Ingraham Flats, WA

Ingraham Flats, WA

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Here's to Now

The past 20 days have been a whirlwind of office work, student programs, trad climbing training, crag clean up, and teaching improvised self rescue courses. Luckily, it is the holidays and the new year is right around the corner. As a treat to myself I am headed down to southern Thailand next week for some time on the beach, some diving, and most importantly some climbing.


We recently had the 8th annual Crazy Horse Buttress crag clean up and it was a great success. The morning consisted of splitting into groups and attacking all the crags. Mostly we just clean up trash, cleared the trails, and cleaned the routes as best as possible. We also hauled an ungodly amount of gravel to various crags to stabilize the belay areas, before the next rainy season. After a long morning of physical labor most people spent the afternoon either climbing or sleeping. I opted to explore the local area and familiarize myself with it. I ended up walking around to a temple on the back side of the crag and visiting a tourist cave. After that I ascended a long stretch of stairs to bang the gong at the top of Crazy Horse Buttress. Overall it was a pretty successful day. Check out the link below:






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So many stairs, drunk with fatigue


Views from the top

 Totally ignoring all safety measures

On one of my night time strolls I came across this gang of fixed geared riders at Tha Phae Gate. They were being very hipster and looking good. If your familiar with the movie "Stomp the Yard," it was very similar. Someone would do a trick and everyone would ooo and ahhh, then someone else had to out do it. Anyway, it was interesting to watch, though my camera didn't really get any good photos of the action.
Fixed gear gang at Pratu Tha Phae


Day practicing some gear placements



 



So, Christmas has turned out to be interesting here in Thailand. It's another strange Thai / Western cultural clash. The Christmas Promenade was set up at the Three Kings Monument here in Chiang Mai, it includes fish and chip stands, an ice ring, a band singing carols, a Thai Santa Clause, and of course a CMRCA climbing wall. Thought I would stop by the other night and see how everyone was getting on at the bouldering wall, which ended up being over run with kids. Below are a few pictures that may help put it into perspective.


Some random guy with Santa and co.

Ice skating in Thailand?

3 Kings Monument

The CMRCA Christmas booth


Katie and Santa


Sunday, December 4, 2011

Midnight Express and Doi Suthep

                Time is flying by already. I have been here a month and still feel like I got here yesterday. It may be due to the busy schedule and cultural adjustment, who knows. The last week was pretty hectic at the shop. We recently took out a writer for the New York Times and as such he wrote an nice article about Pi Taw and the company in general.


                Other than that we have been trying to get a new website up, premiered the Reel Rock Film Tour in SE Asia, and rock climbing at Crazy Horse. My friend Sam, who is working in Bangkok as a teacher, came up this weekend for a nice break. We ended up going out to Crazy Horse for a day of climbing, it was great to see Sam getting comfortable leading. Yesterday we headed up to Wat Doi Suthep, kind of a big deal in Northern Thailand. It was a good time.

Stairs to Doi Suthep

This what I got when I asked Sam to be happy

Doi Suthep

Gold is cool



Again I asked them to act happy, but I got strange instead


A monk painting some dragons




         So, I recently became a hypocrite. I purchased a fixed geared bike here in Chiang Mai after years of bashing them. My main purpose was to look cool with functionality being second and safety third. Actually fixed geared bikes are super cheap here. I bought this bike brand new and was given the choice of crank, head set, handle bars, tape, and pedals. All of this for under 200 green backs. Scooters sound good in theory but you can get anywhere in the city on a bicycle, and if I need a scooter for a longer trip I can rent one for relatively cheap. I've dubbed the new bike Midnight Express, after a pow-wow drum circle group from Montana.

Midnight Express

Thursday, December 1, 2011

Thai Field Trip






Ridiculous transport


Safety is always first

               I recently took part in a field trip with my Intensive Thai 1 class to the old elephant farm.
It was a pretty good day. Just watching elephants do elephant things like moving timber and painting pictures. The pictures pretty much sum it up. If your in the area check it out http://www.changthai.com/ .


Elephant bath?



Elephant impressionism

Finished product




Pig skins

Friday, November 25, 2011

Settling In

Well, it has been about three weeks since I have been in Thailand and I am slowly getting used to it. I am still living with a host family until the end of the week and then I am moving into an apartment south of Chiang Mai Gate, which is close to the market and work. Next week will be my last week of intensive Thai language lessons, which is good and bad. Bad in the sense that it will be over but good in the sense that I will be able to work full time at the shop and actually get out into the field. Next on the to do list is buy a scooter and a cheap guitar.


Moo young (translates to shredded pork), the family dog


Intensive Thai with Ajan Dear


Old Payap


I realized the other day that I had not put up any pictures of the shop or of Chiang Mai in general. That damn camera just seems to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But I plan on remedying that in the upcoming weeks. Here are a few photos from the last couple days:


Bouldering wall


The shop

I have also decided that my favorite part of everyday hits around 6 pm when the light is amazing, the sun is sinking low, and the temperature cools. Don't think I will ever get sick of it.













Wat Phra Singh


Wat Phra Singh


Wat Phra Singh


This is going to sound pretty strange but there is a fixed geared bicycle revolution happening here in Chiang Mai. I thought I escaped this fad when I left the upper Midwest (yeah I am talking to all you Minneapolis and Fargo hipsters) I was recently telling this to my buddy Andrew Haak, owner of North Coast Bicycle Restorations in Ann Arbor, MI, and he couldn't believe it. I had to document this and the pictures don't lie. Never been into fixed geared bikes much, namely because I have heard horror stories of guys going down hills and their chains falling off (crash), but whatever floats your boat I guess. If you get a chance check out Andys' website http://northcoastbikerestore.com/  (the website is still under construction but it will be done soon). He is doing some pretty sweet stuff over there. Great classic bikes in original condition at a very reasonable prices.


Fixie billboards?


One of many fixie shops


The Thai fixed geared revolution