Chuck and Nori’s Orchestra

We were a fourteen-piece orchestra on our mountain bike ride this morning. Nori is a fine-tuned Labrador who will always jump at the chance to run with bicyclists toward a water experience....Water music to her ears. I said let's go to Last Chance Creek and she got very excited as I was tuning up my mountain bike. We got off to a slow start through the trees behind our house but the tempo increased energetically when hit the old dirt road. Four miles to the year-round output of Last Chance Creek. My two legs, two lungs, big heart and navigating brain followed her synchronized four legs, hammering lung lobes, willing heart and working tongue to produce a one hour cycling concert deserving of the one minute of applause we received from Lisa when we arrived home.

Still Cranking To The Higher Elevations

It's Monday...third Monday of August. Lisa says, "let's go ride to the NP summit." We start at the visitor's center, 6.700ft. and pedal up the switchbacks to the summit at 8,511ft. Which bikes? I'm thinking skinny-tire road bikes...just because that's always what we have ridden in the National Park and...offroad riding is not allowed in the NPs. She invited Cindy R. on the early morning climb and Cindy has converted over to E-bikes on every ride. Well, I was thinking roadbikes, I tell her. She says, "Great!" So, here we are at 8:30am pulling our bikes off the back of our Honda...eighteen pound bicycles with no electronic shifting, no batteries, rim brakes, front derailleurs, skinny tires, clip-in pedals...so last century! Muscle memory, route memory and effort memory all clicking-in at the same time. Traffic was minimal, it's Monday and the road surface was the best it's been in years...We Love this ride!

Surfing With Maeve

Maeve is our first grandchild. She just invested one of her first ten weeks with Lolly and Pops. She executed her first lake swim, her first hike in her dad's front pack to 9,300ft. which is the remnant of Mt. Tehama called Brokeoff, her visit visit to a U.S. National Park...Lasssen Volcanic. Her attitude is up and down, big wave, small wave...she lets you know when she's not happy, adjustments need to be made. Her mother and father are appropriately responsive...my diapers are full, my stomach is empty. Burping, farting and pooping, "I am taking care of business here and I need your attention here." Lolly and Pops are enjoying the wave action, not primary caregivers but, we get to hold her when her toes are hanging five.