06/27/2006   Corner Brook  
In June 2006 Mazie told us that Dad did not have long to live so Susan and I and the boys drove up to Vancouver and caught a series of two or three flights to Newfoundland. Writing these entries 15 years later, I have forgotten many of the details but I did take quite a few photos and wrote a fair amount in some of my birding notes which partially explains my focus on birdwatching, hiking and other outings in this account. I didn't take any photos of Dad nor did I write anything at the time about my visits with him. He was not feeling well and was not up for a lot of visiting; most of the time I visited him alone and never for very long.
I did pray with him several times and he seemed to find that reassuring. After being skeptical of organized Christianity for his entire adult life, I think he returned to the faith of his youth at the end. Shortly before his death, about a month after we returned home, he prayed with a couple of friends (who happened to be Seventh-day Adventists) and asked Jesus to forgive his sins and save him. Mazie reported that after that he was a changed man, gracious and loving toward her and Jennifer, with whom he had for a couple of years refused to speak after she reproached him about how he was treating her mother. I guess he found a peace which had long eluded him.
Anyhow Mazie didn't have room to put us all up at their house so we rented an inexpensive apartment for the week from the nearby Sir Wilfred Grenfell College. The campus bordered an extensive forested park with direct access to the Corner Brook Stream Trail system which the boys and I explored on our first full day in the city. We were particularly intrigued by a big leaky water main which ran down the hill into the city from a reservoir on Corner Brook Stream. From an article in the Corner Brook Telegram I later learned that the wooden-stave pipeline fed the hydroelectric station for the Corner Brook Pulp and Paper Company and would continue to leak for at least the next 15 years following our visit. I was also intrigued by the birds and flowers. The orchid display was particularly impressive and included the Pink Lady Slipper (Cypripedium acaule) common in New Hampshire along with the three species pictured below.
Excerpted from birding notes:

06/28/2006   Cedar Cove  
Susan stayed in Corner Brook while the boys and I joined Jennifer, Daley and Isaac on an outing to Cedar Cove on the rugged and exposed west coast of Newfoundland south of the entrance to the Bay of Islands.
Excerpted from birding notes:
Daniel batted pebbles into the teeth of the gale. Both boys leapt off the bluff into the wind hoping that it would support them. It didn't.

06/29/2006   Humber Arm  
After a leisurely morning we retraced our route out along the Humber Arm shore west from Corner Brook as far as the BlowMeDown nature trail, stopping here and there for photos or a little exploration. We did not have time to hike the nature trail but we walked out to the mouth of BlowMeDown brook where we found blue bellflowers and ripe strawberries growing among the rusty cobbles above the high tide line. On the way home we stopped to photograph a rainbow spanning Humber Arm and a white church overlooking the bay.

06/30/2006   BlowMeDown Brook  
In the morning I did a bird run on the Corner Brook Stream trails, about which I recorded the following notes:
In the afternoon we returned to BlowMeDown Brook and hiked the nature trail, as I noted in my birding notes:
I remember that I dove into the brown water and missed a large angular boulder hidden under the surface by only an inch or two. Sobering.

07/01/2006   Western Brook Pond  
Adapted from birding notes:

07/02/2006   Gross Morne hike  
Jennie and I did a brother-sister hike up Gross Morne while the boys went exploring with Susan for the day.
Adapted from birding notes:
We reached the summit at 5PM, lingered briefly for a couple of summit photos and started down. At the top of the big gully we flushed an Arctic Hare which bounded away but fortunately stopped while still within photo range. Dad and I used to snare them in the winter in the hills around Sop's Arm. They were pure white then but in the summer they turn gray with black ears. As I recall, the meat was dark and lean and quite mild in flavor for game. After our hike Jamie met us for dinner that evening at Java Jack’s Restaurant in Rocky Harbor and taught the boys how to fold the napkins into the form of dead chickens. Although 15 years later I do not recall what we ate, I do retain a very favorable memory of the food.

07/03/2006   Rocky Harbor  
A wet day. I birded a little around our motel, the Ocean View Cottages (I think) in the morning then drove out to Berry Hill CG where I failed to find any Mourning Warblers. In the afternoon we visited the lighthouse where the boys built a spectacular cairn in the style of Andy Goldsworthy.

07/04/2006   BlowMeDown hike  
Excerpted from birding notes:

07/05/2006   Bonus day  
As I recall it was a leisurely morning. Sometime around midday I checked on our flight times for tomorrow and discovered that our flight was actually scheduled for today and would be departing from Deer Lake, an hour away, in 15 minutes. It was on time, unfortunately.
In an illustration of how with God things work out for the best, Dad returned to the hospital today after his last night at home. I was able to accompany him after he got settled into his room and spend some good time with him which I would have missed had I not mixed up our return date.

07/08/2006   Home again  
At home, summer is underway. In the greenhouse, Daniel set up his ceramics wheel and David's water garden thrives in a stock tank. Flowering parsley in the tomato bed attracts a horde of flies which in turn feeds a herd of Tree Frogs, which we affectionately call "Pipsies". Out in the garden, zucchini is flowering and the carrots and beets are coming along. We won't get around to harvesting the latter so mice and moles will get most of them but I love zucchini and will eat them all summer long.

07/15/2006   Summer Snowboarding at Paradise  
Wes Sandvik was crazy enough to join Daniel and me for a summer snowboarding adventure at Paradise. The snow was perfect and the flowers were beautiful but the walk up was a little tough at first. We bushwhacked up from the bend in the road below the Paradise Lodge then hiked up to Panorama Point, pausing for a photo by some Japanese tourists who looked as though they wished they could snowboard down with us.
The top of the snowfield at Panorama Point is nice and flat but a 30mph wind was sweeping fog just over our heads and our fingers were almost too cold to tighten our boots. After just a turn or two to warm up we dropped into a tricky series of senescent schrunds. We each managed to get stuck at least once. A quick traverse along the crest of the snowfield put us at the top of the headwall, the crux of the matter. We each successfully negotiated the two or three turns on the steep terrain, although Wes did pay a brief visit to the rocks on the edge of the snowfield on the way down. It was easy riding after that until our snow abruptly ended at a waterfall in a narrow gully a few hundred feet above the car. We saw the end coming soon enough to avoid mishap, though not soon enough to avoid a scramble back up out of the gully.
It was a really fun outing and afterwards we told each other we should do it more often, but somehow we didn't.

07/18/2006   July  
For years, July was raspberry season. Our little raspberry patch produced upwards of 200 pints of raspberries each summer. I canned them in quart jars with about a quarter cup of sugar per quart after first cooking them until they just barely simmered into a sauce.
In July 2006 we apparently also acquired a new cat, actually two of them, from the boys' friend Caitlin who had too many of them. We had recently lost our first orange cat. She had been a stray who'd adopted us when she was starving and who although personable, had never become really friendly. We had called her Lazy, not with any malicious intent but just because she generally seemed reluctant to move once she got settled in somewhere. That tendency proved her undoing when Susan accidentally ran over her as she lay on the concrete apron in front of the garage door.
The boys came up with names for our new cats but I forget what they were because I just always called them "Puss". Although we started with two we soon lost one, perhaps to a local coyote, but the other one was loyal and affectionate with an energetic enthusiasm for chasing the light of a laser pointer and a bemused tolerance for being slid across our hardwood floor on her back, a game I called "Propel-a-Puss". I can't imagine what she called it.

07/29/2006   Unicorn Peak hike  
Unicorn Peak is one of the prominences in the Tatoosh Range on the south side of Mount Rainier National Park. Except for the last 50 feet which are technical, it is a pretty easy Sabbath afternoon hike.
I now disapprove of them as a form of natural graffiti but back then we were into building cairns. Daniel built some on the way up. We scrambled up to the summit ridge but declined to tackle the top. The views were spectacular despite a partial cloud ceiling not far overhead. The flowers were still somewhat limited, it being early in the season for that side of the mountain.
On the way down we stayed on snowfields as much as possible. We each selected a large flat rock and attempted to slide down the snow while standing on it. Daniel had the most success with that.

08/07/2006   Mount Saint Helens climb  
Because it is a volcano I get to call it a climb but it was really just a hike. The boys and I did it on the day Dad died. We were still in our sleeping bags in our tent when Mazie called to let me know. The boys didn't know him very well and I had not been particularly close to him for a number of years so the news didn't affect us much. I mostly felt grateful that I'd had the opportunity to spend some time with him during the preceding year. Grateful too for the nine months I lived with him after high school. Were it not for that, I'd have barely known him at all.
He'd have enjoyed the hike with us, though in truth he would probably have preferred to go fishing. We started up at the crack of 8AM or so, entertained a couple of Canada Jays in the woods (or did they entertain us?) then diverged from the usual route up a rubbly lava flow to scramble up a remnant knob of some older terrain. Unlike the rest of the mountain it hosted a carpet of grass and flowers alongside a tongue of forest extending up from below.
The rest of the way up to the summit was a sandy slog on a ridge of boulders and ash. The summit, just the highest point of the gritty crater rim, hosted a small crowd when we arrived so after a few minutes we hiked a half-mile or so north along the rim so we could indulge in some minor vandalism, pushing boulders down into the crater. They generated a very satisfying dust plume during their descent. The crater itself was a surreal sight, a jagged cliff-rimmed bowl lined with talus and partly filled with a cone of pale rhyolite rising out of a moat of black ice.
We played around on the rim for about an hour before starting down. Both photos and memory suggest a descent more exuberant than the climb up. We followed a slightly different route down, staying as much as possible on sandy slopes or snow, the boys racing ahead while I slogged more sedately behind. We celebrated our ascent with dinner out somewhere on the way home and ordered deep-fried ice cream for dessert. It must not have been that good because I have never ordered it since.

08/12/2006   Crater Lake Marathon  
Four days after our St. Helens climb I drove south again, alone this time, for a double marathon weekend in central Oregon. I stopped by Gresham on my way to visit Uncle Bill. He was quite a runner in his day with a sub-five minute mile and numerous runs up Mount Washington to his credit. He doesn't run anymore but he still plays the Steinway grand piano which dominates his small apartment.
The marathon was gorgeous but my knee got sore in the last 8 miles so I decided not to tackle Haulin' Aspen the next day and went thunderegg hunting at Richardson's Ranch instead. I finished towards the back of the pack in 5:19 and had to wait a long time for a bus back to the start, my only complaint about an otherwise well-run race.
At Richardson's I dug in the Opal Bed, or maybe it was the Blue Bed. It wasn't crowded and the eggs were abundant. The prettiest egg I found was filled with orange opal. Having cracked it open, I couldn't cut and polish it so I gave it away but not without some subsequent regret because I never found another one like it.

08/17/2006   Newfoundland visit  
Dad's memorial service was set for 18 August so we flew back to Boston, or maybe it was Portland, and met Eric, Sarah and Roger. I hopped into their car and we set off for Newfoundland while Susan and the boys drove up to Jackson. Sarah and Roger did most of the driving which meant that we listened to Irish folk music most of the time. That got a bit old but otherwise it was a good trip.
We drove under ominous clouds in central Maine and reached the Nova Scotia - New Brunswick border around sunset. We might have driven through the night; at any rate we boarded the ferry for Port aux Basques at sunrise the next morning. I looked for birds during the crossing and recording the following notes: We disembarked in Newfoundland in the early afternoon and and took the opportunity to do something I have always wanted to do - stop and explore the mountains north of town. With their steep flanks and barren heights, those mountains have intrigued me since I first saw them back in 1963. They were flatter than I expected on top but and there were not many birds but the views were great and we all enjoyed the outing.
Sarah, Jennie and I all spoke at Dad's service. I don't remember what we said though I did have a recording of it somewhere. In the afternoon we drove up to Deer Lake with the urn containing Dad's ashes and gathered around it for a brief graveside service. We did not stay for the actual burial so I'm not sure what that entailed.
The next day Mazie and Jennie joined us for a hike up Gross Morne. We encountered no Ptarmigan this time but other hikers reported a group of Woodland Caribou just over a rise near the summit. Sarah and Roger walked over for some close-up views but for some contrary reason which I do not recall, I did not join them and settled instead for a couple of distant shots.
Before returning to Deer Lake we drove out to the lighthouse and checked out Daniel's cairn. It was still there, but now accompanied by a host of more modest imitations. The beach was littered with cairns. Hopefully the winter ice will wipe the slate clean. We left the next day and camped that night at J T Cheeseman Provincial Park near Port aux Basques in order to catch the ferry in the morning. I had time for a short run before sunset and found a few birds, including a family of Rusty Blackbirds in what I presumed was their breeding habitat, Alder thickets along a small stream. Also a mink in rocks down by the saltwater.
The weather was less favorable this time but the birding was actually better. As I noted: I was particularly impressed by the warblers - a Magnolia, a Black throated Green, a couple of American Redstarts - and a Northern Waterthrush which appeared during a heavy rain shower, landed on the deck and took refuge under a lifeboat. All so out of place and vulnerable, tiny colorful birds flying with such determination over such an expanse of inhospitable gray ocean. We also encountered quite a few Storm-Petrels, probably mostly Wilson's, in the first couple of hours out of Port-aux-Basques.
Our southbound migration was unremarkable though I was interested to spot several apparently healthy American Elms in northern Nova Scotia. In New Hampshire they were all killed by Dutch elm disease back in the 70s. Also noteworthy were the cow and calf Moose browsing on ferns in the field in front of the house the morning after we arrived back in Jackson.

08/23/2006   New Hampshire  
Was this Mom and John's last ascent of Washington on foot? I think it might have been. As I recall they did not accompany us back down the trail but instead caught a stage down the mountain to the Glen House where we may have left a car for them. Mom and I explored a little around the Lakes of the Clouds; she may have suspected that she would not make it back there again.

09/10/2006   Skagit Flats Marathon and a wedding  
Sometime in the previous couple of weeks Susan took Daniel to Proctor in Andover NH to begin his postgraduate high school year. I didn't get any photos of their departure. Expedia hosted employees and guests on a dinner cruise around Elliott Bay. It was reasonably fun. I think we might have danced some too. Two days later I ran the Skagit Flats Marathon in good time: 3:54:10, my best since my final BQ attempt at Tucson two years ago.
That afternoon we attended Kai and Brandon's wedding at church. Bride and groom looked happy but I always wondered as usual how long the marriage would last, not that I had any reason to suspect that it wouldn't. That looks like John McLarty in the background who married them, and who would become both my pastor and my friend over the next decade, but I could be mistaken; I'm not too good with faces.

09/23/2006   Guye Peak caves  
David and I hiked the rough trail up Snoqualmie Mountain as far as the Cave Valley where we explored a narrow little cave right along the side of the stream channel. David pushed farther in than I did and gave himself a pretty good scare which may have permanently dampened his enthusiasm for spleunking. I went in far enough to retrieve a fluted piece of marble which was just lying on the gravel floor of the passage. It is a very cool rock. Daniel is at Proctor so it is just David and me on these adventures.

10/01/2006   Portland Marathon  
Jeff talked me into running Portland with him, or perhaps it was the other way around. We met several years ago at the Mercer Island half marathon and have been running together from time to time since. He takes them a little more seriously than I do, perhaps because he doesn't run as many. As I noted in my comments on my Maniacs marathons page at the time: I think maybe his wife Anita ran a 5K that day. Jeff's finish time was probably a little under four hours; mine was about 13 minutes over, respectable enough as far as I was concerned back then. We ate somewhere reasonably nice together afterwards before driving back to Seattle.

10/07/2006   Indian summer  
It looks like I spent a day digging petrified wood over at Saddle Mountain near Mattawa, probably with Pat but I don't recall for sure. From the look of the wood it came out of the big hole in which we and others excavated pieces of a petrified Sequoia stump some 8 feet in diameter over a period of six months or more.
Back home in the garden it was a good year for tomatoes, and as previously noted, also good for Tree Frogs in the greenhouse.

10/08/2006   Nick's mom's wedding  
Nick's mom married an Auburn businessman at Federation Forest State Park. Nick reported that he's an okay guy. Someone was blowing soap bubbles after the ceremony so David and I tried to photograph them.

10/13/2006   Visiting Daniel at Proctor  
Proctor scheduled a Parents Weekend about six weeks into the school year so we took the occasion to visit Daniel. We attended an English class, ate in the cafeteria and hung out around campus for a beautiful fall day. The boys juggled. We met Daniel's girlfriend, at least she was reported to be his girlfriend, and her parents. Daniel did not appreciate our enthusiasm about her and her family.

10/15/2006   Jackson  
After visiting Daniel at Proctor he accompanied us to Jackson for a few days and joined Sarah's group at Mae Kelly's on Sunday night. Susan must have driven him back to Proctor on Monday morning. I hiked up to Slide Peak with Matt. No snow on the mountain yet though the leaves have mostly fallen.

10/22/2006   Back home  
Back home the field and garden have their characteristic autumn aspect, damp and unkempt. The fall foliage is brighter and more colorful on the east side.

10/29/2006   Tri-cities Marathon  
I finished fifth from last but since I started two hours early I crossed the finish line while the clock still read only 3:23, which was quite gratifying. One of my best clock times ever. The day was sunny but a strong west wind was sweeping across the river, and since the course is mostly on a dike along the water, we ran much of the race leaning sideways into the wind. I ran mostly with a local woman whom I have never seen since but we got to talking and overlooked the cones marking the turnaround so ended up running an extra 3 miles. I ran the Halloween Marathon last weekend so this was the first time I ran marathons on successive weekends.

11/05/2006   IUWR Seattle Marathon  
For my third race three weeks, I ran along the Green River from Kent to Alki in 4:33. I wrote in my Maniac Marathon notes "A quiet well-organized little race sandwiched between rain storms. Ran w/ Barefoot Jon."

11/11/2006   Ron Herzog 50K  
The Ron Herzog 50K in the hills near Granite Falls was probably my toughest race to date. For the middle third of the race we ran in an inch or more of slush and the bottoms of my feet got so cold I felt as though I was running on little foam pads. Completing it qualified me for four stars in the Maniacs listing.

11/24/2006   Thanksgiving  
Daniel flew home for Thanksgiving and we had a modest dinner together in front of the fireplace. The next day we drove up to Crystal, as I recall in a long-lost Snowboarding page:

12/15/2006   Storm  
A windstorm brought down one of the 30-foot leaders on the Cedar tree, narrowly missing the front porch roof. We used our old climbing rope to lower it to the ground so I could cut it up. The storm also knocked down an ash tree in the woodlot across the street. The tree fell across the utility lines and into the road. I don't recall if we lost power but I eventually sawed up the ash tree, carted it up to the workshop and split it into firewood.

12/25/2006   Christmas day  
Daniel returned home for Christmas and we celebrated the holiday at home rather than going to New Hampshire as we often did. Actually the boys and I celebrated part of the day at Crystal Mountain where conditions were good and crowds were modest.

12/27/2006   Year end