ivan

8/19 - day 18 - laps 36-40 for the rare Reverse Platinum Sombrero - a near week at the beach w/ the fam - a crossing of quinault and an epic lake crescent thing - barely a week left in summer 2019 i awoke wicked sore but set out east anyways - the stone near alone for the first 4 laps, but then dave n' steve where there n' we cackled our way upwards together alone to mushroom ledge n' some serious meditation

8/13 - day 17 - laps 34-35 - the world waxes largish, so what exactly is the goal now? last year the improbable # of 60 made me think 61 is all any sane man might relish, or maybe just 62 to stick a fork in the eye of roger morris, but now something much bigger indeed seems possible - how about 74 to offer the proverbial bitch-slap to barry bonds? even if that is to be the improbable mark, such a tally looms already large in the wind-screen and is to be sought for - the hazy outlines of a plan for a phenomenal 14-in-a-day assault in september with a whole heap of fools to propel the thing to a frenetic conclusion - that's in the future though - tonight was sublime solitude and shade and space for easy contemplation - a podcast on theoretical physics' hapless potential to create an end of the world to keep me company - the peregrines on the scene after being rather silent this past month - stone throwing teenage tourists and a positive conversation on the merits of manslaughter - a road trip begins tomorrow w/ the family and maybe a giant swim in crescent lake at the conclusion - there's marrow still in the bone of summer boys, and meat on it to spare as well

8/12 - day 16 - lap 33 - the smell of sudden fiery death roused me at 5 and an hour later i arose in protest at my prickly senses - after tea and trailer park boys i eased myself eastwards for a single lap in the sun - the stone alone, i savored my solitude, the drip-drip of sweat the only sense of time to contend with - afterwards car-chores and lake-swimming w/ many chilluns

8/11 - day 15 - a rare reverse-golden-sombrero raises the lap count to 32 on the summer - the trip took weather-faith, for the rain fell throughout the gorge on the drive in, even in the lot itself a profound mist made its presence known - a fool's errand i thought, but took my shoes down to the base anyway to see if the stone was dry despite 2 days of storms and so it was, and with hordes of portlanders putting their dirty libturd-hands all over it in flagrant degradation too - kyle n' bill n' joe n' countless over fools all encountered and gavreeted with, and one parcel of folks i passed 4 times in total over the next few hours - the history of the world it would seem, and fitting that the soundtrack was 4 episodes of a podcast all about the ending of it

hmm...not certain why, but if you're looking for the final tr with the topo, it's buried at the bottom of my quoted post on page 3 (july 24, 2017) a good bit of activity in the area lately i've heard - looking forward to seeing the story of a 2nd ascent...

8/9 -estival beacon aeon 14 - laps 27-28 - a lazy friday summer sleep-in, the first in some time - warm coffee n' cold eggs w/ the wifey over steven colbert n' some orange-is-the-new-black - the kids like college students, slow to rise - afternoon i ambled out to beacon to meet old ben - beat him by an hour so got a lap in alone before he arrived with his boy asher, sullen n' silent, as a man should be in this shocking modern age - led them up the route sans belays, which i reckon counts as solo too, though a rope was technically tied round my ample beer-gut - a gaggle of elk gamboling about the meadows below the eastern train track, their worries little ones in this wonderous season - the drive home dominated by the sweet smell of summer rain n' the dying sun...

for every one of us living in this world means waiting for our end let he who can achieve glory before death when a warrior is gone that will be his best and only bulwark

8/8 - day 13 - laps 24, 25, 26 - a sad week away from the bacon-stone, but well spent - a swim-trip to crater lake - cock-blocked by the feds, we found better refuge at waldo lake, which was much like taking the 2nd hottest girl at the party home - union bidness in mcminville and quite alright, though it brought the summer death-knell to the forefront of a keening mind - rain in the west, after hours the beaconwand cast its spell and the world was my oyster again - gnome the larry in the gloaming lot, then kyle n' company came crawling in - three laps passing through numerous parties - some-guy-named-steve earned his Hero of Beacon Rock w/ oak-leaf clusters - placid blood flowed freely as it should in the scraping places - kyle got the kid up though competent legal counsel would eagerly have urged him not

8/1 - sou'side summer beacon day 12 of 2019 - solo laps 22-23 - early morning rising to house-hunt n' tidy up domestically, kinda lame really but we are rarely masters of our own destiny i reckon - the daughter-child to her amiga's skamania abide in the late afternoon left time for yours truly to scramble up the bacon wand twice before achieving apogee and getting sucked back west once again to stuff more things into the bursting garage before the photo man comes to record it all in the morning - the great crater lake creep south at sunrise, all mortal concerns cast aside in the gawdamned interest of aquatic glory

7/30 - 11 back-to-back beatard days and i'm a bit drained - 2 more laps for 21 total on this still youngish summer - crater lake complications and house-swapping horseshit clouds everything, my spirits low - might it be that nothing ever really gets better?

that'll show The Man

7/29 - was supposed to be a beacon-less day but the beacon lords giveth n' they take away too - beacon day 10 (in a row!) at any rate, n' solo lap 19 - met the k19 near noon after carting the boy child to row-row-your-boating on lake vancouver and stuffing in a quick swim at fallen leaf lake - after dressing his sadly chapped hands i cast out camas-ways - the plan was the adventure swim to phoca rock from the washington side, a jam i've yet to even get wet for yet despite numerous attempts, and this one the same - nastia said she was illish and prefered a columbia crossing at hood river instead, so sure, why not? we both drove to set up a car shuttle and noticed near arrival that the wind was whipping, the waves white-capped and their swells nice n' rolling long - gave me the heebie-jeebies a bit, soul-scarred as i remain from the one and only trans-columbia transit i made a few years back w/ ole'pat when the gorge was freshly burnt and i was perhaps drunk by naval standards at our 10 am departure (holy jeebus, that incident still ranks high on my most-terrified ever list) - after setting up the shuttle though we gave her a go, me in my wetsuit and snorkel and boots and web-gloves and day-glo orange personal swimmer buoy (and sober besides, having learnt all kinds of lessons that chilly october morning) but the russkaya of course was just in her dainty 2-piece and rocking the doggy paddle stroke, true russian-berserker style and blazeningly loving it - not too far from shore the waves and winds announced their presence with authority and our humble tribe quailed at their querulousness, first she then me after starting a 2nd attempt alone - retiring to the oregon side once again to recover her car n' kick about the conversation-can we revolved the rubik's cube of future combinations and settled upon giving something/anything a chance someday soon, assuming we live that long - a solo beacon lap on a wind-wracked n' shady south side sans shirt was my true reward for listening to the Little Voice Inside Me and chopped the voyage home neatly in half - all i have to worry about now is tomorrow...

7/28 - beacon day 9 - 2 more laps makes it 18, a tear beyond my tenous memory - wurst to drag adam's esposita up the corner at first, but she foreswore the morning heat and when adam got froggy on the immediate details i said fork-it n' went n' did a lap while he helped a timberline high-to-do set up a big kayak shuttle down to kalama- soggy as hell from sweat i returned as his business was concluded, having to concede another climb in the immediate future was fucked - we repaired to the river again then n' had a mort of swimming n' redneck shenanigans before i felt honor-bound to take advantage of the recent shade for another clambornation n' siddle on back home - plenty of folks casting about at the base, one even who recognized my nom de guerre n' threw a compliment my way that in hindsight i think i mighta thrown back a tad too heelish - perhaps if i spent more time on my people skills instead of scratching the Endless Itch?

7/27 - summer beacon day 8 - the late morning meetup out near no'bo - adam n' claire n' naterring as we waited for ole'geoff to arrive w/ his prized n' feared jet-ski - beers n' bullshitting n' plan forming - claire drove us up near the dam and we flung ourselves into hamilton creek, expecting far more fun than the fickle world felt like paying out, stumbling mid-knee forever through the stream in wetsuits w/ stuff sacks full of beer - the main current at last and drifting down under the beacon face, admiring some hard-dudes dancing on the journey to the east above big ledge - many more bevies on the dock afterwards n' some soft-porn skinny-dipping by the masses, than back to the little road hold-out before cursing them fools n' cutting loose to clamber up the corner in the gloaming-dark before darting back to home for chicken salad n' discoursing over stranger things

7/26 - the end of my first summer beacon week and a productive one with 2 more laps to bring the total to 15, 1/4 of the way to last year's ludicrous total, but at a pace to bury it should that be my jealous jam on looking back (i've heard tale their no more nefarious thief than nostalgia though) - a mile swim in fallen leaf while the wulf-man paddled away on lake vancouver, then beacon just after noon in the brutal brightness - shed my black shirt in favor of royal blue - lovely pair of sheilas atop tree ledge on the first lap - sucked down my beer in a batch of shade in the gut under uprising, panting like a bitch - a horde of latinos on the way down, one fella w/ a pack to support the lot of them for a month if need be - the second lap lonely but bearably in the breeze, fat drops of sweat drip-dripping and sizzling away on the stone - then house-hunting and general real-world bummer concerns...

7/25 - another hat-trick makes it 13 laps in 6 days, a healthy clip - irish death's n' lovely crowds n' sun n' shade and all after a right-nice long swim continued a paradise-theme-of-a-summer so far...

yes but He Does

7/24 - day 5 - laps 9-10 - ten laps in five days not so shabby - nary a soul in sight on this sweatyish day, but steve in the parking lot - a week a paradise it would seem...

7/23 - day 4 - lap 8 - swam a slow wetsuit-less mile in fallen leaf under cloudy n' cool skies, fetched the boy child from camp, then deposited him again before darting out to the bacon-wand for a single ascent before coming back camas-ways to peruse new houses and ultimately sup on delectable thai takeout

no i'm not

7/22 - day 3 - laps 5-7 - a hat trick on a hottish day, 2 in the sun and the third in the shade the hottest of all w/ numerous half-clad hotties along the way

no FFA nor even 2nd aid ascent yet that i know of - i bet a shiny $2 bill it'll never be entirely freed, particularly pitches 3-6, 9 and 11 a feller did try rappelling the route the other day and came to grief https://q13fox.com/2019/07/20/climber-rescued-from-tower-rock-i-was-probably-gonna-die/ been monkeying around on new things since rapunzel but nothing that can compare in kewlness to tower, it's just so damn big compared to everything else w/n a couple hours drive...

7/21 - day 2 - laps 3-4 - hey, only 33 more days at this rate to top last year - foiled upon arrival at battle ground lake, i bounced off fallen leaf lake too n' resigned meself to clambering out at beacon - once again the rock all to myself, despite the weekend situation - a lap alone, then another w/ some folks thrashing their way up the original dods exit at the end - summer's halfway home n' i'm still all smiles

7/20/19 south side day 1 of the year, well after le grande opening i'll grant you as i sallied up n' down the coast courting more arduous adventures - swimming in the olympics, multi-day colonel bob bumblefuck, marriage counselor sheenagins n' regular ole climbing in leavenworth w/ the silvermans shit-talking each other at every turn, then near a week about mt whitney w/ the whiskey hooligans - 2 solo laps in the shade, every hold an old friend and unforgotten - geoff n' kyle n' larry the gnome at the top n' beers n' bullshitting at the base - managed 70 solo laps last summer, so that's 1/35 of the way to repeating that unbelievable total

could it be that both harding and robbins will lose?