I've finally left the Bay Area, all be it a little later than planned thanks to a bout of sickness and find myself in Eugene, Oregon. I've talked about the stoop by the
hostel I stayed at in San Francisco in earlier blog posts and today's post goes back there...
I met so many people there all with a
different story to tell but as I reflect on the goings on I find
myself thinking about a young Canadian man I met there from
Saskatchewan, “right in the middle [of Canada]” as he so aptly
described it. His name was Sterling, I found this out only after
mistakenly suggesting he might have Scots or Irish roots (I suspect
knowing his name would have done little to shake this
misapprehension), it turned out he wasn't and was in fact a little
Hungarian and the rest Cree Indian. A quick check on Wikipedia
reveals the Cree are one of the largest remaining Native American
tribe, at around 200,000 strong which seems like quite a few more
than I'd guesstimated... He had strong features and dark auburn hair
with freckled skin and noble green eyes. His voice, soft and scratchy
was self deprecating and manner, almost old fashioned.
It turns out he's here to skate, not
like the other “skaters” I've met on the stoop who are to be
found across San Francisco and the state of California. Instead
Sterling skates on ice, chasing a puck at breakneck speed in the game
of ice hockey. He was visiting San Francisco to try out for a
professional team. On hearing this news I naively asked if it was
with the NHL (the main ice hockey league in North America). He looked
a little embarrassed by my enquiry and named a different league that
I hadn't heard of. Scrabbling to move onto more solid ground I
suggested a parallel between the league he was joining and AAA
baseball (the level beneath the major leagues in baseball), he agreed
with this comparison and was assured by everyone around's insistence
that this was still a big deal.
It turns out this was Sterling's
second try out, coming to San Francisco by way of Miami. I asked how
this had gone, to which he replied “pretty good”. Sounds
promising thinks I and suggest he'll have less pressure on this time
round given this would be his second try out and he'd have a better
idea what to expect. He answered “sure, no pressure”. Now I was
confused... This young man who seemed so humble just moments ago was
equipped with vein filled with liquid nitrogen, “no pressure”?
The slow, soothing cadence of Sterling's voice was interspersed with
lengthy gaps and it is only now with hindsight I realise the pause
that followed this latest uttering was one of them. After what seemed
like minutes he went on... “I figured now I've seen Miami and
they've offered me a contract I'd come here. The flight was paid so I
thought I why not?” The light switched on... he was so understated
the offer of a contract only merited “pretty good”!
This humble aspect of Sterling struck
me (obviously - I'm writing about it in my blog), I think it
reflected a very different perspective on life he has vs. most of the
people I met in day to day life – accepting most of its been spent
in cities. We talked for quite a while and he described life in
northern Saskatchewan within Native American culture. He'd spent
sometime working on the tar sands which were the first real
employment opportunity that'd been available to him. But life without
the tar sands growing up had been tough... He was raised with his
siblings by his mum, a challenge in itself but Saskatchewan doesn't
have many people, especially up north, the landscape is flat -
covered in forests, lakes and tundra the winters are bitter and long.
It was listening to this life I realised the reason I was so
fascinated wasn't some romanticised notion of life in the wilderness,
it was the way he reminded me of my father who's manner so similar.
He too choses his words carefully and would wish no ill will on
another sole but this quiet nature is underpinned with a steely will.
It made sense to me that Saskatchewan, Canada and The Isle of Lewis,
Scotland could produce two such similar souls, I suppose they're rare
in the western world as there are fewer edges of real wilderness
within our environs – perhaps none remain in Scotland? My father
may have been the last of his kind, and Sterling for that matter too
with the Tar Sands bringing money and people and change may be the
last of his kind from Canada too?
Its interesting, the tar sands didn't
really seem to trigger even a flicker in Sterling when he mentioned
it. This in part might be a function of his own naivety or perhaps
its simply the fact that a job that pays good money where
opportunities are so scarce trumps everything? Certainly these played
some part but the concerted efforts of the Canadian government to
censure scientists rights of free speech. Via strict control of all
research funding made available by government and private industry
the Canadian government cherry picks projects that will support
industrial interests (this isn't isolated to the Canadian government
– take a look at George Monbiot's article on it
http://www.monbiot.com/2013/09/30/age-of-unreason/).
Over time the narrow band of opinion expressed by scientists that is
broadly supportive of exploitation of the tar sands, arctic drilling,
fracking or whatever else it may be seeps into public consciousness
via whatever media channels they're plugged into. Its another case in
point of how few of our opinions are formed in an unbiased
environment. Science is so often reduced to a debating point in
public debate hosted by the press that can stand or fall based on
opinion as opposed to cold hard analysis of test results that must be
comprehensive if they are to support anything pertaining to be
science. We just get normalised to some much stuff, and ironically
its perhaps most difficult to see in in ourselves...
Sterling's history reminded me of
something that John Curl (the godfather of coops in the Bay Area and
writer of one of the best books on coops and American history I've
read: For All the People). When I asked him about why had the Bay
Area had enjoyed a thriving ecosystem of coops in part of his answer
(the answer consisting of a number of combinatory factors) he
reminded me that the United States was populated with the descendants
of pretty intrepid people who've been arriving in this vast nation
for more than two hundred years. Only the most fearless members of
communities in Europe and Asia travelled to the states and most
African Americans had to survive the passage from Africa aboard
slaver's vessels. This meant they one and all share some optimistic /
survivalist component of their DNA / make-up. California is a
microcosm of the US in this context and has over the last hundred or
so years seen the arrival of frontiers people ready to work hard and
innovate. Be it the gold rush, the summer of love, or silicon valley.
Sterling had something of the frontiersman about him. And although
his brand was perhaps more authentic I've met many others who like
him share that intrepid nature here. Where his grandfather had traded
in the deep interior of Canada with Cree Indian, and now he
travelling down to San Francisco to play hockey... I'm beginning to
understand why Americans don't hold passports. Why would you when a
new life and a fresh start lies just one state away and there are 50
to choose from, all speak english and all accept dollars. Its easy,
and I'm now here in Eugene, Oregon for my latest fresh start...
Monday, 7 October 2013
Sunday, 22 September 2013
Sunday 22nd September
I've been in San Francisco for almost
two weeks now, and find I've arrived in that sweet spot where you
feel as though you know enough of the city to feel comfortable moving
around it but still not too familiar so as to eliminate its potential
to put a smile on your face. San Francisco feels like the end of the
line for travellers making their way out west to find whatever it is
they're looking for. I should make clear that for the most part these
travellers are American kids who've come from the Midwest,
Pennsylvania and South Carolina to California. The hostel I share
with them does have the obligatory sprinkling of Aussies, Dutch and
Germans but they're in the minority and in general they are somewhere
in the midst of their travels rather than their end.
Life here when I'm not out wandering the streets and parks or visiting a co-op centres around the stoop next to the hostel. Here the day to day happening of the hostel's inhabitants are discussed and dreams shared. The inhabitants of the stoop include: Turtle Smasher, a young guy from South Carolina who skates and paints cubist art, Sean from Wisconsin, who's setting up a dispensary business, Benji from Philadelphia a young man who's lived more in his 20 years than most have in a life time - he's here to find work (anything will do) and add to his life experiences, and there's Eva from New York who's here to get away from the insanity of Gotham and work in PR. All seem to come from entirely different worlds yet find themselves here in San Francisco united in their desire to build a new reality for themselves. As you can imagine such a diverse cast of characters leads to many interesting tales of love, loss and life. Between the trips to eat a slice of pizza, writing in the quiet room or reading up on the next coop I'm due to visit I've sat and listened and learned a little more about how life in America. I think the single biggest thing I've learned is just how willing people are here to up sticks and move to another part of the country. The kids around me who are doing it now, simply mark the latest in a long line who have chased opportunity here, wherever it may be. This willingness to move around harks back to the founding of this country and its vast scale where settlers only finished claiming “new territories” at the very end of the 19th century – which is really only around four or five generations ago. I appreciate that this “settlement' of the interior and west of the States was in many ways barbaric and I don't think people here appreciate just how savage these times were. However, the urge to chase the latest boom whether its the California gold rush or the more recent flight to Silicon Valley remains intact and in this day and age much more humane...
Today I'm going to meet up with Oddy and Vanessa who moved here from New York around the same sort of time I arrived. We met at Burning Man thanks once again to Alex and his happy knack of introducing me to wonderful people from all around the globe. We're going to visit an Urban Adamah, which as far as I can tell is a Jewish Harvest festival where with luck wine and pickled feeds will flow – and goats!
Life here when I'm not out wandering the streets and parks or visiting a co-op centres around the stoop next to the hostel. Here the day to day happening of the hostel's inhabitants are discussed and dreams shared. The inhabitants of the stoop include: Turtle Smasher, a young guy from South Carolina who skates and paints cubist art, Sean from Wisconsin, who's setting up a dispensary business, Benji from Philadelphia a young man who's lived more in his 20 years than most have in a life time - he's here to find work (anything will do) and add to his life experiences, and there's Eva from New York who's here to get away from the insanity of Gotham and work in PR. All seem to come from entirely different worlds yet find themselves here in San Francisco united in their desire to build a new reality for themselves. As you can imagine such a diverse cast of characters leads to many interesting tales of love, loss and life. Between the trips to eat a slice of pizza, writing in the quiet room or reading up on the next coop I'm due to visit I've sat and listened and learned a little more about how life in America. I think the single biggest thing I've learned is just how willing people are here to up sticks and move to another part of the country. The kids around me who are doing it now, simply mark the latest in a long line who have chased opportunity here, wherever it may be. This willingness to move around harks back to the founding of this country and its vast scale where settlers only finished claiming “new territories” at the very end of the 19th century – which is really only around four or five generations ago. I appreciate that this “settlement' of the interior and west of the States was in many ways barbaric and I don't think people here appreciate just how savage these times were. However, the urge to chase the latest boom whether its the California gold rush or the more recent flight to Silicon Valley remains intact and in this day and age much more humane...
Today I'm going to meet up with Oddy and Vanessa who moved here from New York around the same sort of time I arrived. We met at Burning Man thanks once again to Alex and his happy knack of introducing me to wonderful people from all around the globe. We're going to visit an Urban Adamah, which as far as I can tell is a Jewish Harvest festival where with luck wine and pickled feeds will flow – and goats!
Wednesday, 18 September 2013
Tuesday 17th September 2013
I felt as though I needed
to let some time pass between the event and attempting to write about
it. There were so many different thoughts and feelings provoked by
Burning Man I wanted to give them sometime to settle before I
committed words to the page. I'm not 100% sure the time is now, but I
have the distinct impression there may never be a perfect now in
which to do this as the chains of thoughts its triggered could be
without end. On that basis now is as good a time as any to begin...
To my surprise it seems as though what's stuck with me most is the different mode of operation I have adopted in day to day life, rather than some fond reminiscences of my adventures on the playa (this is the terminology for the desert where Burning Man is based among Burners (those who attend Burning Man)). I seem to have found the space between the words, there's more time to think and to get things done. Perhaps its a byproduct of not spending time thinking about the book I'm trying to write in its totality (something I've been trying to avoid but finding on occasion unavoidable). Now without effort I find a series of smaller tasks that present themselves to me as if dropping off a conveyor belt at a branch of Yo Sushi. With this simplification comes the time to breath in and breath out. I'm sure this is not just Burning Man's effect alone, how truly difficult would it be to ever isolate anyone influence on our person and determine its extent in the wider frame of reference? Impossible I'm sure. But I know its in there in some high sphere of influence driving me forward. Sure, life on the road charges me up, and San Francisco and the Bay Area are bringing me all sorts of good source material for the book but Burning Man meant something else...
What was it about Burning Man that triggered this response? First and foremost the people and their interactions with one another all through the festival. Even before we'd arrived we were subject to a warmth and generosity of spirit I've rarely encountered. An afternoon spent in Walmart in Reno attempting to get everything we'd need to survive in the desert was interspersed with meeting other burners doing the same thing we were, happy to share tips and tales of life on the playa. The lady at the cash-desk was happy to see all of the Burners too, and insisted on packing the shopping as she'd got “a pretty good idea of what would be best packed together” having been “packing for Burners for years”. She even closed the checkout to take Chris to the butchers to get dry ice to keep our cool-boxes really damn cold. This isn't in itself all that remarkable, nice but not remarkable. It does however, mark the beginning of a crescendoing level of friendliness that climaxed one week later in Blackrock City (the name given to the week long settlement in the desert that is Burning Man) with the burning of the man.
As far as I could tell the attitude of every person at the festival was one of unity. An air of permissiveness (not anything new on its own) coupled with a desire to share and exchange ideas (whether they be frivolous or profound – I'll give an example of each in a minute) was underpinned by an awareness that we needed to look after one another and that included the desert (a both harsh and delicate environment simultaneously). No one dropped a cigarette that I ever saw, and if there ever was a piece of rubbish on the ground I was usually alerted to it by virtue of the fact someone had ducked down to scoop it up as soon as they spotted it. This is called MOOPing (Matter Out Of Place) and is a typical behaviour that is promoted here and lies at the very core of Burning Man's ethos and mission. Sure its a big party in the desert but its a party that celebrates and promotes some serious things all be it in a very alternative manner, and the The Ten Principles lie at the heart of that. I won't list them all but to give you a flavour...
Item 1: “Radical Inclusion – Anyone may be a part of Burning Man. We welcome and respect the stranger. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community.”
- Right off the bat the door is opened to all, no exclusivity, although I did read an opinion piece in the Burning Man Gazette contesting the truthfulness of this statement given the necessity of being able to afford a ticket to be included in the first place! But I think even that shows the extent to which Burning Man tries to be open to internal debate and discussion, so much so they allow publication criticising their adherence to a core principle!
I digress, items 2 and 3... Item 2 “Gifting - Burning Man is devoted to acts of gift giving. The value of a gift is unconditional. Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.” Item 3: “Decommodification - “In order to preserve the spirit of gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation. We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.”
- This means no cash and no corporate influence or advertising, and it means bars are free as the drinks (you provide your own cup) provided are gifts! One of the other totally different thing about Burning an vs. another festival is the absence of stages per se. There are no bands or DJs booked to play on a huge stage or vast tent. Instead parties are much more localised and on the whole smaller based in whichever camp is throwing a party at any given time. Burning Man is composed in the main of camps, most Burners join a camp (we were a part of the wonderful Campi camp) but they range in size, theme, experience, centrality, vibe, etc... Our camp was around a hundred people and centred around a Bedouin tent but some were much more elaborate and included huge art-cars: colourful vehicles that travel round the site and out into the deep playa usually kitted out with sound systems and lighting rigs that will blow your average ravers mind. Among my favourites were a huge fire-breathing octopus, a unicorn made from a double decker bus, and a Spanish gondola sailing across the desert. So you're basically only a couple minutes away from some fun and generosity no matter where you are and what time it might be. Gifting takes many other guises beyond simply providing free drinks at a bar, first off the people working at the bars are gifting their time to work there! Chris was gifted among other things a yellow kazoo and an imaginary friendship bracelet but people extend it even further, no one will walk past someone who looks like they might need any kind of help and will do whatever they can to deliver it. This coupled with the complete absence of money from my life for a week was truly blissful. I like many others have felt the stress and strain of exerted by money or more accurately the lack of and its complete silence on the playa undoubtedly has some bearing on the freedom people seem to find.
The rules continue from there and cover: communal effort, civic responsibility, and of course leave no trace (link to the entire listing: http://www.burningman.com/whatisburningman/about_burningman/principles.html#.Ujjl6mTR32A). Before I go on I should make good on my promise to give an example of a frivolous idea and a more serious one that someone wanted to share on the playa... The place for frivolity was definitely in and around the camps on one day I had the pleasure of swinging in a hammock under canvas at one particular camp before taking my first ever ski-shot. This basically involved three people drinking shots of bourbon from glasses that were glued to a small ski, meaning the guy in the middle (me) has to drink without using his/her hands and rely instead upon his co-drinkers; all of this is served via a picture frame held by the barmen. More serious messages were to be found in the temple, this year it was a huge wooden pyramid that must have been at least 50 meters high. Inside people are encouraged to leave messages to loved ones who might be in trouble or dead or confessions of their own. On the last night the temple is burned and with it in silent ceremonial witness all of the Burners in theory let go of whatever pain they were carrying with them. We didn't get to stay to see the temple burn on the Sunday night but a visit during the day on the Wednesday reduced me to tears as I read some of the messages and felt the emotion of everyone there lie thick in the air.
The long and short of all all this is that the people of Blackrock City and their sense unity, enthusiasm to exchange and share ideas and compassion for one another living under a different set of values / principles have triggered a shift in me. From talking with others I've met in San Francisco since who also attended Burning Man my experience is not unique, and some I've spoken to have talked in even more fantastic terms than I about what their experience meant to them. Perhaps even quazi-religious! Lets see how long it stays with me, and here's hoping it keeps me charged until next year.
I'm wondering if having described what has stayed with me from Burning Man and why I may have inadvertently said very little about what actually happened at Burning Man. This may be so and ordinarily I'd aim to remedy that but this time I think a little enigmatic perhaps fits this desert city best. So I'll leave it here and finish by making sure I thank all of the new friends I made in the desert for their kindness, brilliance and good humour; and suggest that like most things in life if you really want to taste it, best get there in person.
To my surprise it seems as though what's stuck with me most is the different mode of operation I have adopted in day to day life, rather than some fond reminiscences of my adventures on the playa (this is the terminology for the desert where Burning Man is based among Burners (those who attend Burning Man)). I seem to have found the space between the words, there's more time to think and to get things done. Perhaps its a byproduct of not spending time thinking about the book I'm trying to write in its totality (something I've been trying to avoid but finding on occasion unavoidable). Now without effort I find a series of smaller tasks that present themselves to me as if dropping off a conveyor belt at a branch of Yo Sushi. With this simplification comes the time to breath in and breath out. I'm sure this is not just Burning Man's effect alone, how truly difficult would it be to ever isolate anyone influence on our person and determine its extent in the wider frame of reference? Impossible I'm sure. But I know its in there in some high sphere of influence driving me forward. Sure, life on the road charges me up, and San Francisco and the Bay Area are bringing me all sorts of good source material for the book but Burning Man meant something else...
What was it about Burning Man that triggered this response? First and foremost the people and their interactions with one another all through the festival. Even before we'd arrived we were subject to a warmth and generosity of spirit I've rarely encountered. An afternoon spent in Walmart in Reno attempting to get everything we'd need to survive in the desert was interspersed with meeting other burners doing the same thing we were, happy to share tips and tales of life on the playa. The lady at the cash-desk was happy to see all of the Burners too, and insisted on packing the shopping as she'd got “a pretty good idea of what would be best packed together” having been “packing for Burners for years”. She even closed the checkout to take Chris to the butchers to get dry ice to keep our cool-boxes really damn cold. This isn't in itself all that remarkable, nice but not remarkable. It does however, mark the beginning of a crescendoing level of friendliness that climaxed one week later in Blackrock City (the name given to the week long settlement in the desert that is Burning Man) with the burning of the man.
As far as I could tell the attitude of every person at the festival was one of unity. An air of permissiveness (not anything new on its own) coupled with a desire to share and exchange ideas (whether they be frivolous or profound – I'll give an example of each in a minute) was underpinned by an awareness that we needed to look after one another and that included the desert (a both harsh and delicate environment simultaneously). No one dropped a cigarette that I ever saw, and if there ever was a piece of rubbish on the ground I was usually alerted to it by virtue of the fact someone had ducked down to scoop it up as soon as they spotted it. This is called MOOPing (Matter Out Of Place) and is a typical behaviour that is promoted here and lies at the very core of Burning Man's ethos and mission. Sure its a big party in the desert but its a party that celebrates and promotes some serious things all be it in a very alternative manner, and the The Ten Principles lie at the heart of that. I won't list them all but to give you a flavour...
Item 1: “Radical Inclusion – Anyone may be a part of Burning Man. We welcome and respect the stranger. No prerequisites exist for participation in our community.”
- Right off the bat the door is opened to all, no exclusivity, although I did read an opinion piece in the Burning Man Gazette contesting the truthfulness of this statement given the necessity of being able to afford a ticket to be included in the first place! But I think even that shows the extent to which Burning Man tries to be open to internal debate and discussion, so much so they allow publication criticising their adherence to a core principle!
I digress, items 2 and 3... Item 2 “Gifting - Burning Man is devoted to acts of gift giving. The value of a gift is unconditional. Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.” Item 3: “Decommodification - “In order to preserve the spirit of gifting, our community seeks to create social environments that are unmediated by commercial sponsorships, transactions, or advertising. We stand ready to protect our culture from such exploitation. We resist the substitution of consumption for participatory experience.”
- This means no cash and no corporate influence or advertising, and it means bars are free as the drinks (you provide your own cup) provided are gifts! One of the other totally different thing about Burning an vs. another festival is the absence of stages per se. There are no bands or DJs booked to play on a huge stage or vast tent. Instead parties are much more localised and on the whole smaller based in whichever camp is throwing a party at any given time. Burning Man is composed in the main of camps, most Burners join a camp (we were a part of the wonderful Campi camp) but they range in size, theme, experience, centrality, vibe, etc... Our camp was around a hundred people and centred around a Bedouin tent but some were much more elaborate and included huge art-cars: colourful vehicles that travel round the site and out into the deep playa usually kitted out with sound systems and lighting rigs that will blow your average ravers mind. Among my favourites were a huge fire-breathing octopus, a unicorn made from a double decker bus, and a Spanish gondola sailing across the desert. So you're basically only a couple minutes away from some fun and generosity no matter where you are and what time it might be. Gifting takes many other guises beyond simply providing free drinks at a bar, first off the people working at the bars are gifting their time to work there! Chris was gifted among other things a yellow kazoo and an imaginary friendship bracelet but people extend it even further, no one will walk past someone who looks like they might need any kind of help and will do whatever they can to deliver it. This coupled with the complete absence of money from my life for a week was truly blissful. I like many others have felt the stress and strain of exerted by money or more accurately the lack of and its complete silence on the playa undoubtedly has some bearing on the freedom people seem to find.
The rules continue from there and cover: communal effort, civic responsibility, and of course leave no trace (link to the entire listing: http://www.burningman.com/whatisburningman/about_burningman/principles.html#.Ujjl6mTR32A). Before I go on I should make good on my promise to give an example of a frivolous idea and a more serious one that someone wanted to share on the playa... The place for frivolity was definitely in and around the camps on one day I had the pleasure of swinging in a hammock under canvas at one particular camp before taking my first ever ski-shot. This basically involved three people drinking shots of bourbon from glasses that were glued to a small ski, meaning the guy in the middle (me) has to drink without using his/her hands and rely instead upon his co-drinkers; all of this is served via a picture frame held by the barmen. More serious messages were to be found in the temple, this year it was a huge wooden pyramid that must have been at least 50 meters high. Inside people are encouraged to leave messages to loved ones who might be in trouble or dead or confessions of their own. On the last night the temple is burned and with it in silent ceremonial witness all of the Burners in theory let go of whatever pain they were carrying with them. We didn't get to stay to see the temple burn on the Sunday night but a visit during the day on the Wednesday reduced me to tears as I read some of the messages and felt the emotion of everyone there lie thick in the air.
The long and short of all all this is that the people of Blackrock City and their sense unity, enthusiasm to exchange and share ideas and compassion for one another living under a different set of values / principles have triggered a shift in me. From talking with others I've met in San Francisco since who also attended Burning Man my experience is not unique, and some I've spoken to have talked in even more fantastic terms than I about what their experience meant to them. Perhaps even quazi-religious! Lets see how long it stays with me, and here's hoping it keeps me charged until next year.
I'm wondering if having described what has stayed with me from Burning Man and why I may have inadvertently said very little about what actually happened at Burning Man. This may be so and ordinarily I'd aim to remedy that but this time I think a little enigmatic perhaps fits this desert city best. So I'll leave it here and finish by making sure I thank all of the new friends I made in the desert for their kindness, brilliance and good humour; and suggest that like most things in life if you really want to taste it, best get there in person.
Saturday, 7 September 2013
Saturday 7th September
I'm in San Francisco (I've been reliably informed by a local not
to refer to it as San Fran) its too hot to sleep in my hungover
condition and I don't expect Chris will be making an appearance
anytime soon so I might as well write something; its basically that
or vomiting...
We arrived here yesterday from Yosemite in the late afternoon approaching the Bay area on highway 580. As the road swoops down towards Oakland and the Bay bridge that crosses to San Francisco there was no sign of the prevailing fog; instead clear skies and bright sunlight scattered reflections across the bay and offered a clear view of the Golden gate bridge far off in the distance. For once our luck with traffic on this trip has changed for the better and within 20 minutes we were parked up and at our hostel: Adelaide. Handily placed just around the corner from Union Square in the heart of town.
After our basically carnivorous diet in the forests of Yosemite we decided it would be best to switch up to Japanese and by all accounts San Francisco has some of the best on offer outside of Japan. Fortuitously the hostel is just around the corner from Geary street where a host of sushi places lay in wait. Our appetites didn't allow much time for research and the first place we found was the one for us. The restaurant was called Katana-Ya and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a bowl of ramen soup, goyza or sushi rolls. Each and every mouthful was a divine and it was a welcome change not to be greeted with the now customary oversized portions that every restaurant here seems hell bent on providing. After dinner we did a little bar hopping where thanks in no small part to a friendly Las Vegan called Stuart prompting some rapid shot drinking we found ourselves pissed as newts and consequently in my now severly hungover condition.
Before I get to far down the road on San Francisco life; not that I have much more to tell than what's detailed above I should probably mention our final slice of Yosemite... After the exertions of the previous couple of days neither Chris or I was up for much more than a gentle stroll. But as luck would have it our last destination required no more than just that...
The Mariposa grove is located at the southern end of the park on route 41 and its where the biggest living things in the whole wide world reside... There are around one hundred sequoia trees there, some as much as 1,800 years old which means they we sprouting up form the ground back when civil war raged in the Roman empire and the Han dynasty in China fell. Chris seemed a little underwhelmed but for me the ambience of the grove was pretty special, in his defence we've seen so many mammoth natural wonders here in Yosemite its easy to begin to accept leviathan such as these as the norm. As we meandered through the forest I felt as though I was walking on the forest moon of Endor (sorry Star Wars reference), sadly there were no Ewok or Imperial stormtrooper sightings but these majestic red giants were good enough. On an even more trainspottery note I feel I should mention the biggest sequoia we saw: called the Grizzly Giant and although it wasn't the tallest one around (apparently the top came off at some point a couple hundred years ago?) its girth was absolutely mind blowing – around 35 feet in diameter I think?
I'm sorry to have to leave Yosemite and I'm sure I'll be back, I feel as though we managed to do a fair whack in the three days we spent here but talking with a Yosemite veteran called Jim who's been coming here every summer for around 40 years, it takes that long to exhaust all of the trails and activities on offer. Here's hoping I get closer to that feat!
We arrived here yesterday from Yosemite in the late afternoon approaching the Bay area on highway 580. As the road swoops down towards Oakland and the Bay bridge that crosses to San Francisco there was no sign of the prevailing fog; instead clear skies and bright sunlight scattered reflections across the bay and offered a clear view of the Golden gate bridge far off in the distance. For once our luck with traffic on this trip has changed for the better and within 20 minutes we were parked up and at our hostel: Adelaide. Handily placed just around the corner from Union Square in the heart of town.
After our basically carnivorous diet in the forests of Yosemite we decided it would be best to switch up to Japanese and by all accounts San Francisco has some of the best on offer outside of Japan. Fortuitously the hostel is just around the corner from Geary street where a host of sushi places lay in wait. Our appetites didn't allow much time for research and the first place we found was the one for us. The restaurant was called Katana-Ya and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a bowl of ramen soup, goyza or sushi rolls. Each and every mouthful was a divine and it was a welcome change not to be greeted with the now customary oversized portions that every restaurant here seems hell bent on providing. After dinner we did a little bar hopping where thanks in no small part to a friendly Las Vegan called Stuart prompting some rapid shot drinking we found ourselves pissed as newts and consequently in my now severly hungover condition.
Before I get to far down the road on San Francisco life; not that I have much more to tell than what's detailed above I should probably mention our final slice of Yosemite... After the exertions of the previous couple of days neither Chris or I was up for much more than a gentle stroll. But as luck would have it our last destination required no more than just that...
The Mariposa grove is located at the southern end of the park on route 41 and its where the biggest living things in the whole wide world reside... There are around one hundred sequoia trees there, some as much as 1,800 years old which means they we sprouting up form the ground back when civil war raged in the Roman empire and the Han dynasty in China fell. Chris seemed a little underwhelmed but for me the ambience of the grove was pretty special, in his defence we've seen so many mammoth natural wonders here in Yosemite its easy to begin to accept leviathan such as these as the norm. As we meandered through the forest I felt as though I was walking on the forest moon of Endor (sorry Star Wars reference), sadly there were no Ewok or Imperial stormtrooper sightings but these majestic red giants were good enough. On an even more trainspottery note I feel I should mention the biggest sequoia we saw: called the Grizzly Giant and although it wasn't the tallest one around (apparently the top came off at some point a couple hundred years ago?) its girth was absolutely mind blowing – around 35 feet in diameter I think?
I'm sorry to have to leave Yosemite and I'm sure I'll be back, I feel as though we managed to do a fair whack in the three days we spent here but talking with a Yosemite veteran called Jim who's been coming here every summer for around 40 years, it takes that long to exhaust all of the trails and activities on offer. Here's hoping I get closer to that feat!
Thursday 5th September
I started the day dropping Chris off in Curry Village around a
mile or so up the valley. He'd arranged a one to one rock climbing
lesson for the day, leaving me an opportunity to explore the southern
side of the valley. After I'd deposited Chris I popped to the grocers
in the central tourist development in the valley called Yosemite
village for a sandwich, energy drink and other sundries for today's
hike... There's a pretty expansive grocers come gift shop here, as
well as a grill restaurant with terrace, sports shop, ranger station,
art gallery, lodge that in actual fact is a low rise luxury hotel
complex complete with swimming pool, recycling depot, workshop and a
smattering of grand chalets (or should I say cabins?). It all sounds
a bit much but the design of the buildings sits pretty well under the
towering lodge pole pines, incense cedars and Douglas firs; faced
with greenish brown shingles and sloping roofs, marking their base
close to ground level.
Returning to the camp the fire I'd somehow remembered to start before I dropped Chris was ready to go and in no time at all I was enjoying a bacon and egg doubler with a smoky taste permeating the sweet bacon, complementing the iron like ouse of the egg yolk. Next stop Trailhead around two miles up the valley where the mist trail begins...
I'd decided to go for a walk that a) gave me options (i.e. an easy way to back out if I was feeling it on my dodgy knee); and b) was orientated around the southern side of the valley. The route I'd opted for ascends a canyon that marks the route to many of the more extreme treks available to the most intrepid, many go all the way to the top of half dome from here (perhaps Yosemite's most distinctive landmark?); this is a twelve hour plus walk that is often undertaken over two days camping in the high Serria overnight. Other routes such as the John Muir route stretch on for hundreds of miles and require a commitment of weeks rather than days! My plan was more humble... All going well I would climb up a canyon that leads to Venal falls and from there up higher still to the top of the valley where the high Sierra south of the valley begins and the even taller Nevada falls drop nearly 600ft! Both of these waterfalls run all year so the hiccup with Yosemite falls yesterday – there weren't any water to fall wasn't going to be repeated. And as I mentioned earlier if I wasn't feeling great after yesterday's exertions I'd be able to back out at Venal falls.
Thankfully I felt even better today than yesterday, in no small part to being better fuelled and hydrated and setting out before the very hottest part of the day (10am vs. 12pm). The path as it really can only figure to be given the vertiginous heights of the valley was steep, although perhaps not as relentlessly steep as yesterday? Even so getting up the side of each waterfall's cliff face certainly pushed me endurance to the limit – again the 90 degree heat couldn't help but take its toll. But once more the views back to the valley as I climbed ever higher (a more modest ascent to just under 6,000ft, but still over 2,000ft of climbing) were awesome and although I didn't have Chris on point with the camera I still managed to get a few great shots. That said if we exclude the different perspective of the valley the south side provided a couple of distinct elements I didn't encounter yesterday: two active (can I say that or is it just for volcanoes?) waterfalls streaming their misty ribbons of ice cold water over sheer granite walls polished smooth; and a fleeting brush with the southern high Sierra on my arrival at the top of Nevada falls. These highlands felt completely different in terms of the landscape and flora of its northern sibling we'd visited yesterday.
Unlike yesterday today's route was a loop rather than a straight up and back down retracing the steps we taken upwards on the way back down. The mist trail I'd gone up took me to the top of Nevada falls where routes fan out in the shadow of liberty cap, a towering granite monolith that rises from the shelf the falls plunge from which just as promised looks exactly like the top of a liberty cap mushroom. The way back down would take me down the start of the John Muir trail back to the valley floor. Happily it was a little less steep than the mist trail, avoiding the waterfalls and instead following a more gentle contour down the opposite side of the granite valley walls to the canyons edges the mist trail follows. The sun dappled through the trees as I walked back down to the valley below and I found so much wonder walking along the dusty tracks, not a thought of anything other than this magical land out west existed in my mind.
I should before signing off mention this evening and its two notable features (I'm not going to count getting my ass kicked at Scrabble by Chris as a notable feature). The first was the cooking of the marinaded baby back ribs and new york strip steak (an extremely well marbled thick cut of sirloin to you or I) cooked over wood in our fire pit. And second of all the stars... I don't think I've ever seen such bright stars, even in the desert. The Milky Way stood out like a ribbon of white tinsel and the moonless sky was still bright enough with starlight alone of mark our the edges of the cliff faces towering far above. I'll miss Yosemite so. It seems as though I live the right way here with little or no conscious effort... Days are filled with hikes in an environment that I cannot quite comprehend, its vast towering peaks, its calm cleansing air; writing, reading, and even a little yoga! If I can keep this time and the desert with me there's no telling where this could lead. An exciting thought to end another inspiring day.
Returning to the camp the fire I'd somehow remembered to start before I dropped Chris was ready to go and in no time at all I was enjoying a bacon and egg doubler with a smoky taste permeating the sweet bacon, complementing the iron like ouse of the egg yolk. Next stop Trailhead around two miles up the valley where the mist trail begins...
I'd decided to go for a walk that a) gave me options (i.e. an easy way to back out if I was feeling it on my dodgy knee); and b) was orientated around the southern side of the valley. The route I'd opted for ascends a canyon that marks the route to many of the more extreme treks available to the most intrepid, many go all the way to the top of half dome from here (perhaps Yosemite's most distinctive landmark?); this is a twelve hour plus walk that is often undertaken over two days camping in the high Serria overnight. Other routes such as the John Muir route stretch on for hundreds of miles and require a commitment of weeks rather than days! My plan was more humble... All going well I would climb up a canyon that leads to Venal falls and from there up higher still to the top of the valley where the high Sierra south of the valley begins and the even taller Nevada falls drop nearly 600ft! Both of these waterfalls run all year so the hiccup with Yosemite falls yesterday – there weren't any water to fall wasn't going to be repeated. And as I mentioned earlier if I wasn't feeling great after yesterday's exertions I'd be able to back out at Venal falls.
Thankfully I felt even better today than yesterday, in no small part to being better fuelled and hydrated and setting out before the very hottest part of the day (10am vs. 12pm). The path as it really can only figure to be given the vertiginous heights of the valley was steep, although perhaps not as relentlessly steep as yesterday? Even so getting up the side of each waterfall's cliff face certainly pushed me endurance to the limit – again the 90 degree heat couldn't help but take its toll. But once more the views back to the valley as I climbed ever higher (a more modest ascent to just under 6,000ft, but still over 2,000ft of climbing) were awesome and although I didn't have Chris on point with the camera I still managed to get a few great shots. That said if we exclude the different perspective of the valley the south side provided a couple of distinct elements I didn't encounter yesterday: two active (can I say that or is it just for volcanoes?) waterfalls streaming their misty ribbons of ice cold water over sheer granite walls polished smooth; and a fleeting brush with the southern high Sierra on my arrival at the top of Nevada falls. These highlands felt completely different in terms of the landscape and flora of its northern sibling we'd visited yesterday.
Nevada Falls
Unlike yesterday today's route was a loop rather than a straight up and back down retracing the steps we taken upwards on the way back down. The mist trail I'd gone up took me to the top of Nevada falls where routes fan out in the shadow of liberty cap, a towering granite monolith that rises from the shelf the falls plunge from which just as promised looks exactly like the top of a liberty cap mushroom. The way back down would take me down the start of the John Muir trail back to the valley floor. Happily it was a little less steep than the mist trail, avoiding the waterfalls and instead following a more gentle contour down the opposite side of the granite valley walls to the canyons edges the mist trail follows. The sun dappled through the trees as I walked back down to the valley below and I found so much wonder walking along the dusty tracks, not a thought of anything other than this magical land out west existed in my mind.
Liberty Cap
I should before signing off mention this evening and its two notable features (I'm not going to count getting my ass kicked at Scrabble by Chris as a notable feature). The first was the cooking of the marinaded baby back ribs and new york strip steak (an extremely well marbled thick cut of sirloin to you or I) cooked over wood in our fire pit. And second of all the stars... I don't think I've ever seen such bright stars, even in the desert. The Milky Way stood out like a ribbon of white tinsel and the moonless sky was still bright enough with starlight alone of mark our the edges of the cliff faces towering far above. I'll miss Yosemite so. It seems as though I live the right way here with little or no conscious effort... Days are filled with hikes in an environment that I cannot quite comprehend, its vast towering peaks, its calm cleansing air; writing, reading, and even a little yoga! If I can keep this time and the desert with me there's no telling where this could lead. An exciting thought to end another inspiring day.
Wednesday 4th September
We climbed to Yosemite point today, approximately 3,000ft (914m)
above the valley floor. We managed to do it in a very respectable
five hours in 90 something degrees fahrenheit (34 oC) –
given the estimate the guide book provided of six – seven hours.
The climb amongst the cliffs that mark the north side of Yosemite
valley rise up from the forest and wild pastures of the valley floor
below like stone guardians watching over Eden. Our ascent up steep
hairpins, skirting up the side of the sheer granite cliffs, laid out
in Granite dust, stone and slab (I cannot imagine the efforts of
those men who forged this trail) was exhausting but the views of the
valley as we climbed ever higher through tree lined trails took my
breath away. Many of the trees sheltering the path appeared to be
clenching the granite rocks making it impossible to discern whether
the trees held the granite in place or vice versa? As we passed
through ever more regular periods without shade, the rock face we
somehow spiral refuses even the most pushy of trees is reflects the
sunlight with brights greys, golds and slate colours marking times
slow advance. I felt as if I was walking in some Tolkienesque world.
As I understand it the Yosemite valley was formed thanks to some sort
of massive rift in seemingly impregnable granite. The views of this
rift inspire an emotional response and strangely I found myself
reflecting on not just this tear in the earth before me but another
much smaller one I saw in the Tate Modern some years ago. I suppose
both are in some ways microcosms for so much in the world. Chris once
more very kindly took responsibility for the photography and they are
sensational! I'm especially glad we have them as I don't think I have
worlds to describe what only the eye can behold.
Its late evening now and I'm starting to feel a little more together But I readily admit that today's expedition took me to my physical limit. Happily all of the things that stopped working (blistered feet, sore knee, mild dehydration all reserved arrival for the very moment we arrived back at the car. I never thought I'd say it but thank goodness for Gatoraide a large infusion helped regather most if not quite all my composure, topped off with a fantastic burger cooked on the fire by Chris sealed the deal and I'm now tucked up in bed ready for a deep dreamy sleep (its around 10pm) as I listen to our neighbours speak spanish - which is sure to bring good dreams.
Its late evening now and I'm starting to feel a little more together But I readily admit that today's expedition took me to my physical limit. Happily all of the things that stopped working (blistered feet, sore knee, mild dehydration all reserved arrival for the very moment we arrived back at the car. I never thought I'd say it but thank goodness for Gatoraide a large infusion helped regather most if not quite all my composure, topped off with a fantastic burger cooked on the fire by Chris sealed the deal and I'm now tucked up in bed ready for a deep dreamy sleep (its around 10pm) as I listen to our neighbours speak spanish - which is sure to bring good dreams.
Tuesday 3rd September 2013
After attempting three already convoluted routes of entry into
Yosemite park we've finally arrived at 11pm, five hours later than we
would've had it not been for the fourth largest recorded forest fire
in Californian history that has closed most of the roads into the
park and if memory serves burnt around 357 square miles of forest. We
(Chris Key and I) are sitting at a table under canvas roof, in a
small 4 berth shelter that is both cabin and tent at the same time.
Despite our weary condition we're both in a state of silent
excitement; attempting to unwind by reading and writing respectively.
We've had little in the way of dinner, omitting charcoal from our
otherwise extensive shopping spree at Walmart in Carson City was our
only if somewhat important failure.
Arriving under the cover of darkness means there is no way of knowing exactly where we find ourselves. However, consultation with the guide pamphlet we've been handed alongside our pre-existing knowledge of the location mean I'm certain that I sit within fifty metres of the Merced river, from who's banks an upward glance will reveal the granite wall of Yosemite valley rising up 3,547ft in American money, which I think is over a kilometre high!
Yosemite cloak of darkness offers abundant mystery and wonder but this cloak hides not just inanimate wonders shaped over millennia, life teams here... Our food is stored carefully with not a shred left in the car for fear of the bears we've been warned will be attracted to the slightest scent: noses more sensitive than bloodhounds, silent gait thanks to padded feet, appetite more voracious than a Californian stoner who's been unfed for days, so we've shut everything up in our bear proof locker made sealed with sturdy spring-action steel bolts. Thankfully no insects that bite have come to our lamps, but a gentle hhhhiiiiiizzhhh of crickets flows over the gentle breeze.
The drive was (I think?) the longest I've done. We're riding a huge GMC Yukon XL SUV with the obligatory automatic gearbox. I'd never normally allow myself to use a car like this except in the very specific circumstances of this trip... To get to Burning Man we needed to carry three passengers, not in itself a particularly big ask but once you factor in all of the kit to camp and live in the desert for a week it starts adding up. This included but is not limited to: an 18ft diameter dome tent, an air-conditioning unit, a gasoline generator, three persons clothes and hand luggage (ie 20kgs suitcases and smallish rucksacks), groceries for a week, 36 US gallons (approx. 150 litres) of water, 100 cans of beer, two huge cool boxes, a gas burner and grill plate gas cooker (and gas), a 5 gallon gerry can of gasoline, 2 double airbeds, 3 sleeping bags, a full set of kitchen utensils and steel crockery, and a few other unspecified items... This vast quantity of stuff which reveals just how much stuff we need to survive, though I guess it was to survive in the desert which maybe a little more demanding than more temperate climbs. Anyhow, we now find ourselves minus most of that stuff thanks to a quick visit to storage unit in Reno (£200 for a year!) and free to enjoy the other elements beyond sheer practicality of our V8 powerhouse (bear in mind I recon this thing weighs close to two tonnes).
To get from Reno to Yosemite requires a crossing, or at least if all roads are open a partial crossing of the Sierra Nevada. As things stand with the fires we found ourselves doing a full crossing via Sonoma pass, which turns out to be the first pass successfully navigated by settlers, led by “Grizzly” Adams in something like 1854. At its highest point we were at around 6,950ft which by anyone's standards is pretty high. The pass was a narrow winding road with steep climbs and drops that lasted for something like fifty miles until we reached the beautiful old town of Sonoma. With the benefit of hindsight this appears to have marked around the halfway point of our journey, though at the time we felt as though we were on the finishing straight. After leaving Sonoma behind we travelled further and further south vainly hoping that we'd skirt round the rim of the fire control area and find a route in as twighlight grew large passing through beautiful little mountain villages nestled among the pines. We'd stopped only twice as we travelled from Carson City and lunch, and this second occasion we doubled back having met our third road block of the day. Hoping for some directions and a little local knowledge in one of the small mountain settlements we'd passed though right before we hit the block. In a pizza shop that seemed like something out of my teenage dreams of American life a friendly girl at the counter gave us a definitive set of directions and the finally we were tantalisingly close to the park!
The route she'd suggested was down a very minor road that swept up and down ever steeper mountainsides as night finally engulfed us climbing over the most precarious pass we would encounter. Eventually we arrived in Mariposa, a small town on the south corner of the national park where the biggest sequoias are to be found and we'd made it at long last to Yosemite.
Arriving under the cover of darkness means there is no way of knowing exactly where we find ourselves. However, consultation with the guide pamphlet we've been handed alongside our pre-existing knowledge of the location mean I'm certain that I sit within fifty metres of the Merced river, from who's banks an upward glance will reveal the granite wall of Yosemite valley rising up 3,547ft in American money, which I think is over a kilometre high!
Yosemite cloak of darkness offers abundant mystery and wonder but this cloak hides not just inanimate wonders shaped over millennia, life teams here... Our food is stored carefully with not a shred left in the car for fear of the bears we've been warned will be attracted to the slightest scent: noses more sensitive than bloodhounds, silent gait thanks to padded feet, appetite more voracious than a Californian stoner who's been unfed for days, so we've shut everything up in our bear proof locker made sealed with sturdy spring-action steel bolts. Thankfully no insects that bite have come to our lamps, but a gentle hhhhiiiiiizzhhh of crickets flows over the gentle breeze.
The drive was (I think?) the longest I've done. We're riding a huge GMC Yukon XL SUV with the obligatory automatic gearbox. I'd never normally allow myself to use a car like this except in the very specific circumstances of this trip... To get to Burning Man we needed to carry three passengers, not in itself a particularly big ask but once you factor in all of the kit to camp and live in the desert for a week it starts adding up. This included but is not limited to: an 18ft diameter dome tent, an air-conditioning unit, a gasoline generator, three persons clothes and hand luggage (ie 20kgs suitcases and smallish rucksacks), groceries for a week, 36 US gallons (approx. 150 litres) of water, 100 cans of beer, two huge cool boxes, a gas burner and grill plate gas cooker (and gas), a 5 gallon gerry can of gasoline, 2 double airbeds, 3 sleeping bags, a full set of kitchen utensils and steel crockery, and a few other unspecified items... This vast quantity of stuff which reveals just how much stuff we need to survive, though I guess it was to survive in the desert which maybe a little more demanding than more temperate climbs. Anyhow, we now find ourselves minus most of that stuff thanks to a quick visit to storage unit in Reno (£200 for a year!) and free to enjoy the other elements beyond sheer practicality of our V8 powerhouse (bear in mind I recon this thing weighs close to two tonnes).
To get from Reno to Yosemite requires a crossing, or at least if all roads are open a partial crossing of the Sierra Nevada. As things stand with the fires we found ourselves doing a full crossing via Sonoma pass, which turns out to be the first pass successfully navigated by settlers, led by “Grizzly” Adams in something like 1854. At its highest point we were at around 6,950ft which by anyone's standards is pretty high. The pass was a narrow winding road with steep climbs and drops that lasted for something like fifty miles until we reached the beautiful old town of Sonoma. With the benefit of hindsight this appears to have marked around the halfway point of our journey, though at the time we felt as though we were on the finishing straight. After leaving Sonoma behind we travelled further and further south vainly hoping that we'd skirt round the rim of the fire control area and find a route in as twighlight grew large passing through beautiful little mountain villages nestled among the pines. We'd stopped only twice as we travelled from Carson City and lunch, and this second occasion we doubled back having met our third road block of the day. Hoping for some directions and a little local knowledge in one of the small mountain settlements we'd passed though right before we hit the block. In a pizza shop that seemed like something out of my teenage dreams of American life a friendly girl at the counter gave us a definitive set of directions and the finally we were tantalisingly close to the park!
The route she'd suggested was down a very minor road that swept up and down ever steeper mountainsides as night finally engulfed us climbing over the most precarious pass we would encounter. Eventually we arrived in Mariposa, a small town on the south corner of the national park where the biggest sequoias are to be found and we'd made it at long last to Yosemite.
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