Eight years old and spooked-out as our favorite horror monster Creature From The Black Lagoon. Lookin' our Ben Cooper best, too - cheap store-boxed Gill-man costume with vacuum-formed PVC plastic half face mask and silk screened smock that tied in the back hospital gown style. One size fit one, so for most the eye holes didn't align and you were constantly adjusting the thing for viewing one eye or the other. Best practice was to just wear the thing catcher-mask style when not behind home plate - until the elastic head band would eventually break. The smock hung like a potato sack and was constructed from a paper-thin synthetic fabric that whiffed off some space-age plastic polymer chemistry. If you're a shorter kid it's a bit clumsy and hazardous, too. While walkin' you'd occasionally plant a step on the longer draped smock and go stumbling face down. The box graphics, indicating in large type the costume to be "flame retarded", always caught our attention. We took it to understand that the legal department recognized that the suit could ignite and go up in flames and are covering their asses in event of mishap due to Halloween shenanigans. We always imagined a scene akin to the old (urban) legend ya' used to hear of the new bride, brewin' some morning after coffee, who got too close to the stovetop burner while wearin' her thin slinky honeymoon negligee and went up like a struck match (everyone was a product tester back in those days - now'days they're not allowed to sell half the stuff).
(Internet Image)
We're costumed and headin' out to march in our first, and subsequently last, city Halloween parade. The parade began around 7pm, well past 'fall-back' standard time 5pm darkness. Mom drops me and the buddies off at the staging area and books to find a spectator stance en route. The 'trick-or-treaters' are assembled en masse and are to bring up the rear of the parade. A contingent comprising the typical city officials, parade queen, decorated floats, emergency, fire and military squads and vehicles, high school marching bands and boys and girls scout troops lead the way.
The spectacle organized and began on the west side of town. The route followed the main avenue east, over the river bridge, thru downtown, then swung south, ending in the south side at the old armory building. Maybe a mile total distance. There's no marching order or formation to the trick-or-treaters, you're basically just walking along with your costumed buddies and the rest of the group. Ya' occasionally wave to familiar faces in the crowd ("Hi Mom!"). Along with the visuals, the curb-lined spectators additionally delight in watching the marchers jostle about retrieving their frequently tossed handfuls of candy and other treats. It would at times get a bit rough with the bigger guys. To the crowds delight, there was occasionally a bit of roughhouse pushing and shoving
About three quarters along the route sets the town library. The library building sets high above and a few hundred feet back off the roadway, fronted by a long down-sloping lawn and stepped concrete entrance walkway. A low stone retaining wall and wide concrete staircase separates the library grounds and street-level public sidewalk. Parade viewing from atop the wall or a higher lawn position is like viewing from the grandstands. There's no outdoor lighting to the lawn nor entrance walk. A bit of indirect lighting filters thru from adjacent street lighting, but that's it. It's pretty dark after nightfall. The entire property is contained in its own small city block. A bit trapezoid in plan layout, at best half a football field distance fronts the main avenue and parade route.
Up to that point everyone's had a good time and most have picked up a bit of a haul from the crowd. Hitting that short dark stretch passing the library was a different tale. The sidewalk spectators are tossin' treats as usual. From the darkness of the lawn we're suddenly gettin' pummeled with an aerial barrage of hard candy - gumballs, tootsie rolls, jelly beans, hard caramels, root beer barrels, lemon drops, Bazooka bubble gum - all coming in at high velocity. Worse were frequent jawbreakers - those things were the size of 12 gauge shotgun "punkin' ball" rounds and darn near as deadly. Saw one ricochet with a loud 'THUNK' upside the head of Casper the Ghost walkin' a few steps ahead, who immediately burst out bawlin'. Small arms fire, too - lots of shelled corn raining down. A salvo of mostly spoiled red apples cannonball in - a vampire Dracula takes a head shot and is immediately covered in rotted applesauce hair slick. Some individuals are purposely targeted - a wolf man is systematically tracked and hit with a few raw eggs and a tomato. A few small pumpkins shatter on the pavement. It got to the point that most of the costumed revelers passed on retrieving the pavement scattered treats. Witches, ghosts, goblins, Popeye the Sailor, Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker - they're all bee lining the short distance to the end of the block and clear of line of fire. Some in their haste are trippin' over their smocks and face plantin' - now sitting ducks. The assault eventually ceased and most returned to retrieve the abandoned loot. The assailants, now short of ammunition and having sparked the ire of marchers and spectators alike, fled.
We found out a few months later, while playin' summer basketball, that the assault was triggered by a few older guys from our end of town. Gotta' admit that the tale from their perspective was pretty funny.
The following Halloween mom inquires as to our plans for the parade -
"You guys marching in the parade again this year?"
"Naa - we're gonna' just watch from the library lawn".
Made the annual pilgrimage to the 'Keystone Nostalgia Nationals' last month -
Strolling thru the Pits...
... life in the lineup...
... a few crowd-pleasing smokin' burnouts...
... and wheelies...
... some track action...
Didn't take a whole lot of images as usual. We got there early and had to pack out around 2pm to finish paintin' the back porch before the predicted following day rain. Toted along an old Canon EOS Digital Rebel XT we have - wanted to check it out prior to passing it along. Works great - like new.
Always a great time - place was packed when we left...
... gotta' love the good ol' USA.
(Note: We never crop out the American Flag from edits if ya' happen to notice)
Muscle Girl Sarah checkin' in with us end of last week...
(Sarah Zagorce Image)
...just off a nine day Colorado River trip thru the Grand Canyon... we're full of envy
That's ok. Spent two fun days this past weekend drift casting streamers on the Yough. September is the official start of fishing season in our mind (usually September thru December). We hadn't touched a "standard" fly rod in a couple of years, preferring instead small creek fishing Tenkara style. Was a bit curious to see if we had lost any of our "big river technique" considering the long layoff. Not a concern. Fished both days pretty much early to mid-afternoon, probably 11am to 2pm. Deep Holes. Open water in a bright sun.
Pretty sluggish current this spot. Great spot, though, for (real) casting dry flys when things are hatchin'
Saturday hooked four average size browns drifting a #12 Wooley Bugger. Landed four on Sunday as well - three average size browns and one average size smallmouth, all drifting a #12 Muddler Minnow (the only streamer we generally ever use). Was so much fun we're now debatin' how we want to proceed once the temperatures start droppin' (and the copperheads and rattlesnakes have packed out). Alternative bit rough two to three mile hikes along forested tight creeks; trippin' fallen logs, limbs, greenbrier's and such. By and by wading sometimes rugged, lush stream channels with always the frequent line twists and snags. Or leisurely short rivers edge hikes or bit longer MTB rides with a brief jaunt over the river bank to wide open shoreline casting.
Lets think about this... some tunes for thought...
... three total badass pioneers of rock - Bruce/Baker/Clapton:
Encore (for the times):
We're givin' the film crew sound engineer and co. some credit as well - sounds better than if mixed in the studio - wow
Thus...
... think we'll stick with the creeks - still like that bit of misery factor. We'll still drop in a day of river casting here and there (if pressed, we can also be on the river within probably 1/2 hour from out the front door)
Annual attempt for a repeat of the short crack/seam on Whale Rock...
hard to pass up on a hot day and a good river level - think around 1.8ft OPG this day. Always good for a few not-so-serious efforts...
approach from up river - Whale Rock and the Three Sisters rock formations...
(Lower image from Internet - NOAA Fisheries)
guess that it does resemble an Orca whale in profile at this angle...
the Yough has to be one of the cleanest rivers anywhere when running clear - you can always infinitely see river bottom from this POV atop the Three Sisters when these conditions.
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Posting a third in a series of old film shorts:
Bouldering (1999)
Run Time 24min. (Approx.)
A bit of mundane minutiae: Filmed entirely on 16mm film - Eastman Kodak Color Negative 7245 EXR 50D (as we recall - there's a file folder in the archive cabinet with all the technical and processing details, but we ain't goin' back ta' look). Processed, color corrected/timed and scanned to Beta video tape for studio DNLE editing at WRS Film Labs located in Crafton, PA. They've since closed their doors a few years back*. Don't know how many (dubbing) generations this video print represents - we just grabbed an old off-the-shelf DVD for the MP4 transfer. Definitely a few considering the three-color bleeding. We discovered, too, that DVD discs apparently degrade over time - a few wouldn't function (20+ years age). Originally copied to VHS video tape with later transfer to DVD-disc when that format became available and we had acquired the resources. Filmed entirely MOS. Later studio dubbed the voice over and a few sound effects. It used to be fun goin' out and recording sounds (e.g., throwin' large boulders in the pond) - weren't any on line effects libraries at the time. Music pilfered (for the most part) from Gary Hoey's brilliant soundtrack to Bruce Brown's equally brilliant Endless Summer II theatrical film. YouTube apparently screens uploaded videos concerning copyright issues. They gave us the green light so I guess we're good. Posted for viewing herein only - no malicious intent intended. If it should disappear that's the reason. We sure as heck ain't goin' back and re-editing (although, we'd like to change some of the corny dialog). Either way thanks Mr. Hoey (and Co.)
Old school through and through. No pads back then ('99 and earlier) - carpet squares, old floor mats, an attentive spotter. Pads did arrive on the scene at around this time, though. We probably visited 20+ local SWPA boulder field and one-off sites throughout '97 to early '99 acquiring footage. Strongmen Rob and Matt with muscle girl Sarah as backup attended to the climbing chores. Your loyal scribe stepped in when necessary.
We had to keep the boulder problems to pretty much stuff we had wired (maybe V4 difficulty at the stiffest now'days) not wanting to "blow the budget" on wasted footage of repeated falls. Think that a 50ft film roll gave ya' about 3 minutes of footage. The spring-drive Bolex, Cine-Kodak and a Russian-made K-3 cameras we employed each gave ya' about an average 17 seconds shooting per (spring wind) drive cycle. We had video resources available (gave some consideration to Hi-8 photography), but wanted to stick with film for various reasons.
Strongman Matt was definitely primed at the time - a pretty good climber considering a 6'-3" frame at a body weight of probably around 215lb. He'd put up a few pretty hard un-repeated problems that he wanted to include but we told 'em no for the aforesaid reasons**. Also with consideration, knowing him, that it would be a big fight with 'em to back off if he failed on the first attempt or two and he would insist that we keep "rolling" (he wasn't payin' for film and processing). We eventually returned to three of those problems and he nailed two first try and the third on the third try. Boy was he pissed! He was pretty tall with a long reach, good vertical leap and pretty good at long dynos to small edges (see around 19:25 of the video as example). Toward the end he had wanted an MP4 copy to extract a few clips for Instagram posting, unfortunately time ran out.
Muscle Girl Sarah in current times on two old "Matt Dyno" routes
Consider this post dedicated to 'em
Final note: There's a fun end sequence of some "river bouldering". We were always out on the water so naturally would have some fun on the boulders and stone piers dotting the Yough gorge. There's a few good one-offs hidden back in the brush and upper slopes flanking the Lower Yough***. We caught a bit of flak for wanting to include that clip as it wasn't considered "real climbing". Those routes were usually climbed barefoot, so we stuck some climbing shoes on 'em to be legit - made sure to get at least one shot of the boots. Now'days "Deep Water Soloing" is just another recent sub-category to the fun of rock climbing - gotta' love progress.
*FYI for a guy or two who had questions regarding Super 8 film processing and video conversion - we came across these guys here, MovieStuff, LLC, who manufacture what appear to be pretty nice and affordable film scanners in every format.
**Also, nine times out of ten ya' can't tell the difficulty of a climbing move on motion pictures, anyway. We mainly just wanted to showcase the great bouldering around these parts. We're really just landscape photographers, adding people for scale.
***And we'll never tell, now, considering all the recent access issues around here.
A few weeks back. In between runnin' laps around the lake, while alternately in between shakin' some pesky gay dude who sprang from the bushes (an occasional annoyance over at the lake we've come to learn. He finally backed off after being asked if he could swim), we were lookin' on with interest watching a guy and gal in the parking lot prepping' a small trailered sailboat for launch. Never saw a sailboat in the lake before.
A bit of skepticism on our part. The lake seems a bit small for a sailboat. Whole time watching we're doing a bit of cypherin'. Think that the lake measures just a bit over 100 acres. Maybe 1/2 mile N-S and 3/4 mile E-W at it's widest. Subtract maybe another 1/10th mile along the eastern shore which is silted up to just under 1ft depth - we've had to line the SUP a distance throughout that area when it's 9 inch fin dragged bottom. Map distance for our usual paddle route is a shoreline loop of around 1.8 mile circumference hugging the shoals. Venturing outside that loop will afford ya' a draft of less than 1ft. We're figurin' they're gonna' need at least 3ft. Winds were fine - maybe 5mph. It could be double that on the water. It can get pretty windy out there. There were several instances that we've really struggled paddling into the wind. Quit paddlin' and you're quickly blown in reverse 5 or 10ft. Cross-current you're ridin' a bongo board. Once saw a gal out there on an inflatable SUP bein' blown around in circles. Couldn't get 100ft off shore. At least a hard board can cut the water and not just bob around on the surface.
Back in the '80's - '90's there used to be a few sailboarders who frequented the lake. Sailboarding used to be a big deal back in those days. Knew one of 'em through work. Talked a few times of meeting 'em over there to give it a try. Never came about. Eventually lost contact with 'em after he moved on to a new job. That eventually all died out. Haven't seen one around since then.
But, back to the sailboat. Hey, what do we know. Our sailing experience is limited to plastic boats in the bathtub.
We were always fascinated with sailing while living in Severna Park, MD, along the shore of the Severn River, in turn just up the road from Annapolis, MD, in turn along the shore of sailing mecca Chesapeake Bay. About every third person in the neighborhood owned a sail or power boat. Never got to go for a cruise, however. Invited a few times but was always busy at some other endeavor come the weekend. One thing that we always noticed about those older hard-core sailing guys was that they were all pretty physically fit - must be a pretty good workout tacking and jibing all weekend.
Anyway, once launched, it was obvious that the skipper knew the lakebed and had probably been there before. That small sailboat added a bit of dimension to the scale of the lake. Is a bit larger lake than it appears. Looked like fun.
End of the line - a hot but comfortable five miles out...
... a bit of effort with reward...
... big sky water summit of the ridge - a photogenic spot
All down river from there...
... all a few days back - lots of wildlife - flocks of merganser and wood ducks, deer, osprey, squirrel, crows, swifts, water snakes, hawks, turkey vultures, two beaver kits that sat along the river bank barkin' at Zman while photographing them - and somethin' black and unidentified that ran across ahead of the trail on the hike in...
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First became aware of Stand Up Paddleboarding (SUP) during a 2010 trip out to California's Huntington and Malibu beaches...
... watchin' this guy right here from the deck of Huntington Beach pier - he was rippin' on that thing, too. Thought that was pretty interesting - he was the only guy in the surf riding one...
Next day we were up the coast at Malibu's Surfrider Beach - saw a few more boards. Many of the folks were out beyond the breaks paddlin' around in the open ocean - most long distance. Forward thinking as usual - immediately the light bulb went on - "Boy, those things look like they'd be a lot of fun on long flatwater stretches of river or lakes back in PA - and a good workout ta' boot!"
A week later got back to PA and immediately looked in to where ya' purchase and what would be a good board for the river. No inflatable boards back then. The few we found were all soft top/ hard foam boards for paddling ocean waves. A bit sketchy for our intent ("Bet those hard foam boards ding pretty easy") - no big rocks or shallow rocky bottoms (usually) at the coastline shore breaks . One company, Surftech, made a 12'-1" soft top/hard foam board advertised as designed by big wave surfer and at the time the sports premiere practitioner, Laird Hamilton (would like to know what he got paid per board for havin' his name on 'em) and shaped by master craftsman Ron House. Can't beat that duo, we guessed. On top of that, REI peddled the brand and would ship 'em direct to store for pickup. Conveniently, they'd recently opened a store in SWPA. We called the store direct to place an order and spent probably twenty minutes on the phone with a sales person trying to explain what we were talking about. Luckily they had an item number on their website so was eventually able to communicate with the guy. Can't fault him, though. Not one person to whom we had tried to describe the activity had a clue as to what we were talking about ("What the f*k are you doin' now?... a surfboard ya' paddle on the river??!). Got some unusual looks.
As suspected, the foam boards (eventually picked up a second) did ding (dent) a bit easily so we took it easy on 'em, limiting their use to forgiving stretches of river. After a few seasons, and as the activity became more popular, inflatable boards - synthetic elastomer coated tight stitched polyester fabric similar to a rubber raft - more suitable for river "running" and distance touring became available. That's all we use on the river nowadays - they take a pretty good beating. The foam boards are still the preference for the lake - they're pretty fast.
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Again back in 2010 - we visited a usual paddling spot to shoot a bit of photography and video footage to test out a then recent GoPro camera and several camera mounts. The footage wasn't bad so we edited together a short for fun:
SUP (2010)
Run time 7min (approx.)
A couple DSLR images we probably posted previously herein:
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