10-06-05 Ready to go for real, Arcadia to north of Portage Lake, Michigan (computer, phone)

What stories do I want to tell, what is the story? Are details like my struggle with Wordbooker worth telling? This geeky stuff might be trivia, but if ALM is about learning how to do a project, how to be low impact and effective, if it’s about an open source approach then these details could be the components of a future epiphany.

The details I choose to include reveal my opinion of what matters. What’s most important and what’s next most important? Including the disaster details means I can turn around and talk about what did work…

“The best gear (approach, attitude) is often not mentioned because it’s never part of the problem, it’s never a cause or contributor to trials and tribulations. Rather, good gear is an invisible assumed element of every solution. Here’s my roster of invisible stuff.”

Now we’re into collaborator territory. This could also make me a field testing force to be reckoned with. The question is – is grabbing collaborators part of my main theme(s)?

I can also bring the blog right into the movie as screen capture while narrating.

Tangents aside, there’s an immediate goal here – to make a first pass on the video, to post it. To revitalize the project and find out what it is, who’s on board. Can there be an online following between trips? How does that work?

Another tangent. Recently I saw Dave Hart and we had a great time just hanging out. When I think about philosophy of projects I am reminded of an argument we had about cam chocks for climbing protection, back on the South Manitou boat when he and I weren’t getting along so great. I gave Roger Bonnet’s argument that cam chocks were overly complicated, expensive poser gear. I can’t remember why Dave liked cams – maybe because they were a sort of one size fits all solution that ultimately reduced the amount of metal (and weight) on a rack. It doesn’t matter what you do or don’t know about climbing, the basic argument was simplicity vs complication. Both of us felt probably felt like we were arguing for simplicity.

Simplicity will emerge as one of my principles of preparing for and approaching a challenge, but my idea of simplicity has to be clarified, rigorously polished until it’s perfectly obvious.

What this all helps me to understand is that I’m ready to take another whack at the index cards and sort the main themes of the project. It’s a great day, except for this burning pain in my adrenals. But that’s another story.

Behind the scene details were posted on June 6.

10-06-04 Adjustments in Arcadia, Michigan (computer, phone)

10-06-02 Elberta to Arcadia, Michigan (computer, phone)

The end of the expedition wasn’t all sex on the beach, tho. Being back early made me vulnerable to wedding invitations. I loathe weddings generally and ALM was supposed to be my get out of jail free card. Now my nephew and brother-in-law’s weddings were looming, in New Hampshire and California respectively. Shit.

Having a limited supply of nephews, I decided to shag my ass out east. A visit to New Hampshire would put me within striking distance of the four 20 foot galvanized pipes I left on the roof of my alternate crib in Brooklyn, NY.

Heading to wedding in New Hampshire with an iridescent obsidian knappage by Steve in Ogden Dunes, IN.

Weddings - gak!

Family face time, my genius niece with her two main men, Gordon and my famous brother, Jim

Galvanized pipe and AIS Klamps are like Legos for big kids. Originally I had intended to use the pipes to build a fire escape for my 3rd floor apartment and facilitate direct access to the ground floor gardens. Static from the snooty french neighbor on the second floor complicated the design requirements and the 20 footers were no longer practical. The plan was to bring them back to the Artist house and build a passive solar greenhouse informed by Mike Reynold’s Earthship aesthetic.

The transport protocol involved stacking 2″ thick foam blocks on the roof of the Honda Odyssey to supplement it’s wimpy 100 lb capacity roof rack. 5 ratching cargo straps locked the load down with a couple of tee shirts around the leading straps to dampen high speed vibration. Having 1 1/2″ pipes poking 6 ft over the windshield made my POV rather like commanding a tank or missile launcher.

While packing the pipes I realized that I wasn’t excited about returning to the Brooklyn apartment in the fall. After 6 years of living between Brooklyn and Beulah, perhaps it was time to return to Michigan full time.  I let that thought settle in during the 15 hour drive back.

En route, I got a call from Gene, a fellow devotee of Swami Bua, my yoga teacher. Swamiji had died in India from complications of stroke. He was about 120 years old. Here are articles from Hinduism Today (obit) and The New Yorker (2006).

An ~80 year old Swamiji in the 1970s. I was 13 when I first met him in 1976.

A few days back in Beulah and I knew I was finished with NYC.  The Odyssey and I headed for NYC once again – on a mission to extract the last of my gear and wrap up obligations. Mission accomplished on August 1.

I plan to visit the Big Mango every other month for my Taoist check-up and After Effects New York. It feels totally right to be back in Michigan full time – consolidating my resources, building a production alliance, focusing on the local and letting Lake magic flow through me. It’s hard to describe how that works here, you’ve just got to experience it.

A nice couple helped me bring down the mast. Beatrice and … The staff at the Illinois beach state park (including Darleen and Dick) accomodated my take out plan by giving the van access to the beach path.

Hello World was unpacked, disassembled, loaded into the Odyssey and out of the park by dusk. The return trip ran the gauntlet of heavy rains and lightning. One casualty – the window of the Odyssey’s rear hatch was smashed. I didn’t secure the door completely and the mast clipped it from above.

We hit the driveway at 7:00 am. After 5 hours of sleep I’m up and functional. The first days back at the house were nice, but having Hello World and all the gear elsewhere was distracting. Now the trip is truly done. It’s good to have the pickup handled.

Here in The Palomino in Milwaukee sipping on a Blackout Stout. The ALM 2010 expedition is over, for now. In a couple of hours I’ll board the Lake Express ferry bound for Muskegon, Mi and catch a ride back to Bear Lake with Patrick and maybe Jonathan and Luke too. So here’s the scoop.

Coming out of Chicago, I noticed a strange distortion in the port hull. As reported on the day 35 post, we sailed 30 miles to Illinois Beach State Park, landing in the restricted south unit Preserve at about 9:00 pm.

In the light of the morning on day 36 I looked more closely at the port hull and took some pictures. It looked bad, but I was ready to push off and do another 40 miles to Milwaukee when I noticed my iPhone was smashed! Still functional with a shattered screen – but for how long?

Now I had two significant variables and that’s when chaos theory really kicks in. I made the call to stay put until my spare iPhone could be shipped from the house. I could use the extra day or two to access the hull.

I found power and tent space in the park campground and moved Hello World north a couple of miles, out of the forbidden zone.

Later I discovered that my campsite had a deserted beach perfect for parking Hello World and a bike path that gave me easy access to town. Day 37 found me catching up on the blog and exploring locations for fixing Hello World’s hurt paw. I hadn’t yet checked the replies on the Hobie forums, but I felt confident that something had broken loose inside the hull. Ernie of Ernie’s Automotive Service offered space and power behind his shop. Ernie’s was only 1.5 miles from the deserted beach via bikepath. I could strap the port hull to the z bike and walk it there! We were entering the doable zone.

I wanted to ponder a bit before committing to an extensive repair in the field. Whether or not I decided to keep going or shut the project down, Hello World needed to be moved a few more miles north to the deserted beach near my camp. At about 2:00 pm of day 37 I left camp to do just that.

Around dusk the previous evening an ominous storm had swept through the park. At the time I had been eating pizza and posting to the Hobie forums at the resort’s bar. Leaving camp to move Hello World on day 37 the skies were sunny and clear. I made a mistake – I didn’t throw the rain fly over the tent. I figured moving Hello World a mile or two would take an hour tops. What could happen in an hour?

To make a long story short, a huge storm swept in right after I launched. I was on the last tack into my landing when the wind changed and the rain came sweeping in.

Having anticipated a short jaunt, I hadn’t put my wetsuit on or raised the jib. A quick note on the water at the park – it’s killing cold. Due to some idiosyncracies of lake physics, water temperature Is as cold there as Point Betsie in April – 40 degrees F? A bare skinned human would not last 30 minutes in it. I yanked my wetsuit on as the shore vanished in fog and squall.

Having no jib meant that manueverabilty and responsiveness was minimal. I hadn’t expected to have to do anything fancy during the 30 minutes or so out there. Now I struggled with shifting winds and sluggish helm, a half an hour stretched into an hour and beyond. Rain was bucketing down, thumder cracked the sky wide and the main sail had nothing reliable to bite on. Then the tiller, (that’s what steers the boat), broke.

I know I’m not normal. Death was close and all I could think about was this blog post. What a story, so me! I laughed out loud when the tiller failed. Wow, how could this get any worse?

Easy pal, it can get way worse.

I tried a couple of quick fixes on the tiller but a zip tie did the trick. I had helm back when the wind figured out where it wanted to blow. The shore reappeared and we made several attempts to head in, but the storm wasn’t ready to release it’s toy. After all this trouble, I’d be damned if we were going to land short of our goal.

We kissed beach 100 feet short and I walked Hello World the rest of the way. A creepy thick fog rolled in and slithered over the sand. Whatever! I hauled Hello World up and unstrapped the z bike. AOK here, but what’s the situation back at camp?

I found the Macbook Pro sitting in a puddle in the low end of the tent. Opening the case and pulling out the laptop, I experienced a profound detachment as water poured out the IO ports. One laptop, toast.

Ok, that’s it. Trip over. How many things have to go crazy wrong before we get the message? I emptied the tent and did my best to remediate the flood, then packed up and rode to the nearby coffee shop for some comfort. I checked the forum replies and found this from Matt Miller of Hobie Cat USA, no less.

“This indicates a failed pylon shoe. You need to access the area inside the hull (inspection port). Force the pylon back upwards somehow, then glass / bond the shoe back to the hull or the pylon to the shoe.”

The implication here is that if the shoe is not glued down, the pylon could eventually rip through the hull. That would be a catastrophic failure. If this could happen to one pylon, what about the other three? What if I fixed the port front and the starboard front went lame 100 miles later? Obviously the best course of action is to do them all at once. More than I want to manage at Ernie’s while living out of a tent. Then there’s that new laptop I need.

So I’m on my way home. I’ll be back for the boat in a couple of days with van and trailer. 288 miles and another 20 hours of raw movie to post and then edit. What then?

Something bad has happened to the port hull, or maybe it’s starting to happen. The deck is sunken in all around the front pylon. I noticed it first just out of Chicago and confirmed it on the beach this morning. This does not bode well. The pylon must be coming loose inside the hull but there’s no obvious cracks or bulges anywhere.

I had planned to do 40 miles to Milwaukee today and almost pushed off in spite of this problem. Great wind, just did 30 miles with this problem last night, we’ve got the whole day… Let’s go! I’d already left early morning messages with contacts in Milwaukee for meetings tomorrow. I debated the wisdom of pushing off while packing and then I noticed that my iPhone was smashed. Still functional but the glass front was shattered, the clear scratch protector the only thing holding it together.

Now two critical elements were compromised. I asked myself, if I had a friend with me whose life I was responsible for, would I launch now?

I pulled Hello World back up on the beach and resigned myself to finding digs in Zion until another iPhone could be had. I could also research the hull issue and come up with a plan. Worse case scenario, this might mean the end of the trip.

North along the beach I walked the z bike with a backpack full of technology until I hit the “do not enter” signs for the Preserve, facing backwards. Beyond them a trail led to a two track, then a parking lot and paved road out of the park. My idea was to find a motel with wireless, but the park had campsites with power hookups for $25/night, so I stayed.

I spent the day reporting my faux pas to the camp office and moving the boat out of the Preserve. I discovered later that there’s a deserted beach close to my campsite, that’s where I’ll bring her today.

I had pizza and posted to the hobie forums at the parks resort hotel. Jeff the bartender told me about the nuclear power plant next door that has been turned off but still has it’s rods. Oh did I mention there’s a nuclear power plant 200 yards north from my campsite? What the hell is it with beach parks and nuclear power plants?

I woke up pretty rested, it’s amazing what humans can get used to. Last night was 4th of July and after fireworks the harbor was jumping with boaters conducting alcohol inspired manuevers and tenders bringing revelers to and fro. Meanwhile back on land, bikers exhibiting symptoms of late stage testosterone poisoning were challenging each other to loudness contests. Add to this cacaphony and general mayhem the up, down and sidewise vectors my little boat was executing in the chop, and sleep would seem unlikely. F-it, I had a beer and a good time making movies during the fireworks. Ready to crash!

One tender captain joshed me as he motored by, “No campfires in the harbor!” Another captain with a load of passengers saw the camera’s light and thought I was signalling for a pickup and when she approached they caught me in mid rant.

Mary the tender captain picked me up the next morning and said that back in the harbor master’s office they were calling me the mountain climber of Lake Michigan. Not bad.

The plan was to lighten the load by shipping back the drives I had cloned and the books I had taken or been gifted. I kept only “Catamaran Sailing”, “Wilderness Medicine” and “Knots and Slings for Climbers”.

As the 5th was observed as a federal holiday, the only shipping location available was at the McCormick Convention Center, a place I’d been many times before for conferences like the World Con (science fiction), Siggraph (computer graphics), Sigchi (computer human interaction) and NSGA (computer graphics).

I rode the Z bike south against a very intense wind to the convention center and after some wandering found the very nice ladies who carefully boxed up my crap.

There was some event in progress involving youngish people and uniforms. Seeing them sitting on the floor waiting for the next session replete with badges and schedules made me whistful for the misspent days of my youth.

Back on the streets, the wind was blowing me back uptown steady and strong. Time to get out of town. I had maxed out on the city, i felt tense and lonely. Does this presage my decision about returning to NYC?

In leaving Chicago, I would be missing out on interviews with presidents and directors of institutions like the Shed Aquarium and the Field Museum. I should have made arrangements weeks earlier, I certainly wasn’t bumping into them at barbeques.

You probably don’t get to be the leader of an high profile aquarium or museum unless you’re somewhat vested in the status quo, so i’d have to ask uncomfortable questions. This project is not about what’s going wrong, it’s about what’s going right. Maybe these high muckety mucks were not so relevant to the project. Anyway, I’d have to stay at least several more days to meet them, the timing was off.

I couldn’t find any decent food to resupply so I just went back to the harbor master’s office to settle up and take one more Baolong bike tour of the harbor. I had been told to leave fenders on the starboard side of Hello World to fend off the tenders, but the fender line had gotten snagged on a sharp edged shroud shackle and cut. Three Baolongs lost. I had searched the harbor and found one, which was a minor miracle because the place is HUGE. This last tour was fruitless, I trust the other two found caring homes.

Back to the North Oscar 29 can at 1:00 and ready to sail at 4:00. While prepping a single hull solo sailer coming off the Big Lake told me it was powerful out there. My main concern was just getting out of the harbor. The wind was blowing south and I had to go south and east to exit. There were boats clustered in cans east and west of me. Way too windy to paddle clear of the other boats, I’d have to let go of the can while under wind power. Of course I’d never done anything like this before.

When the time came I rerigged the can for quick release with a caribiner, then pulled on it to position Hello World on a tack that would sneak us by the other boats. She took the wind, I popped the biner and we slid out, collision free. Once past the breakwaters we turned and took the full power of the wind on a north course – 245 by the charts.

4:00 and 30 miles to sail before dark, with this wind it could be doable. The torus popped off it’s bungee and dragged behind making an awful racket. I hauled it back and clipped it to a backpack. I got into the wire and we hauled ass.

I called jung Woong Kim to chat about his family’s summer plans, and while on the phone I recovered a colorful beachball. After I hung up I recovered another beachball and then a child’s swimming ring, but missed a green kick ball. I’m going to upgrade found objects on the water to 30 points so the score for Chicago was (2 fenders x -50) + (3 floating toys x 30) = -10 points.

Up on the wire I was able to look down on the port hull and see that the deck around the front pylon seemed warped. It was late in the day and the deck was wet and shiny so I couldn’t tell if I was just seeing things. I’d have to check it at the next stop.

By 5:30 we had blown north 10 miles and were looking good. Around 8:00 we pulled in at a public beach for directions, Lake Bluff. Yes, there’s the navy base 2 miles north and past those smoke stacks is the Nature Preserve. Thanks very much! 5 miles to go.

We beached just north of a big power plant with a bit of light still in the sky, 9;00 pm. This beach had no tracks, tire or foot. The Nature Preserve is human accessible by permit only – I found this out later. It was a pleasant night and deep sleep, there on a desolate beach watched over by a brooding hunk of humming infrastructure. I am constantly reminded me of my status as Rat in the Wainscotting.