Adventures of the Hullabaloo Crew

Wednesday - Travel We left Dulles on Tuesday at 6pm and landed in Nice on Wednesday morning at 8:30am.  A bit of difficulty figuring out the car rental location and navigating to terminal 2.  Eventually figured it out, got our car and drove to Port Lympia.  dropped Suzi at the AirBNB with the luggage and went to parking.  There is a 5 level parking garage underground in the port.  My job was to assemble the bike and so I got to work on that to get it out of the way.  Somehow one of the headset bolts got stripped and I ended up having to go down to the bike shop and get a new bolt.  We walked down to the port and went to the bike shop "Eat Sleep Bike".  It was one of the shops Joe recommended, so I texted him letting him know we were at the shop not knowing that he lives directly above the shop and he came down to say hi.  The guy at the shop found a new bolt and we were good to go. Thursday - Trail Run and more Travel Woke up Thursday morning...

Drive to Moab hotel in Moab Moab Red Stone Inn Jun 14–15 Check in Jun 14 Check out Jun 15 Duration of stay 1 night Address 535 South Main Street, Moab, Utah 84532, United States shuttle from Moab to Durango 6/15 pickup     shuttle reserved with porcupine shuttles Below are some details about your activity: Tickets purchased: (SJH) Durango : 1x Van Activity date: Wednesday, June 15, 2022 Start time: 11:00am Please plan to arrive 15 minutes before. Meeting location: Your pick up location. BOOKING ID: B-W4GP9YE Purgatory Resort Jun 15–17 Check in Jun 15 Check out Jun 17 Duration of stay 2 nights Address 1 Skier Place, Durango, Colorado 81301, United States leave date is 6/17 booked w San Juan Huts. Moab Red Stone Inn Jun 23–24 Check in Jun 23 Check out Jun 24 Duration of stay 1 night Address 535 South Main Street, Moab, Utah 84532, United States

Armstead Campground fishing Beaverhead Creek, which is fed by the Clark Resevoir. 2 feeder streams very fun small streams with loads of trout. Red Rock River and Horse Prairie Creek. Upstream both of these traverse private property. George has the names of the ranchers and a friend who knows them personally that he fishes with in Chile. Beaverhead just below the resevoir (upper) is very grassy. loads of small trout hitting on dry flies. lower down a couple of miles the grass disappears and larger browns hitting on streamers. Beaverhead lower section worked well last night with streamers. George had a dark streamer, I had a white one. used the same white streamer on Horse Prairie and got 6 strikes yesterday. Headed back to Wolf Creek today to check out more of the Missouri. The temperature is 40 degrees colder this time around. Bryan

Thank you, I am truly honored by this award and humbled by those of you that are here tonight on my behalf. As a wrestler at Bucknell, every day on the way to practice we would walk past the hall of fame pictures lining the hallway. Often I would stop and look at the pictures. I specifically remember the images of a football player named Joe wearing some sort of old cloth helmet with a smile on his face and the long lanky muscular body of a swimmer on the blocks. I would look at the faces, sometimes into the eyes, perhaps to get inside the head of what motivated these individuals. I remember coach Ferraro telling us that as we get older our past experiences become more important to us. But it was hard for me to understand these sorts of forward looking statements and I remembered thinking at the time that I hoped I would never be in a position to look back and would always be looking forward. As a freshman on the wrestling team, I might have been voted least likely to be induc...

i have often contemplated the appalachian trail the neverending barrage of soccer events gave us a reprieve last weekend and so I siezed the opportunity to do some joint planning with my son, Jackson.  we considered overnight camping on the C&O canal, the cross race in Winchester along with some other options.  Given the choice, Jackson wanted to go hiking on the AT.  So on Saturday morning we laid out all of the stuff that we'd need in preparation for the brief adventure.  We laid out lighting, backpacks, sleeping bags, camp stove, etc... threw it all together and tossed the pack in the back of the car and off we went.  The plan was simple.  a brief stop at the local grocerie, then off to the AT.  We planned to just go to the trail, hike in a direction until we found a place to camp.  camp.  wake up and hike back to the car. which is exactly what we did. on the way back, we came upon Richard Gwozd, a thru hiker from Quebe...

I was thinking about this as I was driving the kids around getting the last of the 'back to school' stuff today. Imagine that you LOVE ice cream. Wouldn't it be really fun to have all day access to Cold Stone Creamery? You would eat ice cream until your body hurt and then you might have a little more until you don't want ANY more. The SM100 is sort of like a Mountain Bike Binge day I guess. After you are done, you absolutely don't want any more. But then, like eating too much ice cream, quickly after your stomach settles down, you wouldn't mind having a bit more. The 2010 Shenandoah 100 brought a unique combination of camaraderie, pain, pleasure and everything in between. As a last minute entry, Chris Hayes decided to enter the race for the first time and we rode down together and ended up riding the first part of the course at the same pace. Chris had done a bit of reconnaissance on the course with his wife Sherry and knew more about the course than ...

The Shenandoah Mountain 100 could easily become my favorite race of the year. It is without a doubt the most epic race in the state of Virginia. The race begins and ends at the Stokesville campground, or west of what most people may be familiar with - Harrisonburg, VA. The race is in the George Washington National Forest. Approaching the campsite, it becomes clear that you're headed into a mountainous region. The race meanders through these mountains and contains 6 major climbs over 100 miles. If you look at the terrain profile below, you'll see that one of the minor climbs is 1000 ft and the biggest climb is slightly over 2000 ft for a total climbing elevation of 12,000 ft. The venue itself is superior to that of any race that I've participated in. The entire Stokesville campground is reserved for over 500 participants in the race. Dinner, which consists of pasta, bread, salad, drinks (including a limitless supply of beer) is served on Saturday evening and race ...

Shortly after purchasing a mountain bike and doing a couple of races down at Wakefield Park in Annandale, Joe Dombrowski convinced me to race the Shenandoah Mountain 100. This race, I suspect will be the hardest ride or race that I will have ever done. It is 100 miles, 12,000 ft of climbing on a combination of single track and fire roads. The top riders like Jeremiah Bishop, Chris Eatough, Floyd Landis finish this in something more than 7 hours. It takes some 12 hours and many never get to the finish. Lance just won a like event in Colorado, the Leadville 100. He and Floyd were joking around that the Tour De France was just training for the Leadville 100. It would be cool to see Lance attend the SM100. In preperation for the SM100, Joe took me out to some of his favorite training grounds out west of Front Royal in the National Forest. He's done these rides solo before, but doesn't like to as there are trails on this route that take you 15 miles away from something ...

Here in my early 40s, I figured it was finally time to enter my first ever mountain bike race. Wednesday's at Wakefield was the venue. As I am starting to be more involved with the Haymarket Bicycles Junior mountain bike race team, I figured that I should have at least *one* real race under my belt, so I can speak with some race experience. That said, I think I'm now hooked and will race as many races as I can that doesn't conflict with road and especially in the off season. I also plan to use the new mountain bike for cyclocross rather than purchase another bike. After purchasing a Gary Fisher Paragon from the Haymarket Bicycles shop and taking it out on a leisurely ride for a couple of times...I was ready to race! So...what was my first race like? I entered the sport category and lined up next to Stephen Kendall and his brother Brad, from NCVC . It was also Stephen's first MTB race. I lined up at the front on the outside and off the start, I found myself a...

got some good miles in over the past 2 days...depending on your definition of 'good' We spent Thanksgiving at Suzi's parents place in Milton, PA and I ate too much like everyone should on Thanksgiving. Actually, I ate an entire 1/2 of a pumpkin pie, each piece with whipped topping. So, as it has become ritual, I decided to go out on a long ride the day after Thanksgiving. Danville is about 15 miles to the East of Milton and separated from Milton by Montour Ridge, over which there are several paved and gravel roads. So, I found my way to Bald Top (a residential section of the ridge overlooking Danville) and descended down the hill into my old stomping ground. I always find it quite nostalgic to take this ride. As I descended into town, I immediately came upon my old high school, which started me thinking about how I might best enjoy my trip down memory lane and I came up with an idea. I decided to ride sequentially from my elementary school, to Junior High, to Senior...

OK, well...not really...anybody who really cries on a bike in public just needs hang their clips up, but I will concede that this one did make me think twice about staying on the saddle. It's sort of like touching an electric fence and just hanging on. It's just natural to want to let go. This is one steep hill and it caused me pain today. The road is called Bear Wallow Rd. 16% grade at parts and mostly 12%. After riding 40 miles doing everything I could to keep a low cadence and stress my muscles, this was the prize at the end. At the top of the hill, it was all I could do to propel the bike forward enough to stay balanced. I can't imagine riding up hills this steep for hours every day in stages like those in the tour. Now we know why those Warrenton guys are so fast ... with a hill like this in their backyard. My first ride over this hill and we've already developed a love / hate relationship.

Chris Jones : Your buddy Kyle pipped me at the line, well that's the way I saw it anyway! Fanny : Thanks for sending me the newspaper clipping!

Links of Fishing Trip to Kodiak Alaska The Island The People The Bear Camp Isolated Living The Eagles The Bears The Fishing Interviewing The Crew

When Jeannie was in grade school, people asked her the question "What do you want to be when you grow up?" She says that question was annoying to her and so she would answer "A Hermit". Little did those folks know that she was right. Jeannie lives on Uganik Bay in remote Kodiak Island, Alaska with no power, no running water and no neighbors aside from the occasional Bears who have discovered her Rasberry Garden. Jeannie was our cook and she didn't mind us poking around her place, so we did the short hike down the coast of the Bay to her place and took some pictures. Chris, Jeannie's friend with a plane was visiting. A 6 foot chain fence surrounds the property to protect from the bears. It's the little things that matter - a flower box. quite an elaborate garden and greenhouse. cabbage Rasberry and Gooseberry Bushes and View of the house. Lots of amenities here for such a remote location.

I have never seen so many Eagles as I did while on Kodiak Island. The number of Eagles in Alaska are comprable to the number of Turkey Buzzards in Virginia. They are scavengers just the same. You could look up and see 10 Eagles circling. On one occasion, we came across an Eagle with a broken wing. I could have walked right up to it, but I decided to give him some space. I sneaked around a rock to get as close as possible, but not so to spook him too much and hurt himself even more. Although our guide said that he saw the same eagle defending himself against a bear the previous day.

Lots of big animals like to eat Salmon. The bears, which normally spend their time up in the mountains come down to eat salmon before they go back up into the colder elevations to hibernate. At one point, we saw 28 bears at one time. The bears make all sorts of paths thru the high grass surrounding the river. We use these bear path to get from one fishing hole to other fishing holes. On many occasions, we encountered bears across the river, in the river on our side of the river...all over. They were more interested in the salmon than us. Some bears were very comfortable with us being there and others were very skiddish. Sows, Boars, and cubs....we saw them all. Some of the larger Boars stay up in the mountains and are content with berries. Here are some pictures of the bears. Bear video:

Sean Bill Frick and Frack Curious George and the Grizzly Bear as George says in not so many words ... We all have our own Grizzly Bear.

George says that our week of fishing is the worst week that he's ever had on Kodiak. Since it was my best week of fishing ever, I can't imagine a good week. It rained every day, which made the water a bit murkier than normal. In spite of that, I caught the biggest fish that I've ever caught on a fly rod. Here is a video and some pictures of the fishing.

The View From the Bay. Coffee To Start The Day Dick Rohrer's Bear Camp is the "Waldorf" of camps on this side of the island. The basically consists of the basics. There are 3 cabins that consist of bunk beds and a propane heater. There are 2 outhouses and 1 common room cabin for cooking, eating and cribbage (the preferred card game of all commercial canneries in Alaska).

We met some very interesting people during our trip. Trevor Dunbar and his father (coach of the Kodiak Cross Country Team) were returning from a 21 team competition just North of Anchorage. Trevor had just beat the state record time for the 5k, with a time of 15:17. (pretty damn fast) Look for Trevor in the 2012 Summer Olympics. Jeanie lives on Island paradise and I will do a seperate entry on the wonderful place where she lives. In addition to being a very self sufficient woman who lives in a remote part of Kodiak Island, she was also our cook for the week. She knows how to cook fish as well as other things like Gooseberry pie, cornbread and rasberry scones to name a few. Sam (left) and Dick (right) Rohrer are the owners and guides behind Dick Rohrers Bear Camp, which was the outfit behind our trip. Dick grew up in Lancaster, PA and found his way to settle down in Kodiak and operate his camp. His son, Sam, is a native of Kodiak. Their operation includes Bear, Goat and Deer hun...