizard cages. I began scratching my head. Then I remembered that I also had experience remodeling a nineteenth century log cabin using hand tools when I was sixteen, a bit of time building mud huts in Northern Thailand, and I'd done a lot of research on alternative energy systems and a bit of design work back in college. Eureka. I had all the false confidence I needed to begin.

And so work began with the few tools I had- a tape measure, hammer, nails, handsaw, and a pile of scrap lumber leftover from a mill that had closed-down. Later, I obtained a straight edge, level, power tools, and a generator, which greatly sped-up the process. Progress was still slow since most of the lumber I was using was warped or not uniform in thickness, and every time we needed more supplies we had to drive more than an hour into the nearest town, and load as much as we could into our shiny silver four-door rental while gritting our teeth at the thought of paying for a scratch in the paint.

During the three weeks of construction I oversaw two young workers from a nearby Gitxan reservation, and a volunteer named Erhardt from Mexico as we constructed the pantry, put-up wall tents, dug ditches for waterlines, built a bar for the dining hall, helped a neighbor install the plumbing, constructed a new outhouse, and erected the pilings and main supports for the water tower. It may have been a slow process, but I was impressed by the meager results we achieved.

After the construction phase it was on to the training phase, as a group of people from Canada and the United States gathered to participate in Rediscovery International's eleven day training for youth workers. The training included bushcraft, navigation and route finding, camp safety standards, voyageur canoing, and cultural and natural history as we visited modern and historic sites of the Tsimshian, Gitxan, Wet'suwet'en, and Nisga'a Fist Nations Peoples. A highlight for me was stuffing myself with salmon, fry bread, and eulachon (candle fish)- which were traditionally used by First Nations People for their oils which could be burned for light, or mixed with food as a caloric preservative. Another highlight (and this one more lasting than the mouth fulls of amazing food) was getting to know people like Val, Ken, Lavender and Theo, who introduced me not only to their Gitxan culture, but also showed me a level of hospitality and generosity that I hope I can show to others in my own life. And of course I also had a wonderful time with James, Maggie, Lea, Midori, Erhadt, Pat, and Thom as we traveled, worked, and learned with and from each other each day. 

And now I am back in Bellingham, readying myself to lead a sailing course for youth in the San Juan Islands off Washington's coast. It's sunny and warm here like most of the States at the moment, and I'm desperate to leave this laptop behind and get out in some rays before they remember this is the Pacific Northwest and go back where they came from.

Happy summers to you all! Light a candle-fish for me,

Glen

PS: If you're ever having bad luck fishing in BC, don't forget to check the road.  James grabbed us a huge Spring Salmon dropped by an eagle onto the highway.  It was still cold, and definitely still delicious despite the claw marks.

Huh.  Did I really leave Asia more than three months ago?  Yep- I guess so.  It is now the middle of June, and my last blog was back in late February.  So what have I been up to?  Well, certainly not all I intended on being up to, but somehow life has a way of making me bend to its will.  I'm bending.

Upon returning to the States I began working for Peak Performance in Joshua Tree National Park, as is common for me to do in the Spring and Fall.  I worked with some great kids from Marin Country Day School and Polytechnic School who I took backpacking and rock climbing in remote areas of the park.  Between courses I visited the "Integetron".  What the heck is an Integetron?  Why, it's a machine built by aliens of course!  Ok- not exactly.  The machine was built by George Van Tassel in 1959, after he was visited by some friendly folks from Venus (would you call them Venetians?) who told him to build the thing.  Unfortunately the machine was never finished, so it wasn't able to create the positive ion field needed to increase human life expectancy twenty years, but hey, you can't blame a guy for trying.  Check it out on wikipedia:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Van_Tassel  

After my escapades in the desert I headed for Bellingham, WA, where I had spent the winter before.  I was excited to attend training for Odyssey Wilderness Programs, which consisted of rote memorization of curriculum, mission statements, core competencies, risk assessment models, and protocol.  We were then tested verbally and in written form before being cast-out on the Olympic Coast with fellow instructors who acted like at-risk youth.  Days started at 5:30am, and finished around 1am.  We hiked in the dark and the rain, taught navigation classes and camping skills, and practiced our therapeutic skills on one another until we wanted to kick each other in a very unprofessional manner.  Then we boarded a longboat.  Longboats were once used as lifeboats aboard Tall Ships, as well as for exploring shallow waters and traveling up major waterways inland.  Ours was called "The Resolution", and we rowed and sailed it for the following six days around the San Juan Islands.  Fourteen of us slept aboard its 26 foot length, double deckered on the floor boards and oars which were laid flat over the top of the seats to create a second platform.  We all relieved ourselves in a bucket on the bow, which required use of commands like "Eyes Aft!", and "Ahoy!  'Tis a mass of gas!".

Following training, I joined my friend Dave on a trip to Bend, OR so I could recertify my Wilderness First Responder.  The class was a load of fun, with one of the instructors cracking jokes left and right, and explaining how an 'inny' could actually become an 'outy' if a hernia occurs in just the wrong way.  I've always wanted to know what it's like to have an outy, so I spent the next two days trying to rupture my abdominal wall as I climbed at Smith Rocks in Bend.  Then it was back to Bellingham to wait for work.  And wait for work.  And wait for work.  But nothing.  Bad economy has meant low numbers of admissions, which means a little work divided a lot of ways.  So, it was back to teaching martial arts, and I began to make a modest sum (very, very modest) teaching private lessons and evening classes at a gym in Bellingham.  Check-out my profile under "instructors" at http://www.usmaa.us/.  I also began spending more time with mountain rescue folks, tying knots, untying knots, talking about knots, and not tying knots.  I am proud to say that I now do not know how many knots I've knotted over the past few days I've spent knotting knots that I previously did not know.

And then Bonom came for a visit, and as always happens when Bonom and I get together, thousands of feet of elevation were ascended in a matter of a few days.  We attended a talk by the infamous Dean Karnazes- an ultra-endurance athlete who has- among other things- run across the major deserts of the world, including a good section of Antarctica.  Ah, what a great vacation.  With inspiration in our pockets we woke at 5am every day for an uphill run or mountain climb, followed by a swim, and a bout of rock climbing as we made our way north through Van Couver, Squamish, and Whistler, then east through the North Cascades, and Northeast to Mt. Baker.

Then I arrived back in Bellingham and promptly contacted Thom Henley, who I worked for in Thailand and Indonesia as a trip leader and environmental educator.  He told me work was available, and to get my butt to the Skeena River east of Prince Rupert in BC in late June.  So- that's where I'm headed.  You can see my description on his website under "Who we are": http://www.in-touch-with-nature-education.com/who/who.htm.  My life is as unpredictable as ever, despite my plans to "settle down" this year.  Bellingham does feel like a home in the making, and I hope that some how, some day, some way I will actually be able to find work that allows me to stay put.  It's getting rediculous.

I hope you are all well in all those place you all call home!
Glen