Auf Deutsch fuer meine deutschsprachige Freunde. [via Adventure Blog]

The day shall not be up so soon as I,
To try the fair adventure of tomorrow

- William Shakespeare

[via Expedition News]

I just had drinks at the tallest bar in the world, 1601 feet high.

Ozone, 118TH Floor, Ritz Carleton, Hong Kong.

Photo taken by Troy Daniel.

Location: Old Parkland Hospital, Dallas, TX. http://goo.gl/maps/gFWZ

What an adventure!!! This weekend Justin Huskamp and I rowed 80 miles from San Francisco to Petaluma and back. The row was fast, scenic and cold.

• Saturday 40 mile row to SF to Petaluma
• Sunday 40 mile row to Petaluma to SF

The flood tide began early morning Saturday so we left with it at 6:00am. The flood tide ended by 10:38 when we reached the Petaluma entrance. The counteracting ebb tide against us was weak during our row up the Petaluma. The ebb tide that would push us home began at noon so we left as late as possible, 8:00am. Our late departure gave us fast current speeds, faster boat speed of 8 mph, but higher winds and thunderstorms. You can’t have it all.

Gear list

• Individual gear: 2x rowing gloves, waterproof outers, 2x rowing clothes, 2x shoes, 2x socks, baseball hat, knit cap, sunglasses
• Shared gear:, dry bags, walkie talkie, 2x bailers, horn, life vests, 3x blade sets, extra ropes, 2x headlamp, bow light, sunscreen, water, charts, iPhones, Leatherman, ziplock bags, sponges
• Food: GU gel, GU Chomp, GU Brew, toasted bagels w/cream cheese, cashews, walnuts, cooked chicken, cooked sweet potatoes

Like Yvon Chouinard says, “it’s not an adventure until something goes wrong”. Here’s what went wrong:

• Low visibility in San Pablo Bay meant we couldn’t see shore in any direction — solution: GPS
• Waterproof GPS got wet and gave wrong bearings — solution: compass
• Gigantic tanker emerged from the fog just as we crossed the central shipping channel — solution: sprint
• Headwind got so strong that I couldn’t hear Justin 2 feet behind me — solution: yell louder
• Thunderstorm soaked my clothes — solution: borrow Justin’s hat
• Our hands got blistered from rowing wet– solution: deal with it
• I completely bonked just as we finish the row Sunday night — solution: cupcakes

Rowing blisters. (Justin left, Neal right)

Waypoints:

• Southend Rowing Club of SF at Aquatic Park
• Alcatraz
• Angel Island
• Richmond San Rafael Bridge
• China Camp
• Black Point Marina
• Papa’s Taverna, Lakeville
• Petaluma Marina

Day 1 - 40 miles

Day 2 - 40 miles

The boat was the “Valhalla”. She’s a fast, 22 foot long, 3.5 feet wide, lapstrake wooden rowboat built by boatwright Jeremy Fisher-Smith in 1979 at Tomales Bay. I love this boat and called Jeremy today to thank him for building the boat 30 years ago, when he was a 22-year old.

Stats for this row:

• My hardest row ever
• My 2nd longest row ever (100 mile row to Sacramento was longer)
• Speed 7 mph
• Seals: 20+
• Duck blinds spotted: 1
• Other rowboats spotted: One 1-person shell on Petaluma River
• GU gels and chomps eaten: 12 on Saturday, 15 on Sunday

Future rows:

• SF -> Farallon Islands (70 roundtrip) – 1 day
• SF -> Half Moon Bay (70 roundtrip) – 2 days
• SF -> Tomalen Bay (120 roundtrip) – 2 days

Thanks to:

• Justin for being awesome.
• Owen, Dan, Tom, Joe and Tom and everyone from the Southend Rowing Club.
• Carol/Ken for Petaluma dinner and housing.

Video:

• Day 2 : Hour 8 : SF-Bay

On October 5 – 7, Ken Howery, Ken’s dad, Alan Nichols, Tenzing, and I climbed Mt. Whitney, the tallest mountain in the lower 48 states, at 14,498 feet, in winter conditions.

I am planning a trip to Ama Dablam, 22,349 feet. The year is unclear as I’m still in planning mode.

Ama Dablam dominates the eastern sky for anyone trekking to Mount Everest basecamp, that’s when I first saw it and was captivated. It’s a gorgeous peak.

The most popular route by far is the Southwest Ridge (right skyline in the photo). Climbers typically set up three camps along the ridge with camp 3 just below and to the right of the hanging glacier, the Dablam.

As with Mt. Everest, the best climbing months are April-May (before the monsoon) and September-October.

I have the gear. I need the team and 1 month vacation.

HD footage from “ivegivenallican” (I’ve given all I can). Shows the the three most memorable parts of summit day, those being Hillary Step, South Summit and Everest Summit. I wish it showed the balcony — I have a pretty foggy memory of this spot and it would have been nice to see it again with a fully oxygenated mind.

Everest is a different climb than any other mountain climb. As the video shows, it is a climb on army-like scale. Larger in duration (73 days in my case) and in the size of the average team (my team was 25 people). Most people on my team were support crew who stayed lower on the mountain. More than half never left base camp. 5 of us were from North America, the rest were Sherpa. Only 6 of us ever intended to reach the summit, 3 North Americans and 3 Sherpa. The altitude is what makes Everest take so long, require such a huge army-life support organization, and it’s why Everest has captured the imagination of so many. I have climbed many mountains that are more technically challenging than Everest, but there is no mountain higher than Everest and that is exactly why Everest is such a formidable goal. The air is 25% as thick at the summit as it is at sea level. Even with oxygen the body is coping with a fraction of the oxygen it needs to perform. Each step requires multiple breaths. Each step is an opportunity to quit. Each misstep off the ridgeline carries enormous consequences.

Watch this full screen.

The Graphic: The colors lines represent actual sharks from 2000-2008. The gray area represents the extrapolated ranging of all great whites in the area. There is no blow-up of the bay, but supposedly they roamed inside the Golden Gate.

The Study: According to a Stanford University-led study released Tuesday, great white sharks occasionally stray from their Northern California feeding grounds for jaunts under the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco Bay, apparently in search of snacks. The sharks lived in the deep ocean near Hawaii between January and July and in Northern California between August and December. The scientists tracked the snaggly toothed predators between 2000 and 2008 from the Bay Area to San Diego, Hawaii and back as the sharks followed a surprisingly precise route in a strict time frame.

My take: There are thousands of seals in the Bay. However, the water is comparatively cloudy and noisy. This relative different probably ruined the hunting efforts of the sharks while they were in the Bay. That said, it’s only a matter of time until there is a great white attack in the Bay — shiver.

Read more: San Francisco Chronicle

The horizontal surface of a gym floor is not the most efficient use of space. The underutilized vertical surface the side is a much more space efficient workout facility.

Check out the architecture of this dorm at the University of Twente in the Netherlands by Arons and Gelauff Architects. This is definitely the product of designing and constructing spaces that reflect and functional, aesthetic and environmental considerations.

The dutch  must belay this building using non-standard ropes for this pitch. This building is 9 stories tall, or 90 feet. Climbings ropes are 60 meters long, or 196 feet long of rope. 6 feet is not enough belay slack.