Day 2

Sunday, June 21st

Today we woke up at 5:30 am to go watch the pro's start at the IronMan. Those guys are INCREDIBLE. After meeting up with Brian Bauer to give him the last heave ho before his start, we headed to the beach to watch the madness begin. [insert photos of group and vid of the beach] We stationed ourselves along the bike route to get some good picks of Brian and then we headed off East towards Montana. Tana and I caught up on some sleep and Susan drove (since she got a lot of sleep while we were all watching the IronMan). Driving through Montana is beautiful. The rivers are huge, and the countryside is pristine. We stopped in Hot Springs Montana and took a dip in the sulfury mineral springs. An old native man pulled up while we were there. He was really a riot. A funny guy who told us he prayed to God for the hot water full of minerals and since He delivered, he now had to be a good Christian. It made me think about how that's not how Jesus really is; works based faith. Although it seemed like he wasn't being entirely serious, maybe he's just doing what he can with his life, sacrificing every minute of it for Jesus since he gave us life. After taking a dip in the springs, we hosed off with the moho's outdoor shower. (We are now affectionally calling the RV the moho) Once we started getting close to Glacier National Park, we found a lake called Flathead. It looked pretty cold but I was desperate for a jump in after still smelling like Sulphur. I used my sweet talking and convinced Tana to jump in with me :) [insert pic of me and tana] Kali (Susan's chocolate lab) also joined in on the swimming :) [insert vid] After the dip we headed to a KOA stationed just outside the park. We cooked some dinner, and headed to bed.

Day One to Alaska!

Saturday, June 20th

Our Journey begins! After Susan picked me up in Seattle along with Phil and Alec, we headed towards Woodinville to pick up Tana. Phil and Alec are catching a ride with us to Idaho to cheer on Brian Bauer in the IronMan. After picking up Tana, and some delicious food in our bellies out at Woodinville, we headed East along I-90. Once we got to Hyak, I took over behind the wheel and powered through for hours until 2 am when we reached Coeur d' Alene. We drove around the town to find a good spot to sleep and ended up in a Safeway parking lot. [insert video on the moho]

My Review of K2 obSETHed Skis

REI

The K2 obSETHed skis tackle every application with ease—big mountain lines and freestyle skiing in deep backcountry powder.

K2 obSETHed Skis

Great all-around skis in park and powder

freek4jesus Seattle, WA 4/11/2009

 

5 5

Gift: No

Pros: Good Grip, Good Carving Ability, Great Flotation, Durable, Smooth Ride

Cons: Scratches Easily

Best Uses: Park and Pipe, Downhill, Powder

Describe Yourself: Advanced Skier

These skis are some of the best all around mountain skis I have skied. I was worried they'd be really hard to turn since they are a lot wider than skis I've ridden in the past, not the case. They turn and hold their edge nice on the groomers and in the park. And, their mini-rocker on the tips and tails makes shredding powder effortless! It's all the advantages of a reverse camber ski, but only on the tip and tail, so that underfoot, there's still a little camber to it. That means you can shred powder, ski some groomers, and shred some more powder. If you want one ski to ski it all instead of having multiple set ups, this is the one.

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A-Rod comes clean

Alex Rodriguez admitted today to using performance-enhancing drugs from 2001-2003. I commend him for coming clean to the public and admitting that he was wrong. I'm glad he is coming to realize the truth has set him free. You can read the entire ESPN article here or watch a snippet of the video here:

Rollin' Rainier

My first time to ski Crystal... The pic says everything if you ask me.

Rainier peepin' out through the low cloud cover from Crystal Mountain

Stead's first camping experience...

Stead told me a while back that he wanted to go camping with us sometime. This initially came as a shock to me because I knew Jordan had no interest in camping. It was kinda like asking Stead to eat seafood, you knew he wouldn't eat anything that swims. So why would you ask him to camp? The only thing I had on my side was the epic pictures we always came back with. Pictures got Stead on facebook, Pictures got stead mountain biking, Pictures got Stead an identical Nikon Camera as Seth Yates, Pictures even got Stead pondering, "how can i put picasa, a windows program on a mac." Pictures were truly the number 1 factor of growth in Jordan's life towards manhood, so maybe Pictures would again have the power to change.

Since he approached me, I felt this could be a genuine movement. So, I began to look for opportunities to get Stead camping, but with the winter season approaching, I knew we'd have to hold out for spring 2009.... or would we?

Stead strolled over one night for a slumber party (actually more like some unemployed college aged kids getting together to talk about the days of the old when being unemployed was legit because you were in school) and asked me where the sleeping bag was. I reminded Stead there was a futon downstairs well equipped with a soft mattress and blankets. He was convinced it was ridden with Spiders... probably because he had seen one spider earlier in the day, and he didn't even see it in the basement. But, rather than accuse Jordan of this weakness, I instead encouraged the sleeping bag slumber. This would warm him up for the real thing.

What I didn't know, is that Jordan thought this WAS the real thing. I leave the room for 2 minutes to brush my teeth and when I return, a picture request. As you can see below, Pictures were starting to turn Stead into a camper.

notes wouldn't let me flip this pic :(

Notice the beautiful camping environment, no tent (only a three level house to provide shelter) no sleeping pad (only 6 inch thick couch pillows) and no signs of nature (only an empty computer chair looking on). Jordan was truly roughing it. In his eyes, he had done it... he was camping.

Rob and I intervened as quickly as we could and reminded and encouraged Stead that although this was a good first step to sleeping in a sleeping bag, an activity that would prepare for camping, this, in fact, was not camping.

He exclaimed "are you kidding me? what's this bag rated at anyways temperature wise." I told him 15, to which he starkly disagreed, and i starkly raised my eyebrow. Since he was in a bag that was rated to keep a human body warm at 17 degrees below the temperature that water freezes, he was envisioning himself camping in the Utah outskirts, it was as if he was in the Alaskan woods in his mind.

Of course, we told him, this is no adventure, only training. To that he rebuked us and showed us adventure by him sticking his hand out of the sleeping bag (because remember, he was sleeping outside of the city gates of Narnia, where the pines sung with the breeze of the wind, and the snow fell like forgotten confetti.) Of course, it was adventure to stick his hand out into the cold (heated room) Note the brave pic below.

wow, a hand... notice the moisture wicking cotton longsleeve :)

So in the end, pictures HAD changed Stead. They convinced him that he really had been camping and they ultimately made their way to facebook (as all of stead pics, and i do mean all of them end up) Stead had won. He had been camping in the ice and snow, and had pics to prove it.... Maybe next time we'll try using my desk lamp as campsite lighting instead of the overhead room lights, one step towards more adventure.

What makes Oklahoma different?

Tonight I was checking out the elections on a state by state basis looking for trends and things of that nature. Naturally, I started to check out the home state I grew up in.

Two glaring things I noticed:

1) Oklahoma has their election process down... It was one of the first states to reach 100% results in even though it is in the middle of the country. Either that or people dang sure had their mind made up.

2) Look at the picture below... Wow, that's the only state I found that way!