For All

Ah to be alive
on a mid-September morn
fording a stream
barefoot, pants rolled up,
holding boots, pack on,
sunshine, ice in the shallows,
northern rockies.

Rustle and shimmer of icy creek waters
stones turn underfoot, small and hard as toes
cold nose dripping
singing inside
creek music, heart music,
smell of sun on gravel.

I pledge allegiance

I pledge allegiance to the soil
of Turtle Island,
and to the beings who thereon dwell
one ecosystem
in diversity
under the sun
With joyful interpenetration for all.


- Gary Snyder

November

Det er som oftast når timane helst skal brukast på eksamenslesing, at eg tykkjer eg kan ta meg tid til å drikke te, eta lefse med nugatti, og lage lister over alt som er koseleg og fint. 

Som for eksempel utsikta frå Studenterhytta, røsslyng, kanelbollar, postkort, Green Eyes av Coldplay, og Bakklandet.

<3

sommarkos

Fjelltur med søtingane. Klatring. Lange lyse kveldar med pils på trappa. Den der solkremen som luktar slik at han minnar om kvar einaste sommar så lenge eg kan hugse. Te, øl, vin, vodka og kake-kveld på Slette. Frisk og rein fjelluft, som alltid kjennes ekstra god når det er varmt og klamt nede i bygda.

Og Toppturar.

God Sommar!

BOULDER, Colorado

Guitars, banjos, climbing, bouldering, sun, sun, sun, tea, mountains, and more bouldering!

Pictures will be up when I get back to Norway

Jenter på tur!

After almost 20 hours on a Greyhound bus I arrived in San Francisco where Marie and Belinda picked me up in a white, clean, Nissan rental car. And after plotting in "south" on our GPS, we were ready for another road trip.
Here's a summary.

We quickly realized we were to have an exciting start, trying to get out of San Francisco in the rush hour(s). It took us a little while, and lots of people honked at us, but we made it out to hwy1 alive and were happily able to relax and "cruise" all the way to Santa Cruz (høhø..). Anyways, that's about all that happened that day. We arrived in Santa Cruz after dark, parked the car and fell asleep. When we woke up we were all cold and hungry for a shower, so we bought ourselves a day pass to a gym in town so we could feel healthy and clean. After lazing around in the swimming pool, the sauna, learning about hummus in the steam room and trying out other gym stuff, we drove down to the Santa Cruz boardwalk to have lunch on the beach.
After a very windy picnic we decided we couldn't leave Santa Cruz without having been at the "Mystery Spot", so we drove out to the woods and got to hang at a 17 degree angle and ponder the mysteries, which was pretty cool for 5 dollars.
We eventually got moving further south, but stopped in Carmel since we'd heard the coast south of there down to Cambria would be the prettiest part and we wanted to see that in daylight. So we parked our little Nissan outside a nice neighborhood, cooked up a pretty good pasta meal, curled up in the car seats and went to sleep.

The next morning was colder than the one before, but as soon as the sun came out we drove to the nearest cliff suitable for a pancake breakfast.
The coast south of Carmel was even more beautiful than we had imagined and we had a really great day stopping at almost every mile and seeing such amazing nature. There were flowers everywhere, in all sorts of different colors, birds and elephant seals and friendly locals (one woman we talked to gave us each a free surfing dvd).
After eating lunch in sweet little Cambria, we drove almost directly to Santa Barbara, and once again in need of a shower and a good night's sleep, booked outselves in to a hostel.

We walked around Santa Barbara for a little while the next day, and it's a really pretty little city, but the beach was too cold for sunbathing so we got in the car and drove down to L.A and Santa Monica, hoping that beach would be warmer.
Again we got stuck in rush traffic, and the L.A traffic is so much worse than the San Francisco traffic that when we arrived at our destination we were happier about being alive than we had ever been before. Not only was the traffic going faster, there were up to 6 lanes each way, packed with cars, going 50-80 miles per hour (80-120km/h). It was scary, but at least now we're not afraid to drive in Oslo anymore.

L.A wasn't any warmer than Santa Barbara, and with neither of us being very excited about the city of angels we only stayed for one night. We wanted to see all the famous stuff though, so we booked a tour and went sightseeing like real tourists. Venice Beach, Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills (only famous person house we saw was one that Marilyn Monroe supposedly lived in at some point), Sunset Strip, Hollywood walk of fame, Chinese Theatre, Kodak Theatre, Farmers Market.
The Farmers Market was really cool, the other stuff wasn't very impressive. As Belinda put it when we were at the Hollywood walk of fame; "det ser litt ut som ein halvferdig byggeplass" (It kinda looks a little bit like a halfway finished construction site).


Pictures, the rest of the road trip and a summary of the past week(s) might be up before I get back to Norway. Right now I'm enjoying life and the sun in Boulder, Colorado, drinking tea, climbing and hanging out with Hana and Josh (and soon Flannery!)
:]

Portland

I've had two absolutely beautiful days in Portland, and it's by far my favorite city so far on this trip, a little bit because of the weather (sun, a clear blue sky and 25-30 C), but also because it's just a really cool and beautiful place. The city is full of art galleries, flowers and beautiful, old houses, and it has a really laid back comfortable feeling to it.
Later today I'm taking the Greyhound bus (or maybe a train?) down to San Fransisco where I'll hook up with Marie again and her friend Belinda, and maybe go on adventures in another rental car!
:]

Fjell, strand og regnskog! Roadtripping around the Olympic Peninsula

After a day (or was it two?) at Sylvia's house, Marie and I set out for yet another adventure. With lots of help from our host, car reservations and enough (in backpacker standards) gourmet food to survive for a few days we headed west to drive around the Olympic Peninsula.
Here's a short summary.

DAY 1: Tacoma - Port Townsend
Not much to report, we made it painlessly to Port Townsend where we walked up and down the main street, enjoyed the scenery, had ice cream and hung out with the local (drunk) hippies for a little while before driving out to the hostel. We made it out there without hitting any deer, which at one point I was sure we would as they were everywhere. It's pretty cool though, we soon discovered it was like this all over the Olympic Peninsula, and they don't seem to be very afraid of people, so you can see them up close (like right outside your car).
The hostel was nice, though we got the feeling it could have been taken straight out of a thriller movie. The only ones there was the bald manager and an old man, but luckily I don't think any of them had intentions of killing us.

DAY 2: Port Townsend - Forks

Dungeness Spit, Port Angeles, Hurricane Ridge, Lake Crescent, wine, and an afro american police man in Forks (which according to him was pretty unusual).

Dungeness Spit

DAY 3:
Forks - Hoh Rain Forest - Ruby Beach - Ocean Shores - Aberdeen.
Sun, sun, sun. This day started out really cold, waking up in the car earlier than we'd woken up the past 3 months, but ended up being the most beautiful day on our trip. We drove up to the Hoh Rain forest, where we changed in to our "running clothes" and ran for about 6-7 miles (omtrent ei

mil) among HUGE trees in this amazingly green and old forest. The idea was to jump in the river when we got back to the parking lot, but we chickened out and ran in to the warm restrooms instead.
The day ended in Aberdeen, we took the long way there, along the coast and via Ocean Shores. The plan was to park somewhere in Aberdeen and sleep in the car again, but the city was full of drunk people (yelling or sleeping on the streets), so we drove on, found a rest area a few miles further east and fell asleep at once.

piccies!

We're at Sylvia's house southeast of Seattle, enjoying life and comfortable beds. It actually couldn't be better right now, she has three beautiful Greenland dogs, a cat, a chipmunk, three funny-looking cute alpakkas, and chickens and a climbing wall in the basement! We've been hanging out, planning a trip for me an Marie (we are renting a car and driving around the Olympic Peninsula), and earlier today we took the dogs for a walk in the woods.
Not much more to report from the evergreen state so far, but here's some pictures from the last weeks :]

EH?

Summing up the past week in British Columbia; SUN, Vancouver, Squamish, bouldering, camping, hiking, nutella, more coffee, climbers, more beautiful spring weather, stunning scenery, pikniks, even more coffee, nice canadians, good views.
We havn't really done much but hang out in the woods underneath the Stawamus Chief in Squamish, bouldering and eating bagels. One day we hiked up to the 2nd summit on the Chief, and the view up there was amazing. I'll try to upload some pictures soon.
We ended up having about 5 sunny days in Squamish, and one rainy day in Vancouver before going back to Seattle. Totto got on a plane back to Norway, and I met up with Marie who was also coming down from Vancouver. We went pub crawling (på fyrste paaskedag faktisk), and I got a free beer as my American birthday had just been the day before :]

Seattle; påskeegg, kaffe og heidøl!

I made it safely to Seattle, as did Totto, and for the past two days we have had more coffee than what's good for us. Starbucks' birthplace has coffee shops on every corner and it's hard not to drop in every now and then, especially as the coffee is really good! (Eg drakk sterk svart kaffe i gaar Marie, og likte det!).
Seattle is a really cool place, we have been lazily walking around the city, doing tourist stuff like smelling and enjoying the busy Pike Place Market, taking pictures and enjoying all the funkyness.
(I gaar kveld saag vi Monsters vs. Aliens i 3D, og der var det i folge Tot like stort oppmote som naar dei snurrar film i Heidalen).
We've seen the Fremont troll, and spent a few hours there today soaking up the sun and the good atmosphere. In Gas Works park people were flying kites, playing ball games, or laying around on the grass studying, reading, or just enjoying the beautiful view of downtown Seattle.
Tomorrow we're taking the train to Vancouver, and as long as the weather gods hold off the rain, the plan is Squamish and bouldering for a few days. Exciting! :D

Halvor thinks this is some Dante's peak shit

Maybe doomsday is close, with all these storms, blizzards, volcano eruptions and floods everywhere. Marie and I are starting to wonder if we picked a bad time for visiting this part of the world, even the exchange rate is bad! 

Mt. Redoubt has been spitting ash in to the air for a few days now, and the airport in Anchorage is closed. We thought we might get away from the ash fall here in Willow, until tonight when I was outside feeding puppies, and I couldn't understand why the snow hitting me in the eyes stung so bad until I looked down and realized it was "snowing" ash. Luckily we only got a few millimeters, and hopefully that's all for now. 

Marie has a flight to Juneau on Monday, and I am supposed to fly to Seattle on Wednesday. Right now we're just crossing our fingers and hoping for some wind that might clear the ash from the air, and that Mt. Redoubt goes back to sleep. It's a silly volcano anyways, it doesn't even have lava!

Other than that life goes on pretty much as normal. Tante Kari and JP are racing in Tòk this weekend, and Marie and I are running the show, running dogs and knitting. 

We were supposed to go to the North American Championships open class in Fairbanks last weekend, but JP didn't feel like he had a team, so we ended up going to Anchorage and seeing Banff instead. We stayed with Halvor at UAA, and had a super weekend with skiing and snowboarding at Aleyaska, beautiful weather, beautiful scenery, and awesome movies. 

jula 2008; ei kort oppsummering (ein god del på etterskudd)

Jul og nyttår i sørstatane er noko forskjellig frå jul og nyttår heime i Norge. Ullstilongs og fleece er bytta ut med t-skjorte og jeans, vinterskoa med sandaler, og i staden for skigåing er treklatring og slakkline det største tidsfordrivet.

Det må og nemnast at eg og Flan slo ihjel ein god del timar i kjellaren (dei dagane det regna), der vi baka cookies og brownies og kaker, trente yoga og spelte fussball.

2-3 dagar før jul reiste vi som vanleg opp til grandma og grandpa Moore i Ohio for å eta oss feite (bake fleire cookies), opne gåver og kose oss. Det er betrakteleg vansklegare å slå ihjel tid i flate Ohio, men etter at

Rubiks Kube-dilla så vidt hadde begynt å spre seg, og Mel grov fram ei

30 år gamal kube som visstnok ingen hadde klart å løyse før, gjekk det ikkje lenge før eg og Flan hadde frivillige tidtakarar og kvar sin heiagjeng.

Veka før nyttår reiste Flan, Hana, Jamie og eg enda lenger sørover, forbi utallige kyrkjer og kyr i Tennessee og til ROCKTOWN! Eit utruleg stort og fantastisk buldreområde like utanfor LaFayette, Georgia.

Der møtte vi resten av gjengen frå Morganton, og etter ei veke med sol og vakker sandstein var det ingen som klaga over mangel på fingeravtrykk og blodige fingertuppar :]

Bedre seint enn aldri?

Eg har omsider rista av meg latskapen og gjenoppliva bloggen. 

Trur eg..  :)

gamle Solo på skitur tidleg i mars