Discovery - One Man's Struggle with Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness...: October 2014

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

I won the Zumba Hallowen costume contest!!!

And $30.

Pretty good for an outfit I plucked out of the closet and did 5 minutes of scissor work on!

Headed to Halloween Zumba at Family Fitness

Back to Basics.... And 1974... And Kung Fu Fighting!

5:45 pm Workout at CrossFit WMD

Mmmmm.... Deadlifts....Basic Movement.... Strength Exercise...

And I'm paired up against the Mighty Mouse Giant.... a guy named Little John.... who's probably 5'6" 140.... but lifts like 6'3" 230 and runs like an Olympic Sprinter....

Definitely the strongest, fittest, fastest guy in the Box.... IMHO

And then some Auxiliary Work..... I like that word Auxiliary.... Most people can't even do 10 strict Chest to Bar Pullups....

and then a 13 minute AMRAP of Front Squats and Kettle Bell Swings....

That's about as varied of an all body workout as you're gonna get.

As you can see, this 52 year old idiot was chasing the 40 year old Mighty Wonder and getting blown away....

John got 345 on deadlifts for 5 reps which is incredible.... considering how tiny this guy is...

I got 335 for 5 reps which is incredible to me.... just goes to show you what happens when you got a rabbit to chase....

He got 7 complete rounds on the 13 min AMRAP.... I got 5-1/2 rounds....

But who's counting?

I am....

Hey.... it's call the Human "Race" for a reason....

Everything is a Competition....

If you don't think that way then....

You're losing!

One of the advantages of being back home is that I can cook what I want....

And what I want is tons of veggies - raw and cooked - and tons of protein -

In this case - diced Holmes Pork and Venison Sausage and a big Ahi Tuna Steak - grilled hard on the outside and rare in the middle....

It's like Ribeye Sushi!

Dialed up the "Have a Great Day" playlist on Spotify and was met with a remake of one of my favorite 1974 classics.....

Kung Fu Fighting!

Hello my Faithful 4 followers and all the rest of you casual observers out there.....

I'm up early and trying to figure out what I can tear up today....

So let's get this Terrific Tuesday started....

I got the Disco rocking 105 Poinciana....

Taking the garbage out in the dark...

Gonna ride the bike to Starbucks and drink Cafe Americanos till I explode....

Pick up the pieces and throw it in my pannier....

And ride to Family Fitness for a little Phat Burner.....

And then Disco down to Zumba...

Then back home for a hard copy review of 135 pages of a Technical Procedure - Yuck!

No.... No..... Not Yuck! Money!

I don't have a clue what my future or this Tuesday holds for me....

But let's get up and take a swing at it and see what happens!

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Home is Where the Miller is... And for now that's LJT!!!

Aaah....Morning Coffee....

And it's only 54 degrees.... Not Bad Lake Jackson..

Getting all my clothes put away...

And put all my bicycle and hiking gear in one container for the next great misadventure...

Needed to loosen up my arthritic and very abused and swollen left knee so I headed down to Surfside for an hour walk in knee deep surf...

Best hydrotherapy I've found yet.

And it was a beautiful day on the beach....

Yesterday morning (1:15 am), I was exiting the Sky Rim Trail at below freezing temps.

Today, I'm knee deep in the surf at 81 degrees.

How's that song go?

Changes in the Weather....

Changes in Me.

Sky Rim Trail Route Map and Where I Went Wrong

Here's a pic of the Trails Illustratred topo hiking map for the Northwest part of Yellowstone with the route I took shown with the arrows.

That little diversion down and to the left terminating in "Lost" is where I peeled off what I thought was Big Horn Peak into the very steep drainage that terminated at a cliff.

I had to climb back up that drainage to the top of the slope which was the last of the 3 big peaks BEFORE Big Horn Peak.

As stated in the previous post, I then worked my way over to the base of Big Horn Peak and bear crawled up it and then caught the Black Butte Creek Trail down and out to the road and then down the road from the Black Butte Creek Trailhead to the Daley Creek Trailhead where I left my vehicle.

Total hiking time was 16 hours 45 minutes including the 4 hours lost in the diversion down the drainage.

The last 11.5 miles from the peak before Big Horn all the way out to the car was done in the dark.... well I had a headlight on....

On the positive side.... I took the time several times to turn off my headlight and view the most beautiful sky full of stars (thanks Coldplay) I have ever seen.

All's Wills that Ends Wills.

Good bye Yellowstone....

Good bye Sky Rim.

Sky Rim Trail Mile 10 - 22: a 4 hr mistake Help! Walking the last 10 in the dark

I got to the top of this ridge and the wind was blowing at least 25 - 30 mph and it was cold and I was cold.

Found this cairn of stones...

And NO TRAIL..... Nothing..... just this grassy slope. Based on the time elapsed from hitting the Sky Rim Trail, I should've gone 4 miles which would put me on Big Horn and I thought that last climb was the steep slope leading to Big Horn....

But I was wrong.... I decided to peel off the very steep south side of the slope and work my way down and hopefully find the trail (that didn't exist) at the bottom of the hill.

Video of this slope and my thought process flawed as it was....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWzst0Ic0Do&list=UU5JGx4cor4nTTTbn6FNWgLg

The steep wooded slope terminated into a rocky slope where I was basically skidding down on my butt into the drainage at the bottom.

I'll show a picture of the marked up trail map to show where I went wrong in the next post.

Bottom line is that I followed the drainage down to the point where it terminated into a 30' drop off with no way down.

That's about a half mile beyond the point shown in this pic.

It was at that point with daylight going fast that I set down and realized I probably wasn't going to get out of here tonight.

Pretty matter of fact.... No Panic.... Just made a mistake.... Didn't evaluate the information I was given correctly and ended up in a bad situation.

It's when you get in a real bind that you call someone that can help....

So I called my wife....

She took the facts down.... my approximate location.... and said "OK, I'll call the Ranger's office and get them to call you".

5 minutes later I got a call from my wife and the Park Ranger almost simultaneously.

I told the Park Ranger what I had done and where I had come from and described my surroundings and he calmly and cheerfully said....

"I know right where you are.... You can't get out that way.... You've got to go back up the hill, find the 2 orange and white posts (which I had seen earlier on the cold, grassy slope) and then call me back".

So I spent the next 2 hours climbing back up the drainage to the top of the slope.

By the time I got there....

Video of the surroundings and my plan to get out of here....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=to7zQy_lQAI&list=UU5JGx4cor4nTTTbn6FNWgLg

The sun had gone down....

I called the Park Ranger back and got a bearing on where the trail came off the end of the long grassy slope.

No more pics after that.... it was dark!

I worked my way over to the base of Big Horn Peak and then spent at least an hour and a half bear crawling or 3 pointing my way up the steepest slope I have ever hiked up.

Got to the top and found the metal sign the Ranger had described and called him back.

He directed me to the next sign 200 yards down the meadow and then to the sign post for Black Butte Creek Trail which would take me all the way out to the road.

After a couple of failed attempts and a 10 minute walking discussion with the Park Ranger guiding me down the slope based on my description of what I was seeing, I found the beginning of Black Butte Trail and hiked the remaining 10 miles out to the the road and then 2 miles down the road from the Black Butte Creek Trailhead to the Daley Creek Trailhead where my SUV was parked. It took me 5 hours from 8:30 pm - 1:15 am.

I had purchased a new very powerful headlight for this trip and it definitely made the difference on the 5 hour hike out in the pitch black of night.

So I ended up hiking from 8:30 am Friday morning till 1:15 am Saturday morning or almost 17 hours straight in Yellowstone's Northwest Back Country on the Sky Rim Trail.

See the next post for my route.