Cold miserable weekend.

This weekend was cold and miserable. My friend Marc and my Father-in-law took me ice climbing on Sunday. The pic above is Marc rappelling off a 60 foot cliff, after asking me if permanent marker deteriorates climbing rope. I said "I don't know, why?" He replied "because I colored the midpoint of my rope with it this week." I am glad Marc chose to rappel first.
Luckily, he made it, and we climbed for a while. Everyone was rather tired, and cold with the 0 degree windchill, so we called it early and went to a fine beverage establishment. I was hoping to meet Lara from OR, and thank her for the sweet winter clothes, but she was out climbing. I will write more about the sweet clothing later this week.

The day before ice climbing (a very ciruitous way of saying "Saturday") I was talked into going for a bike ride with my friends Jason and Brook. The original plan was to go ice climbing, but the windchill was -15 and nobody wanted to hang out on a big ice cube. So, snowbiking sounded like a much better idea. We got all bundled up, and Brook let me ride his Puglsey. Brook is a rabid innovator, retro fitting his karate monkey for a lefty fork, making snow bikes, (with skis, hardtail and full sus) and even his own handlebars

The bike I rode was a Puglsey frame with a 30" tire on the front. How was it 30"? It was a 29er downhill tire riveted to a Schwalbe big apple tire for durablility and grip. The end result was a very heavy tire with a lot of grip, although I struggled to stay upright in the snow.

We rode for 2 and a half hours and I was shelled. I guess the hour and a half on rollers was not necessary beforehand.

Oh, and the huskies, I never thought I would be getting ready for a bike ride while watching a sled dog team getting set up to head out, but, I guess everyone needs to get out on the trails.