Road Trip 2010, Part 1

On Wednesday, September 8, I set out on my first long motorcycle trip of the year. I've been doing so much cycling and so little motorcycle riding, I'm pretty sure up until this trip I had put more miles on the bicycle than either motorcycle in 2010. I had originally planned on leaving Tuesday, but I wound up having to do something Wednesday morning, so I left as soon as that was done. It's just as well I had to wait, the whole region was getting lashed with rain on Tuesday from Tropical Storm Hermine. I rode just to the corner station to fill up with gas and check that the bike was running well, and got wet even with my rain gear on. It was a lot milder in the morning, but I still got rained on steadily from Austin to Lampasas, then off and on for the rest of the day. I went through a few areas where it was actually sunny, and as soon as I thought that maybe the rain was done and I could take my rain gear off at the next stop, I would hit another patch of rain. My rain gear didn't do the best job of keeping me dry, the top and bottom of my shirt and the bottoms of my pants got wet. The sunny stretches allowed my shirt to mostly dry out, but my pant legs, and worst of all, my socks, stayed wet the entire day. I finally stopped in Guymon, Oklahoma and got dry and a decent night's rest. On the positive side, I did ride through 7 Texas counties and one OK county I'd never ridden through before.

I got packed up and moving on early on Thursday, and got to the Kansas line right around sunrise. I headed north along the western end of the state to its highest point, just east of the Colorado line. The biggest challenge in getting to the highpoint was riding on gravel roads, but that's not exactly anything new. It was the Fat Boy's third actual highpoint (NE and OH the others), so at least that's something. While I was there a man and (I'm guessing) his two sons drove up, who were fellow highpointers. I took a picture of them in front of the highpoint marker, which is kind of a neat metal sculpture, including a sunflower (the point is called Mount Sunflower, even though it's not a mountain). I rode a gravel road from there to the interstate, and headed west to Denver. The weather had been pretty pleasant, but it was hot in Denver. I went to the Capitol, but there was no place to stop for a picture in front, so I had to get one around back. I parked and went inside for a look around. I climbed up into the dome just as the woman was getting ready to close it down for the day. The view was really nice and the breeze up there was great. I hit some traffic on my way out of the city, but fortunately it was just rubberneckers, and not the multi-car pileup in the other direction. The temperature dropped, from quite nice to downright chilly, as I climbed into the mountains, and then it would warm up again descending from the mountain passes. As I have previously, I went through the Eisenhower Tunnel, the highest (and longest) in the US, at over 11,000 feet above sea level. On the way down, I was chasing a semi that seemed to be on fire, as it was spewing foul smoke. I eventually got off of the interstate and headed to Leadville (the highest city in the US). I gassed up and headed just outside of town toward the Elbert trailhead. I found the turn I somehow missed when I was there in 2008, and found myself a campsite in the National Forest campground. I would have just stayed put for the night, but what I didn't realize at first is that the campground was effectively closed for the season- the restrooms (pit toilets) were locked, but there was no fee at least. The manual water pumps (if they were operational at all) had had their handles removed, so there was no water. I set up camp and rode back to town to get water, and I also picked up some cookies and other carbs for the hike the next morning. It was starting to get dark as I made my way back to camp, which is exactly what I wanted to avoid. That wasn't the real problem, though. I realized, after it was already dark and I had no interest in going back to town, that the batteries in my headlamp were nearly dead. I also searched everywhere and didn't have a backup flashlight anywhere. I used to keep a mini-maglite in my backpack as a backup, but I probably took it out to fly somewhere. Of course there was no moon out at that point, and after a little while the headlamp was putting out only slightly more light than the stars. I managed to prepare and eat dinner, and did find a lighter for emergency lighting. On the positive, I did see more stars that night than almost any other time in my life.

It was still dark when I woke up Friday morning. I fumbled about for a while getting stuff sorted out for the hike. It started getting light as I was packing the bike back up, and the sun was rising by the time I got to the trailhead. The toilets there were not locked, so I availed myself of one. There was a pretty big group of guys of various ages (mostly 10+ years older than me) that left a couple of minutes before I did, but I caught up with them in less than 10 minutes. I passed most of them before catching up with the youngest at the front. He must have thought I was with his group at first, because he seemed surprised when he turned around and looked at me. After a little ways, there was a flat traverse section, and I decided to jog a little bit. In retrospect, I probably should have saved my energy, but I was feeling strong. I passed an older guy by himself just after the trail started climbing again. He caught up to me when I stopped for a 10 minute break not long after, and he said he was from Nashville. I think he must have turned back before the summit, because I didn't see him again. It was only about 15 minutes after my break that I reached tree line (around 12,000 ft), and took a quick break to put on sunscreen and sunglasses. It started to get steeped from there, and the air was definitely getting thinner. I met a couple coming down who had been at the summit for sunrise. The air was getting really thin by the time I got to the first of several false summits around 14,000 ft. I would only go about 50 feet before having to pause for breath, and every time I restarted from a stop I got a head rush. Fortunately, the trail from 14,000 to the summit (14,440) was not very steep. The wind, which had been blowing pretty good all the way from tree line, was particularly strong at the summit. Thankfully, there are several low rock walls for shelter. There were two people at the summit when I got there. I had them take my picture before they started back down. I didn't stay very long at the summit, mainly because it was cold and windy. I passed a number of people on their way up as I was descending. Some of them were not exactly thrilled to hear how much further they had to go. I passed the big group I had passed in the beginning just before I got back to tree line. I was feeling pretty tired when I stopped for a break just below tree line. I took my boots and socks off for a while, ate something, and relaxed for a few minutes. I was a bit more energetic after the break and clean, dry (but thin) socks, but it wasn't long after that I was feeling pretty sapped again. I pushed myself for a while, but ultimately decided that I didn't really have to rush and took my time. Ultimately, it took my almost 3 hours from the top to the bottom, and it had only taken me 3 and a half from the bottom to the top. I had to do some rearranging of the bike before I could head back down the gravel road toward town. I rode south and then west to the town of Gunnison. For whatever reason, the first chain hotels I tried were full (or only had an expensive room available), so I wound up staying at a small family-owned motel. It wasn't much and the room was very tiny, but it had what I really needed- a shower. I had dinner at the place the clerk recommended, but it was not very good and the steak prices were significantly higher than Austin's. After dinner I used the motel's curious hot tub in a little wooden house in the middle of the parking lot. It felt pretty good nonetheless, and soon after I was socked out in front of the TV.

It was very cold Saturday morning- the local weather was saying 26 degrees, which was pretty much confirmed by the frost on my bike and the several other bikes in the parking lot. I brushed the ice off and packed the bike anyway. I had breakfast along with the owners of some of those other bikes. We chatted a bit about our rides in the area until I finished and got geared up for my morning ride. I had every piece of warm riding gear with me on, and I was still freezing. The temperature had started to rise, but I had not yet begun to thaw when I got to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park about an hour away. I started to warm up in the visitors center, and moreso when I walked down to a view point and back up. Since a ranger program was starting soon, I rode down to the river to the East Portal ranger station. The road down might just be the steepest paved road in the US at 16% grade. The bike wasn't entirely happy, it was backfiring the whole way down. I found the talk interesting- it was about the Gunnison Tunnel, which at the time of its completion was the longest irrigation tunnel in the world, and is now a National Civil Engineering Landmark. Unfortunately we didn't get to see the tunnel itself, since it is still in operation, providing water for the area's fruit trees and other crops. After the program, I rode back up the steep road and checked out the vistas along the canyon rim. It was pretty impressive- very tall and quite steep. I don't have a great fear of heights, but there was one view point in particular where I had a hard time getting the proper perspective, and it kind of made my head start to swim. At another view point, there were rangers who were checking up on two rock climbers who were coming up just across the way (but still on the same side of the river). That was pretty impressive to see, but even more impressive would have been to climb the Painted Wall, which at 2300 feet is not quite El Capitan, but is the tallest in Colorado. It had warmed up by the time I headed out of the park around noon, and since I still wanted to go a pretty good ways, I got back on the road. The sun was getting close to setting as I was riding pretty much due west into Capitol Reef National Park, so I was having some trouble seeing, but fortunately there was very few other cars. When I got there, the park's one campground was already full, so I went on 10 miles further west into the town of Torrey and got a site at a commercial campground. I had a nice little campfire going and had even picked up some new batteries for my headlamp, even though I didn't need it nearly as badly as I had in Leadville, since there was a big artificial light in this campground.

Sunday morning, I had some breakfast, packed up, and headed back into the park. Since my legs were still sore from Elbert and I wasn't really geared for hiking, I mostly just rode to the various view points, even a couple that were down dirt roads. The one hike I did do was to a natural bridge. It certainly wasn't Arches NP with its dozens of arches and bridges, but it's always cool to see those weird formations. I paid the $3 and took the scenic drive, which honestly wasn't that much more scenic than the main road through the park, but it did offer some spots to pull over and take a few nice pictures of my bike. I headed out of the park around noon, and passed through lots more beautiful landscapes. I particularly enjoyed passing through Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which is rated as one of the most scenic roads in the country. I would definitely agree, it was pretty spectacular. It would have been nice to be able to explore it some, but that will have to wait for another trip. I did stop and check out Kodachrome Basin State Park, mainly because of the name and that once I saw it on the map, I couldn't get the Simon and Garfunkel song out of my head. It wasn't a particularly large park, and I didn't think the formations looked all that different from the others I had passed, but it was still a nice place. It sucked to pass right by Bryce Canyon NP and Zion NP and not have enough time to stop, but I have already seen them and really want several days to explore them some day. I headed east toward Page, AZ as the sun was setting, and was treated to a typically gorgeous desert sunset. The hotels in Page seemed to be pretty full and while I might have found a better deal elsewhere, I checked in to the Best Western. After dropping my stuff, I went out for food. For as many foreign tourists as there were in my hotel, the town seemed to be pretty dead. I had a pretty good dinner, then headed back. It wasn't too late, since I had gained an hour by crossing the UT/AZ line, so I went for a swim. The heater for the hot tub was broken, but the pool was open. The air was cool and the pool wasn't especially warm, but it was fine once I eased my way in, and I started swimming laps despite it being an irregularly shaped pool and the lights (in the pool) being off.

Lost Pines Triathlon

As I mentioned oh so long ago in my last post, I became interested in doing a triathlon after watching the CapTexTri downtown on Memorial Day. After mentioning it to a coworker, he suggested looking at trifind.com to find one I was interested in. After looking and thinking for a while, I zeroed in on the Lost Pines Triathlon in Bastrop State Park at the end of August. It's considered a sprint distance, and the 400m swim is in a pool (followed by a 16 mile bike and 5k run). That pretty well alleviated any fears I had of drowning out in open water somewhere.

Starting just 10 weeks before the race, I decided the best method for training would be to join a gym with a pool, since swimming was a big concern of mine. I joined the enormous one, about 6 miles from my house, LifeTime, with two lap pools (one indoors, one outdoors). Also, not that it has anything to do with a triathlon, it has an indoor rock climbing wall. After about two weeks of running and swimming (on top of my usual cycling) and a trial run of the race distance, I was pretty confident I would be able to at least complete it, and I registered for the Lost Pines race.

Training went pretty well, I did about an hour a day 4 days during the week, and usually a little longer on the weekends, with a mix of in the gym and outdoors (which included cycling to work about once a week). I initially jumped around on the machines in the gym, since I'd never belonged to a gym before, trying out the stair master, the ellipticals, the rowing machine, before pretty much settling on the treadmill. I swam about twice a week in their lap pool, and on most Saturdays I joined the group bicycle ride leaving from the gym. One weekend I rode my bicycle downtown to the running shoe store, bought some proper running shoes (instead of just my regular all-purpose sneakers), and went for a run on the hike-and-bike trail. A week before the race, I did another "brick," riding to and around the veloway for 16 miles, and then running a 5k on the high school track.

After all the prep, today was race day. I woke up at 5 in order to get to Bastrop State Park before 6:30 to get one of the limited number of parking spots actually inside the park. I got my bike and other stuff and set up in the transition area. Being a rookie, I managed to do things out of order and initially missed getting my number drawn on my arms and legs. I picked up my timing chip and strapped it to my leg. Then it was milling about and getting my gear situated and ready to go before they closed the transition. In the pre-race briefing, it was explained that since the pool is old and not a lap pool, it was about 33 yards and the whole swim would be "about" 400 yards long. Also, that the run wasn't 3.2 miles or even 5k as advertised, it was more like 3.6 miles. Then the real chaos started, as they basically threw out the seeding and rather than have people start based on what time they said it would take for them to swim the course, they just let people go whenever. For example, there was a really big guy who it seemed could barely swim started long before I did (he got a big cheer when he finally finished the race, well after me).

The course worked kind of like a maze, going down and back one lane (which, by the way, were divided basically by pool noodle floats), moving to the next lane, down and back, next lane, etc, for a total of ~11 1/2 laps (ending at the steps in the middle of the pool). The starter wasn't releasing people at a regular interval, she just started people when the person in front was most of the way through their first lap. Because of the random order, I managed to catch up the person ahead of me around the first turn. I passed two more women in one of the lanes, which was complicated by oncoming traffic- the lanes were narrow for even two people to pass, three was impossible, so I had to wait for an opening. I passed a couple more people who stopped for a breather on the walls. At one wall, I stopped long enough to get a comment from the woman who started right after me (and had been chatting with) that it was harder to follow the lane dividers than expected. I definitely found that to be the case- having done most of my swimming in a specifically designed lap pool, I got used to having a tile stripe on the floor to follow- this pool was oddly shaped and had no such markings.

My first transition was pretty slow, mainly because I put on socks and had to wipe the pine needles and crap off my feet first. I also put on my helmet, gloves, sunglasses, heart rate monitor, watch, ... I was feeling an adrenaline rush at the start of the bike ride, and my heart was going over 170 bpm. After the first couple of rolling hills, it was over 180. Once it leveled out more and I was in "bike mode," my heart rate came down to reasonable levels. Then came more and more rolling hills. I passed a lot of other bikes, and really only one passed me (one guy was climbing slower and descending faster than I was who passed me twice, and I him twice), some of whom got off and walked some of the bigger hills. The steepest hill was as steep as the steep section on the veloway, but a little bit longer. I never had to get off the bike, but I did get down to the lowest gear I have (and then had to stand up and crank). I finally got to the turnaround point, and had to do it all again in the other direction. Fortunately there wasn't as steep of an uphill on the way back. I did manage to lose a water bottle (that I was holding at the time) going over a paved-over cattle guard. At least it was the one with straight water, and not the one with electrolytes.

The second transition was quicker, swapping my cycling shoes for my running shoes, racking my bike and ditching my gloves and helmet. I started to feel my calves cramping changing my shoes and at the start of the run, but I figured it would work itself out as long as I kept moving (and hydrating), which turned out to be the case. The run course went right past where they were cooking kielbasa for lunch, which was a bit tortuous as I was feeling hungry before the race started. The run went fine, I certainly didn't set any speed record, but I'm pleased that I managed to keep up at least a jogging pace the entire time. The guy I had been dogfighting with on the bike sailed past me, as did a woman. In the very last stretch, two guys overtook me. Right at the finish line I felt pretty spent, and was glad someone was there to bend over and take my timing chip so I didn't have to. After a little replenishment, I felt really awesome, kind of a "runner's high," I guess. I ate and drank a ton, and just sort of wandered about until they gave out the trophies and such. It turned out to be worth my waiting around, I won a wetsuit in the prize giveaway. My time ended up being 1:53:09, good for 66th overall (of 200+), and 5th in my class (men 30-34, of 12 total), which I feel is pretty good for a first time. The guy who got the best time (~1:20) said of his 20 years of racing, this was one of the toughest courses he'd done. Should make the next sprint triathlon I do seem easier, or maybe I'll just jump up to the Olympic distance...

Long Overdue Update

Man, it's been quite a while since I've written anything here. I guess I pretty much lost interest. That, and I haven't been up to too much that's particularly exciting. Not that that stopped me in the past, but I sort of fell out of the habit and have had a hard time getting interested again. Maybe part of the problem is that I've gotten very little feedback about this blog. I haven't done much of anything to bring in readers, other than sending out what I wrote about the Rainier climb along with pictures to a bunch of people. I haven't even set up a feed from here to Facebook, which is where I do pretty much all of my sharing these days. Other than the Rainier article, pretty much the only feedback I've gotten about this blog is in real life, which is just kind of weird. Enough with the excuses, I'll get to a brief overview of what I've been up to.

In February, I went skiing for the first time in at least a decade in Taos. I went the week of Presidents Day, just after the project I had been slaving over for a few months at work wrapped up. I made the arrangements only about a week or so beforehand, when it finally looked like we were going to make it. I made all the arrangements (including lift ticket and ski rental) through the hotel I stayed at in Taos Ski Valley. Staying there was definitely more expensive than staying in town would have been, but I wanted to be close, especially in case there was overnight snow and my little car would have getting trouble getting to the mountain. After parking Monday morning, I didn't move my car until I left Thursday morning. I ate breakfast and dinner pretty much every day in a little bar/restaurant in the same clump of buildings as my hotel and the ski rental shop. It was good and reasonably priced, probably only a little more expensive than town, but it was full of skiers and people who work on the mountain, which made for easy conversation. It was also really nice that the Olympics were on TV the entire time, there was always something to discuss with strangers.

I raced slalom in high school, so I used to be a pretty good skier, but only skied a couple of times during college, and not at all after moving to Texas. Having once been relatively good and my legs being in good shape helped significantly, I think, in my return. I started on green runs (the easiest), quickly moved to blues (medium), and even a couple of black runs (difficult) by the end of the first day. I didn't even come close to attempting any double black diamonds (expert only). Taos Ski Valley has pretty advanced terrain, and most of their black runs, in addition to being fairly steep, are ungroomed and therefore covered in moguls. One run I spent a while on was half groomed, so I could take the moguls one or two at a time to relearn how to ski them, and then ski on the groomed portion for fun. I certainly didn't get to the point that I would call good on the moguls, but I did really enjoy myself. One other reason I liked the black runs is that I spent a lot more time than on the blues- I mostly sped down the blues faster than the lifts were going up. At the start of the third day my legs were pretty tired. It took about an hour for them to really warm up, and they about gave up well before the end of the day.

On my way back home, I stopped and spent the night with some old family friends in Santa Fe. They showed me around the town, which I really liked. I had actually stopped for a little while on my way up and toured the Capitol. My parents actually just visited them as well.

A short time after I got home from the Taos trip, my grandmother passed away. I went up to Dallas for the memorial service in March. My parents, sister and niece all came down, so it was good to see them. My aunt and uncle and cousin and her family all live up there, so of course we saw them as well. There was a funny moment- my niece and I had gone over to my cousin's house where she and my cousin's daughter worked on a coloring project; my cousin and I were helping them and they ran off to watch TV, leaving two adults coloring with crayons.

Once again this year I went up to Pittsburgh in April for Spring Carnival. I took an absurdly early flight on Thursday in order to get to the buggy display before it ended. I took a bus from the airport to my hotel, dropped my bag and walked at top speed to campus, and made it with enough time to wander around and chat with old friends. However, most of the people I saw throughout the weekend who I knew from when I was in school lived in the area- there weren't nearly as many of my friends from out of town as the first few times after I graduated. The buggy races were pretty spectacular- there were a lot of crashes on Friday and on Saturday there was a shocking major disqualification of an entire team that would likely have won in both the men's and women's divisions. The weather changed dramatically between Friday and Saturday- whereas Thursday and Friday were warm to where I wished I was wearing shorts instead of jeans, Saturday (especially the morning for races) was very cold, to where I had to go inside to warm up a few times. There was some sort of 10-year reunion gathering at some point that sounded pretty lame, and that I skipped to hang out with my fraternity brothers and other old friends.

I have been cycling quite a bit, just over 700 miles since I got a computer for the Secteur. Since the end of March I've been riding to work at least once a week, and it's become my main means of transportation on the weekends. After mulling it over for quite a while, in April I swapped my toe clip pedals for clipless pedals. I went with ones really meant for mountain bikes, mainly because those kind work with cycling shoes that actually look like shoes. Since I still mostly ride to places and stay for a little while, I wanted shoes that didn't look totally bizarre out of context and also were easy to walk in. I also picked up a pair of "commuter sandals," which also accept cleats compatible with the pedals. I haven't had much trouble with them, mainly in clipping in from a stop- sometimes it takes a couple tries before they click in. I've found the sandals are harder to unclip than the shoes, possibly because there's extra play between when the foot moves and the sandal moves. Only one time it caused me to fall over when there were some bicycles in my way and I couldn't unclip in time to keep myself from falling over. I bruised my hand and butt slightly in the fall, nothing too serious. This past Monday (Memorial Day) I went downtown to watch the CapTexTri for the first time. Seeing all of the "less than elite" competitors kind of made me want to try one some day. We'll see if that interest lasts and if I can swim a half to three quarters of a mile without drowning.

I haven't been inline skating much. I have been hiking in Barton Creek Greenbelt every now and then. I haven't been riding the motorcycles too much other than to and from work every once in a while. I haven't been camping and it seems I missed the weather window for this area- it may hit 100 degrees this weekend.

That's probably about it for now. Maybe now that I've gotten that stuff down, I'll write about my next adventure without feeling a burden of all this other stuff I hadn't mentioned.

Holidays

Last Thursday, Christmas Eve, I went cycling. I didn't have much of anything specific in mind, so as I was riding north on Lamar I decided to see a movie. I decided to see Avatar. I had been planning on skipping it since the reviews that looked past the spectacle have said it wasn't a very good movie, but of the movies that were playing I decided that was what I most wanted to see, even though it cost an extra $2 for the 3-D experience. It may have been due in part to it being the first of the new generation of 3-D movies I've seen, but to me the spectacle was enough to make it an enjoyable experience and worth the $8. After the movie, I went to the bicycle shop down the street. I had been looking around at different places about buying a new road bike, and I was pretty much decided on buying it from this shop and that was good of a day as any other. I test rode a few around their parking lot, and decided to go with the Specialized Secteur. There was one I liked a little bit better, mainly because it came with 105 components instead of Sora, but it was more than I really wanted to spend. The Secteur frame is slightly stretched compared with a traditional road bike, which is supposed to make it more comfortable for long rides. I don't have any immediate plans for anything close to a long ride, but around the parking lot it handled more like what I'm used to, not as twitchy as the lower end bike I tested. Since it was getting kind of late in the day and the store was going to close before too long, I decided to lock up my Roma to their bike rack and ride the Secteur home. It was immediate trial by fire, riding a brand new bicycle on the side of a busy street. I had to figure out the gears, handling, and even where I wanted to put my hands since there are three different possible positions. One of the biggest things, though, was getting used to toe clips. It's been many years since I've ridden a bike with toe clips, and to try to remember/figure out how to get my foot back in them after stopping. I've gotten a little more used to it now, but I was not having an easy time with them then. For probably many reasons I was having trouble setting and keeping a good pace. I was fitted for the bike, and it seems like the proper seat height is lower than what I was used to. The gearing is quite different, and with the compact 2-ring front derailleur there's a really big difference between the two. I wound up over-exerting myself and a couple of times had to throttle back to keep from getting a cramp. At least I made it home without wrecking or getting hit or anything.

I woke up around 7 Christmas morning and had enough time to open the few gifts from my parents before heading to the Dallas area for dinner with my aunt, uncle, grandmother, cousin and her family. The day before the Dallas area had gotten a rare snowstorm that actually stuck. On the interstate, all it amounted to when I got there was a little bit of water on the road and occasional patches of snow in the median. Once I got of the highway, though, the road hadn't been cleared as well and there was some slush left in the middle of the road. That (and the expected 50 degree high) made me glad I hadn't decided to ride my motorcycle. We had a really nice home cooked dinner around 1 and a little later exchanged gifts. My cousin's kids (7 and 10) and I played with the little nerf guns she had given each of us for a good while until they went home. I spent the night there at my aunt and uncle's after a rather subdued evening.

Saturday morning after breakfast I left for Colorado Bend State Park, just outside of the tiny town of Bend. I got to the headquarters (all the way into the park) around 1:30 and decided I would take the 2 o'clock guided tour of Gorman Falls. I also signed up for the cave tour the next morning as well as paying to camp for the night. I walked around that area for a bit before meeting the guide, Kevin, and following him in my car to the falls area. At the gate, since I was the only one taking the tour, I hopped in his truck for the last mile past the gate to an old hunting lodge. The falls are actually quite impressive, a stream over 60 feet of travertine. It formed in essentially the same way that cave formations do, where the limestone is dissolved upstream, flows in the creek and then deposits the minerals forming, essentially, a big dripping wall. Kevin gave me all kinds of information about the falls as well as the park in general. He said that there was more water flowing than he had ever seen, so it was nice to see it so full. In some sections the water fell almost like mist, and in a couple of places was a full stream. Another interesting thing nearby was an old car buried in the bank of the river. On the ride back to my car in the truck, there were calls over the radio about shots fired, directly across the river from where I had planned to camp. When I got back to headquarters, they told me they wouldn't let me camp in that area and I could pick any of the regular campsites, that are usually a few dollars more, for the same price. Since there was nobody else camping, I could pick literally any of the sites. After a quick survey, I decided to take site #7. The plus side of camping in that area was that I could have a fire, so I bought some wood. I had planned on waiting to light it until after dark, but as soon as the sun started going down the temperature dropped rapidly from the beautiful 50-degree day it had been. After I got the fire going I made dinner and read the newspaper. I sat in front of the fire reading (my book after I finished the paper) until around 10, at which point it was quite cool. Around 6 o'clock, I saw a car pull in. Since the headquarters had already closed, they must not have had much of an idea of where to camp, because out of literally any site they could have chosen, they set up in the one next to mine. It's not like it was a big deal, he didn't bother me or anything, it was just kind of funny.

I don't know exactly how cold it got overnight, but it was cold enough that when I went to get some water to make oatmeal, the spigot was frozen solid. I ate a couple of granola bars instead, which were so cold I warmed them up in the rekindled fire. I managed to stay warm overnight in my down sleeping bag with two layers of clothes on. I packed up and doused the fire and after scraping off some of the ice on the car, went to join a couple to wait for the 9:15 cave tour. Kevin was the guide again, and we caravaned to a parking area for the somewhat secretive trail leading to the cave. The park has 350 known caves, but the one we were going to, Gorman Cave, is, if I remember correctly, the largest by volume (but not the longest). The trail Kevin led us on to the cave was really nice, especially on such a beautiful morning. We stopped at the top of a box canyon, and then continued along its rim before dropping down to the river bank. We followed the trail along the river for a little bit before we got the entrance to the cave. The cave was pretty nice, but since it was private property until only about 30 years ago, so it wasn't protected and subsequently was filled with a lot of graffiti and a lot of formations were broken. One kind of neat graffito, though, was one dated 1883 that has been authenticated as actually being that old. Since it is a wild cave and the area has gotten some flooding recently, there were several places we had to cross through water. It was never deeper than my boots, but the boots seem to be a bit less waterproof than they should be. I didn't have puddles at my feet, but my socks were damp. We took our time going through the cave- even though we only went about 1000 feet in, we took two hours doing it. We stopped at a gate, after which point the oxygen levels are low and it goes underwater. We didn't take much time retracing our steps to the entrance. We decided to go out a different natural entrance near the one we had come in, which required a little bit of a scramble up a talus slope. On our hike back to our vehicles we took a different route, which took us past an old abandoned gold mine. I chatted with Kevin most of the way back to the car. I drove back to the headquarters and set out for a hike. The first two miles were nothing too special. I took a break at 2 when I got to the road, then crossed over and headed for Spicewood Springs. It was all going just fine until the first time I crossed the creek. Due to two big recent floods, a lot of their trail markers were lost, as well as the trail itself being damaged. Since the park doesn't get that many visitors, and the trails have only been built in the past few years, it wasn't exactly a major, obvious trail to begin with. The markers that they had replaced they only set up for people coming from the opposite direction as I was going. I lost the trail several times, but I knew I couldn't get too lost, I just had to follow the creek. The stream itself was really nice, it had clear water, and there were numerous small waterfalls along the way. It was frustrating trying to follow the trail, and my pace was pretty slow. Finally around 3 I came to a swimming hole that seemed to be more popular with visitors. The path from there back to headquarters was wide enough to drive a vehicle down, so I made quick time that last half a mile. I stopped in and bought a Dr Pepper and complained about the trail. I left the park and got home just before dark.

I had the day off Monday as well, but wound up having to do a good bit of work anyway, but at least I didn't have to go in to the office. In the afternoon I was able to get away and go for a second ride on the new bicycle. I went for a pretty basic ride over to the veloway. I was already feeling fatigued when I got there, so I only did one lap, then rode home. I had originally wanted to take the whole week off, but had too much work to do. I was able to take New Year's Eve off, and around 11 I went for the third ride, which went better than the previous two. I think I managed to find a better pace and what gearing I wanted. I again rode to the veloway and did three laps. I stopped for lunch on my way home, and called it a pretty good ride.

At the end of 2009, the Fat Boy's odometer reads 101921, and the Night Train's reads 7285. That only adds up to just over 11,000, which I'm pretty sure is the least number of miles ridden since at least 2002. I was going to take the Night Train for a little ride today since I haven't ridden it in a while, but the battery was dead. I tried hooking up the charger for just 25 minutes, but it wasn't enough to get it started. Unfortunately Harley batteries don't last very long, so it may be due for a replacement.
As for my bicycles, I don't think I rode my mountain bike at all (and it's been sitting over at Jimmy's for months); the Roma's odometer reads 1362, most of which is from this year since I got the computer last December; the Secteur's mileage is approximately 45, but I haven't rigged it up with a computer yet. I looked into getting a second cradle for the computer I have (since it can do two bicycles), but that would cost only slightly less than getting another one like I already have, so I haven't decided what I'm going to do yet.

And finally, rather than make New Year's resolutions, I thought I would make some goals for 2010:

• Complete riding in all of Texas' 254 counties
  
• At least five state highpoints (this can include revisiting ones)
  
• At least five state capitols (can include touring ones I only photographed)
  
• Enter some sort of athletic competition
  

Costa Rica

On Thursday, November 19th, I flew to Costa Rica for a week of vacation with my parents. I got a call from them before I left for my afternoon flight that there were airport delays because of a computer problem or something, but my flights were still listed as on-time. I had a short layover in Dallas and then a four hour flight arriving in San Jose around 9. While waiting to go through immigration, I picked up some free wi-fi and found a email from my dad saying that they had missed their connection in Miami and had to spend the night there and would arrive in Costa Rica the next day. Fortunately we had planned for this possibility, so I had the hotel information. It was soon apparent that, as promised, a lot of people spoke English fairly well and that US dollars are an accepted currency (in addition to the native colones). I paid $3 to a taxi dispatcher, and got in a cab. The hotel was only about a mile from the airport, so we got there quickly and that's all the fare was. It took a few minutes for the driver and security guy to negotiate that I was in fact a guest for the evening and let me in. The guard showed me to my room and tried to ask what time I wanted to have breakfast, but we couldn't understand each other, so another employee who speaks English called to ask. I had trouble getting to sleep since it was kind of warm and pretty humid, and no air conditioning. I couldn't quite figure out the overhead fan to get it to go fast or at least not hum so much, either.

Friday morning, in what would be a recurrent theme, I woke up with the sun and the many birds around 5:30. I tried to go back to sleep, but couldn't, and read my book until around 7. The hotel served a traditional breakfast- delicious fresh fruit, eggs, and rice and black beans. I would have gone for a walk or something, but the neighborhood didn't look very good when I got in, so I just went back and read in the room. By the time I thought that maybe I should take a taxi to see the downtown area, it was too close to when my parents were due in. I wound up finishing my book, Jon Krakauer's new one, Where Men Win Glory, by noon. I checked out and waited on the porch reading a magazine until my parents arrived at 1. After saying hello, we threw my stuff in the car and headed toward our destination for the next two nights near Arenal Volcano. Initially we were driving on what passes for a major highway in Costa Rica- four narrow lanes, the outer ones looking more like a shoulder in the states- we got off on a smaller road that seemed more typical of the roads in the country. It was paved, but there were numerous one-lane bridges and spots where the road had washed out and the road department just put up warning signs. In some cases, the road surface was torn up and there wasn't even a warning. Also there were lots of tight turns as the roads wound along the steep water-formed valleys in the lush hills. It was kind of sad to see how much of the land near the road had been cleared for farming, which couldn't be easy with the steep slopes. Fortunately the deforestation hasn't been anywhere near as extensive in Costa Rica as in many other tropical countries. Costa Rica seems to have realized that the rainforests are its chief asset, and tourism (especially "eco-tourism") is its major industry. When we got to our hotel and our room we found it was very nice and that it would have an excellent view of the volcano, if only the clouds would clear up. After getting settled a bit, my mom and I soaked in the hot tub for a little while. Later we had a pretty good dinner in the hotel's restaurant.

Saturday morning, the volcano was still hiding behind the clouds. After breakfast we went to Arenal Volcano National Park. We weren't far when it started to rain. We all had rain jackets, but my mom's was old and worn out and didn't really offer any protection. She decided to turn back toward the car, and my dad went with her. They let me go on hiking while they kept themselves busy. On my own, I went at my pace, which is of course much faster. I left the hard-packed main trail for a muddy side trail through dense forest. It was my first taste of a real tropical rainforest. The rain came down in varying levels- never too heavy, but never quite letting up. At one point I thought I must have been near a river, but realized it was just that the rain on the leaves was particularly loud at that point. By the time I got back to the main trail, I was pretty muddy from the waist down. I was thinking I'd just head back, but realized I was pretty much at the end of the trail, so I climbed up onto field of large volcanic rocks. If it hadn't been for the clouds, it probably would have been an excellent view of the volcano. In the other direction I could just see Lake Arenal through the clouds. On the way back to the car it was quite evident that a lot more people had shown up since we arrived, and there were a few tour buses as further evidence in the parking lot. From the park, we drove on to what was supposed to be one of the finest craft shops in the country, except that it was closed. At a shop further down the road run by American expats, we found out that it had recently closed, and another place my mom was interested in had closed several years ago- proof that our supposedly recent guide book was out of date. When we got back to the hotel the rain had stopped and it looked like the sky might actually clear. I wanted to go for a hike or something in the afternoon, but there was nowhere I could walk to from the hotel, and driving around it didn't seem like there was much of any place else to go hiking, at least not without some charge. I wandered around the property and found they had something of a nature walk, although it seemed to not have been completed. I sat on the porch of our room for a while, watching for the clouds to clear from the volcano while my dad was painting. The clouds started to lift and seemed like we might actually see the volcano, then another cloud came along and obscured it again. It went on like that a few times until the sun started to set, and more of a layer of clouds rolled in. We went into the small nearby town to look around and ostensibly to have dinner. We went into a couple of shops that had some interesting wood stuff, and that was about the only thing that seemed all that interesting. We were going to have dinner at a place there, but it didn't have anything we were particularly interested in eating and seemed a little expensive, so we just went back to the hotel and shared a pizza.

Sunday we got up, had breakfast, checked out and headed on to our destination for the next two nights- the town of Monteverde at a higher elevation in the "cloud forest." Monteverde is not very far, as the crow flies, from Arenal, but it takes a while to get there over narrow winding dirt roads. Along the road we stopped at a place with waterfalls we had picked up a brochure for. The place was called Viento Fresco Waterfalls, and it lived up to its windy moniker. The poorly translated brochure might have been a warning, but the guy selling tickets only spoke a little more English than any of us spoke Spanish. After his pidgin description my mom correctly surmised that it would be more walking than she cared for. The dirt road we had already come across from Arenal was enough to convince us that we had made the right choice in upgrading the rental car to a 4x4, but the tiny single-lane "road" down to the parking area for the waterfalls really required it. Either my dad and I or the people in charge of the place (or both) are not the best judges of distance in meters, and it seemed as though we should have already come to the trail when we saw a trail heading up. We thought it must be a trail to the first waterfall, even though it wasn't marked. We hiked up and found that it only led back to the narrow road we had been coming down. We did get a close-up view of a few vultures taking off, so it wasn't a total waste of energy. We got back to the car and drove just a little further to the actual parking area, where there were signs pointing to the waterfalls. The trail wasn't great- fairly steep concrete steps that were a little slippery and a "railing" that was more like irrigation tubing. The first of the four falls of one small stream was the most accessible, and the others descended from there probably about 500 vertical feet to the lowest one. The first one was nice and they had added a small dam for people to be able to swim. The second was nice, with the water dropping from around a big boulder, and with miniature caverns behind the falls. The third one, however, was the most dramatic at over 200 feet. It looked as though it was set up to allow people to get into the water or even stand under the falls, but it seemed to me like it would not be fun to have water falling that far and pounding on a person. It seemed as though the place was set up to have plenty of visitors, but we didn't see anybody else while we were there, and in fact according to the visitors book we were the first since Thursday. We decided not to go down to the fourth falls, which was more like a slide than a straight shot like the others. I had some water and a snack before we started making our way back up to the parking area. The drive back up to the "main road" was challenging, but fortunately our car was up to it, and it didn't prove to be a problem. We continued along the dirt road through the beautiful lush green valleys through the small tourist town of Santa Elena (ah, paved roads) to the even smaller "town" of Monteverde and to our hotel. Before we got to the hotel, though, we toured a butterfly garden with four enclosures meant to represent different areas of Costa Rica. Also on that tour was a colony of leaf cutter ants in a glass enclosure to see their fascinating lives. It turns out they don't actually eat the leaves, they bring them in to feed a fungus, and the ants eat the fungus (or a byproduct of it, I'm not certain which). Right near our hotel we stopped at a cheese factory. It wasn't in operation, but we did buy some cheese, which turned out to be quite tasty. Once we got settled in our room we made arrangements for a guided tour of the nearby National Park in the morning, then headed into town. We wound up having a delicious dinner at a small tapas restaurant owned by an American expat.

Monday morning we had breakfast early, then met up with our guide and another couple staying at the hotel for a tour of Monteverde Cloud Forest Biological Preserve, a short distance up a muddy road from where we were staying. The reason we decided to hire a guide rather than just find our own way was in hopes of seeing the famous but hard to find quetzal, a colorful bird with a long tail. Our guide was from the area and spoke excellent English, and knew the flora and fauna of Costa Rica in general and specifically in this park. It was also nice to have the guide because none of us had thought to bring binoculars and the guide had a spotting scope on a tripod so we could see things we'd never be able to see with our naked eyes. There were a number of birds flying around, but most of them jumped around too quickly to get a real good look at. We walked to one area where the quetzal had been seen, I believe it was near a nest. The guide pointed out lots of the plants along the way, including numerous orchids, most of them very tiny. Most of the trees were alive with epiphytes that live off of nutrients and water in the clouds that pass through pretty much every day of the year. We waited around in that first spot for a little while, all of us with our eyes peeled for any possible sighting. After not seeing anything there, we moved on to see if maybe we would spot it elsewhere. Whenever we passed other groups, the guides would confer as to whether they had seen a quetzal or if they had heard anything, which was nice to see the cooperation. After coming up empty in that area of the park, we went back to the entrance for a quick break and then went into another area. We went pretty much straight to a large tree bearing small avocados, a favorite food of the quetzal. In all likelihood a bird would be at that tree sometime in that next day or two, but since we didn't have that kind of time, we headed back having seen a lot of and learned a lot about the cloud forest. In addition to all the stuff about plants and wildlife, he said he had climbed Cerro Chirripó, the highest mountain in Costa Rica three times, which is something I would have liked to be able to do but didn't have time for this trip. We ended the tour at a shop near the entrance with several hummingbird feeders and lots of hummingbirds, in at least six or eight species, but probably a lot more than that visit them. We went back to the hotel and had a simple lunch. Later my dad dropped my off back at the entrance to the park, where I got a trail map and the woman gave me some information about the trails. I started out on the trail up to the continental divide. The first stretch of trail was pretty nice and hard packed, but then it connected to a muddy dirt road. It was pretty cloudy up at the continental divide. I could see maybe 100 yards or so toward the Atlantic, and could just make out the Gulf of Nicoya, but not the Pacific proper. Nonetheless, it was a really nice view. From there, I would have taken this other trail, but it was closed off. I headed back down the 'Camino' (road) trail until I got to another trail that led upwards. I took that until it intersected another trail that went even further uphill. When I was near the crest of that trail, I came to another trail. The woman at the entrance had marked on my map that this trail was closed, but there wasn't any barricade or anything on the trail itself marking it as closed. Figuring that it led to some overlook or something of interest, or perhaps that it was some other trail entirely, I headed up it. Not far from that intersection, the trail turned from easy-going concrete blocks to slippery tree slices. The slices had, at some time, had wire mesh on them to provide traction, but almost all of it was gone. I hadn't seen anything particularly interesting when the trail started downhill. At that point I was sure that I was on the trail that I had been told was closed, but I figured that I had come this far and there were no warnings or anything, I would continue on. The trail heading downhill looked more like a dry stream bed than a proper trail. It was slippery and had big steps. Most of the way down I was just hoping that I wouldn't have to turn around and go back that way. When I came to the end of that trail at a 'T' junction with another trail, it was blocked off to the left. I started to the right, which I was pretty sure was the same trail that was blocked off near the divide. I soon saw why it had been blocked- a boardwalk through a swampy section had been heaved up when a tree that had been standing next to it fell. The boardwalk ahead was up about waist high and canted precariously to the right. It seemed far too dangerous to proceed, and I headed back to the rough trail I had taken down. I certainly didn't mind the hiking itself, and in fact I felt much better than I had when I woke up congested that morning, but I was a little ticked off. I cut a piece of the caution tape blocking the trail that our guide said was closed because of a landslide, and made my way back up. At the top I tied the tape around some vegetation across the path, hoping at least to warn the next person who might come along. When I got back almost to within sight of the entrance station, I took another trail heading away to go to a "sky bridge." The bridge across a narrow valley was metal with a grate for a deck and shook noticeably when anyone walked on it, but it gave an incredible up-close view of the canopy of the trees. The bromeliads, orchids and other stuff that normally lives way up high was almost literally within reach. After taking some photos and enjoying the view, I hiked back to the entrance station. I was pleasantly surprised to see my parents were sitting there. After cleaning myself off a little bit, we went back to the hotel and I more fully cleaned up. We went to town and had dinner at the sister restaurant of the the place we had eaten the night before, with "nuevo latino" cuisine. It was also delicious.

We had breakfast early again Tuesday, and the around 7 I was picked up for the "canopy tour," really just a series of zip lines (not meant to be educational), that I had signed up for, but my parents had no interest in. Apparently the Monteverde area is the origin of the canopy tour, and it has several choices. The woman at the hotel had suggested this one, eXtremo, since it's newer and has longer runs than some of the other places. Since I was the farthest from the place, I was the first picked up by their van. We picked up more people in Santa Elena at a few different places. First was a couple who I never quite figured out where they were from, possible Spain or Italy. Also in town were two guys from Israel and two guys from Montreal. At our last stop we picked up a couple from Colorado that had actually been at the restaurant we were at the night before, and an Indian couple from San Francisco. We all payed up and got outfitted with the safety gear- a climbing harness, helmet, and a pair of gloves with a thick patch of leather. We got a quick lesson in what we needed to know and do, and learned that the leather on the gloves is to steady and slow oneself on the line. With that, we climbed up a staircase to the first line. The first two lines were pretty short and since they went quickly required quite a few guides, more than I realized at first, in order to have one at each end of each line. Those two were pretty quick and easy, after the initial instruction to sit down, hold rope with one hand and put the other on the line. When we got to that third line, however, it was a lot longer and more unnerving. The woman from Colorado balked at first when she looked out, but calmed enough pretty quickly and went across. I don't remember the exact sequence of the, I believe, 14 different lines we did, but the longer ones crossed a picturesque valley that might have been some sort of farm. We crossed this valley four times in total, with other shorter lines on each side. One of the short ones was the fastest, with a simple arresting system at the end. The second fastest, however, didn't have the arrester and they told us we had to start braking ourselves in the middle of the line, and to stop using both hands. I was pretty unsure of changing up anything about the traverses and moving my left hand from the safety lines to the zip line. I managed to do it, well enough that I didn't have enough momentum at the end and had to "crawl" along the wire, running over my glove with the pulley a couple of times. The last thing we did before the final wire was the "Tarzan swing," jumping from a high platform, swinging out into the trees and being caught on a lower platform. I say jump, but really the guides pushed everybody off the platform. It's one thing to intellectually know that everything should be fine, but it's not easy to take that step off of a fairly secure platform into nothing. For me the scariest part of it, other than the first step, was the initial couple of feet of freefall before the ropes tighten and take the weight. The swinging part was pretty cool, and it almost seemed like we would hit a big tree at the far side. Not everybody opted to do the swing. The two Israeli guys were first, and the second one balked after his friend went and he saw what it was like. That made me second, and I got to watch the other people from the lower platform. Only one of the three women opted to jump, and all the other guys did. There was a fair bit of hiking involved, seeing as how gravity only works in one direction, and we wound up exactly where we started. Of course I don't mind, but for most of the time I was following the much younger Canadians and it definitely got my heart going keeping on their heels. Possibly the longest hike was from the Tarzan swing to the last cable, which is nearly 1km long. Most of the clients made it to the launch point before the last people and guides arrived, so we had a good chance to stare it down. The last line was where the "Superman option" kicked in. I hadn't chosen to pay the extra $5 for the privilege of going down head first, and with a second single pulley to hold up my legs behind me. The six people who had chosen to go Superman style went first, then the rest were sent as couples to have enough weight to get a good speed. Since I didn't have a partner, I went with one of the guides, who was in charge of any braking. We had some time after we turned in our gear before the van got back with the 10:30 patrons and to take us back. We mostly talked about our respective Costa Rica trips, most of which were a lot longer than mine. I was dropped off at my hotel at 11:30, as promised, showered, then we checked out and headed for the Pacific. As seems to be the Costa Rican way, we weren't going very far but it still was going to take several hours. We arrived in Manuel Antonio mid-afternoon and checked in to our hotel. Our bungalow didn't have a view of much of anything other than vegetation, but the nearby pavilion had an excellent view of the Pacific. The place we stayed was spread out over quite a bit of ground, and had a variety of rooms, the most unusual being one converted from an actual passenger plane. The hotel also owns a restaurant across the street with a military plane inside of it.

On Wednesday morning, after waking up to the sound of howler monkeys, we went down the street just a short ways from our hotel to Manuel Antonio National Park. The main draw of the park is its beaches and relatively pristine jungle. Because it was a little unclear where the official entrance was, we first went to the "new" entrance station (still under construction), which is farther from the beaches than the "old" entrance. We got our tickets, and my parents drove to the old entrance while I made my way from the new entrance. It started out as a sturdy trail, really more of a primitive road, through the jungle. Since it was early and there was nobody else, I did see some wildlife- several Morpho butterflies, birds, and possibly a sloth or two, but it was hard to tell since they didn't move and they were kind of high up in a tree. A little later, on the narrow foot path to a viewpoint, I passed under several howler monkeys who seemed to be sharing the morning gossip. The viewpoint itself wasn't really all that impressive, just looking over a small bay. I hiked back down to the trail leading to the more secluded beaches of the park. I went past the "fourth beach" toward the fifth. The trail pretty steep and slippery as I got closer to sea level, and it was a good thing there were ropes to keep from slipping since I was just wearing my sneakers. When I got to the "beach," I first found a family of raccoons, then saw that the concrete stairs that used to lead to the water were destroyed, and finally that the beach itself was pretty much gone too, there was more of a patch of debris. I made my way back up the slope and back toward the beaches, sweating in the sultry jungle. I met a couple going toward the end of the trail and kind of tried to tell them there was nothing there, but they weren't native English speakers and probably, like me, felt like they had come too far not to at least see what's there. At beach four I sat down on a log to take my shoes off and get my feet wet. The beach was pretty small, but there were only two people there. I wandered around a bit, but not too far since I hadn't bothered to put on my sandals and the rocks were pretty sharp. I foolishly was lulled by the placid waves to get closer to the water, just as a bigger wave came along and half soaked my shorts. While I was there hanging out for about a half hour, I saw this cool iguana hanging out on the rocks. I knocked off a layer of sand and put my shoes back on to go find my parents on one of the larger more accessible beaches. When I met up with them around 9, the beach was sparsely populated. It started filling up pretty steadily, and by the time we left around 11 there more people than any of us really cared for. While we were there, I went walking on some rocks, the surf splashing over me with every wave. I also went for a little swim, figuring that being in the lee of a small peninsula it would be the calmest ocean water I'd likely ever find. I could definitely feel the rip tide, but overcame it easily enough to go out a fair ways from shore. I'm really not that great of a swimmer, and I headed back when I started to feel the slightest bit tired. My dad painted most of the time, but he and I did the little hike around the peninsula. As we packed ourselves up to head out, a "gang" of white-faced monkeys had moved in looking for unsecured food. They managed to get some cookies or something from some people's stuff near ours. The one thing I hadn't contended with by going through the new entrance was that the old entrance requires fording a small tidal stream. The tide had gone out since my parents had crossed earlier, but it still required getting wet (or crossing the land sharks' boats). I just plowed straight through the waist-deep, kind of icky, water. We went back to the hotel and cleaned up, then went for a bit of a drive and lunch. We ate a Tex-Mex place with an amazing view overlooking the Pacific. I had been thinking of walking back to the beach after lunch, but I was so full and it it was already almost 2 when we got back to the hotel, I just laid down for a little while. I went in search of something I had seen earlier for the first time since arriving in Costa Rica- Dr Pepper. When I got to where I had seen it chained against its will, I was horrified to find its entire environs had been spirited away. I asked at the desk, and the guy told me they had moved the fridge (which had been sitting outside their closed cafe below), but assured me that Dr Pepper was available in the local grocery store. I had looked when we had been earlier and certainly I would have found one had it been there. I actually didn't have much caffeine while I was in Costa Rica, Dr Pepper being my main delivery system. I naively thought maybe this was actually what I needed to kick the habit and I would lose some weight (from the lessened sugar intake), but it wasn't long after returning home that I was back to my 2-a-day habit. Later I walked down to the pool and sat drinking a beer and enjoying another magnificent view until it started to rain a little. I went back to the room and my mom and I went to the pavilion to watch the sunset. We had a simple dinner in our room, which had a kitchenette.

We packed up and headed out Thursday morning, taking the same road along the coast we had come in on. We stopped at Carara National Park, known for its macaws. We paid the entrance fee and the guy gave us the locations of a couple of known nests. The first section of trail was wide and hard packed, with informational signs along the way. As we got to connecting trails, they got smaller and more primitive. In one section, about as far from the entrance as we went, the trail was almost obliterated by a fallen tree. Midway we crossed a bridge over a stream and came to a small hut. It was somewhere in this area that the guide told us there was a macaw nest, but not quite following his explanation, it took us quite a few minutes to finally see it, way up in a big tall tree. It was far enough away that I could barely get a decent photo (as is evident here). We just stood watching as another one came out of the nest. They're magnificently beautiful and it would have been really nice to see them closer, but that's probably not possible outside of a zoo or something. We went for another loop of trail, and as we were getting back to the hut my dad spotted another macaw overhead. When we were almost back to the entrance, some people told us there was a toucan spotted near there. Luckily it was still hanging around when we got there, but again it was hard to get a good look or photo of it. Another thing we saw a few places along the trail were "highways" of leaf-cutter ants with a constant back-and forth between the nest and the tree whose leaves they were harvesting. From the coast we headed back toward San Jose, with enough time to do something else for the afternoon, but not really enough to see any of the other National Parks. My mom wanted to go to one of the numerous botanic gardens in the area, but left it up to me as to which one. I made what would turn out to be a fairly unfortunate choice of one east of San Jose, Lankester Botanic Garden in Cartago, mainly because the guide book showed a nice church in that town. The gardens were actually really nice and diverse. They even had a Japanese style garden and a cactus area. One of the things my mother really liked, and even I thought was pretty neat, was their orchid house. They had more of the large style of orchids that most people are used to seeing than the tiny ones we had seen in the forests, but they had those as well. We drove back into the town and parked to have a look around the church. There was some kind of service going on, so we quietly checked out the interior. It would certainly not make it very high on my list of the most spectacular churches I've been in (if I even had such a list), but it was still a nice place and more impressive of a building than anything else we'd seen. It didn't take that long after leaving the town that the unfortunate side of its location kicked in. Since we were east of town and we were staying by the airport (on the west side of town), we had to cross through San Jose, and it was around 5 o'clock. Traffic was horrendous, and if there was anything akin to an American superhighway around the city, the GPS didn't guide us that way. At one roundabout, the GPS gave misleading information which led us the wrong direction, and getting back took several minutes. There was one place that was under construction where traffic barely moved. Throughout all of this traffic were tons of small motorcycles and scooters that, to me, seemed like they had to be crazy zipping in and out of all the cars and trucks with barely inches to spare in some cases. We finally made it to the hotel, the same place I had spent the first night, around 6:30. We had dinner there, which wasn't bad, but hardly in keeping with a traditional Thanksgiving. I did have a pork chop that was more like ham, which is something we usually have around the holidays, so there is that at least.

My flight Friday was about an hour and half before my parents', but around 9 we just checked out and all went to turn in the car, then just hang out at the airport. My carry on bag was flagged going through security. It turns out that the small first aid kit I usually carry in it includes a pair of scissors, something I don't think I'd ever even realized. I'm fairly sure I'd brought it with me on a plane in the past (not to mention flying to Costa Rica), and never had an issue. For some reason the security person insisted on taking a roll of bandage tape from the kit as well. Curiously, I later realized there was another roll of bandage tape in my bag that I had bought in Seattle. I bought myself a tshirt with the logo for Imperial, the Costa Rican beer I had enjoyed. I was going to buy a bottle of Costa Rican rum as well, but by the time I decided on it, they said it was too late to get it to me on the plane (I couldn't just take it with me). While I was milling around one of the shops, I sampled a chocolate covered coffee bean. I didn't love it at first, not surprising considering I like the smell of coffee but not the drink itself, but it had a sort of addictive property to it. I almost bought a bag, but didn't think I'd really like that much of it. However, it stuck in my mind and I picked up a small bag of them at my local market (origin of the beans unknown). My flight back to Dallas was problem-free, I cleared immigration and customs quickly, so I had a little time to kill. I sat a bar for some beer and college football. The woman sitting next to me works at Taos Ski Valley, which re-ignited my desire to finally go skiing again, and also brought back memories of climbing Wheeler Peak, New Mexico's highest point. Depending on everything else, I'm hoping to make a trip out there this season (or somewhere else, for that matter).

Saturday, after participating in the Chuy's Parade with the HOG chapter, I went to Threadgill's and had myself a nice turkey dinner with dressing and cranberries, and took home a slice of pumpkin pie for later.