Rained Out In February

The forecast called for rain beginning Thursday and lasting through the weekend.  California was in the midst of the worst drought in decades and I took the forecast with little more than glimmer of consideration.  Trevor, Maddie, Chelsea and I caravanned up from Santa Barbara to Big Sur on Wednesday morning.  The weather was stereotypical of Central California; mid sixties and the typical north wind.   The stars shined bright and uninhibited by clouds as we circled the wagons a few hours after dark.  Light tapping started on the aluminum roof of my camper late Wednesday night and by morning, the dishes from the night before were over flowing with the first rain the area had seen in months.

With the exception of few hour long breaks in the storm, it rained sideways for the next 72 hours.  Searching for shelter,  we parked in the lee of trees and under the cover of red woods.   Instead of hiking around the hills and surfing point breaks,  we hunkered down in our campers and schemed plans for spring and summer.

Chopping tomatos.

Slippery when wet.

Chelsea and Maddie taking a dip.

Frying up some veggies.

Misting.

Target practice.

Check out the Woody and The Blue Ox shorts here.

Sand Dollar Beach.

A soggy campfire.

Rain for days.

A break in the storm.

Chelsea blasting.

Trevor cooking up an afternoon snack.

"I'm ready for spring and summer."

"No shit."

"Weather like this makes it better when it comes though."

Here are some more links,

Escape from Bigfoot Country (Vimeo).

The Guarantee

"Sir, very fresh food.  Please come.  American?"

I looked forward and kept walking through the crowd in Marrakech's central square. If I acknowledged them in anyway, they would leave the security of their shop and follow me for thirty feet or so, carrying on about their products, value and track record.   They also tended to hassle a single person less than one walking in pairs so I walked a few strides ahead of Edge, my childhood friend and former roommate in NYC.

"Parlez-vous Francais.  English?  Very good Tajine.  Best in Marrakech."

I kept walking.

The square was pandemonium.  Swap out tourists and Moroccans with men and women clad in business casual attire and the scene resembled Bryant Park subway station circa 8:30 am on a Tuesday.   The combination of tourists taking photos of snake charmers with iPads and locals getting across town had me confused as to weather I was witnessing a tourist spectacle or a legitimate place of commerce.   Giving a group of middle age women walking around with syringes full of what I later learned was henna, a wide birth I kept on bearing towards a group of restaurants.  Edge was thirty feet behind me.

A group of men,  mostly locals, congregated in a circle.  Pausing, I stood on my tiptoes and looked over the four-deep wall of people to see two early teen boys with their shirts off wearing boxing gloves.  A referee/booky was collecting bets.  I stood and watched while the MC jabbered in a combination of Arabic and French.  This would be a twenty minute commitment, I thought to myself, and continued on.

As I approached the line of restaurants,  a group of salesmen came out and stopped five feet from their last picnic table as if limited by an invisible, electric fence.   My plan was to do a fly by and see which restaurant had the most non-tourist customers and go with that one.    Before I could finish, a man in his early thirties wearing a GAP Athletic T-shirt broke rank and came up to me.

"Guaranteed no diarrhea for the last two years.  Guarantee.  My word."

I burst out laughing and stopped dead in my tracks.  "How can you guarantee something like that?"

The man smiled with a look of success.  "For you sir,  I make very good price."

Regaining my composure,  I continued you on towards the last row.

Look behind him.

A brass bathtub.

So many dates.

Well Loved.

I've been using Adobe Revel to host and share my photos as part of their Ambassador Program.  Take a look at these photos from Morocco and more here.

Fishy.

Edge in Essaouira.

Cat power.

Loc' dog in the Sahara.

A 400 year old Riad in Fes.

Camo.

4x4's in Eastern Morocco.

"Your days are numbered"

Fully Loaded.

Hanging tough.

Marrakech.

As far as the eye can see.  Sand.

Threads.

OG BMX BIKE!

Nice marmot.

Essaouira.

Reaching the end of the row,  I stopped and waited for Edge.

"Did one of those dudes say something about no diarrhea for the last two years?"

"Yah...I died laughing."

"How the fuck do you guarantee that?" I asked,  hoping  to get an answer for the question that the man from the restaurant left unanswered.

"No clue.  Pretty bold claim."

"Certainly.  Which one of those spots do you want to eat at?"

Here are some more links,

Morocco (Adobe Revel).

Farewell to Summer

It always passes quickly. Waking up with the sun at six transitions into seven and then seven thirty. The days shorten on the other end too. Living in your car makes you aware of when the sun rises and sets.  Temperatures retreat below the acceptable level to sleep with just a wool blanket and I grab  a down sleeping bag. Condensation covers the single-pain window of my camper in the mornings.  Parks, that just a few weeks earlier buzzed with tourists in rental Mustangs, empty out. The first fall storms are on the way.  Here are some shots from this summer.

Beach daze in Malibu.

Camping with Jay in the Sierra.

Monsoon season in Arizona.

Options.

Maddie and Trevor in the Los Padres.

Shoe quiver.

Wild flowers.

Shades on shades.

Mexican peelers.

Morning in the Mission.

Stoked Grove in Meiners Oak.

Driftwood Fire.

Bryan, Trevor and Cal having dinner.

Ryan Lovelace working on his 1948 Bus.

Marissa stretching in the morning.

Mount Piños.

Lazy mornings.

Mobile changing room.

Ian Durkin on the West Coast.

Standing tough.

Club Med, Lake Tahoe addition with Tahoe Messi and Ian Durkin.

Collection of roadkill skulls at Lloyd Khan's house in Bolinas.

Bryan making dinner.

I'm ready for winter.

Here are some more links,

Out of Reception (Tumblr).

Fort Collins to Carpinteria

 I leaned forward and stuck my head out of the Jeep Comanches fiberglass canopy.  Resting on my elbows, I looked around the Valley in the Eastern Sierra that we were camped.  The nearest big city,  Fresno,  was a few hundred miles to the southwest, leaving the night's sky unmolested by light pollution. There wasn't a could in site and the stars shined bright, casting just enough light to see the beaver pond that we had backed up to just before dark the night before.  Despite being early summer,  the air was still cold, and by my best guess,  in the low 40s.   Retreating back into the truck Canopy,  I rearranged my pillows, checked the valve on my thermarest to make sure it was tight, laid down and pulled my sleeping bag up around my face.

I couldn't sleep. Rolling over on to my stomach and propping up on my elbows,  I took a swig from my water bottle and stashed it under my pillow. Twenty minutes passed,  maybe thirty and I wasn't any closer to falling asleep.  Frustrated,  I kicked off my sleeping bag and crawled out of the Canopy.  Finding my flip flops in the dark,  I walked twenty feet away form the truck and took a piss.  The night was quite, save for the constant hissing of wind running down the  aspen trees in the valley floor off towards the basin some three thousand feet bellow.  I was forcing it.  I didn't really need to pee but was searching for anything possible barrier between me and waking up next to a stream in the Sierras.  Finally, after swaying with the trees for a few moments, I heard the familiar  sound of pee splattering off river rocks.

Five days before, Trevor and I flew to Denver to pick up a Jeep Comanche he found on Craigslist.  After spending the night at my college roommates place in Denver,  the truck checked out as promised and we were off.  Taking the 14 through northern Colorado into Utah, we camped by night in BLM land.  The Comanche ran like a dream.

Pellet gun target practice.

Sunrise in the high Sierra.

Hot springs changing room.

Along the way, I shot a look book for Patagonia's upcoming 40th Anniversary Collection.

Snackfood.

Flicking the fly.

Shakas, Bra

"People still use that shit?"  referring to an atlas.

Chili, Avocado and a tortilla.  Dinner

Fifteen miles off the 50 on a one track road, somewhere in Nevada.

The last remnants of winter.

No AC.

Trevor's 1991 Jeep Comanche.

Beaver damns.

Wake up in Utah.

Evening entertainment curtsy of Bureau of Land Management.

;

Staring up at the sky,  I searched for a satellite.  After a few seconds,  I spotted one and followed its slow track across the sky.  It was just before 3:30, and I had been awake for an hour and a half.  Memories of sleepless nights laying in my apartment in New York  listening to sound of sirens and the occasional subway getting increasingly anxious for a meeting the next morning brought me back to reality. Walking back to the truck,  I reached for my sleeping bag and pad and pulled it out of the bed.

After finding a level place,  I kicked out a half covered rock and set my pad down.  Obstructed by the valley walls and a few aspen trees, I yawned and resumed my search for satellites.

Here are some more links, 40th Anniversary Collection (Patagonia),

Trevor Gordon ARTS (Facebook).