Thursday, July 24, 2008

Good stuff the Riverpeople are listening to.


Had the oppritunity to see John Mayer in SLC recently. I get to see a college buddy of mine that works for JM and each summer we get the chance to catch a show and I get to reconnect with one of the few folks that I stay in touch with from that chapter in my life.


The real bonus this year was catching Brett Dennon opening the show. Check it out.


Sunday, July 6, 2008

Utah Rock climbing, 500 feet of fun.

My 4th of July vacation happened in the early hours of July 6th. I went to Big Cottonwood Canyon, Mule Hollow wall and linked Down, Dirty, Doublecrossed, 5.7 430 feet and Implorien 5.9 200 feet.
Up at 5:30 AM, meet Dan at 6 on the route by 7AM after about a mile and 1200 vertical feet of approach.

Sunrise happened some time during the first or second pitch. Beautiful rock and views of Stairs Gulch for the next hour or so keep us content and make the "evil StairMaster" approach worth it. 2 and a half double rope rappels gets us back to the ground. A short walk and we are heading up again on Implorien. More great stone and a trail of bolts gets us to the top and we rap. Back on the ground again we suck down some water, eat an apple and run out to the car.

6 pitches, 4 rappels, 2 miles, 2400 vertical feet of up and down approach and 4 hours and 27 minutes and we are back at the car. 4th of July celebration complete.

For the grade I don't think that rock climbing in the Wasatch gets much better.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Reality Rafting hits Moab, UT

Imagine my surprise when, at 6 PM Sunday, I walk into the office and a camera crew, sound guy and the artist Kenny Harris are standing there rolling film. This is the last time in the next 24 hours that things are remotely normal.

My first thought was that my wife had finally, after years of threatening, signed me up for some TV show.

Turns out Kenny is an artist who has, for the last 32 days, been making his way across the country trading the art he makes for food, transportation and lodging. NY to LA on only what he can get from his art.

Kenny wants to incorporate some rafting into his journey and after some time I concoct a plan to run him through Cataract Canyon in a day. This will get him 120 miles closer to LA. This plan involves running 29 0f the biggest rapids in N. America and traveling from 8AM til 6PM or so in a "sport boat". These are basically dingies on steroids. After some convincing the production crew is "in" and departure is set for 7 AM.

The day is a blur of red rock canyons, blue sky and clouds, HUGE rapids and the camera. The camera followed us everywhere from the office, to the bar (only to finalize plans), launching the boat, running down river, making lunch, running rapids and finally, to the middle of no where in the hot the desert, saying good bye.
The show air's in October. I wonder what I'll look like on TV?
I think that Kenny's blog does a good job of capturing the day, check it out.