A Tahoe reminder

No signal. I love when it says that. In fact, seeking that elusive status was one of my reasons for going up to Tahoe in the first place. To spend two days in the white opulence of this year’s record snowfall on the branches of ponderosa pines that will carry three centuries of memory while they grow on slopes that slough off the passing of millennia. Puts these plastic pocket addictions into perspective.

It's not Tahoe without Emerald Bay

The absence of cell signal is getting harder to find. The previous day a millennial had told me his wild travel story “When I was in Morocco, I just, like, didn’t buy a sim-card for my phone? I just didn’t get one! I was there for three weeks, without a phone!” I waited to hear how this setup contributed to an adventure before realizing that being disconnected is itself an experience worth relating now.

Now up in the Sierras, the temptation of the phone tickled me. “I suppose I could post an instagram of this…” I thought, guilty maintenance of my sadly inactive account. But there it was: no signal. I smiled in the clear air and put the phone away.

A buddy and I snowshoed around Spooner Lake that first afternoon, trying out the clompy plastic flippers we’d rented. Walked a while before we realized the big snowy meadow WAS the lake, no indication of its watery underlayer except a small pool where winter-frozen fish floated belly-up in their silvery thousand, distracting from the darker wiggles of their still-living kin below.

“Maybe they’re just...hibernating.” One of us offered. “You know, that winter stasis thing.”

We watched the sluggish stirs of the living among the immobile remainders of their kin, inert and inverted. “No, probably not.” Snap a picture out of curiosity, then go check out those aspens…

The next day Fallen Leaf Lake was waiting for us, politely holding onto a layer of ice until we stood gaping at its side, then letting it dissolve in the crackled collisions of cold succumbing to an unseasonably warm sun.

Somebody benevolent left a canoe on the shore, so now we were paddling, jiggling in the wavelets kicked up by a wind that came to greet us when we left the stony shore behind.

Hot tubs were invented for cold nights beside snow embankments while stars monitor your relaxation below. Granted the electric lights killed them away years ago, but I could put them solidly in my mind’s moonroof anyway.

Hard to see the ski tracks down the western slope, and
trust me that that thing is even steeper than it looks.

Four lakes in two days has a certain symmetry, so we trudged out to Eagle Lake before joining the Sunday return. Snowballs rolling down the slopes to the snowmelt creek that earned its fame in the waterfall of name, and paid homage to the local lunatics who laid the sinuous tracks down sheer slopes when no one was there to see. What that must feel like, I can only envy.

Travel has driven home that America’s greatest treasure is its wild spaces. (Sorry Hollywood.) So it was nice to get out there and light a memory votive on the altar of one of California’s great ones. You can always count on a mountain to show things in perspective, and the signal was coming in loud and clear.

How does one describe an ice cave?

Gravel moraine left by the retreating glacier

“The cave I was going to take you to is filled with water today, so you might die if we went there. Instead, have you heard of Crystal Cave?” Our guide, looking ruthlessly Icelandic with his ice blue eyes far over my head, seemed to be asking a rhetorical question.

“Yes!” Answered Ben, the member of my little trio who had done all the research.

“We go there.” Answered our guide. Excess verbiage does not survive the climate, perhaps, where the garrulous are prone to frostbitten tongues.

This raft was tied up at the entrance for days when the
river was running to high to enter on foot

My two friends and I joined the guy who runs the Arctic Arts Project and his Icelandic guide/coworker/friend on the benches of a familiar family-roadtrip bulky van from the 1970s, with one significant difference: this thing was lifted five feet off the ground on monster truck tires. I thought it a tourism affectation...until we hit the gravel moraine left by the retreating Breiðamerkurjökull glacier. Then the timpani of tires, the artillery of airtubes, the titans of tread, all made sense.

“Think the Dacia could make this?” asked Oshyan, the third member of our traveler trio, referring to our funky little white rental SUV.

“That's why the rental companies hate you,” answered the Icelandic photographer from the Arctic Arts team. (Hastening to assure us that he was joking, Icelanders don't actually hate anyone.) The dashboard of the Dacia featured a prominent sticker warning us that river crossings and off-road terrain were not covered by the insurance policy, and we would be liable for all damage.

The five of us bounced around the benches like lotto numbers, attempting conversation in short intervals, whenever clavicles weren't hitting the roof or sternums smacking seat-backs. They told us of a film crew from Outside magazine who had taken two jeeps into the highlands, and in their bravado and foolish showmanship, gotten hopelessly stuck.

“They had sunk all the way past the tires. People had to go pull them out. They were all thrown in prison, for damaging the land.” A country that imprisons people for damaging the land? Add this to Iceland's criminal prosecution of bankers for their roles in the financial collapse, and I think I've found the nation of my heart.

Our guide wasn't listening, peering instead into the white abyss. “This is the hard part” he confessed. “Finding a small hole in the glacier, all this gray and white, can be hard. And it moves. Ah.” Such is the Icelandic version of “Eureka!”

The opening looked mysterious. Welcoming, promising and forbidding. The sort of place that inspires troll legends.

“We are the first here, but there will be more. Make the most of your time.” More taciturn advice from our guide. I was lifting my camera as we went inside, but it froze halfway up, and my jaw dropped, breath caught, eyes wide. How do you describe an ice cave?

Blue.

Blueblueblueblue. Cold. Crystaline. Motionless and mobile. Water overhead and water passing your ankles. Snow in cones under shoots. Icicles grow in the corners, but the ceiling is a reverse bubble, faceted but smooth. Eternal and ephemeral, ice from millennia ago in a cave that will be gone within weeks. Ancient and newborn. Blue. White. Gravel. Such stillness.

I had hoped to let the images speak for themselves, but to my frustration, the files I brought back do not match the corresponding memories of their creation. I had hopes of digital editing salvation, but here I am, laundry almost done, last leftovers disappearing off my plate, and a plane to catch in not so many hours, and the answer to that riddle still escapes me.

They're still not too shabby, though.

But for further ice cave images I recommend my friend and co-traveler Ben's flickr stream here, and the Arctic Arts project on facebook.

Cathedrals of stone (made by men) are impressive. Cathedrals of redwood trees (made by gods) ache with the divine. And now, cathedrals of ice (made by Time) are repositories of chronology, libraries of geologic potency.

There is much to see in this world.

(And a couple more pics on the other version of the blog, here.)

Aurora Borealis makin' me crazy

Aaaaaaarggghhh! I am tearing my hair out on this one. Aurora Borealis. A combination of the Roman goddess of the dawn/sunrise and the Greek god of the wind, the name conjures sweeping colors, crackling cold, and the very soul of Odin looking down at you through the ages...and the experience delivers!

But the weird thing about the aurora, it’s the only incidence I can think of where the camera records it better than the human eye. Normally our eyes trumps the living bejeezus out of any equipment (really, they are amazing), but a camera’s ability to withhold perception for thirty seconds comes in handy with the aurora, slow, subtle, and faint as it often is.

So when we spent a few frigid nights watching muted colors caress the underbellies of the stars, and I looked down (with fully night-adjusted eyes) to see beautiful colors on my magic little view screen… I had high hopes.

So today, trying to get them to look the way they did when I was there….

aaaaaaaaaaarrrrgggghhhh! Why you no wanna werk wif me, stoopid image?

Blaming one’s equipment is a lame excuse at best, if not outright verboden, and I can already see at least one setting I should have changed. And if I was better at editing, I’m sure I could enhance these more effectively. But at the end of the day, it was damn fun to be out there, scrambling around in the dark, nabbing what I could. And I’ll take the learning experience.

We had pessimistic forecasts every day, “solid cloud cover and low aurora activity” the screens would declare, but for the first couple nights, and one towards the end, we had enough clarity and enough activity to marvel at the green glow of ionic mysticism.

The first night was crouching on the ice cubes piled up beside the lake in Þingvellir National Park (Thingvellir), where I, being a complete space cadet, had forgotten to bring my tripod, so rested my camera on the ground.

The second night was an improvement in equipment, my tripod splayed by the road back from Akranes, but the wind was being petulant, and even in the relative calm next to the car, a sharp image escaped me.

The last night was spent overlooking Jökulsarlon, the glacial lagoon that anchors my love of Iceland. I clambered down the gravel hillside and sat alone in the dark, listening to the crunch of icebergs, and the occasional splashes and air-blasts of seals close at hand in the darkness.

The images might not look as good as I’d hoped, but the memories are gorgeous.

Ice gets up early

I'm not a morning person. "Grab hold of your attitude" I admonish myself, and try to remember the

satisfaction of looking at the clock after a productive day and finding it's only 11:00.

That prospect was paler than the predawn light when Ben's cell phone beeped its excessively cheery tun into the stuffy air of our three-bed room at Gerði Guesthouse near Höfn, Iceland.

It didn't take long to remember where I was, and that if it was raining, I could go back to sleep. One step spanned th emodest room and the photographic shrapnel of tirpods, cases, and battery chargers in it. My sleep-soggy fingers parted the blinds to find...stillness. No rain, no falling snow, no car-tipping wind. Yet.

The rest of the morning, and a gallery of photos, are on the wordpress version of my blog, here.

Have a good, and warm, morning!

Iceland has ponies. Laughing ponies.

Iceland is aptly named, sure, but I'd hate to give the impression that it only has frozen water. It's also got ponies.

Ponies who like frozen water.

Ponies who pose, oh so pretty.

Ponies who endure high winds and frozen manes.

Ponies who smile.

Ponies who laugh.

Ponies who guffaw.

Ponies who photobomb each other.

Ponies who would mock me for being inside on a day as lovely as this one.

The country is freezing, and in unrelated news: if I stay too long I'll have to eat the ones I love.

Spring is waiting for something this year. It's the first time Belgium has had this much snow in mid-March since 1952, it's the coldest March (23^rd at least) since 1873, and the big storm a couple weeks ago led to a record length of 1,038 miles of traffic jams during rush hour (which, by my rough google maps calculations, is enough to span the length of Belgium upwards of five times).

Personally I think Spring is being polite, and waiting until we install the blinds on the full-length bathroom windows so that when the neighbors return to their backyards they won't be able to chat with us while we're in the shower.

Is that fresh lemonade? Can I have some? Let me just finish shampooing real quick, as you can see, I'm almost done.

The house may be under construction (which doesn't bother me in the slightest), but I consider it a lottery win to have found. Not only is it nice inside, good location, and great roommate/owner, but it has chickens.

And not just any chickens, they are two Chinese silkies who are nearly never more than a meter apart, have curious personalities, and have promised me eternal love in exchange for the wax rind off the gouda cheese that I eat massive quantities of.

I give them different names every time I see them. Right now they're Agnes and Maurice. Yesterday they were Mortimer and Gertrude, Rupert and Maximilian before that.

But for now I am enjoying my walks around our new hometown of Lier. There is a rather impressive public swimming pool complex with a normal lap-swim pool, sauna, steambath, and four other pools of various temperatures and currents for kids the kids; the open Grote Markt central plaza is all repaired after a plumbing project last year found remains of a Roman chariot; and the library has a reading cafe where I sat for a few hours with the English-language guide book for Sri Lanka I found.

In other news, I am now going to Sri Lanka.

But first, it's chilly strolls in my boots (which do not travel with me, despite being made for walking), periodic indulgences in Belgian food (fries of course, plus beer-based beef stew, chocolate, and a tasty homemade rabbit stew, and waffles asap), and the upcoming spectacle of K's ridiculously adorable niece hunting for Easter eggs.

We'll just have to see how much ice there is on Sunday before deciding whether the hunt is indoors or out.

Even being mauled by a wild animal was...familiar.

Back in Western Europe, the Low Countries, my second home. It felt good to be back, Dutch felt like a familiar game, more familiar to me than baseball now, with more players and matches everywhere.

I was back in the land with the world's best public transportation, stunning cultural density, and a dismal grasp of breakfast. My first morning I found a place with bagels, which were nearly unheard of over here a few years ago but are gaining traction quickly. I sat and watched the two-wheeled commuter traffic, feeling the flow of the universe.

(There are more pictures on the other version of the blog.)

After switching to the proper hotel I was considering the trek back across Amsterdam, but found a nice little cafe that served warm but delicious coffee, good brown bread, and K's essential: fruit salad with yogurt and granola.

There was one other selling point. His name was Sam, he was always precocious, sometimes welcoming, and absolutely insane. K and I ended up coming back here every morning, and Sam was happy to see us...

Did you know Toronto is bigger than Chicago?

Y'ain't in San Francisco no more

Hello from Toronto! And also, hello from a hostel common room, where we are watching Gone in 60 Seconds, which I am hereby citing as the reason why any of the following sentences make no sense, or are interrupted by phrases like “Why is this happening?” and “Let's drive!”

The sign above the customs line in Toronto Pearson International Airport advised an estimated waiting time of 46 minutes, so nearly an hour-long demonstration of the secret that humans are tremendously capable of determining our own reality.

We all had the same line, and the bell curve's hump just zombied through it, but as usual, instruction was in the extremes. The businessman in a fine suit in front of me called three different people to complain about it. Must be swell to be on his contact list. The lady in the fur coat looked positively appalled that she was being asked to do something so mundane, so quotidian, so....proletarian as wait in line. The gall!

The family in jeans joked with each other and took turns carrying a duffel bag. The gal-pals in hooded sweatshirts were cracking up. There were giant grins on some of the Jamaicans who had just returned from Montego Bay, and they had not yet broken into the identical cardboard boxes presumably housing two bottles of rum that nearly everyone seemed to be carrying.

Did you notice an apparent correlation between economic status and attitude? Me too. How remarkable.

Yes the line was long, and no, there was nothing anyone could do about it. So why be pissed?

I used credit card reward points for my flight here, and had enough left for a night's stay in a fancy-shmancy hotel. I even upgraded from a queen bed to a king, or maybe an emperor, I don't remember, but it was stupidly large. Excess doesn't suit me, and I just felt slight remorse at increasing the laundryload for someone. And I really don't have room for more tiny bars of hotel soap in my bag, I'm bursting with cleaning potential.

That's a good thing, because after a night in a dorm room full of backpacker dudes, I can use a good scrubbing. I think I violated a blogging length rule with that post about otters and whatnot, so I'll save the other sights and smells of this rather fantastic hostel and city for next time.

But I am quite happily back on the road, not yet cured of those vagabond urges.

Stop, heyey, what's that sound?

I heard a new sound last night.

The leaves of the grandfatherly tree were frozen, and when the breeze seeped through them it was a crackle of dry and cold.  Elsewhere leaves famously rustle, but here they sometimes crackle.

Then it started to...I don't know the word, I actually doubt English has the right word for it, I need one of those anecdotal Inuit languages with their 23 words for snow.  It wasn't snow, nor was it hail.  It was salt crystals of dry frozen water that decorated my jacket and sat like sleeper cells in my hair, waiting for body heat to melt them into unexpected cranial kisses as I took my seat in class.

I stood out in the dry precipitant salting, smiling up into the tree, listening to its skittering giggles.  Winter may be a sever old man, but he can still sometimes giggle.  The Belgians waiting for their classes may have thought I was a tad touched in the head.

The Romanians walked up, sleep-deprived eyes burning even more intensely than usual.  He gets up at 4:30 AM to go to work at the construction site.  He sets his Coke down next to him, and sometimes when he goes to drink it, it is frozen.  He does not blink while telling me about never having time to do anything beyond work and sleep.

"Sometimes I am want to look at the TV, and I am there 10 minute only and you hear me...""  He makes a snoring gesture and sound.  I cannot quite remember what a snoring gesture looks like, but I understood it clearly at the time.

The cold is punches, and I fear the Romanian's boss may soon hear what "all work and no play makes Traian a dull boy" sounds like in Romanian while axes chop down doors...but last night that cold gave me a gift.

I was riding home, cheekbones a broadening sting, nose (thankfully) not even communicating any more, and as an oncoming car drove by I made a screaming face at it.  And remembered!  That's me!  I do things like that!  I sing to myself on crowded streets, and dance on street corners (if the song is good) to the confusion of commuting Berliners.  Oh yeah!

Lately the prospect of building a life overseas and otherlinguistically has seemed daunting and impossible, and it has squeezed me in a bit.  I started going to temp agencies yesterday and was nearly mute with shyness.  But Father Winter reminded me last night that some crazy lives in me, which makes everything so much better.

So when I went temp-agency-trawling today I was still blushing and sweating, sure, but not nearly as profusely as yesterday.

Thank you Father Winter, you passively belligerent bastard!

Peaceful anxiety

I just spent a couple hours looking through job postings, and was well under the cold thick water of discouragement, frustration, and anxiety regarding my chances at successful living here.  Then I looked outside and saw snowflakes.

There is a unique stillness to snow.

Passing on bicycle under a highway overpass Monday morning, the sound of relentless and self-important semi trucks of shipping empires overhead was just the murmur of a television turned down a couple rooms away, and the modest whir of my tires was humbled and self-effacing between snow-covered fields.

Maybe my awe at the uncaring and intimate (it’s like a zombie that wants to snuggle) whiteness reveals that I am a nooby to this stuff.  Maybe one who has lived at mountainous altitude or monstrous latitude for awhile finds it simply something to deal with, but for me it is still magic.

So I still feel sick to my stomach at the barrier of finding employment here, but in the meantime the gentle drifts are slowly growing on the balcony, and this cup of tea sounds better and better.