Dear Friends,

We stayed closer to home in 2006. Our only foreign excursion was a van trip to British Columbia where we hiked the West Coast Trail. I found it interesting that there was a folder in my file cabinet from 1980 when I first thought of doing this hike. Rena and I backpacked for 8 days and were lucky to encounter good weather on this beautiful hike along the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Look at the long ladders! We managed to keep our feet dry, a rarity on this hike! After, we visited Victoria, Squamish, Vancouver and other points of interest in this area.

After floating Utah’s Dirty Devil River in 2005, Howard Booth and I returned to float the nearby Escalante River in May of this year. It was a spectacular 11-day trip in my SOAR canoe. Although we had to push the canoe on occasion due to low flows, we had time to explore some of the side canyons that are much more accessible from the river than from land. The Golden Cathedral is one of the gems. Note the rappeler.

I traveled to Utah on 6 different occasions during the year to backpack, explore canyons, or float rivers. It is turning into my backyard. Zion National Park has some of the best canyonering in the world. I did a 300-foot rappel, my biggest ever. Rena and I floated the Ladore section of the Green River in the SOAR in the fall.

March and April had the highest combined Sierra snowfall on record. Unfortunately, all my spring ski tours were canceled because it was storming all the time. I did manage to repeat a local tour in the San Gabriel’s; a 2-day tour from Wrightwood to Mt. Baldy that passes over several peaks along the way. The photo shows Armando Menocal skiing toward Mt. Baldy. After it finally stopped snowing, there was enough snow to do a 4-day Sierra tour near Sonora Pass in early June.

I returned to my hometown in Waterloo, Illinois for my 45th high school class reunion. I had not seen most of my classmates since I left high school. It is very interesting to see the different directions that people take in their lives. Rena and I met Marla, Simon, and one year old granddaughter Sophie in Pinnacles National Monument, to introduce Sophie to camping. Located just south of San Jose, this is a very accessible park with great hiking, rock climbing, and a beautiful campground.

Rena’s artistic endeavor this year was an all-consuming class in printmaking, where she learned many processes for producing prints, such as silk screening, lithography, and intaglio. We have to get a bigger house to hang all of our prints, paintings and photos.

There are several more trip reports on www.adventureplus.org . Check out the
Escalante Float, the Sonora to Twin Lakes ski tour, the Wrightwood to Baldy
ski tour, and the Telluride to Moab Mountain bike ride.

We hope you have a happy and healthy 2007.

Rich Henke
rich@adventureplus.org
(310) 316-5050