Jason and jenn

It’s June. It’s raining. Seems familiar. Last year it rained 25 days in June.  I hope it just goes ahead and rains today and get’s it out of it’s system. Still, we need the moisture. This is a desert after all.

Been really active toward the end of May. I tried hiking to Glimpse lake and ran into snow about 5 miles in at around 9500 feet. Saw bear tracks in the snow. There were 3 sets, one large and 2 small. This gave me pause and I made sure to make plenty of noise the rest of the day.

We’ve been developing a new climbing area in Pinedale that we’re calling the Ranch. It’s quite nice, with a lot of potential, but requiring a lot of work cleaning and brushing. We’ve put up 10 routes already, with at least that many more to come this summer, and maybe 50-60 routes possible in total. Very cool little domes of granite overlooking some summer homes and a lake.

New living arangements are going well.  Free rent for the summer more than makes up for any hardship of living with other folks.

Speaking of which. Our house in Kentucky is paid for. We paid the last of our little loan. It is surreal to think that we bought and paid off a home in less than a year.  Now we need to save money for home improvements this fall.

So now i’ll take a rest day from climbing. My fingers are sore and the backs of my hands are scabbed. I will enjoy the rain, knowing that it will bring Balsamroot and aspen leaves quickly, and it will give this high desert a much needed drink.

Probably not, but we’ve had quite the cold snap lately. Snowed in the mountains over the last week or two. Quite significant for this time of year.  Also have had a few mornings of frost already, marking a very short season for growing stuff in Pinedale this year.

We spent the weekend in Yellowstone, enjoying crisp temperatures, smaller crowds than typical, and just talking, making plans, and enjoying a relaxed weekend together with no strings. It was quite nice. We’re huge fans of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, long past deliniating a place by it’s geographic and political boundaries.

Some of our planning includes figuring out logistics for a big hike in our future. We want to hike from South Pass City, WY to Gardiner, MT. Through the Wind Rivers, the Gros Ventre, Absarokas, and the more remote reaches of Yellostone. We’re thinking we’ll spend about 5 weeks on the trail, but we don’t have it all planned out just yet.

It’s all part of our plan to keep living life as an adventure, not settling for the superstition of security, the myth of the American Dream, or the blandness of a “safe” life.  Our friends Steve and Jill just passed through on part of a long road trip. They sold their house in Lexington and are out and about taking it all in.  Not directionless, and not without purpose.

Similarly, our plans, our wanderlust, our desire to escape the rat race, the status quo, and the idea of keeping up with the joneses is not without purpose or direction. In fact, I would say we are still living very purposeful and deliberate lives. We’ll see where it leads, but if and when it leads away from Pinedale, we’ll leave without fear, knowing what we’ve gained from living here, and that we’ll return to explore the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the most diverse and wonderful spot we’ve found in all our travels.

It’s May. Middle of May to be exact. In a month, I’ll have been here in Pinedale for a year. That’s pretty cool. I only occasionally get the itch to get back on the road and do the seasonal thing. Having permanent and quality employment in one of your favorite places is not a bad thing. The bad comes from living in one of the wealthiest counties in the country. That makes affordable living tough, at least when you’re trying hard not to re-enter the rat race and live a life of mortgages and car payment and debt up to your eyeballs.

A week ago I went skiing in the morning then fishing at Half-Moon lake. As the snow melts from the lower elevations, wildlife is out in abundance (we recently saw, in ONE day, 20 moose, 300 elk, 15 big horn sheep, and legion deer and pronghorn). This wildlife includes Marmots, which if you know me, you have heard how one carried off my boot in Sequoia on the honeymoon and another chewed on our van last year at Lodgepole. Well, they’re after me again. As I came back from Half-Moon, I chased one away from the back of the van, then drove the 8 miles home. The next morning our neighbor knocked on our door to inform us we had two marmots coming in and out from underneath the car.  After a drowning attempt from animal control, followed by game and fish officers chasing them through offices and down the street, we are happy to report no damage to the van, slight damage to one marmot tail, and that two marmots remain at large in Pinedale! 

Warm weather has arrived in force, and I spent yesterday in Lander climbing 70 degree sunshine. Sunday it’s supposed to be 75 in Pinedale. The snow is still 6 to 8 feet deep in the mountains, but it’s hard not to want to go hiking/backpacking when the weather warms up like this. As usual, it looks like the mountains will not be accessible by foot until July. Things are turning green, people are playing outside, and there are boats on Fremont lake already.

Going to focus on climbing for a bit here this spring, developing new areas and trying to get in shape. Spent some time at a new bouldering area outside of town recently. The Galaxy. Here are a couple pictures:

Well, it’s sunny and “nice” outside today, though just 30 or so degrees. I climbed in Sinks Canyon on Thursday and it was 60 and sunny. Friday was nice too, and Saturday in Pinedale was 55 degrees and I rode my scooter to work. Sunday morning there was snow on the ground… and again on Monday.  The rest of the state got hammered by a spring storm.  The snow is melting quickly in town, but they’re calling for a good dumping tomorrow.  Ah, Wyoming weather. Two weeks till we head to Escalante. And counting….

Kicking backward, like a horse, I get forward momentum and glide along the snow. Using the opposite leg now and also sticking my poles into the snow, I kick again. I ski up the rise. I’m tired. I have been at this for hours. I am also sunburned, thirsty, and hungry. The snow makes sounds beneath me, a crunchy melt freeze crust beneath a layer of new downy powder reminds me that spring is coming, but not yet.

I stop for a break. The snow is softening in the warmth and is sticking to the bases of my skis. I add a layer, then drink half a bottle of water and eat some dried fruit. I apply a coat of paste wax to the bottom of my skis. The day has warmed from 0 to about 30. The sky is hues of blue to my eyes, deep blue overhead blending into a brighter blue where it meets the mountains and trees.

I sit on my pack in the sun. Gloriously warm. There are rabbit tracks in the snow, everywhere, and birds flit in and out of pines. I saw tracks from a fox earlier. The moose from my last visit to the area are nowhere to be seen. It’s March now and they are beginning to migrate once again.

Being from Kentucky, March is supposed to be warm and turning to spring. Trees bud and leaf out, flowers lend color to the otherwise drab brown earth. There are hints of green. Not here in Wyoming. Winter still has us firmly in her grasp by all appearances and yet the streets are no longer snow covered. There is bare ground and grass in the park, and everywhere the sound of water. Dripping from eaves, running down the street, and the creeks and rivers are opening. Soon the lakes will open as well, and the melt will commence in earnest. Late April and May will be muddy. The locals say there’s no spring season, just mud season and then summer.

At the top of a rise I drop over the lip and sink into a telemark turn, lose a little speed and then face down the hill before dropping into a turn the other way. Then the steepness abates and I am just sliding down hill, no need to turn, just enjoy the break for my legs. I still have a couple hours of skiing back to the van and the sun is still high. Kick… glide… enjoy the sun and blue.

I skate down the road for the last hundred yards to the van and crawl into the bed. Solar. I’m warm and content and flirt with a nap, but I know Jenn has to be back to work at 5:30, and I’d like to see her before then. I slide into the drivers seat and start home. I turn on the ipod. Feist is singing a happy song about dirt roads and knee deep snow. Seems about right.

Next week I may be climbing in Lander in a T-shirt, and there’s a trip to the desert coming in less than a month. On the drive home I look at the snowy landscape, the Wind River Range buried under feet of snow and the sagebrush plain a vast whiteness. It sure still looks like winter, but my soul says spring is near.

Extra Extra! We have sled dog races in town.

You can learn a lot about a place from it’s news. Pinedale has a great little website in PinedaleOnline.com

It’s how I found out about my job here. It’s how we still keep up with what’s going on in town now that we’re here. From webcams to local news, pictures, job announcements, classifieds, etc.

Taking a look at the February news archives for this year, you get a sense of what life is like here. There are stories about sled dog races, ozone warnings, elk testing, the ever-raging wolf issue, high school ski races, scenic photos, as well as both local and national politics.

Wednesday we went skiing and continued to work on our telemark turns. Jenn is getting better and linked some good looking turns. It was in the mid 30s, windless, and the Wind Rivers were shimmering close by while the Wyoming range dominated the western skyline. We found a powder stash and had fun with our friend Steve helping us hone our turns. Wednesday night I played music at Jes’s house with Steve on banjo, me on Mando and guitar, John on banjo, and Katie on fiddle. We played Turkey in the Straw and Cripple Creek and Wagon Wheel. Thursday John and Josh and I were trying to decide between Skiing, Ice Climbing, or Fly fishing when we decided to check the weather for Lander.  Turned out that climbing in Sinks Canyon was in order. The weather was in the low 50s and the sun was blissful for about 30 minutes.  Friday I played music at work for our first anniversary open house before heading to the Rock Rabbit with my mandolin to sit in with John Fogerty.

Ahhh, Wyoming winters aren’t so bad huh?

We are students of snow. We are learning to cross country/telemark ski. We are learning the technique differences between powder and sun-crust. We are learning to be okay with falling a thousand times. And lately we’ve been learning how to evaluate snow conditions to determine the risk of travel in avalanche terrain. We’ve learned about faceted snow, weak layers, wind-slab, depth-hoar, wumping snow, slide angles, snow pits, shovel tests, rhutschblocks, terrain traps, beacon searches, and how we factor into making all this white stuff slide. And just in time. After two weeks of high pressure and no snow, it is snowing outside and we feel a lot more confident about venturing into the backcountry to ski. Now if only we could get better at the actual skiing part.

From January 2009

This is what the town looks like. Coming in from the South on 191, you hit a closed cajun restaurant, then some log buildings on the right, a small-town car lot. Then There’s the grocery store/hardware store. A gas station, a bank, another bank, one more bank. The courthouse is tucked to the left and doesn’t face the main street (actually we don’t even have a named “main” street). There’s the Rock Rabbit, where jenn works, a couple bars on the left, the cowboy shop, the post office, the outdoor shop. A service station. The brew pub and a couple run-down hotels where the clientele vehicles all read Halliburton. Another gas station with our one franchise eatery inside. The good old Wrangler cafe and an auto-parts store. Several big box hotels that again have nothing in the parking lot but F250s with drilling equipment in their beds. And then you’re back in the sage scrub desert. That was Pinedale. All 2000 of us.

But now, 7 months into living here, we see more. We see the aquatic center where I work, the bike path that leads up the hill to the CCC ponds and Fremont lake. We see the great local library which hosts writers events, book signing, and art galleries. There’s the three parks in town, lots of green space around otherwise cluttered lots. There are the two health-food stores in town. Both seem to be doing well! There’s the local butcher shop/deli and the BLM and Forest Service and Fish and Game offices. There’s the residences with non-profit offices lurking inside, trying to save us from ourselves.

At the Rock Rabbit on a given night, you might here some local talent, and boy it’s great. There’s local town council member John Fogerty (nope, not that one) playing “The Day John Henry Died” and “Feeling Good Again”. Terry Hill soulfully sings with a constant smile and welds in the oil fields for his day job.  Local girl Sarah Domek looks and strums like Victoria Williams and croons Old Crow songs. Jared Rogerson plays his local hit “Boomtown” and sings songs about the mountains between shifts doing burcellocis research on local cattle.

The Pinedale Fine Arts Coucil brings in the goods too. We saw Chinese Acrobats that rivalled our Vegas Cirque show. We saw a local production of the Sound of Music which was amazing in staging, acting ability, and vocal talent. More recently, we saw a Flamenco dance show with live music all composed by the guitar player and filled with stunning Choreography.

There are 3 murals in town, some mosaics done by school kids, and on a random street there’s a house rented to roughnecks right next to the one with Tibetan prayer flags hanging outside. There’s the snowmobile cruising down B street while the cross-country skiiers head 2 miles up toward the lake to go for a tour and spot eagles and moose.

Is Pinedale what I imagined? Is it a mountainous eden? Nope. We can’t afford to live here long term unless the housing market plummets dramatically. Many locals seem unaware of the long term consequences of their short-term profiteering off the oil fields.  There are no codes to speak of and no code enforcement even if there were. “Cowboy up son, and deal with it”, is the local ethos, which seems about right considerring this IS Wyoming, the so called “equality” state. Which maybe means that everyone should equally stay out of everybody elses business. Pinedale is struggling with this now, as boom-town changes are not quite what the old-timer residents are used to, and yet they want to still have as much freedom from laws and codes and zoning and possible while remaining true to their frontier spirit.

Pinedale is a town in flux, a sort of microcosym of the country as a whole. We are blessed to be here, where unemployment is virtually nil and where, most importantly, the Wind River mountains loom over us, unchanged, stalwart, and magnificent in the evening light.

This is from a local webcam this morning. I don’t even understand this.

COLD!