#but i was on the fastest way home (legit like 3 minute drive) and saw like 5 cars all one after another so i turned aorund expecting a trai

[tinyorangepotato]

Leave earlier❤️ride a bike❤️

[globaloscillations]

Rediscovering New York

Quite a while back now we grabbed tickets to see John Oliver and Seth Meyers live in New York at the Beacon Theater. Back on March 9th we made that trip and it was our first time in New York City proper since 2015. 🤯 For this particular trip Kristen and I, because it had been so long, kind of wanted to rediscover things and get our bearings on our own terms. It's fair to say though that it won't take us almost another almost entire decade to make it back. Though it pains the 'Boston is better rivalry' part of my soul to fully admit it was a fun adventure and there's a lot to explore we left planning our next trip.

At least some of my mind-shift on New York is based on the fact that in a lot of the best ways it feels kind of like another country. We took the train there, there's a bustling transit network, a unique culture, lots of dining and pubs, world class cuisine (mmm bagels LOL), and a seemingly endless amount of entertainment, landmarks, museums, etc. to explore. Our trip started by hopping on the Amtrak Acela and heading down the Northeast Corridor for a quick 3 and a half hour trip, perhaps the most Europe equivalent train journey you can make in the United States. You'd be unlikely to drive it in that time with typical traffic and if you did you'd of course miss out on "train beers." 😉 As a transit nerd aside one nice thing about the BOS-NYC section of the Northeast Corridor is it has some of the fastest sections of track on the whole corridor (except you Connecticut come on get with the program!). We emerged into the new 'Moynihan Train Hall' Amtrak's primary station in New York City (more on that later) and made our way to the cab stand for a short ride to our hotel in Chelsea.

We had more extensive plans from Saturday evening but by the time we made it to our hotel room and got settled the rain had started teeming down and we didn't really have the appetite for traipsing across the city. So we made our way to the 'Barcade' located a few doors down from our hotel. Apparently these are a chain across at least the NYC are and they're a lot like what they sound like. Overall the beer selection was good with a bunch of craft beer options on draught and the selections of games was fairly solid as well. There were classics like Frogger, Galaga, Ms. Pacman to pretty wild things like Sega Time Travler, Tron DISCs, and a Trivial Pursuit in arcade cabinet form. For me the highlights were a version of Tapper with the proper Budweiser branding both on the cabinet and in game as well as the Asteroids & Lunar Lander with the proper vector displays. To me the most unique thing I saw was an Apollo 13 pinball game which was very well themed and instead of having the standard pull to shoot the ball it had a replica of the Apollo Command Module abort handle that you had to twist to launch the ball, very unique. Overall we had fun imbibing, vibing, enjoying some above average nachos, and alternating between our favorite games. All in all a pretty solid date night we'd have to work harder than walking a few doors down to achieve at home. I certainly forget at times the convenience of city level density, not that it doesn't come with its inconveniences to.

Sunday morning we headed uptown and stopped for what else? BAGELS! I got in the epic line to order and it took me a minute to figure out what I was looking at in the display cooler...cream cheese like I've never seen it. Mountains of it in flavors I wouldn't have dared to imagine. Pretty wild honestly. 🤯 I placed our order and took a seat at the table Kristen had found. After a few minutes a guy came over not sure if he was the owner, manager, or just MC it is apparently a thing most legit bagel places in Manhattan have someone out on the floor to kind of keep order, mingle with tourists like us, direct traffic, add some local flavor to the experience, etc. He asked where we were from and told us an amusing story about a family that had been down from Massachusetts not long ago and were very hesitant to reveal their origin. LOL. He was like "Hey own it!" Absolutely. Honestly I've never had a hostile reaction to being in NY and from the Boston area. Maybe some good natured ribbing but I'll be the first to admit there ain't much of a Sox/Yankees rivalry these days and that's in favor of the Yankees with the Red Sox lagging the last several seasons.

After some delicious bagels, no one does it better than NY, we headed over to the Museum of Art and Design for an exhibit they've been running on Taylor Swift's various concert attire, outfits, fashion, artifacts. The collection was donated and curated by Swift herself. It's always interesting to see the genuine article for stuff like that. After the museum we headed back downtown to our hotel and as Kristen had some work to finish up I went the next block over to Smithfield Hall which is a soccer pub in NY and often home to Manchester United fans in NY area. Sadly United weren't playing but I caught the tail end of the Liverpool/City game and had a beer so I could say I did.

By this point it was time to head to dinner. I'd picked a place I thought looked good and we hopped a cab. Unfortunately when we got there it was apparently trivia night and there were no tables. My suburban proclivities were caught of guard by the concept of a trivia night on a Sunday but hey who am I to judge the customs of another culture? Since the place happened to have a Cask Ale on I had one before we headed up the street to a different pub and were seated quickly without issue. I had a solid steak sandwich and ended up partaking in another unusual custom of this different culture something known as "happy hour?" Apparently the custom involves drinks being discounted, sometimes heavily, to draw in patrons at times when business might otherwise be slow. Truly this is a foreign custom! (Aside: I kid but for those not in the know Massachusetts has outlawed happy hour since the 1970s. There was an accident involving an attractive young woman being tragically killed in a drunk driving incident and people had had enough. It is not, as commonly thought, a Puritan thing but it does fit with that narrative. There have been some efforts to revive it but change around anything alcohol related takes time lots of time here in Massachusetts.)

Time for the main event, or at least rationale for this trip in the first place, some stand-up courtesy of John Oliver and Seth Meyers. I don’t think they need any introduction. John Oliver was up first and his set was more or less in the lane I would have expected. What I was most impressed by though is the absolute effortlessness and lightness he proceeded through his set with it. It was impressive and not unexpected but fun to see from a master practitioner of the art. Seth was up next and had a great set as well. His material was more centered on family and parenting vs. the well trodden path of ‘Closer-Look’ segments. Still a very funny set and fun to witness. Afterwards the two teamed up for a Q&A that was definitely worth staying for despite their insistence that all were free to leave and probably should (😂). Perhaps the best review/summation of the evening was Kristen who said as we were leaving “I’m pretty sure I just laughed for two hours straight.” I don’t disagree.

So here’s the thing reader... As travelers we aren’t great at the ‘last day’ of a trip. Monday morning we headed of for some bagels (obvi) and the made our way down to checkout some shopping in the area of the hotel. Sadly one of the places we were hoping to check-in on was the LEGO store and it wasn’t open. Also unfortunate the iconic Flat Iron building is currently covered in scaffolding. Which is a theme I thought about a few times over the course of the trip was how much work it is to maintain the iconic landmark buildings in and among all the new construction. Personally I’m glad the effort is made because there’s nothing I love more than some 1930s Art Deco architecture. The LEED certified glass monstrosities that Boston seems to throw up if it gets the chance just feel so uninspired in comparison. On our very wind walk back to the hotel we spied the Empire State Building poking out every so often and I thought about what it’d be like trying to dock a Zeppelin to the top in those winds! (Aside: the design of the Empire State Building was such that at Zeppelins might dock to the top of the building and man would that have been absolutely amazing to see!)

After making our way back to the hotel in the crazy wind we decided that we didn’t really have a strong plan for the rest of the day. With our train being at 5pm we could probably have made more use of the day but with the wind and lack of planning we didn’t have a strong sense of what we’d do. We ended up making our way over to Moynihan Train Hall and grabbing a couple of day passes to Amtrak’s “Metropolitan Lounge.” The passes are $50 bucks a day for the NYC lounge and you get a spacious private lounge that lover looks the train hall, a buffet of food and non-alcoholic drinks, private cash bar, and pre-boarding of your train. All in all it didn’t feel like that bad a deal especially when we got a private escort right on to the train platform a good 15 minutes before everyone else. This made an already pretty hassle free experience of boarding the train (vs. any commercial airline experience in the US) pretty much sublime.

We spend a fair bit of the day looking out over the relatively new (apparently it has been 3 years?!) Moynihan Train Hall the primary arrival in NYC for Amtrak trains traveling the Northeast Corridor. Honestly the facility is impressive and apparently at one point in time was the primary mail sorting facility for the USPS in New York. The impression the openness and architecture provides on first arrival in my opinion rivals most of what I’ve experienced in the UK or Europe. A realization that comes with a twinge of frustration because it takes so much to get big infrastructure projects over the finish line in this country but look at the result when we do! When they happen, all to rarely, they’re a reminder that we can achieve things worthy of the greatness we like to ascribe to the fragile experiment we call America. Then it was time for the rain ride home which was the same relatively three hour trip but no quite as fun. Did get to spend a minute looking out at the gridlock on I-95 from the bar car though.

It was a fun mini-trip and we hope to do it a fair bit more in the future explore some more and hopefully meet-up with friends in the are on subsequent trips!

“New York is not a city, it’s a world.” – Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1958)

[chriscoleman]

Pinned on the Green

Mistakes were made…

Julia and I recently bought a 17’ Clipper Tripper canoe. We’ve been on about 8 trips with it and our confidence has been growing. The Puget Sound taught us to avoid big boats. The Chehalis River taught us to pay attention to wind direction and speed. The Black River forced us to learn shallow water exit/entry repeatedly. Plus, a variety of other lessons as we’ve jumped into the deep end of the boating world.

However… nothing prepared us for what happened on the Green River between Auburn and Tukwila, just south of Seattle, WA, on Saturday, October 6th, 2018.

Early Saturday the 6th we headed out for a 15-mile paddle on a section of the Green we’ve never seen. It was a rather last-minute plan, as our weekend was open and the weather looked clear. It’s one of the many ‘urban’ rivers near Seattle that we have been exploring.

The day started out badly, possibly an omen of what was to come. We drove 2 cars to the put-in. That’s bad, because you need to drive both vehicles to the TAKE OUT first, so that 1 can be left there. We quickly realized our mistake and took the extra 40 minutes to drive to the proper take-out spot and leave my Jeep. We had another mini-adventure here because the take-out was not optimal. We scouted up and down the river for another close option, but ultimately stuck with the Van Doren’s Landing spot.

The put-in was another ordeal. The first spot we began to unload at was not possible to use. The gate was just enough for a person, not wide enough for a boat. A kind neighborhood homeowner asked us about our plans as we were unloading. He had never seen someone try to get a boat into the water via his street. He kindly gave us directions to a spot we could get through a wider fence just around the corner. This was probably red flag #1 (limited boat activity from a guy who looks to have lived there a long time). Immediately followed by red flag #2 when another friendly neighborhood homeowner at our next put-in spot also knew very little of boating on the river right behind her house.

We charged ahead, already past noon, two hours behind schedule. We instantly saw another canoe on the river. 2 guys in a red boat just like ours. Cool! We aren’t alone. This must be legit, someone else is doing it. A classic heuristic trap we learned from backcountry skiing avalanche training (just because someone else is doing it doesn’t mean it’s safe).

The first hour of floating was amazing. Perfect in every way. The water was flowing well, making our paddle strokes easy. We were making great time with little effort. This was the fastest water we’ve been in with our new canoe. The salmon were jumping left and right. One scared a scream out of Julia it jumped so close to our boat. There were fishermen on every bank. We probably passed 50 anglers in 10 miles of river travel.

The red flags began to stack up as the fishermen asked us if “it was safe” and “what do you do about the trees”. We shrugged it off with a laugh and kept going – everything was great!

Then we saw it. About 30 seconds after a fisherman said “there is a blockage ahead” - we came upon our first major hurdle.

A tree was blocking the entire river. Shore to shore, no way around in a boat. The left bank had eroded dumping the recently live tree exactly perpendicular to our path. I pointed our boat left, towards the base.

This is one of the most dangerous situations for boats of all types. The water is rushing under this obstruction. The flow wants to pull you under with it. The problem is that there is a mess of branches and other junk under the water. If you were to get pulled under – it’s very likely that you will get stuck – unable to swim upstream against the current and unable to swim downstream because of the branches/rocks. This is called a ‘strainer’ in the river community. Extremely deadly.

Luckily we handled the situation well. We balanced the boat, leaning into the tree. Julia scrambled out onto the huge trunk / muddy roots. I stabilized the boat as Skye made it towards the front of the boat. Julia pulled her on the tree by the scruff of the neck. Then I scrambled out too.

At this point our lives were relatively safe. The boat was still in a bad position though. We began to form a plan of squeezing the boat through the splintered base of this enormous tree. The water did not allow us to get the boat in line with the hole the tree provided. We pulled with all our might and eventually got the canoe wedged into the tree, out of the water. Some of our gear had floated away during this maneuver, but nothing irreplaceable (water bottles and booties).

Nothing worked. We could not get our canoe over/through the tree. The next plan was to go up the steep bank. It was nearly straight up – through blackberry bushes. I held the boat at Julia forged a path up the loose dirt into a thorny mess. 10 minutes later she returns with a story about the farmer. The farmer rode his 4x4 to the edge of the field, then kept on going. She screamed for help but no reaction.

I pushed while Julia pulled. 1… 2… 3… GO. 1… 2… 3… GO. 1… 2… 3… GO. 1… 2… 3… GO over-and-over. Sometimes I only heard the number 3. Sometimes I had no strength, so just held the canoe from falling back into the water. We eventually got it balanced where I could climb up myself and help from the other end. Climbing was one of the hardest things of the trip. There was a crux where I could not get my leg up another inch and there were no hand holds other than thorny blackberry vines and loose dirt. I eventually pushed in a faithful move, successfully. Skye bounded up easily.

Julia’s legs were bloody with scrapes by the time we got into the farmers field. We could finally rest. It was about an hour from the time we hit the tree to the time we laid in the field. Collard greens everywhere.

“Our friends are out picking pumpkins with their kids. We are bloody & sweaty sitting next to our canoe in a field of collard greens with our dog in a life vest.” Sounds about right.

At this point we had 2 options. #1 – call uber. They would take me to my car, I would return for Julia/Skye/canoe, and we’d be home with our tail between our legs. #2 – find another put-in downstream of the tree and keep paddling. We really were 50/50 on this until we found a relatively safe access back to the river. We both agreed we wanted to continue. The farmer has a pipe to pull water from the river where we scampered down to re-launch the adventure.

Back on the water, it felt good. I was still a bit shaky from adrenaline and fatigue. We were happy. It should have been another 30 minutes of paddling until the takeout. Then we hit major incident #2…

We rounded a bend in the river and saw a handful of wood obstacles. The majority of the river was running left so we naturally decided to stick with the flow. We zigged past 1, zagged for number 2, and hit 3 hard. This big log twisted us sideways, Julia’s bow end pointed directly at the left shore. We leaned into the log downstream, but it was too much force. We began to take on water as our upriver side dipped into the water. In seconds we were all tossed from the boat. Julia stayed next to the boat, standing almost immediately. Skye somehow ended up in the eddy behind the boat, frantically trying to climb onto the now sideways canoe. I floated into the next obstacle of wood. My head began to go under and my mouth filled with water. This was the closest I came to dying, which says a lot after our previous experience. I was quickly able to roll out of the tree, float away, and get my footing. I quickly returned to the boat to rescue Skye. I helped her to the shore where we all regrouped.

Once again – our lives were safe, but the boat was not.

The next hour was spent pulling on the boat in freezing cold rushing water. No progress was made. We could not budge the boat, even using rocks/logs as levers. Eventually we pulled the gear we could reach out of the boat.

Getting out of the river from this location wasn’t very easy. One bank had massive blackberry thorns. There was fast moving deep water between us and the other bank. We made the command decision to go for the easier exit (thorns are bad). We scouted an area that allowed us to walk without getting swept away. I pulled Skye using her life vest handle. It was cute how she tried to still doggy paddle as I pulled her across. After much effort we made it up to a bike path at Foster Park in Kent, WA.

The boat was pinned in the river, but all 3 of us were uninjured on shore. Cold.

I called for Uber. Sat on my rain jacket as we drove to my Jeep. 15 minutes later I was back to Julia to load up the few pieces of gear we owned. Drove home without a boat.

7pm we arrived home in Seattle. Started making plans to rescue our canoe first thing Sunday. Crazy decision – I went to play ultimate at 8pm. Hip Hop had a hard game vs. Huck Butters. I had been nursing an achilles injury the past 3 weeks. I was really looking forward to playing, plus getting to hang out with my good friends for a few hours was a valuable respite from the day’s incidents. We won 15-13!!

Back home at 10:30pm Julia was pulling the cat in a laundry basket with ropes and carabiners. This was a scaled down version of the pully system we were planning to execute. It worked on the 15 pound cat, it should work on our 1000 pound boat.

Sunday morning we were back in action. Sore, but moving by 8am. We staged everything in the garage to begin the rescue mission. Our friend Jared offered to lend equipment. I originally planned to buy everything necessary, but accepting help is often the smart thing to do.

REI was still our first stop. We needed rope to make a temporary ladder into the water from the steep bank. We also got a 200’ rope to use as a ‘safety line’, to prevent the canoe from going downstream further, potentially into the next obstacle, after we release it. Plus some carabiners, prusiks, and a wet suit top for Julia.

Jared lived only 4 miles from where our canoe was stuck. It was great to stop for gear + advice. Shortly after we were parked back at the scene of the incident.

The first activity was to verify the boat was still there. It was. Not folded in half or yanked out by some other crazy people with ropes. We could begin the operation.

We tied the ladder rope, lowered all the gear down, and setup shop on a small island near the boat. The first anchor was in the water – a sturdy stump about 50’ upstream of our canoe. I laid out the rope while Julia walked to the canoe to attach the 2 lines (1 primary pull and 1 safety backup).

Unfortunately the come-along we brought was not functional. We were unable to get the cable extended out. It was fully coiled, jammed shut. Luckily we had the pully system as backup.

The 3-to-1 mechanical system we setup with the pulleys worked well. It was the first time we’ve done this. I’d like to think we did it flawlessly, although I’m sure if any experts were around they would have found mistakes. The Z shape gave us triple the pull power, which was 100% necessary for the situation.

Pull. Pull. Pull. Pull. The boat barely budged. Although we were making small progress. We changed anchors to a spot more equal with the boat. Then a spot slightly downstream. We also moved the boat anchor from wrapped around the stern to the bow handle. My hands hurt. Pull. Pull. Pull. Pull.

I’m not one to ask for help hastily. If that tells you anything about the situation we were in – I called for help. Jared and his wife were quick to accept. They suited up and headed towards our location.

Julia and I waited for reinforcements. We got cold as this was the first break after getting soaking wet. We decided to setup the anchor system in preparation for help, mainly to stay busy. We secured the most durable anchor upstream and tightened all the prusiks. Then we decided to give it one last yank.

HOLY HOLY it’s moving! We saw the most action in this final yank. We started to pull hard then release. It was rocking free. We pulled then the river pulled. It was just like in the videos! The safety line worked as expected, preventing the boat from getting away downstream. We pulled towards our little island, eventually getting the boat in a safe location. High fives all around.

Throughout the day there were people walking on the path above the river. A few asked us if we needed help or simply took pictures. I’m sure they thought we were crazy. The sad part was that when we got the boat free – no one was watching. Julia yelled out in happiness. We got out of the situation just as we had arrived into it – alone.

I quickly texted Jared about our success. He was already en route. We began to clean up our equipment to prepare for the final stage of the rescue. The boat was not out of the river yet. We didn’t bring paddles or have any desire to continue paddling this river. The plan was to pull the boat up the bank and onto the Jeep.

Jared also asked a river friend of his to come help. Together we all pulled the boat up the bank and onto the bike path. I laid next to it completely exhausted 4 hours after we arrived at the river – about 4pm.

The boat looks to be in great shape. A minor bend in the gunnel. Slight discoloration in some of the Kevlar, but no real damage. We loaded it to the top of my vehicle, changed into dry clothes, and enjoyed warm cider with Jared and Lyss. A great ending to a crazy weekend.

Now we are home. The garage is full of wet gear. My online shopping cart is full of river rescue equipment. Skye has no idea how much danger we were in, she just wants to go on another adventure. Overall – life is good. Long list of lessons learned on this one. Julia and I survived an adventure together – handling the stress extremely well throughout. I’m proud of us.

A river rescue course is next on the list. Official training will be helpful the next time we get ourselves into a situation like this (I mean – so we can avoid another situation like this).

We almost died, then we didn’t. Yay.

-Chris