Day -2 Errin's Departure

July 1, 2015 - 0700

Wednesday morning, Jeffry and I were receiving some photos via text. The first was a plate of scrambled eggs and what I'm assuming was Trystero coffee. A few minutes later, another photo. It was taken in a space that resembled a bathroom, with a very nice throw rug on the floor, and an aerial view of bare legs and some brown canvas pants down around the ankles crumpled over some worn grey Birks. The caption read "Pre-ride jitters". It was Errin, and he was documenting and sharing with his team, the morning of his departure from Los Angeles in painstaking and marginally inappropriate detail. Thank you for that Errin.

This was at once confusing and entertaining to Jeffry and I. It was a little early in the day to mentally process literal "toilette" humor, and the three of us haven't spent a lot of time together. I haven't actually met Jeffry in-person yet. We've interacted via the internet and electronic devices. Errin and Jeffry have met once in-person, and only just recently at one of Errin's Wednesday morning #larivercampcoffee gatherings. So with this photo came a new level of comfortability, intimacy and excrement *cough*, I mean excitement. Excitement not from the jitters photo, but from the photos that I can share, photos of Errin's first day on the road north...

Errin's 2014 F800GS-Adv packed and ready for departure

Errin left Los Angeles around 0800 Thursday morning. We had radio silence until sometime around mid-day, when he sent out the following text:

The first communication from Errin, after leaving his home in Los Angeles

 He had ridden from Los Angeles to Tulare and stopped to refuel his bike and his body. If you've ever wondered what a rookie explorer consumes during an open road expedition, you've come to the right place for answers. Behold, orange soda and peanut butter cookies.

Carbonated orange sugar drank and crunchy sweet cookies for our rookie explorer

 At the end of the day, Errin had ended up at his uncle and aunt's house in Mariposa. He spent some time catching up on life events, he gave them a run down of his trip and was provided with an offering of pizza and beer. He then set up his tent and snapped off a few photos to send to his curious and excited team.

Errin's camp for the night on his aunt and uncle's property in Mariposa, CA

Sunset in Mariposa, CA

Screen shot of Errin's Spot tracker, allowing us to follow along on his progress

At the end of the day, he had covered roughly 300 miles. Nice work Errin. I'm looking forward to seeing you in Seattle very soon, and I know Jeffry is eagerly awaiting our arrival in Anchorage. I'm sure tomorrow will provide some more exciting details on the ride north.

We would like to thank Errin's wife, Serbrina, for being supportive and letting us borrow Errin for a couple weeks this summer.  Thank you Serbrina!

Jeffry's #WeakWristWorld

Thrukon Alaska Team Guide, Jeffry Hesse, is already on the ground in Anchorage and has been busy scouting locations of interest in preparation for the arrival of Errin and Nathan in July. Jeffry has recently completed a preliminary survey of the Byron Glacier with a few friends, and we are excited to present Jeffry's photos and his account of recent events, as well as dejected to say that some of the ice masses in the photos taken in November 2014, have now disappeared. Reminding us that these structures are rapidly becoming extinct.

Thank you for getting us these words and images, Jeffry.
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By Jeffry Hesse

Keeping with the theme of hurting yourself getting ready for an expedition seemed like a good idea? For the past month or so since leaving Washington, DC towards Alaska, I've been pushing myself further than I ever have to exercise. In the past few weeks I've ridden my bike the vertical amount that equals the elevation of Everest, massive amounts of miles, and done some crazy hikes to boot including summiting Flattop twice, and a dry run of Byron Glacier. What on earth could possibly go wrong?!

About two weeks ago my buddy Alex flew into Alaska and went on an epic trip to explore Denali and other areas. Follow Alex's adventures here

Before leaving Anchorage we summited Flattop the hard way taking a much longer hike in while wearing all my camera gear, and dodging moose. We had a great run in with a bull moose, got to the summit, shot some test pan footage and got down with no issues. 

Bull Moose, Power Line Pass Trail, June 2015 

Kim Moosedashian on the Power Line Pass Trail, June 2015 

Fast forward a week and Alex is back from Denali with his buddies. We make super last minute plans, I throw a ton of gear into my bag, and we all head down to Byron Glacier at around 2 PM on a Friday. We get in, we hike in, and it's a little bit of awesome, and a little bit of horrible. By horrible I mean our original plan was to go explore ice caves I had seen last November. In the space between November and now, not only did the first cave disappear, but so did the further caves I had found in November with my brothers.

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First ice cave at the end of the trailhead end for Byron, now gone. Bryan Hesse picture, November 2014

First ice cave exit towards the larger glacier, Josh Hesse walking, November 2014

Additional ice caves about half a mile hike in from the end of trailhead, November 2014

Seeing how we couldn't find any caves, we got much more ambitious with this hike. We ended up hiking all the way up to the main "calving" face of Byron. The view was amazing and absolutely worth the hike.

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Calving face of Byron Glacier, June 2015 

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Alex and Oscar in front of Byron Glacier, June 2015 

Right beneath the calving face, and likely a horrible spot to be in with regard to danger, we located a 20 foot deep ice cave near what I would call the bergschrund of lower Byron, since the upper calving face is not connected to the lower glacier which is largely a mix of firn and ablation zone before becoming the tarn.

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View into the blackness beyond, Ice Cave in Byron Glacier, June 2015

After hanging out, setting ice screws and drinking some glacier water right off the face, Alex and I took a late descent at around 7 PM towards the van and safety. Unfortunately even with extreme caution you can still mess up. As I was walking down the glacier I slipped on some ice and caught my fall with my left hand. It bent some unbelievable amount backwards as it held the weight of two huge cameras and a bunch of other gear on my back. I instantly thought "Oh no, I broke my damn wrist". Thankfully after a few minutes I was able to see some motion and rotation, but extreme pain. We made our way back down the rest of the way, but I fell twice more on the SAME wrist but with a bit more caution each time.

Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, I don't have any pictures nor x-rays of my hand, but I do have a tender wrist that I can barely use. The timing is of course perfect. In the next week to finish preparing for Thrukon I need to continue my hard work outs, do some rock climbing to get back in the saddle, and as well I have to retake a test to get a drivers license so I can follow these maniacs around in Alaska.

Rena on top of Flattop, June 2015 

Moral of the story? Do more rad stuff. This is certainly an obstacle but it won't stop me. The day after hurting my wrist I summited Flattop again with my friend Rena. Tomorrow if I can get back on the bike I'm going to ride down to finish the first part of getting my Alaska License. The day after, wrap up the whole thing. We are so close to doing Thrukon, The excitement is building, and a little pain certainly isn't going to stop us.

Errin's #ComicalClavicleCruise

Holiday weekends can be a real downer. And getting ready for an expedition can be stressful at times, especially with other life stuff going on. It is important to have some balance, and doing fun stuff is a good way to get a break and re-focus. As we get closer to the departure for Thrukon, our timeline for the team and team members, becomes more critical.

Right around Easter, Errin was having a stellar weekend. On the Saturday he was doing a little motorrading around Angles Crest highway ride testing and getting some if his gear settled. Everything was going well. It was April and we still had a couple months ahead of us to plan for Thrukon. That afternoon he sent me a photo of himself with his motorcycle to use for some of our promo material.

 Everything looked bright and cheery down in sunny Southern California. 

The next day, Sunday, he headed up to the hills around Pasadena to shred some bicycles through the dirt. And that reminded me of that saying, the old adage, something specific about 'not getting too rad too close to your departure date for a major trip'. Do you remember it? I suppose it's possible that there isn't a saying about that particular situation, but there should be. And someone should tell it to Errin, because Errin gets rad. Maybe he gets a little too rad.

Either way his radery reached a pinnacle as he descended a steep dusty peak on two skinny bicycle road tires and lost the front end of his ride. I didn't witness the crash, and there aren't any photos of it, but I was told he ascended to the heavens, and with a sharp arc in his trajectory, fell back to earth with haste. The impact was hard. In an effort to break his fall, he punched the ground with his fist.

Earth-1, Fist-0

Errin quickly realized that his attempt to the fist fight the San Gabriel mountains wasn't working, so instead he switched up his tactics and used his right upper torso to arrest his descent from the clear blue sky. Unfortunately, this resulted in a fractured clavicle, which required surgery and some titanium hardware. 

Anterior x-ray view of Errin's brand spanking new, bionic, ultra-lightweight upgrade

An injury of this type, while being an inconvenience, is typically not a major concern. It may or may not buy you a ticket to the operating room. If surgery is required, it's a rather routine procedure. Then 4-6 weeks to heal, and you're good for the most part. Once Errin got settled into his diagnosis and prognosis, he and I had a conversation on what this was going to mean for the expedition. Was he ok? Would he heal in time for departure? Was riding a motorcycle at speed over distance going to be a issue? These were a few of the concerns we had. I was a little worried this accident may potentially end Errin's participation before it even began. 

Looking back though, I think one of the biggest concerns from this incident was his ink. A day or two before Errin's bone smasher, he had a huge chest piece finished up. A majestic, full color scene of Mount Whitney in the Sequoia National Park, with axes, clouds and a meadow. He feared the surgeon may have sliced through the freshly tattooed border of Kevlar dynamic kermantle rope.

Our hero takes a post-op bathroom selfie 

Errin had his follow-up visit with the ortho surgeon today, and I am happy to report that he has made a full recovery. He's been back on two wheels for a couple months now, feels strong, and is in the process of packing his gear to depart from Los Angeles for a leisurely drive to meet me in Seattle, from where we will both leave for Alaska to meet up with Jeffry. Oh, and the surgeon was able to avoid slicing through the peak of Mt. Whitney.

I love it when a plan comes together. 

Ride Training with RawHyde: Base Camp Alpha- Part 2 Day 5

Panoramic photo of BCA group at Trona Pinnicales

BCA
Day 5- Tuesday The fifth  and final day of motorcycle ride training in Nathan's preparation for Thrukon

Morning at Base Camp Alpha. Breakfast burritos. They were delicious and warmly welcomed after a wet night. The sky pissed all night, drops rattling against the rain fly. It was a legitimate challenge trying to sleep. Since our gloves didn't have a chance to dry overnight, a few of us had resorted to roasting them over an open fire. Some fell in and were promptly rescued by heroic observers with only minor burns.

 Makeshift glove dryer constructed from rocks, wood and an old leaf spring

I spent some time trying to shake the water out of the tent, a pointless exercise. In the end I packed it soaked.

 Video still of the author offering a prayer of dry nylon to the Mojave rain gods -Shot by Gonzalo Pascual

After every one packed up their gear. We were off. On the way to a martian landscape in the Mojave called Trona Pinnacles, our fearless leader Shawn was the victim of an unprovoked attack. He went ahead to scout the condition of the trail and was violently ambushed by a combination of recently felled rain that had mixed with ultra-fine powdery desert floor, creating a slippery mucosal layer of mud. There were a few quick flashes of white-red-white-red and finally white light as his 450 pound R1200GS spun around in the brown slime.

The event

The result

All hands on deck! Righting Shawn's 1200GS after a slippery slide through the Trona mud

The group arrives at Trona Pinnacles to find rock spires and  sloppy mud pits.We spend some time drifting around the muddy trails and inspecting the ancient towers up close.

Then on to the sand pits to really challenge our balance and low speed control.

Ride Training with RawHyde: Base Camp Alpha- Part 2 Day 4

BCA

Day 4- Monday

The first day of BCA for me, started the night before, as I was busy making some mechanical and electrical adjustments from the previous two days of riding the 1200GS. I found the positioning of shift and hands levers slightly more important now than I had before. As well as access to SAE and 12v electrical ports. It is challenging to try and make these adjustments in situ. So the evening activities involved moving the levers and connecting power cables so they would be easily accessible on the fly.

 Repairs by headlamp around midnight

Monday morning started at 0700, woke up, dressed then to the mess hall for 0730 breakfast. At 0800 we had a mandatory group pre-departure meeting with BCA ride leader Shawn Thomas. Topics included the route, group riding safety and etiquette, what to expect on various highways, and what to do if there's a problem. Afterward, Shawn ends every announcement with same closing statement, "I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have." And with that, it was time to hit the road.

The ride out to BCA was relatively uneventful. There was a stop at Red Rock Canyon State Park, located in the Mojave/Tehachapi dessert where the Sierra Nevada converges with the El Paso Mountains. Lunch consisted of sandwiches, chips, drinks and sweets. Simple, yet effective. I went off for a walk out into the middle distance to shoot some landscape photos.

Face of Rad Rock Canyon bluff

Later on we stopped off at the Burro Schmidt's mine, which was built by non other than Burro Schmidt, over the course of 38 years. There's an interesting story there, but that's for another time.

Unfortunately on the way up to the mine, one of the other riders nailed a large boulder with the front wheel and put a hefty dent in the rim, which resulted in a flat.Unable to repair the wheel, the damaged bike needed to be loaded onto one of the sweeper trucks and taken back to the Ranch.

Video still of R1200GS with a damaged rim being loaded onto a truck

Another rider had also developed a flat on their front tire. This one was due to a puncture. A great opportunity for a demo on how to plug a puncture with a repair kit.

BCA ride leader gives a demo on puncture repair

The rest of the day was wet. We rode through mud and rain, and more rain, arriving at BCA right around dark. Everyone proceeded to set up their tents in the annoying the type of rain that's not quite heavy enough to soak everything immediately, but just enough to make things uncomfortable. There was no fireside chats or merry sing-a longs. Just about everyone turned in for the night.