I was in town today getting snow tires for Erin’s Jeep, and when I’m in town, I often head over to Hyperspud to look at maps, books and gear that I can’t afford. Today I was looking through the book Mountaineering: Freedom of the Hills put out by the aptly named Mountaineers Press. They put out some nice hiking guides and how-to books for outdoor recreation. Turns out, this book is the “Bible” for mountaineers, and I want it. I also desperately want to get into mountaineering so that I may continue to hike and explore all year round. While researching a potential winter hike to [read more...]
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Picture of the Week |
On Friday, I woke up to find a light layer of white on everything. At first, I thought it was a heavy frost, but when I put my glasses on, the truth was revealed. We had our first snowfall. It wasn’t much, less than an inch, and by late afternoon, all was gone. It wasn’t the first snow of the season either, but it was the first to stick on the ground, especially at our elevation. But Sunday night, it began to [read more...] I’ve got two new books available for purchase. 2010: The Year of Change, Volume 1 is a collection of photographs and stories from the first half of the year. 2004-2007: A Portfolio from the Archives is a portfolio from my first four years out of college. This book is more of a photo portfolio rather than a personal album. I’ve been so busy lately that I haven’t been able to make any new posts. I wish I could tell you that I’ve been busy doing some sort of interesting research, but that’s just not the case yet. However, during my drive home this evening, I was given a nice treat. My drive to and from school is about 25 miles, one way. This is a bit on the long side but nothing that can’t be done. I do sometimes envy those [read more...] We’ve been in and out of the Altoona area to pack up belongings in preparation for the big move later this summer. We usually stay with Erin’s grandfather who lives on a farm off of Rt. 22 near Williamsburg. He has some “stray” cats that he feeds, but won’t get spayed or neutered, so every so often we find a litter of kittens. Two weeks ago, we were visiting and the kittens were out playing. I couldn’t resist a photo shoot. [read more...] I haven’t been very good at updating this or my livejournal in a while. I’ve been fairly busy for the past few weeks. I returned to my job at the mountain campus (www.mountaincampus.org, check us out) in the middle of March and spent the first two weeks cleaning up and preparing for the season. With all of the heavy snow this winter, we had a fair number of trees fall in critical places, so we spent the better part of a week removing some of them. It’s been so wet, though, that we can’t get to all of them with the truck yet, so there are still many downed trees remaining. We also got all of the tents set up and the buildings deep-cleaned so they would be presentable for a summer camp open house. Last Friday, Steve and I went camping at Hone Quarry outside of Harrisonburg. The Forest Service campground is small and rustic, and nestled in a deep hollow of Shenandoah Mountain. It’s a beautiful spot that feels isolated even though it’s fairly close to civilization. It’s also not very crowded in the off season. We managed to choose the coldest night to camp. Temperatures dropped down to about 25 degrees Fahrenheit, which is the comfort limit of my 20 degree sleeping bag. It’s good to know the insulation survived the washing machine. In the morning, we hiked the short trail to a rock overlook and then tried to drive to Reddish Knob, but at 4300 feet, the road still had some snow drifts near the summit that were not going to fare well with my car. We headed down the mountain and went to Second Mountain for an afternoon of bouldering. Last weekend, the new staff arrived for the start of training. We’ve been teaching them the ropes (literally) while playing on the elements and getting them set up for the new season. Training continues next week and we’ll get our first school group the week after. Here are a few photos documenting our fun. Continue reading Life at Camp .flickr-photo { border: solid 2px #000000; }.flickr-yourcomment { }.flickr-frame { text-align: left; padding: 3px; }.flickr-caption { font-size: 0.8em; margin-top: 0px; }
Holy Smokes, it’s March already? My how time flies. It’s funny how time goes by when life is mundane and you feel like you’ve wasted the days. On the other hand, when you’ve got something to look forward to, it just can’t come fast enough. I suppose I ought to let you, my readers, up to speed on my [read more...] For the longest time, I have been wanting to re-design my site to make it easy to update and manage content. At first, I thought a content management system would suit me, but I found them to be a bit daunting. Perhaps later I’ll re-visit the idea, but for the amount of content that I actually publish, a blogging platform would do me much better. I still have the photography up using Gallery2 and the main website is now using WordPress. I figured if I’m going to provide stories and updates, I might as well do it in blog form rather than use dreamweaver and static content. So, welcome [read more...]  On top of The World Originally uploaded by Matthew Singer. Its Memorial Day Weekend already! My how time flies. There’s been a lot happening lately, and between illnesses and deaths in the family, I haven’t been out exploring and backpacking as much as I would have liked. I’m finally going to get out on my three-day weekend. I will be hiking the Three Ridges Wilderness loop with two nights out on the trail. Next week, Erin and I leave for Las Vegas for a friend’s wedding. I’m more excited about [read more...] |
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Copyright © 2012 Matthew Singer - All Rights Reserved |
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