Anniversary Weekend in Porto

(or an overly personal reflection on our relationship)

This April, Brad and I celebrate our eighth anniversary.   On the one hand, it's hard to believe that we have already spent so many years together, but on the other hand, I have a pretty hard time remembering what life was like pre-Brad, and an even harder time imagining what life would be like without him.  One thing that I think is crucial for us both to keep in mind though, is that even after being together for eight years, the choice to be together is, well, exactly that, a choice--and not a default.  This idea of both making long-term commitments to one another (like our 2017 marriage plans), and also mindful decision-making didn't come to us immaculately.  In 2010, there was a specific moment when we were inspired to look at our relationship in a new way. 

In our last years at Middlebury (respectively), Brad and I were both lucky enough to have classes with John Elder.  I say lucky enough, because just before Brad graduated, John retired from teaching after a long career.  Like many a Middlebury student before us, we found ourselves in awe of the thoughtfulness, insightfulness and care with which he took on the subjects he taught and the students he engaged with.  There are many things that Brad and I both took away from his classes; more than content to memorise, John helped his students to reconsider their way of being, seeing and interacting with one's surroundings and one another.   As much a master listener and observer as he is a master speaker, the lessons learned through interacting with John are the kind that come to you gently at first and then seep in over time.   However, beyond his meditations on ecotones and the natural world, one of his reflections that makes a consistent reappearance for the two of us was a comment that the made about his relationship with his wife, Rita.  He said that he and his wife sign a one-year contract every year.  Yes, they are married, but more important than the legal status, they annually and mindfully make the decision to stay together for another year, thus guaranteeing that they are not together by default or because that is how it has been since they can remember, but rather because they decide that they want to be together for another year. 

Afternoon tasting at Taylor's

Whether or not there is a real paper contract, and whether or not John and Rita actually do this every year is relatively immaterial.   The takeaway for us is not that we should have an annual signing ceremony.  Instead, in hearing and internalising the experience of John and his wife, we have chosen to approach our relationship not as inevitable, but as purposeful. And this year, we made that purposeful choice to enter into our 9th year together and kick off an entirely new set of exciting and intimidating new projects in a totally new and exciting setting (thanks to a wonderful surprise from Brad): Porto, Portugal.  So, here for your viewing pleasure, and a change-up from our usual blog content, a few photos from an amazing weekend of visiting wine cellars, promenading, eating pastries and repeating.

Pastel Nata: Brad's new favorite

Cellar tour at Ferreira 

See the resemblance between the Ponte Louis I and the Eiffel Tower? 

Looking east down the Duoro from the Ponte Louis I 

Traditional boats for transporting Porto to Porto for ageing. 

Skiing meets caving in the Dévoluy massif

         Hill and I have been staying quiet on the blog front over the past months, although not due to inactivity or a lack of things to report. We've been all out this year between Hill continuing work as a teacher, beginning a master's program and training for running, and I've been well occupied as well between the final year of my thesis and preparing the entrance exams for the aspirant guide program. Back in March, however, we managed to score a rare day of pure exploration and adventure in the mountains, with no ulterior motive. We teamed up with our friends Thibaut, Corentin and Remy to do the legendary "Chourum Olympique" on the Grand Ferrand in the Dévoluy massif, about a two hour drive south of Grenoble. The photos pretty well tell the story, but basically it's a regular ski tour up until the point when you put skis on the pack and start tunneling up through 50° couloirs passing under cliff bands. The ambiance was spectacular and entirely novel, and made for fun romping in steep terrain without needing a rope. The descent off the south side featured some down-climbing, a section of 40-45° skiing, followed by heroic corn and some of the best turns of the year. "Days like this" make it all worthwhile... 

Can you spot the skin track disappearing into the rock band?

Transitioning at the beginning of the "chourum" or tunnel, happy to be out of the south-facing heat. 

Hillary leads the way up through the first chourum.  

The boys emerging onto suspended snow slopes, between chourums #1 & 2.

Respectable view with the Ecrins in the background.

Ambiance!!!

Thibaut content, just below the summit. 

Fresh corn, rolled in butter and salted to taste.
 

Remy opted to fly rather than ski back to the car... to each his own ;-)

Ridge lines summer 2015

       
           Not everything fun we've been up to this summer fits into a theme of climbing mountains - for starters my brother and Alli got married in the San Juan Islands, Hillary and I got our minds blown eating ramen in San Francisco with Thad and Carrie, and striped blue and white tank tops have featured prominently in beach sessions on both Puget Sound and Cape Cod. But between major family happenings and barbecues Hillary and I have been getting after it pretty good in a variety of settings (please excuse the carbon footprint), with adventures consistently revolving around both great friends and endless mountain ridges. After the first trip to Switzerland in early July, I was about ready to swear off the things and had pretty well OD'ed on ridge climbs, only to be reinvigorated by the prospect of getting out with Hill in our home court mountain range (the Ecrins) and later by the golden granite of the High Sierra. I love a good straight in rock or ice climb, and someday I would like to have* conquered some of the more emblematic north faces of the Alps, but I think at heart I will always be a ridge guy, for at least four reasons: (1) the continuous spectacular position often afforded while climbing sidewalks perched in the sky; (2) the esthetic and logical qualities of ridges in terms of mountain architecture; (3) I've long given up on being a rockstar climber, and the challenges of constant "tricky ridge bullsh$$" often demand more technique and rope savvy than pure climbing ability, allowing me to keep learning without always training three days a week; and (4) I enjoy the continuous movement and physical output of efficiently covering lots of ground, which for me at least tends to happen in the kind of terrain pictured below...

*Note the important difference between "want to do" and "wanting to have done", in this case the major north faces of the Alps. This nuance, as pointed out by Krakauer in his book Eiger Dreams, would make for a great English grammar lesson and also gives a window into climber psychology. For the record, all of the photos below document outings that for me fell in the "want to do" category.



-- 4000m peaks in Switzerland with Olivier --

Van life in a rare patch of free camping real estate in Saas Fe. Olivier objects on principle to the Swiss tendency to pay for everything (camping, parking, right to enter a village), and kept up a sustained and mostly successful effort to freeload the above services as much as possible. His van, complete with bed and kitchen, was key.

              Lenspitze on the left and Nadelhorn on the right, our first objectives, as seen from the descent ridge. Plan A was to go up the steep snow on Lenspitze and then traverse to the Nadelhorn, but lack of a good refreeze (even at 3am and at 4000m) caused us to make a game time decision to head up the mostly rock ridge left of the face, which fortunately is also super classic, and then continue on our way to the second summit. This was a long outing and both of us got rocked by the altitude, arriving at our tent after 10 hours or so of climbing unable to eat, talk, or do anything but take ibuprofen and lay down for a little bit. Then there was the 6500' vertical depproach back to the van, which Olivier had parked another 800' below the trailhead in order to avoid paying for parking... 

                       Traversing to the Nadelhorn, with the Dom des Mischabel (4545m) in the background. I learned that the Dom is the highest peak located entirely within Switzerland (Mont Rose is shared with Italy) and is therefore a very popular objective. 

                                                                                                                                                      Camping below our objective for round 2, Weissmiess, with the regular route (our descent) in view. We came in from the ridge on the left, after a section of rock that you can't see in the photo. 

 Olivier charging across the north ridge of Weissmiess, which happens to feature mostly solid gneiss and moments of high quality climbing up to 5.6 or so. 

On the heroic home stretch just below the summit. Personally I would have set the track a little further from the cornices...

-- 100 Plus belles mission in the Ecrins with Hill --

             The Pic Nord des Cavales in the Ecrins National Park. The southwest ridge we climbed takes the lefthand skyline in the foreground while the descent comes down the righthand ridge. I suspected this route would be my style when I read in the guidebook that this classic itinerary "featured good rock and was once popular 20 years ago".

                                                                                                                               Hillary cruising the low angle section between the first gendarme and the summit pyramid, with some fine obscure Ecrins 3000m peaks in the background: Pic du Gény, le Plaret and the Tête de la Gandolière (left to right).

I was psyched to climb the whole thing in mountain boots, given that the route featured a good bit of 5th class climbing. 

Hillary at the end of the difficulties, with just a few hundred feet of ridge romping left between us and summit.

Helmets off on the summit, with a happy and also somewhat tired Hillary, who several days before had won 2nd place in a 50 mile trail race (see preceding post). That said, she still had more spring in her step at the end of the day than I did. Most of all I was psyched to get in the mountains the two of us, and to check off a local project in the midst of all our travels. Also it is worth noting that we  had knock out views of the Rateau (left) and Meije (right) for almost the entire day. 

-- Trip to the High Sierra in Yosemite: Chapter 1 with Terray and Sierra  --

                                                                                             Tenaya Lake and Peak. In my book this is undoubtedly one of the best roadside mountain destinations of all time, and was our daily staple for swimming, beers, snacks, and at least one attempt to catch fish. We also climbed Tenaya Peak on the left hand skyline, with Hillary leading.

Hillary looking good and keeping things casual while I get gripped on some splitter 5.6 a few pitches up the southeast buttress of Cathedral Peak - photo by Terray Sylvester.

Hillary and me on top of Eichorn's Pinnacle below Cathedral Peak, which is miraculously accessed by a single pitch of airy 5.4 - photo by Terray Sylvester.  

                                                                                                                  Walking off Cathedral Peak with Terray and Sierra.

 

                                                                                                      Somehow throughout the trip Hillary managed to keep squeezing in trail runs. Here she is on an evening run with Sierra and Terray to Cloud's Rest, with Half Dome and the Valley across the way - photo by Terray Sylvester. 

-- Trip to the High Sierra in Yosemite: Chapter 2 with Thad, Carrie and Will  --

Ponies prepare to ridge scramble. We believed at the time that we were at the base of the north ridge of Conness, and only realized that Conness was one peak over once we had summited what we later learned is called North Peak. Turns out backcountry travel without a map is a real gamble, which fortunately in this case worked out totally fine -- do both and continue on to Conness! 

                                                                                                                                                      Climbing up what turned out to be North Peak with Carrie and Thad. This one is definitely not in 50 Classic Climbs of North America, but it did feature some fun sections as well as a couple all points off dynos to get across the occasional deep but narrow chasm. Also the setting was correct, as Olivier would say. Photo by Will Murray. 

Jungle gym fun on the north ridge of Conness, which offered up this spectacular hand crack just below the summit. Hill and I were both really psyched to finally climb with Will, who has casually become an excellent rock climber in recent years. The last morning of the trip we were able to head up West Crack (5.9) together, which counts for me as one of the highest quality rock routes I've ever done. West Crack, however, is not a ridge and therefore is not pictured here. 

                                                                                                                                  Back to the subject at hand: this is the north ridge of Conness in its entirety, with the walk off North Peak just across the way behind the lake.

The other TGV (ie not the Big Fast Train)

Tour des Glaciers de la Vanoise (and some other running)

I think everyone who has looked at our oft-languishing blog knows that it is not an entirely representative sampling of our day-to-day life here in Grenoble.  However,  glancing through the last few years of punctual blog posts, I've noticed that I've gone pretty heavy on skiing/climbing posts and pretty light on posts about running--which is, to say the least, very under-representative of my actual life .  Today, while I try to stay out of the heat wave and also try to encourage my legs to start working normally again, I've decided that it is time to add in a post about yesterday's Tour des Glaciers de la Vanoise...and provide a few pretty pictures of other runs I've been on. 

This past December, Thibaut had the crazy idea that we should run an ultramarathon.   I say crazy not because I hadn't already pondered this idea myself, but more because my ultramarathon fantasy had remained pretty fuzzy and hypothetical up until now.  Technically, any race that is longer than the standard 26.2 miles counts as an ultramarathon--so I've actually competed in several, but never more than 10 miles more than marathon, that didn't really count in my head.  So, I agreed with Thibaut to sign up for the Tour des Cirques in August, a 120km (75mi) run in the Pyrenees with 7,000m (23,000ft) of vertical gain (and loss).  

To help get us ready, we've been running a lot, and we set a couple of intermediate goals to help get our training on track: 

• At the end of May, I ran the Technica Maxi-Race around Lake Annecy on a team with our friend Darin as my first marathon of the year.   

Darin, testing out a section of my race course

• Thibaut and I somewhat randomly picked a loop on the the map and ran 35km around at totally incredible snapshot out of the Windows XP desktop

Tiny speck Thibaut runs around the bend into crazy landscape. 

Windows XP desktop? 

•  Thibaut, Thomas, and I ran 40km around the Taillefer and then linked up a run up and down the Moucherotte from Grenoble the next day with Guillaume.  

Whence we came

Thibaut and Thomas on the Plateau des Lacs

Ending the day on the far side of the mountain.

• Jess Marion and Lincoln Benedict visited and we went for an awesome 2-day running tour in the Vanoise with guest appearances from about 150 Ibex, and a night at a hut. 

Thibaut once said of the Vanoise:
"growing up in the Pyrenees, this is what I imagined the Alps should look like" 

Jess, in perfectly photographical colors, makes her way across a high alpine meadow

• And yesterday, Thibaut and I (and our friend Rémy), ran in the Tour des Glaciers de la Vanoise (TGV): a 45-mile race with 12,500 ft of climbing around the Vanoise National Park.  

This last one, because it was by far the longest, and the most recent in my memory (both mental and physical memories), merits a bit longer of a story: 

Depart:  The race organizers bumped the departure time up to 3:30am and put strict time cut-offs because of the heat wave.  It was already 60° out under a moonlit sky when 430 of us left from the Pralognan town hall.  It was my first early morning race start, and I found the combination of the Pirates of the Caribbean theme music, red roman candles and hundreds of headlamps pretty surreal.  At this point I parted ways with Thibaut and Rémy and entered the mêlée.

1:  Up until the first aid station (8km and 1000m of climb) I was feeling pretty good.  Maybe too good.  I got pretty stressed out early on since the climbing started immediately out of town, and there were some pretty serious traffic jams on the trail.  I pushed hard, maybe too hard, to get out of the crowd and enjoyed the relatively cool weather, traverse of the famous Lac des Vaches--a very shallow lake with a trail of flat stones across the middle--and not-too-difficult climb.  Looking back down the valley, it was all dark except for a line of hundreds of headlamps streaming up the hillside.  I was pretty energized by the ambiance, and when I got to the aid station, they told me I was in deuxième place (2nd place).  I was moving quickly through and thought they said dixième place (10th place), but was pretty stoked.

2: Sometime around here, when we turned south, the sun started to come up, but before it was fully up, we crossed a steep snowfield under the supervision of CRS (French police) who made sure we made it across safely.  They informed me that I was actually in second place, but unfortunately that didn't last.  Still using my headlamp and following those ahead of me, I veered off course in a scree field and ended up loosing about 10 minutes.  When I was finally scrambling back to the course and had taken off my headlamp, I saw the formerly 3rd woman pass me.

3: I managed to keep her at a safe distance up to the aide station at kilometer 20 at the Refuge de l'Arpont.  I was still feeling pretty good at that point, but after we left the station, she took off at an impressive pace.  One of the things that is special about this course, but also what was really challenging for me is that the route involved a lot of 'balcons' or traverses across long stretches of mountainside.  On the one hand, this is beautiful, on the other hand, I'm not used to actually running so much because so often trail races are more about technical up and down than flats and rolling hills.   I managed to keep #2 in sight because we could see for long stretches and because she was wearing a fluorescent green shirt, and even leap-frogged with her a on a couple climbs, but I couldn't keep up with her and started to feel aches and pains pretty acutely.  Between kilometer 25 and 50, I was in a constant battle between holding on, and wanting to quit.  I saw a small snake (or maybe lizard?) and in my delirium even fantasized about getting bitten so I'd have an excuse to stop.  Thibaut arrived at the third aid station as I was leaving which gave me a little boost, but not quite enough to pull me up out of my funk.
I finally lost sight of #2 as we made a brutal descent into the trees (our only time in the shade), took to walking/hobbling as I was feeling quad cramps and pretty severe knee and hip pain.

4:  Shortly before aid station 4 at kilometer 50, I came to terms with the fact that I wasn't going to see #2 again, and that I needed to let it go.  I decided to take a longer stop at the station, and even got the nurse on hand to give me a quick quad massage and some acetaminophen.  Thibaut once again caught up with me and after a good 10 minute rest, we took off together for the last 1100m uphill.  The massage (ahem, are you reading this, Brad?) and company gave me a new lease on life, and I kicked into gear for the climb.  My legs still felt pretty strong for the uphill, and because I could avoid running for the most part, my joints cooperated.  Fortunately, the sun was in and out of the clouds so I didn't die of heat stroke during the due south-facing final climb.

5:  I managed to pass a bunch of guys on the way up the hill, and slogged by way up the final snow fields to the col.  At the col, the CRS folks who has secured the climb with fixed ropes pointed out #2 below us.  They encouraged me to go catch her, and though I was extremely shocked to see her, I didn't hold out much hope of catching her because I'd seen how she ran before, and descent is not my strong suit.

6: I mentally prepared myself for the 18km descent back to Pralognan, and put my climbing skill set to use for long  and efficient glissades down the north side of the col. I finally passed her as she tried to daintily make her way down the snow without slipping.

7: From there, I quickly passed through the last aid station, concerned that she would overtake me again.  I managed to make good time for the first 6 km or so, all time time glancing backwards to see if she was in view.  About half way down, the real fatigue started to set in, and I really struggled to keep running.  I was reminded of the first trail race that I ever did: the Great Adirondack Trail Race.  The feelings of running down the last hills into Keene Valley and running down the last pitches to Pralognan were a very similar mental exercise: alternating between telling myself "you can do this, the end is near, you are strong!" and "Why are you doing this to yourself?  It's ok to cry, just stop, and lay down on the ground."   Luckily, on both occasions, the former voice won out and I managed to take the race to the end, crossing the finish line in just under 11 hours and 16 minutes.

Arrival: So, this concludes my very long answer to the question I've had a dozen times today: so, how was your race?  I'm very pleased with my finish, and though I had initially hoped to clock a slightly faster time (10-11hours), I hadn't taken the nearly 90° heat into account.  I drank at least 7 liters of water through the day, worked pretty thoroughly through my Gu and Shotblok stocks (thanks, Nancy!), drank all of my EmergenC electro-mix (thanks, Steve!) and even stopped to take a couple photos on my new phone (thanks, mom!).  My final finish 30 minutes behind #1 and 30 minutes ahead of #3 was very satisfying, and I was thrilled to put in a 35th place finish overall.
Thibaut made it to the end in 12 hours, and finished 74th, and Rémy clocked in 12 hours and 54 minutes in 113th place.

Now, it's time for Thibaut and me to ask ourselves:  are we ready to double that distance??

Departure

#5: Mid-way up the last climb 

#5: After the boost

Arrival and awards