Every trick in the book.

He's got a job at the new Coles. He's got his P licence. 2 weeks of school left. But something is missing. A new tick.



Matt pauses at the start of his new second pitch route to allow the camera to make a wardrobe decision. Yellow La Sportiva?




And we go with the white Bob Dylan singlet.










Hegets the gear sorted, I work out the angles, and it's go time.










The route straight away sucks him in close with a gaston, undercling, stem combo.












Itpushes him deeperintothe scoop, unknowingly playing to his flexibility strengths.











Kneepads by Upskill







It goads him onto it's thorny bollards and tries tolure him into cutting loose, thus ripping his fore arm flesh,he resists and stays firmlyattached.













Then it's the old "hang onmy magic hold till your arms drop off" trick.

.






There's Bob staring at you.




He sees through it and punches on.






























Uh oh.Climbers, we've all fallen for this one.

It's the massive lunge off the slopey crimp and the end of the route story.



















This route knows all the dirty tricks.




























Even Matty falls forit this time.






















PS. Matt sent the route today 13/11/ calling it Tropic Thunder, 27






jj

Annette Lake & Silver Peak

It was a warm 4th of July at Annette Lake. We could see trout swimming near the shore.

Tania, Michael, Michelle, Danielle, Becky, Bethany, Tina and Doug.





A gang of bloodthirsty mosquitos chased us up the mountain.





Traversing around the summit block.



Michael, Tania, Danielle, Bethany (and Doug) on top of Silver Peak.

Boot-ski race on the way down.

What are they?

Updated June 14th at 7:30 pm: My readers have informed me that these are a variety of Poppies! Thank you all.



















Whatever they are, they are simply gorgeous and they come in a variety of stunning colors. More to come... I know, I'm way out of control with the flowers... Taken in the Temple Square Gardens on Tuesday, June 7th.

Cascade River Aurora

Northern Lights over the Cascade River where it crosses The Grade near Grand Marais, MN. Last night my friend Roger and I were out looking for the Northern Lights and were disappointed by the heavy cloud cover and rainfall that dominated the early part of the evening. Eventually, though, the clouds parted and treated us to some incredible Aurora viewing. A couple of days ago there were a couple of Coronal Mass Ejections that left the sun and were headed straight at Earth. At first spaceweather.com was saying when the CME's hit our atmosphere they did NOT trigger any geomagnetic storms. After the initial impact, however, the arrival of the CME's compressed Earth's magnetic field and lit up Auroras around both poles.

California Saxifrage

California Saxifrage, originally uploaded by ParsecTraveller.

One of the first wildflowers to bloom! This one was growing near a creek high in a canyon in Las Trampas.

Two Below Sunrise

I just got back from spending the early morning along my favorite lake in the world... SUPERIOR! It was a chilly morning, but it felt nice compared to the much colder temps we had earlier in the week. Everything cooperated with this morning's shoot: the clouds, the wind, the light, the ice, the sea smoke... it was all good! This is the first time I've photographed sunrise at this location, and I can say with absolute certainty that I will be going there again for sunrise. It is a wonderful location to shoot the sunrise, especially this time of year.

RTC(W) Company 70-14 Graduation

In the picture at left, that's me carrying the Stars and Stripes. At right is the company passing in review.
After graduation from Basic Training on January 23, 1970, I was sent to the Naval Air Station in Norfolk, Virginia. In April 1971, I attended photographer's Mate "A" School in Pensacola, Florida and after that training was completed I returned to NTC Bainbridge! The base closing was announced in 1971 and I attended the last WAVES formal graduation on May 12th 1972, which was for company 28-72 . I thought it was sad that, according to the scanned article below, there were four additional companies that completed their training at Bainbridge but they apparently did not have a formal graduation ceremony. I can't imagine going through Basic Training without having some kind of ceremony to mark its completion.
The 1,000 acre Navy Training Center was located on the bluffs and rolling hills above the town of Port Deposit, Maryland (situated on the banks of the Susquehanna River where it enters the northern reaches of the Chesapeake Bay). It was officially closed on March 31, 1976 after 34 years of service. Opened in 1942 as a recruit training center for men, it became the home of the Naval Academy Prep School as well as the center for other specialized Navy training schools including, in 1948, the Recruit Training Command (Women).

The photographs in the above article are credited to PH3 Becky Wise. . . but it really was me that took them, I was the only Navy photographer on base at that time.