Aventuras

Year of the Ox

2009-01-24T00:01:00.000-08:00

As we transition into the year of the ox, one can't help but to sit back and reminisce. Hummmmmmmm. 2008 was great to me on many levels, and despite the difficult times that many are facing around the world right now, I can only hope that people will learn to simplify and enjoy their lives and all of the wonderful things that life brings.

2008 was full of travel for me. As the waning months of the year approached, I was able to return home and spend time with some really great friends.
We had some beautiful weather for Thanksgiving at home. Lots to be thankful for.

The late season riding was phenomenal around Bend into December!

Back in Wisco for a week in December, and the snow was piled high!

The old 236

Bogiefest!!!!

Backyard buddy

Night out in Delafield

Back in Fort Collins kickin it with Jen & Jason

and Ernie

and 6 month old 90 lb. Baloooooo

Nice being back in the Rockies...

Re-visit to the Peter Rabbit hut on the full moon.

Powder day at Copper mtn. YAHOOOOO RUTH!!

Nanaimo - Vancouver Island

2008-12-16T16:36:00.000-08:00

I snuck out for another long weekend to 'The Island' with a buddy who's got a place in Nanaimo.

Here's the view from Ian's porch.

Ian grew up around Nanaimo, so he had a bead on the local crabbin spots.

Our vessle

Coast Guard

Dungeness Crab!

We biked around Nanaimo for a day, then got up to Cumberland for some damp north shore-esque singletrack.

Wipe Out!!!!!

Bottoms up at the Dinghy Dock

Canadian Rockies

2008-11-03T10:17:00.000-08:00

Up in British Columbia for a couple months, I made the six hour trek east to check out the Rockies for a long weekend! Friends Marie and Johnathan cruised up from Calgary to meet up for a few days of hikin and campin.

I have to thank Marie for taking most of these beautiful pictures.

We had a glorious fall day for a hike around Kananaskis Lakes.

Never a bad time for a cold Alexander Keith's!

Camped out right on Upper Kananaskis...

And stirred things up in the van!

Cold mornings, eh!

Hit the road and took the scenic route back to Kamloops via Banff, the Icefields Parkway and then Jasper.

Ohhh CanadaAAA!!!!!
:)

Summa Summa Summa Time

2008-09-28T09:18:00.000-07:00

Summer is officially over, and it's starting to feel like fall around Bend. Yeaaaahhh! It was a fantastic summer full of new places, good people, and good times. Here are a few of them....

NORTH UMPQUA

We kicked off the summer on a cold weekend with some friends from Eugene on the North Umpqua River.

Team Sotar

Our California contingent showed up game ready.

Brought the bikes as well. The N. Umpqua trail has singletrack that follows the river for 70 or 80 miles. The "Dread and Terror" section lived up to its name, as we were pushing through snow on the top couple miles, and the lower section was still in rough shape from the winter. Still had some amazing views.

Aubrey tearing it up on "Dear Leap."

DESCHUTES BACHELOR PARTY

We rallied a crowd for my buddy Pete's bachelor float on the Deschutes River. The run was trout creek to Maupin, a two day float through the desert canyon.

We didn't pack light.

Gotta have the limes
Keep those Calderas flowin
There's the bachelor... well not anymore. :)
We decided it would be a good idea to hike up out to the canyon rim to catch the sunset.

Here was the result.

OHHH MEXICO

Contrary to popular belief, I did do some work this summer. Took a trip to Banamichi, Sonora to work on a project there for 3 weeks.
Begining of the rainy season... the desert was nearing full bloom!
In an old mine
Friends from work.
Made it to a couple quinceaneras, which are 15-year old girls' birthday parties... almost as big a deal as a wedding in Mexico.

Hot spring near Banamichi
My friend Lindsey and I headed to the coast near Guaymas for a few days at the tail end of my trip.

Ahhhhh, me gusta Mexico.

AROUND BEND

Ballons over Bend
Mustache Bash
Sailing on Tony's Hobee Cat, Subtle Lake and Elk Lake

Played several rounds of disc golf up at Mt. Bachelor... fun course.

Alex and the SS Noani
Staying cool on the rivers

Of course, lots of fun biking.

ABALONE DIVING

So, if you've never tried abalone diving, I'd highly recommend it! Abalone are very large sea snails that hang out on the bottom in kelp forests. They can be tough to find and catch, but their shells and meat are a rare treat. We cruised down to Mendocino, CA to give it a try. Abalone are highly regulated, as you can only take 3 per person per day. You have to "skin dive" for them, so no SCUBA, which makes it really sporty.

We paddled out to the kelp forests in whatever boats we could find. The sit-on-top river kayak proved to be the best vessle for breaking through the surf on the way out... although did dump it once coming back in.

Big Dan was the abalone slayer
That water was coooooold!

Mmmmmmmmmmm
A delicacy

The harvest celebration begins
Carl... "under the boaaardwalk."
Beeeeee the abalone

MOM AND LISA VISIT

DiannO and sister Lisa came out to visit from Cheeseland.

Showed 'em around Bend for a few days...

Then we hit the road to see some other parts of OR.
Crater Lake NP
Lake level

It was raining on the coast
but the sea lions were still out in Newport
Thanks for visiting guys!!!

WEISHAAR WEDDING - SAN DIEGO

Old Rolla buddy Jeff and Monica got married down in SanDiego.
It was a reunion of sorts, with Timmay and Bruno making it down as well.

The night before the wedding was a bit of a blur
The hookah bar

There's the groom enjoying his last night.

Yeah Timmaaaaaaay
It was a beautiful wedding at La Jolla beach.
While Bruno provided the entertainment
Got out for some kayaking around in La Jolla cove...

The Brunos

MT HOOD MTN BIKING TRIP

Dan M. and the PMS crew threw together this sweet hut-to-hut mtn biking trip circumnavigating around Mt. Hood. It was 4 days of hard riding, starting and ending in Hood River... 150 some miles in total. The 3 huts were fully stocked with food and bedding, so we didn't have to carry much weight!
Getting ready to take off
Eric and Mo
Dan and Sully... STOKED

The first 5 miles or so was along the Columbia River Gorge
Then we started climbing... 6000 feet vert over 30 miles the first day!
But alas, we arrived at the first hut only to find out that they were also stocked with cold beer!!!!

Eatin Goooood

We caught a pretty fantastic sunset stumbling distance from the hut on day 1.

Day two was out longest mileage day... 45 miles or something... about half of which was on singletrack, and half climbing dirt fire roads.

As we began passing by Mt. Hood on the west side, we started getting some great views.
An old lightning strike fire kicked up with the windy conditions that day.

"As the crow flies, we're only...."
After a full day riding, we made it to hut 2 on the south west side of the mtn just before sunset.
Thong tha thong thong thong.

On day 3, we passed the south side of Mt Hood, part of the way on the old Oregon Trail.

We climbed up the pass to Government Camp, our first sign of civilization in 3 days.

The singletrack down from Govt. Camp was voted best of the trip.

Hut 3 had by far the best view.

Wildflower headlamp centerpiece
We woke up on day 4 to a little stretch, frisbee game, and pancake flip-off! This one in name of Tim Suiter

Award winning pancake... this is your brain on....
The dishes are done dude
What? I'm almost ready....
Refreshing shower
All down hill as we headed back into Hood River through orchard drive
free pears... yeaaaaaah

Great trip guys!!

NORTHEASTERN OREGON FLYFISHIN

Old buddy Jeff came back to town, so we hit the road to check out one of his favorite fishin spots.
North of the Wallowa range, we backpacked a couple miles in this complete wilderness area. Bear and elk crap all over the place, although we weren't lucky enough to see any of 'em.

We were a bit early for the october caddis hatch, although the fishing was good anyway!

Mmmmmmmm

Alex was even fishin... weeks after knee surgery.
Despite all odds, Tony and Nadine made a suprise appearance!

a little 5,000

Damn, what a summer it was!!!! If you read this whole thing, you've obviously got way too much time at work! Ha ha. Thanks for joining. See ya soon!

A Tale of Two Sisters and Shots of Bailey

2008-06-26T09:27:00.000-07:00

No, not the two sisters I met downtown last night... two of the 10,000 ft volcanoes outside of town here, and nearby Mt. Bailey. The spring/summer corn harvest is ON, and we've been taking full advantage.

The first, and probably most challenging of the three was Middle Sister.

Friends Jackie, Stacey and I started at Pole Creek outside of Sisters, hauling fairly heavy packs 4 miles in to about treeline.

We camped out at the foot of the Hayden glacier, which would be our route up the mtn the next morning. Things were looking grim after the half block of cheddar got air-lifted by a ravenous raven, only to find the shredded wrapper a few hundred yards away 30 minutes later.

However, sunset that evening over the Cascades more than made up for it.

With a shotgun start at 4:30am, we began making our way up.

Sunrise on the glacier... que linda.

We followed this ridgeline up to the saddle between Middle and North Sister.

At the saddle, we ditched the skins and got ready to really start going up.

On the summit by about 8:30am!!

Here's the view north from the top. That's Mt. Hood in the distance. We could even see mt Adams and mt St. Helens past that, but they don't show in this pict.

Next up, South Sister. They had just opened the road to access South Sister from the south, still a 12 mile roundtrip slog to the summit.

Despite a chance of afternoon showers, my buddy Jody and I decided to go for it on the summer solstice.

It was crazy windy up top...

Ominous skies were looming to the south.

But we made it back to the car just before the rain hit. :)

Friends Pete, Alicia, Jen and I made a quick run up on Bachelor on a bright sunny day.

It was little Cooper's first time skiing... what a trooper!!

Finally, Alex and I made our second attempt at Mt. Bailey... after getting weathered out once earlier this season.

The wildflowers were out in full bloom on the southeast ridge.

Bailey overlooks Mt. Thielson and Diamond Lake.

The dayz are getting shorter again, and we're still surfing these mountains!!!

Nice litte dip in Diamond Lake to top the day off.

ARGENTINAAAAAAAAAAA

2008-06-19T07:31:00.000-07:00

I've really been slacking at putting up this post, but here it is... spent a good part of April and May in Argentina rendezvousing with two viejos amigos de futbol from UMR. Hass flew in from Sioux Falls, and Sebastian lives in Palermo, Buenos Aires. A dangerous trio, let the fun begin!

Flew into Buenos Aires, and spent the first week living the big city life.

Of course there was plenty of fine wines and meat!

The nightlife in Buenos Aires was loco!

We made it to the "Superclassico" match of Boca Jrs. and River Plate at Boca's home stadium... two of the biggest soccer clubs in Buenos Aires and one of the longest standing rivalries in the world!! Neither the game nor the crowd dissapointed as it was the craziest atmosphere I've ever witnessed for any sporting event, and Boca won 1-0!

Check out the video of the cheering that I put together at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qK6sAgguP-4

Sebi and his brothers Martin and Pablo with us at the game.

Sebi brought us to a friend's wedding reception.

Hass and I with Sebastian's dad

Street Market

We got to hang out with Sebi's family a bit. He's got 3 sisters and 3 brothers!!

With Sebastian working full time and going to school, Hass and I packed up and took a 20 hr bus ride southwest to Bariloche.

Bariloche is a ski town in northern Patagonia with lots of surrounding lakes, fruit, and good beer! This is the view from our hostel!

We rented mtn bikes for a day and cruised around the circuito chico.

The autumn weather was beautiful for lots of good hiking around the area.

Ooooo that water was cold!

One hike we did took us to the top of the ski area "Cerro Catedral" apprpriately named after the Cathedral-like jagged spires at the top of the mtn.

The views up there were amazing!

Hass and I at the top.

Friends at our hostel "Pudu" which is named after a tiny species of deer. With good local beer on tap, vibrant young owners, and only $10/night I'd definitely recommend this hostel.

We took a beautiful 2 hr bus ride south to a town called El Bolson, which means "big bag." El Bolson is in a fertile valley right below mt Piltriquitron, which is said to give off positive ions. The vibe kinda reminded me of Mt. Shasta, CA.

Something like 70% of the nations hops are grown in this area, hence the good beer selection.

After Hass left, I headed to Mendoza... wine country!

Hermanas!

Gaston's birthday party at the hostel.

Mendoza is located at the foothills of the eastern slope of the Andes, much like Denver. One of the best ski resorts in South America, Las Lenas is a couple hour drive up the pass towards Santiago, Chile... of course I was a month or two early for the ski season.

Near the top of the pass and border crossing, you can get good views of Cerro Aconcagua. At almost 23,000 ft, Aconcagua is the highest mountain outside of the Himalayas. It costs about 1,500 euros and two weeks to get outfitted to the top of this baby... maybe another day.

A natural Inca bridge.

Mendoza has got a great big beautiful park with a lake.

Due to the volcanic eruption in Chile while I was down there, my plans to go further south in Patagonia were cancelled. Instead, I headed further north to a town called Puerto Iguazu... at the "tres fronteras" corners of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. In this picture, I'm looking out at Brazil on the right and Paraguay on the left, all separated by rivers.

This part of Argentina is more of a jungle, which made for some interesting wildlife.

And of course, the reason that everyone comes to Puerto Iguazu is to see the cataratas (waterfalls).

The Iguazu falls is a bit of a tourist trap, but for good reason. One of the natural wonders of the world, there are 275 falls along a 2 mile stretch of river... bigger than Niagra!

Back to Buenos Aires for the last leg of my trip just in time to celebrate Sebastian's 27th cumpleanos.

My friend Nina de Alemania and I made it to the infamous San Telmo Sunday market with lots of crafts, antiques, food, and street performers.

San Telmo is the Barrio of Tango... check out the video

Muchas gracias Sebi y amigos de Argentina! Nos vemos a la vuelta. Amor y Paz!

Muchas gracia Beth for taking me to the airport in Portland!!

CHAU CHAU

Big Sur

2008-04-20T21:26:00.000-07:00

So, I made it down to California for a week of a little work and a little play. Kicked it in Grass Valley with good friends, and then headed to the coast for the weekend!

After a night out in San Fran, we headed south to meet up w/ some friends in Santa Cruz.

We put in some serious beach time. The weather was beautiful!!

Whoa, put on a shirt!

Made it all the way down to Big Sur where we met up with some more friends and camped out in the redwoods.

Wallowa Mtns

2008-04-18T13:06:00.000-07:00

My buddy Pete threw together a little hut trip in the Wallowa Mtns a few weeks ago. The Wallowas are a large granite outcropping in northeast Oregon, much different than the volcanic Cascades we're used to around Bend. The terrain and cold snow had more of a Rocky Mtn feel to it, and the skiing was fantastic!

Check out my first ever attempt at ski porn... the Wallowa highlight clip!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cXpqB5BxUpw

Our accomodations for the week were the lovely Sheep Creek huts, part of the Wing Ridge Hut system, a mere 4 mile ski in from the road.

Earning those turns. We skinned and skied hard, all day every day.

The snow was great... conditions were medium dicey.

We could see the Snake River canyon and Idaho in the distance.

Face shots all week long!

We barely even scratched the surface of the terrain out there.

We swung by the TG Brewery in Enterprise, OR on the way back... home of the famous IPA.

Whistler... Fukeneh!!

2008-03-17T17:19:00.000-07:00

We hit the road headed towards our friendly neighbors to the north. Picked up Brett at PDX and spent an evening catching up with old friend Beth in Portland.
Driving through Washington, we stopped in Bellingham to taste the local brew and met up with some friends of friends who patrol at the nearby Mt. Baker.

We figured we owed it to ourselves to check out the infamous Mt. Baker for a day, who's claim to fame is the most annual snowfall ever recoreded... something like 95 feet fell back in the '98-'99 season. They've got almost a 200 inch base already this year, and we caught the tail end of a storm followed by sun, which made for great conditions. If I had one word to describe Mt. Baker, it'd be ... STEEP!

After a smooth border crossing, we found ourselves in the lovely British Columbia, eh.

Up through Vancouver and Squamish, we got into Whistler later that night, eh, where our jet-set California contingent met up with us.

Spent our first day on Blackcomb Mtn, where another storm blew in 10 cm of fresh, eh!

On day 2, we explored around Whistler Mtn, and cut up the last of the "in-bounds" fresh snow.

One word... HUGE, eh.

Of course, Whistler/Blackcomb are getting hyped up for the 2010 Winter Olympics, eh.

We took a rest day on day 3, eh, and did this eco-adventure ziplining through the coastal temperate rainforest canopies, a few hundred feet above the valley floor between Whistler and Blackcomb mtns.

On days 4 and 5, we took to the endless Whistler backcountry in search of more pow, eh!

Back into the states, a night out in Seattle with some friends, and home again!

Merci bien, Canada. A bientot.

Oregon Backcountry

2008-02-27T00:04:00.000-08:00

Been doing some more exploring around the backcountry the last few weeks. Lots of long approaches around here make the skiing tough to get to unless you have a snowmobile, although a tow rope and big thumb usually gets you to where you want to go....

Top of Lookout Mtn in the Ochocos

Top of Tam McArthur Rim... "don't go that way"

Yellow submarine team

My buddy Ben from CSU came out for a visit.

An old mine in the Ochocos

We took a full moon run down Mt. Bachelor's cinder cone!

Heading to Whistler next week... more to come!!

Paulina Peak-Hail thy presidente

2008-02-26T22:20:00.000-08:00

For president's day weekend, a crew of us sledded into some backcountry cabins on Paulina Lake, about 40 minutes southeast of Bend. Now, I wouldn't say we were roughing it at this cabin... electricity, running water, and the option to grab a steak dinner at the main lodge of the snowmobiler's paradise made for luxury accomodations. Not to mention, the sleds made packing easy... bring it all!

The spring like weather made for an unexpected February corn ski fest!

Top of Paulina Peak

Chute into East Lake

Get your corn!!

Snow Day!!

2008-02-26T21:50:00.000-08:00

178 inches of snow in January... most since 1972, or so the locals say! It just kept coming, and we thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it....

Mmmmmm

Alex in a snow cave

This one was in my neighbor's driveway!

Larry Moe and Curly

2008-02-26T21:07:00.000-08:00

My bros Brett and Ken came out for a visit in January! Although they came during the one break in the snow for all of January, the sunny weather made for some fantastic views.

Mt. Bachelor Summit

Smith Rock

Road Trip!

2008-02-19T23:32:00.000-08:00

For the holidays this year, I took a few weeks and made the road trip back to Wisconsin. I saw several friends along the way from different walks of my life....

Streeto at his new home mountain... Big Mountain in Whitefish Montana

Had almost 2 weeks of cold and snow at home in WI... glad I brought the skinny skis!

Staying warm for this family pict....

Hit the road with Lara around the 29th, headed west. We swung through Wolf Creek, CO for a new years celebration with my old roomates Jen, Jason and others.

We caught a good storm followed by sunshine... love those San Juans!

Farewell cabin

We beelined for California to beat the storm of the year in.

Barely even stopped through Canyonlands Utah, Moab, or Nevada.

We beat the storm over Donner Pass literally by about 30 minutes. Shortly after, high winds and snow had the roads shut down and power out for 2 days! We hunkered down with friends Becky and Grant near Grass Valley until the storm cleared... turned out to be a good one! Some Tahoe resorts reported 10 feet when the dust settled. It was bottomless!

Abdul, Nick, Becky and I ripped it up at Sugar Bowl.

I finally got Lara to her new place in SanFran!

The snow was so good, I had to stick around a few extra days.

My friend Erin enjoying the snow at Sugar Bowl.

My last stop was through Mt. Shasta where we got a little backcountry action with the Helmet Camera Central.com crew, Chad and Eric.

7th Heaven

2008-01-29T17:44:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm a little bit late with this, but I wanted do a "year in review" post for 2007, as it was a fantastic year full of new things for me... new knee ligament, new town, new home, new friends, new adventures!

My bros came out to visit in January for a look around the Tahoe Sierras.

We stayed a few nights in the Ludlow hut and managed to find some descent snow.

Tim & Jess' Wedding, Jackson, MO! 3 weeks after surgery, and I was doing the 1 legged hop on the dance floor!

On our way from climbing with my friend Aubrey at Smith Rock

Mom came out for a visit, and we toured around Oregon from Bend to Crater Lake, down the Umpqua River to the coast. Nice job camping Mom!

I got up to the British Columbia interior (Kamloops) for a little work and a little play.

Okay, this should have been it's own post, but the next few photos are from our Memorial Day Alaska trip... the first semi-annual "Cooper Landing Ski It If You Can" festival.

Captn Ron and his plane with "Junior" chutes in the background

Base camp for our approach to LV Ray.

"Centerfold" had a 20' + cornice overhanging!

Crescent lake from the top of LV Ray

Flex capacitors assembled.... let the bushwacking begin

"Young and Dumb" We skied/snowboarded some of the most epic terrain of my life on this trip. On this one, our buddy Chunk took the narrower chute on the right while the rest of us took the wider main chute to the left... yahooooooo!

This is a video of Chunk pulling a flip onto this 50+ degree prone chute... crazy!

Came back from AK all charged up, so my new roomate and old friend Alex went for the South Sister summit on the last weekend that it was skiable continuously from the top. This is my new backyard in the Cascades!

My buddy Jeff and I met up with some friends in Hood River to do some boating on the White Salmon River.

I guess this was a class V waterfall... maybe at higher flows. Anyway, my buddy Jason in the back got tossed into the front row of the boat while cracking Jeff and I unsuspecting in the back of the heads... this is why we wear helmets!

A little camping trip on Hosmer Lake with Mt. Bachelor in the background

For the 4th of July, some old friends in California and I rendezvoused for a backpacking trip in the Sierra's Hoover Wilderness.

I made it back to my old stomping grounds in Fort Collins, CO and just happened to catch a world record bike parade for New Belgium Brewery's "Tour de Fat"

Of course, the trip to visit Ryan in the Dominican was unforgetable....

Anxiously awaiting the snow fall, we took a trip to the coast.

Bridge in Newport, OR

Alas, the snow started to build late November... and it hasn't stopped since!

Broken top mtn on a ski tour.

Halloween and Fuji Mtn.

2007-11-09T13:26:00.000-08:00

Happy Halloween!! It was a week long

celebration here with pumpkins, costumes and parties.

We capped it off with a nice hike up Fuji Mtn just south of Bend. Hoping for more snow!!!

First Tracks

2007-10-22T08:36:00.001-07:00

FRESHIES!!!!!! Oct 21, we got our first tracks of the season up on Mt. Bachelor's cinder cone. It's not even Halloween yet! There was about 1 foot of new snow on top of the volcanic pumice. The lifts should be running in a few weeks. They're calling for a La Nina winter!!!

Republica Dominicana - "Es Tan Dificil"

2007-09-11T15:18:00.000-07:00

Talk about an e-dork... I've decided to take the plunge and create a blog page, primarily for my distant family and friends who may or may not want to keep up with my fast-paced lifestyle. So, welcome, and I hope you enjoy the insite into my adventures.

This first blog is about a trip that I just got back from to the Dominican Republic. This was a reunion of seven old friends, traveling from different parts of the States and Central America, despite the overlooming threat of hurricane season, to visit our friend Ryan who is one year into his Peace Corps volunteering in the DR. Lara, who flew in from Honduras, and I met up in the capital Santo Domingo on August 22nd and quickly jumped on a gua gua (mini bus) headed for Ryan's site en el campo (the countryside) near the Haitian border. Getting to Ryan's campo required a 5 hour bus ride from the capitol to a small town called El Cercado, a 20-minute moto concho ride (motor cycle) to a river crossing, and then another 30-minute hike through mango trees, banana plantations, and rice fields to his village.

Ryan's site was in a beautiful valley filled with friendly people, farm animals, rice fields, coffee trees, and all of the exotic fruit trees one could desire. It was difficult to walk down the dirt road through his village to his one-room house in less than a few hours because from every house that we'd walk by, people would insist that we come in to have coffee or food.

One highlight en el campo was when Ryan's work crew let me "drive" the oxen plow, which is the method that they use to loosen and excavate the trench for Ryan's aqueduct project. The workers all looked on and laughed, as I'm sure it was quite entertaining for them to see the Gringo struggling to keep control of the oxen plow.

After three days of exploring around Ryan's site, milking cows, riding horses, eating fresh fruit and drinking lots of sweet coffee, the three of us set out back towards the capital to meet up with the rest of our motley crew.

Bruno, Bard, and Eric all arrived in Santo Domingo in the evening of the 25th, and had their taxi driver drop them straight off at the bar we were at downtown. It was a wild night of rum and dancing, as we learned the popular local steps of the Bachata and the Maranga.

The next morning, we all jumped on another gua gua and headed for a small town on the south coast call Cienega. Ryan knew a gringa with a house on the beach there, so we settled in for the next four days with a couple cold Presidente cervesas from the colmado down the street.

We had several friendly visitors during our stay here. We made friends with the locals and participated in their evening pick up fast pitch softball game, which was very competative. We swam, snorkeled, boogie boarded, and just bobbed in the warm Carribean waters stumbling distance from our back porch. A couple local kids took me skin diving for crab, lobster, mussles, and whatever else we could find, which made for a brilliant feast one evening.

We took several day trips hitchhiking from our bungalow in the back of pick up trucks, exploring some waterfalls down the coast, a coffee plantation, and a larimar mine/jewelry maker. Larimar is a beautiful blue rock that is only found in the south of Dominican.

Next, we hopped on a gua gua further down the south coast to a Haitian border town called Pedernales. We missed the Friday Haitian market by a couple hours, so we settled in for the evening with some rum and dominos. The next day we lined up a chain of rides that ended up with a fisherman dropping us off for the night at a deserted beach in the national park called Bahia de las Aguilas.

It was a beautiful day of beach bummin with a memorable sunset,

although the sand flies got the best of us once we went to bed. With not much sleep had by anyone that evening, we were excited to see the fisherman on his way back to pick us up the next morning.

And so begun, another epic journey back to the capital as it was time for Bruno and Bard to leave the island.

The next chapter of our adventura took us to the more popularly traveled north coast. Lara, Alex, and I headed on a fancy coach bus for less than $10 (we needed a break from the gua guas) to a beach town called Sosua, while Ryan, Eric, and Margo stayed behind in the capital for a few extra days. In Sosua, we checked in to what was our fanciest accomodations of the trip, which was a nice little villa style place owned by a friendly Dutch couple. A two block walk to the beach, we had a swimming pool, AC, and TV in our rooms, 3 luxuries that were foreign concepts to us up until this point in the trip, and all for about $10 each per night!

In Sosua, we quickly got acquainted with the nearest SCUBA dive shop and signed up for a couple dives. For the next 3 days around Sosua, we checked out the beaches, dove, danced all night at the discotecas/clubs, and got hit on by sleezy local women. Sosua is known for its vast selection of cheap Dominican women, which many old European x-pats travel/move there to solicit.

We took a day trip about 40 minutes down the coast to the even more popular beach called Playa Cabarette. Cabarette is a world famous beach for wind surfing and kite boarding. All we did there was sip margaritas on the beach, swim, play volleyball, and get cheap full body massages... not bad!

Heading back to Sosua at the end of the day, we weren't able to catch a hitch, so Alex, Lara and I all piled on the back of a moto for a cheap ride. That driver thought we were crazy!

On day 3 in Sosua, Ryan, Eric and Margo finally caught back up with us from the capital. Ryan showed us the local car wash, which proved to be much more than just a car wash. In the Dominican, the car washes are equipped with bars and dub as popular places to go drink and dance. What a great idea!

The next day, we met up with another Peace Corps volunteer,

Johnathan, and visited his project site in a Haitian Batey. A batey is a town where sugar workers live. The Haitians, who work for cheap, used to travel to the sugar plantations only for the harvest season. Over time, the migrant Haitians have stayed in these bateys for the off season as well, and now live there year-round.

We were met with open arms in the batey, as Johnathan told his friends that a bunch of gringo soccer players were coming. He set up a soccer match with the Haitians, which ended up in a 2-2 draw. The field was fantastic, with pot-holes, cow patties, and pigs running around... they even had jerseys for us to wear!

A short walk from the batey through the sugar cane fields was a mildy touristy attraction called veinte y siete charcos (27 waterfalls). There we had 2 guides help us hike/climb/swim/scratch our way up these 27 falls/pools. The 27th and final pool included about a 40-ft jump into an area as big as a small swimming pool. We then got to jump and slide our way down the 27 falls back the way we came.

After a few more days on the north coast and hanging out with several Peace Corps volunteers for their 1-year party, we hitched and bussed back to the capital. We did a little stocking up on souvenirs and rum from the local markets, and caught our flight back home. Fantastic trip!