Your Backup Hobby

I've been rehabbing a knee injury for a year and it just never ends. Getting old fucking sucks.

I've been hiking more and more, mostly on my own, plus a bit of camping. Where I live is some of the best country for this sort of thing - there are lots of classic trails and things but what I've especially enjoyed is getting off track and just exploring things for myself - getting out the topo map for interesting looking features or noticing things while out that I want to have a look at. I was psyched a few weeks back because I'd seen this photo taken in 1875 and I wanted to find the exact spot, which I managed to do.

Here's the photo - the discussion below has my photo in it

www.flickr.com/photos/blue_mountains_lib..._studies/9235951934/


Lots of fun. I also am getting into light camping, bare necessities kind of stuff. This is pretty vital because where I like to walk is a deep valley that is pretty strenuous stuff.... for a day trip, I'm riding out to the edge, between 5-7ks, then it's like 5-600 metre descent, and of course you have to come back out again and then ride home... so that's a pretty full on day. But lugging lots of gear out is no picnic either.

Anyway I enjoy being on my own doing this stuff but i've hooked up with a local conservation group and I'm going down to be doing some regeneration stuff, clearing invasive species for a few days. Can't wait.

This sounds awesome. If your family is worried, get one of those check in satellite services. Can communicate an SOS basically, isn't for communication.

What is this check-in satellite service you're talking about please? My boys' scout troop used to carry an epirb just in case, but those are a few hundred bucks.

www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/personal-locator-beacons.html

A former advisor is an absolute beast outdoors amd his wife demands he do one of the satellite phone options when solo that has a monthly plan but is basically only for emergency transmissions and/or check ins in practice. There are lots of varieties though. Solo hiking can be a little dangerous so I get it; something that would suck with two can be a deadly emergency alone.

Gary Sax wrote: www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/personal-locator-beacons.html

A former advisor is an absolute beast outdoors amd his wife demands he do one of the satellite phone options when solo that has a monthly plan but is basically only for emergency transmissions and/or check ins in practice. There are lots of varieties though. Solo hiking can be a little dangerous so I get it; something that would suck with two can be a deadly emergency alone.

Thank you! A little cheaper that epirbs, and much smaller.

Cheers Gary. And yep you can actually pick these up at the national parks office which I try to do especially if going camping but they're not always available. I have thought about getting one myself. Usually after, say, almost treading on a snake, which happened within a kilometre or so of the spot i was talking about. No mobile coverage at all, even radios don't get much reception, so a PLB and a helicopter is your only hope if things get serious.

Triathlon season is almost upon us and I can actually do a race in person. After losing almost 100 pounds over the last couple years, I am excited to no longer be a Clydesdale class competitor. Just doing a Sprint distance to start the season, but will go for an Olympic later in the year. My race is at the end of May and I'm sure the water will end up being in the low 60s like last time. I'm too cheap to buy a wet suit, so I go bareback. brrrrr

As a kid I was always a climber. Every tree or thing I could climb I was always up it, seeing how high I could go. Then as a teenager school had a few rock climbing trips and I fell in love with it, but it never went anywhere. I never knew what to do or where to go and it vanished. At university I remember seeing the first few indoor climbing gyms but I was too intimidated and my girlfriend and none of my friends were interested, so again I never rekindled this passion.

Then 4 years ago I was a scout leader (to spend time with my scout daughter) and I took the kids to a climbing gym. By then middle aged weight had kicked in, and while I wanted to give it a go was too scared. My daughter went a couple more times, and that gym was nice because it had a lot of auto belays so you didn't need a partner but I was always too scared of my weight.

3 years ago my wife died and I dropped about 20 kgs (40 pounds) in 3 months through grief. I reassessed my entire life, and one of the things I had always wanted to do was climb, so plucked up the courage and went to that climbing gym, and fell back in love with climbing. Since then I have been going there 1-3 times a week and it brings me so much joy.

I am an intriguing climber and the staff say I climb like noone else at the gym, which is a good and bad thing. I am built a bit like a frog, really long slender limbs and a very solid torso where I keep all my weight. While I am tall (187cm, or 6'1.5"), I have an insane arm span (199cm or 78.5"). Unfortunately I don't have the biceps and triceps at the moment to justify my height and weight, and so when I climb every move involves exploiting my height and reach.

Very early on I learnt one powerful natural movement of exploding out to full stretch and grabbing a solid hold to steady myself. This weirdly meant I was never a beginner, skipping straight to being an intermediate level climber, because I could skip past any difficult section of a climb. However that is where I have stagnated for the last couple of years. I tend to only climb from solid hold to solid hold while keeping my body at full stretch.

My method of climbing enables me to pull off stuff almost noone else can do at the gym, but it is physically draining and stops me from learning other techniques. I struggle when I have less than solid holds or have to get my body off centre. I know what I am doing wrong and am slowly changing my technique. I am learning to move slower, strengthen my core and cope with less secure holds.

But in the end if I never improve any more I don't really care as I love climbing and have so much fun.

Your post gave me some big positive feels, thanks for posting.

The weather suddenly got nice again, and the weather is perfect for an evening run. But I need to wait a while. My block is getting our sewers repaired, so the local water supply is cut off until 10:00 PM. I mean, I could run right now, but then I would need to sit around sweaty for a while before I can shower. Instead, I wait.

With 30 minutes to go, I am debating the merits of "watering" the shrubbery in my backyard.

Good but hot day out today. At least I saw some small trout in three separate pools and floated my midge fly by, but they weren't interested. I should have tried some other flies, but I was frustrated because my short roll casting sucks so bad. And it was a got 3 1/4 mile walk back at midday.

One of those character building beginner trips, I guess.

Even if all you come back with is that picture, I'd say it's worth it.

Looks like fun country Gary!

Is it much of a trek to get to?