General – Page 6

To the Olympics

I ordered my Tom Bihn Aeronaut 45 in December 2014 to use as my main travel bag but it had been sitting idle for a year and a half. Not because I didn’t like the bag, but because I wasn’t taking trips. Understandable at first, as Emma died soon after and left me broken-hearted, then we adopted Trixie and there was much work to be done getting her introduced and accepted by the others. And late in 2015 and early in 2016 my project at work left me too tired to want to drive anywhere.

But mostly I was just not dealing with the daily stresses of life as well as I should have. So after my project finished up I decided it was time to put things to right. Since the commute to work had gotten more and more stressful the past few years, the last thing I wanted to do on weekends was get back in the car, so I quit driving to work and went back to taking the light rail. It takes longer but (most days) is less stressful and I added a few things that make the train time more enjoyable than it used to be. My goal was not just to reduce the daily stress but also to make me more willing to get in the car to go hiking.

I’ve long wanted is to have a handful of places within a day’s drive that I visit frequently enough that I can schedule a trip without much planning at any time of the year, so the next step was to start taking some short trips. In April I chose the easiest such place, the lower elevations of Olympic National Park, a place I had been to a handful of times. I deliberately chose a weekend where rain was expected as I wanted it to rain while I was in the rain forests, so I made my plans on a promising weekend, loaded up the Subaru, and I was off to the Olympics.

The Aeronaut (the Aubergine bag in the middle) was joined on its inaugural trip by my beloved Tom Bihn ID carrying my computer, as it has every day for 13 years. Joining them were my Tom Bihn Guide’s Pack as my backpack (I’ve had the bag for a while but this was my first chance to test its new padded hip belts), the Tom Bihn Tripod Quiver carrying my tripod, plus a variety of smaller Tom Bihn bags like organizers and stuff sacks. And even a few non-Bihn bags, a couple of which I’ve had for decades. Most notably my Tamrac camera bag holding my camera gear as it has for every hike for the past couple of decades, but which may finally be approaching the end of its active use. Also a Nike duffel that carried extra clothes since it was hard to tell how warm or cold or wet or dry the weekend was going to be. This one is also decades old but it’s led an easy life, mostly either storing extra gear on trips like this from spring to fall, and during the winter storing a small army of old towels that I use when photographing at Ridgefield on rainy days. Rounding out the crew of bags was my Domke F-5XB camera bag, a small bag that normally I use for short little trips like when walking our dog Ellie, and while I don’t take it hiking it is handy for storing overflow camera gear on trips like this.

The bags worked well and took some of the friction out of packing and traveling and a couple of months later I packed them up again for my second hiking trip, with more to come soon. The Aeronaut got its first real test when it joined the ID and Domke bags on a trip to visit family, my first flight in years and my first time with all carry-on, the backpack straps and grab handles on the Aeronaut really showed their worth on that trip. I fell in love with it on the first trip, it’s not an inexpensive bag but like all my Tom Bihn bags it’s thoughtfully designed and manufactured and I expect it will join the ranks of bags I use happily for many years.

And I love that color.

The ID at Twelve (and a Half)

[Update February 10, 2017: I retired this ID after thirteen years and replaced it with a newer one.]

My Tom Bihn ID messenger bag has been in daily use for twelve (and a half) years now. I first wrote about it in my eleven year review and it is still the bag I use every day. I’ve added a few accessories, most importantly a 16″ Tom Bihn key strap with a Fenix E12 flashlight attached at the end. It’s not so much for me to see as for me to be seen as I’m walking on my commute, either to or from the train when I take the MAX or in a dark parking lot on days I drive. The red color of the strap makes it easy to see in the bag, which is not true for the flashlight which sadly only comes in black. Because the strap is near the side of the bag, while walking I can reach behind me and under the flap and grab the strap without breaking my stride, enabling me to pull the flashlight out without stopping or even moving the bag around to my front. It’s also nice that the light can hang from the strap if I need to adjust my gloves or use the phone.

I also added a new Brain Cell that is perfectly sized for my 15″ MacBook Pro and an Aubergine Side Effect (with a safety whistle attached in the picture) which fits in the front of the ID and adds more organization. I’m still deciding exactly what to keep in the smaller bag, or if I’d rather leave it in my backpack instead. I put a USB stick on another key strap, I don’t need one very often, but this way I always know I have one and can get to it quickly. I also have an iPad now which makes taking the train much more pleasant, and it can go in several different places. I usually place it beside the Brain Cell in the laptop compartment where it’s pretty secure, but it can also go more loosely in the front compartment or in the magazine pocket on the back of the bag (it can be stowed very quickly there, a convenience if I’m a little late in realizing my stop is coming up).

I have gone back to riding the train most days which puts a lot more stress on the bag than when I drive, as it is under load during the time I’m walking to and from the train and when I’m standing because there isn’t a seat available. But the train commute really highlights why I’ve so loved this bag. It’s wide enough for my 15″ laptop and deep enough to carry the things I take everyday with room left over for the occasional bulky items, but not so large as to get in the way on the train or encourage over-stuffing (I don’t like backpacks on the train but in my opinion they are the only good solution for heavy loads). The front strap keeps the bag cinched down in a narrow profile but can be expanded so I can stuff a hoody or jacket in the bag during the spring and fall days when the temperature is changing drastically during the day.

After all these years the ID is gently preparing me for the day that our time together draws to a close. The back zippered compartment where the laptop goes in particular is having issues as some of the stitching is coming out or fraying from the velcro of the Brain Cell when it’s left open. Then one day while in a hurry I tried to zip the compartment closed too quickly (the new Brain Cell sits a little differently that the old one) and one of the zippers popped off one of the tracks. The other zipper still works fine but it keeps me from just zipping both ends a bit, a little trick to quickly force both ends to tuck in well below the flap for extra protection in a heavy rain. The pad on the shoulder strap is also showing wear from heavy use. In general though the bag is in great shape so it will hopefully last me for a while yet.

I don’t know what I’ll do when it’s time to retire the bag from every day use, as the ID has been discontinued and Tom Bihn hasn’t announced a replacement. And even when they do, since the ID has been such a perfect fit for me, no matter how nice the new design is I doubt it could delight me quite as much as the ID.

I’ve been meaning to post this update for a while but resisted for one simple reason — when I’d set up to photograph an item before, our cat Emma (who hated to be photographed) would come over and photobomb the pictures (she’s the black cat in the pictures in the eleven year review). She died a few months after that review and for a while it was too painful a reminder to set up the bag for a picture and know that Emma wasn’t going to come running over to sit nearby.

So it delighted me to no end when I set up the ID for a quick picture and Trixie came over and started chewing on the key strap that holds the flashlight. Professor Boo then came over and showed his young charge how you can retrieve the flashlight by pulling on the strap, while gently telling her not to be embarrassed, we all have to learn not to eat flashlights. I don’t know what triggered them to come over as they’re both very familiar with the bag — in fact it was one of the first things they each saw when we adopted them, Boo in 2013 and Trixie in 2015, as I brought it with me when I sat with them while they were in isolation — but it was a nice little homage to our dear departed Em.

The ID is within arms reach of nearly every picture I post unless I’m out hiking or taking Ellie on a walk. It’s at my feet when I’m on the couch taking pictures of the pets sleeping on me and I bring it with me when we need to keep one of the pets in isolation (as with Sam below when he was recuperating after getting teeth pulled). At Ridgefield it’s tucked in behind the driver’s seat as I photograph the animals on the auto tour. It’s gone with me on all my hiking expeditions to Yellowstone and Mount Rainier and the like, but it stays in the hotel room while I hike. It goes with me to work every day and is sitting beside me now on the train.

I’m a little shy of fifty so I’ve been using the ID for over one out of every four days I’ve walked the earth. It’s one of the best products I’ve ever purchased, in any category, so its replacement will have big shoes to fill. Many, many thanks to the team at Tom Bihn for both designing and manufacturing such a great bag.

“What a day. I’m beat!”

I hear you pup, I hear you.

After my project this year proved unexpectedly difficult, I was running out of steam and looking forward to time off for the Christmas break. But before I could get there I had to work the past two weekends to help the hardware team get ready for the next board turn. They got the design finished and most of my design work is done as well, so today I was able to start two weeks of vacation.

I was exhausted last night and went to bed early yet still slept to 10 a.m, a rarity for me these days. Ellie was waiting patiently in her bed which sits beside ours, waiting to go on her morning walk. By way of apology for making her wait so long I took her on a different route through the neighborhood so she could enjoy lots of new smells, at least what remained after days of heavy rain.

I was in a bit of a fog today so I didn’t do much. Sam and Trixie slept on me most of the day and Boo joined us in the evening. Tomorrow’s big accomplishment will be to watch football all day. Monday I may venture out for some photography, my foot is still a little sore but it has healed enough that I’m willing to give it a little test. If it’s raining heavily I’ll probably venture up to Ridgefield since I can stay in the car on the auto tour, I haven’t been since my visit in January right after Emma died, and it will be good to see some wildlife again. If the weather’s not too bad I’d like to take the new lens and do some hiking in the Gorge.

Downtime

Between being overly tired or sick, I’ve spent a lot of time this fall not doing much of anything but sitting on the couch covered in cats. It was supposed to be an easy year for me at work but my project proved unexpectedly difficult and left me mentally tired at the end of the day. To top it off traffic, which has been getting steadily worse since we moved to Portland years ago, crossed a threshold this year and I’m spending almost as much time on the road (and sometimes more) as when we used to live much farther away.

By the time I get home and take Ellie on her walk, eat dinner, and take care of the cats, I’m so tired I fall asleep on the couch surrounded by the little ones. On the weekend I just want to let my brain shift into neutral and not think about much of anything. Making decisions, even minor ones, has gotten more difficult, so I put off what I can. I haven’t been hiking at all this year apart from a few days in January, at first because I didn’t feel up to it after Emma died and later because I was either too tired or didn’t want to get back in the car after dealing with traffic all week.

The past couple of months it feels like I’ve been sleepwalking through my life. I’ve had this post half-written for weeks but stringing nouns and verbs together didn’t sound too appealing in my free time. It wasn’t a conscious decision but I realized I not only wasn’t taking pictures, even of the pets, but wasn’t editing my backlog, usually a favorite way to pass the time.

I’ve taken a few days off to extend my Thanksgiving break and am starting to get back on track. I’ve been able to get a bit more sleep, and this weekend I was back taking pictures of the pets. No hiking yet as I hurt my foot, it’s nothing serious but it hasn’t mended enough to risk it on the trails quite yet. It’d probably heal quicker if I stayed off it and stopped taking Ellie on her walks, but I can’t give that up, it’s one of the best parts of my day.

This picture of Sam sleeping on my legs is from September. He and Trixie are curled up on my legs at the moment, with Boo beside us and Ellie asleep in her dog bed below my feet.

Hope Springs Eternal

The route Ellie and I take on our walk through Irving Park is lined with old oak trees, so in the fall we are surrounded by ripened acorns that have fallen to the ground. They smell enough like food to Ellie that she wants to sniff them, but not enough like food to try to eat them. Still, she wants to sniff each acorn just to be sure, hope springs eternal when it comes to food with this dog. This morning a storm knocked a bunch of green acorns to the ground and some kids collected them and stuffed them into the largest hole the dogs had dug in the dog park. Ellie of course had to sniff them, although not for long, the green acorns didn’t hold the appeal of the ripened ones.

In the picture below, Ellie again “sniffs” the acorns. I put sniffs in quotes because this was our evening walk and the morning’s sniff had already revealed there was no food to be had, so she wasn’t interested in further inspection. I wanted a different vantage point than the morning picture however so I bribed her by placing one of her treats beside the acorns. We must have been in a vortex that swallowed sound, however, as several times she seemed not to hear me when I gave the “leave it” command and instead ate the treat as soon as I set it down.

Poet Tree

Several people in the neighborhood post poetry outside their homes, either in a dedicated housing or in this case, attached to a large tree by the street. Sometimes the poetry is self-written, while some highlight the work of others. Ellie and I pass by this tree pretty frequently on our walks, depending on the route she wants to take home, and the postings change over time, a Pooh quote below and a poem above. I was rather struck by the current poem, Langston Hughes‘ “I, Too”. I despised poetry in my youth so it’s not surprising that I was familiar with neither poem nor poet, but I was both moved and educated on our walk that evening.

I, Too

I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table,
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,”
Then.

Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed —

I, too, am America.

Langston Hughes

This Is the President I Voted For

Honest and heartfelt, passionate and powerful. Hopeful. Inspiring.

I Know That Look …

… there’s a UFO above my head, isn’t there.

No snow for us this winter, this is from last year.

Aubergine

I ordered Tom Bihn’s Aeronaut 45 in December with an Aubergine exterior and Wasabi interior. I was hoping to first use it on a trip to the Hoh Rain Forest, as I’m determined to finally visit when it’s actually raining, but life intervened. I’m still hoping to get up there this spring, but in the meantime I took a macro shot of the ballistic nylon fabric.

Mr. Boolie Goes to Washington

I was trying out a lot of new hiking gear on my weeklong hiking trip in September to Mount Rainier National Park and Olympic National Park. In the picture above, the hiking pants and hat are old, but everything else I’m wearing is new right down to my socks and shoes and undies, and it all worked out rather well. The green wool hoody I’m wearing, an Ibex Hooded Indie, I loved so much when I got home I ordered two more for myself and another for my wife.

The backpack is The Guide’s Pack from Tom Bihn, this was my first time hiking with it and it did great. In the pack were more new items, including an Ibex wool coat (the Shak Lite) and an Outdoor Research rain shell (the Foray), both of which I was wearing earlier in the morning but took off as the sun came out, and both of which got tested over the next few days as the rain and cooler weather rolled in. I can’t speak yet to how they will wear with time, but so far I’m sold on the Ibex wool layers, they’re thin and easy to pack but dried quickly and kept me warm when it was cool but I didn’t overheat in warmer weather. This was my first time not wearing cotton layers and I was surprised at how much more comfortable I was, to the point that I began to feel rather foolish for not having moved away from cotton years ago. The Foray rain shell also did well, not a drop of rain got through and it seemed to breathe better than my previous coat.

My shirts were some new synthetic shirts from a variety of outdoor companies as well as one wool shirt from Ibex, and those too I was pretty happy with. Cotton is still the softest but these performed much better on the trail when I started to sweat and were still plenty comfortable.

Funnily enough it wasn’t my new gear that failed me, but rather my trusted old hiking shoes, I learned the hard way that they aren’t as waterproof as they once were. Fortunately I had brought some other new shoes that I pressed into service, even though I had planned for them to be more general purpose shoes. I’ll pick up some new waterproof hiking shoes this fall.

The rucksack design of the Guide’s Pack allows it to swallow a variety of loads. I ordered it thinking I’d pack it with my normal hiking gear, but when it arrived I realized it could hold my Canon 500mm telephoto lens. I hiked with the big lens quite a bit on this trip, too much to be honest, as it weighs 8.5 pounds and I wasn’t in good enough hiking shape for that much weight. The backpack has a frame which helped with the weight, but with all the elevation changes I ended up a bit too tired on some days. Normally I’ll carry a more moderate load as I realize this heavy of a load could shorten the life of both the bag and its wearer, but it’s nice to know I can take it on trails where I expect to see a lot of wildlife. Which on this trip meant trails where from past experience I expected to see pikas and marmots and I came away with some pretty nice pictures thanks to the new bag.

Still, I’d like to limit how often I carry that heavy of a lens and will look for something a little more portable than the 500mm lens but that can replace my aging 100-400mm lens, as it is in need of repairs but I’m hesitant to spend much money on it as it lacks some features of more modern lenses (including weather proofing).

This was my normal hiking setup in terms of the bags I carried, what varied was how much camera gear I carried on any particular hike. The Tripod Quiver (also from Tom Bihn, and also new for this trip) held my Gitzo carbon fiber tripod, while the backpack held either my Canon 500mm lens or the 100-400mm lens, plus extra coats and clothes and food. The Tamrac camera bag held my 100-400mm lens when it wasn’t in the backpack, my Canon 7D SLR, and my Canon M mirrorless camera, plus a water bottle for easy access (new water bottles for the trip too).

I had intended to take the new bags on short hikes closer to home before the trip but ran out of time, so they got pressed into heavy duty service immediately. Not to worry, they both worked out great. I got constantly drenched on multiple days and while the dampness did eventually penetrate the bag, I had everything inside in smaller bags so everything stayed dry. I will probably look into a rain cover for future use, even though I typically don’t have to hike in such a steady rain, but it would be nice to have for emergencies.

One thing I wish I had more of was stuff sacks for the extra coats and clothing I kept in the bag. I had one for one of my layers and attached the bag with key straps to the o-rings in the bag, which made it easy to find and access when I wanted to put on the jacket. But I didn’t have stuff sacks for the other layers and their zippers scratched the paint on the big white lens. Easy enough to rectify on my next Tom Bihn order.

The Tripod Quiver I originally intended to attach to the backpack but found that carrying it on its own with the Absolute Strap was both comfortable and convenient. I took the tripod on every hike, something I’ve been loathe to do in the past, so that worked out nicely.

All in all the new gear worked out well and made for more enjoyable hiking.

The Tamrac camera bag certainly wasn’t new, I bought it the mid-1990’s and it has been with me on every hike since. Like the Tom Bihn bags, it was made here in the United States, and even outlived the company that made it. I was in graduate school when I bought it based on some research, as even though it wasn’t very expensive, every dollar was precious back then. Even so I never would have believed it would be my hiking partner two decades later, but here we are. It fits nicely in overhead bins of even puddle jumpers, so it’s easy to take on trips.

Since it can sometimes be hard to judge the size of things when online shopping, I thought I’d provide this helpful size comparison of the Tom Bihn Guide’s Pack. Based on my preliminary observations, I’d say it’s somewhat larger than an iPhone and somewhat smaller than Mount Rainier.

Up above the tree line on Mount Rainier there’s a fine dirt everywhere so my beautiful new bag didn’t stay clean very long, as this shot from my room in the Paradise Inn shows. Which is good, because I haven’t been hiking enough the past couple of years and it’s a sign things are headed in the right direction. A dirty bag on the trails is better than a clean one in the closet.

I was waiting for the sunset at Rialto Beach near the end of the trip and took a quick shot of the two new bags. The next morning I went to the Hoh Rain Forest and then drove back to my home in Portland. I’m not quite done getting bags, I’ve got my eye on an Aeronaut 45 for longer trips instead of my rolling suitcase, as at most of the places I stayed I had to carry the suitcase and the duffel/backpack style of the Aeronauts would have been much more convenient, and maybe an Aeronaut 30 and/or a Smart Alec for shorter trips.