Breezing through Southern Utah and CO

Utah à Colorado à New Mexico

Saying “See you Soon” to Utah:

For our last morning in Moab, I woke up a little bit early to go for a run along the road and be surrounded by the big red rocks one more time (also because we had a nine hour drive ahead of us and I didn’t want to get antsy). The run was amazing – I think I saw one other person and maybe a few cars, but mostly it was just me and the red rocks all around.

Then I came back and woke Krista and Chase up and we headed out for breakfast before our long drive to Santa Fe. We lingered for quite a while around the breakfast place because it was so fun to hang with Chase, but finally we got on the road and drove out of Utah, looking wistfully behind us at what had been a beautiful few days (the longest time we have spent anywhere since SF).

Our only stop before dinner was in Mesa Verde National Park. Because we purchased the "interagency national park pass" we're like super VIPs in all national parks, so we have sort of unofficially decided to go through as many as possible. Mesa Verde was 1) at a very high altitude, 2)a loooong way into the park because of traffic, and 3) completely different than the other parks we have been to because it is a park mostly because of the human-created cave dwellings that exist in the park. You can hike down to a variety of locations where people built bricks out of the clay and mortar out of rocks, clay, water, and sand to create huge dwellings underneath overhanging rocks. The dwellings can't quite be described as homes, because they're too expansive - they're more like cities built into the rock.

We stood inside one of the rooms and tried to imagine ourselves transported back to a time when this was where people lived. We ended up feeling pretty inadequate in any of our survival skills - there is just no way I would be able to construct a sound house, much less an entire underground city out of clay and sticks. amazing.

DURANGO, CO

We stopped in Durango for dinner and to stretch our legs. It just so happened that they were having a street market and we walked around checking out the different tents. Then we saw that the Cliff Bar tent and the Keen tent were right next to each other and for some reason, we felt the need to tell both groups of people how much their products were helping with our trip (we’ve eaten cliff bars as meals or snacks probably every day of this trip and have hiked every hike in our keens). This resulted in one of the Cliff bar guys donating 2 BOXES of cliff bars to our travels. SWEET! Then we went to Steamworks Brewery for a delicious dinner and got back on the road.

SANTE FE, New Mexico

We rolled into Santa Fe late last night, per our usual, but about an hour before we did, we both had the same realizations: 1) we felt really, really dirty, 2) we sort of needed the kind of sleep that is not so possible in a tent, 3) it was pouring, and 4) we didn’t REALLY know where the campgrounds we were supposed to be sleeping in were.

Solution? Splurge on a hotel: the Santa Fe Sage Inn let us check in close to midnight and gave us a room with a king size bed, a shower, and told us the hours the gym was open and when breakfast would be served. I immediately took a shower and Krista immediately jumped into the bed to pass out. After returning a few emails, I joined her.

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“A wizard is never early, Frodo, nor is he ever late. He always arrives precisely when he means to.”

-Gandalf the Grey (from LOTR)

…and yes, I know this is my third(-ish) JRR Tolkein quote. They just feel so appropriate in this journey.

desert photo shoot (take 1)

two superwomen, no sidekicks. the theme of our trip.

krista in a parking lot in southern Utah - I think it could be an album cover, it's so beautiful.

me running across Wilson Arch, just south of Moab (don't I look like I'm about to take off and fly? that dress is awesome)
krista looking hott (in more ways than one, yesterday it was 100+) in front of Wilson arch

Utah is the shist!

krista managed to do all our climbing around the Fiery Furnace in a DRESS.
Chase and I decide we want to free climb high up.
Krista and I climbing up Jacob's Ladder (or maybe we're climbing down?)
Krista and me and the Delicate Arch, one of the most beautiful arches in the Park
Upon entering Utah - where apparently the state motto is "life, elevated" - so we're trying to get into it.

UTAH:

No, that subject is not a typo- shist is a type of smooth black rock that lines the canyons of westwater- a section of the colorado where we went white water rafting on Monday. It's also 1.8 BILLION years old, making it one of the oldest rocks in the US (or maybe world?). It's surrounded by sandstone that is only 270 million years old, begging the question of what happened to all those layers in between? The sandstone is a rich red-brown color and is coated in parts by "desert varnish", a darker brown clay that has blown up and stuck to the sandstone, painting pictures that often look like wild horses running along the canyons. The clay contains mangenese whose source is completely unknown - a desert mystery!

So we woke up yesterday morning at 5:45 am after about three hours of sleep (thanks to the Utah wind in our beautiful campsite) and immediately grabbed coffee and headed over to Tag-along Tours for our white water rafting day. Even with the coffee, we both managed to completely pass out on the 1.5 hour bus ride to the river, but not before talking with our super cool guides, who made 2 separate Dune references during this conversation (which was AMAZING because being out here in the desert makes is making me think so much about Dune!)

The rafting trip was STELLAR. I had never been before and had no idea what to expect. What I should have expected: a spectacular sunny day of hitting high rapids with seven new friends, a boat flipping (not ours), a rescue mission for that boat (yes, ours), delicious “mexi-cones” for lunch, geography of Utah lessons, and some serious floating time in the Colorado River. Like I said: stellar trip.

We got back and immediately drove to Arches National Park, still a bit damp from the river and toting the popsicles they gave us when we got back. We hiked out to Delicate Arch as storm clouds started to roll in all around us – but somehow not ON us, so we just watched as the blue-green storm surrounded us on our red-brown rocks - it was absolutely breathtaking. Apparently this sitting in the middle of a storm and watching it go wild all around you is “SO UTAH”, according to our resident Utah man, Krista’s friend, Chase. We met up with Chase later that night at Woody’s, THE bar in town according to our rafting guides. Chase was super AGFA (our new phrase, meaning “always game for anything”), proven by the fact that he had just taken a greyhound back from Berkeley, jumped in his car (packed with burritos and gatorade) and drove down from Salt Lake to hang with us!

Before crashing at our new campsite (called Moonflowers and highly recommended), Chase took us climbing up “Jacob’s Ladder” – a wild climbing route inside nearby cliffs that involved lots of wedging ourselves between several rocks then doing a split behind you and using that leg to boost you up to the next level. It was AWESOME. Chase got some great photos of us scrambling up and Krista got some great ones of us on top of the cliff overlooking the most beautiful view of a fully moonlit canyon. We ended up staying up there until almost three before finally resigning ourselves to bed so that we could get up for our next day’s adventure!

This morning we are off to swim at Powerhouse (and bring our Dr. Bonner’s so we can finally wash our hair – or at least mine, since Krista’s is still mostly in dreds) and some bouldering on rocks in The Fiery Furnace, a distant part of Arches National Park. Since Krista and I are officially members of the National Park Association for the year, we can just go back in for free any time we want! It’s hard to believe we leave tomorrow for Santa Fe, New Mexico and begin the Southern (and final??!?) leg of our trip.

Song of the Moment: January Wedding by the Avett Brothers (thank you, Melissa!)

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“don’t try to do what the world needs, do what makes you come alive, because what the world needs is people who have come alive”

-the quote we left with our tip to our rafting guides

Number 43 does not exist (but the grand tetons do rock)

krista is the queen of the woooooorld
after our hike, I decided I just HAD to run in the tetons

almost 10,000 feet and no altitude sickness at all... yeah, baby
krista at amphitheater lake, proud and sweaty
k caught me doing yoga after my run in front of the tetons. so peaceful

Today we went from one of our lowest points of the trip to one of our highest - literally and figuratively.

After waking up in our glorious hostel in jackson (the mangy moose, we definitely recommend it - super adorable and the people were really nice) we drove out to grab food supplies for the next few days and breakfast at "the chuckwagon". It seemed ideal - the grocery store had everything we wanted, we ordered pancakes and eggs and waited at a table at the base of the magnificent tetons. 30 minutes later, I go ask if somehow we were forgotten in the mix. The waitress asks me what our number is - and, glancing at the placard they gave us w a number 43 on it on our table, I say "we're 43". To which she says: 43 doesn't exist. So she replaces our order and long story short, we got our pancakes, enjoyed them (and the view) and headed out to get a campsite for tonight in the tetons.

We get to the first campsite, jenny lake: full. We get to the second campsite, signal mtn: full. We get to the third campsite (which is practically back in yellowstone), lizard creek, to find that the last camp site has JUST been taken. But just as we're starting to think maybe we won't be hiking our 9 mile hike today, a man from wyoming in the suburu next to us steps out to tell us that they just got the last campsite here, but they had already paid for one back at signal mountain that they'd be happy to give to us. We almost hug him. Instead we follow him back to signal mountain where he gives us the campsite and refuses to let us pay for it saying only, "no, ladies, it's a gift. And now you'll remember us westerners as nice people" and smiles as he drives off. Krista and I jump in the air wildly for a few minutes singing " we have a campsite!" Then we set up the tent and get hiking.

The hike we picked was up to amphitheatre lake - a glacial lake that is located just under disappointment peak (which is only called that bc its not THE grand teton, but people think it is; it looked pretty grand to us!). It was un- freaking- believable. After 4 miles of switchbacks with stunning views of the tetons, lined with beautiful lupine flowers, we reached the lake and jumped right in. Freeeeeeezing but so refreshing. We stopped for a quick lunch then hiked up around the lake for a magical view down the valley. Krista and I each sat up on different cliffs collecting our thoughts and figuring out someway to show our deep gratitude for being able to witness such beauty.

Then we headed back to camp, with a slight detour for me to run around for a few miles, for pb&j and a goood sleep!

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"Tremble: your whole life is a rehearsal for the moment you are in now"
-judith malina

I may be allergic to yellowstone

IDAHO:
We stayed with a friends new mother in law who took us all around moscow and fed us so much delicious food from her garden. We planned on idaho being a brief respite on our drive rest and indeed it was - what we didn't expect was how stunning the idaho landscape is. Think huge plateaus of browns and greens that have been sculpted by the winds so that they look like the skin of a sharpei's face. We climbed up one justr before sunset to see the monument to wild stallions at the top.

MONTANA:
So we stayed in missoula last night and although we did arrive late on a weekday night, that town was just super sketch. Not in a dangerous way (parents, please note) but in a way that made us feel like finishing up our beers at charlie b's (a hole in the wall missoula staple, or so we're told) and going back to our (super commercial) camp gound and reading. But we did hike up to the m in the mountain and go on a lovely run by the river this morning, so it wasn't all strange. And we stopped in bozeman for lunch today - THAT is a beautiful montana town - mountains so high in every direction.

YELLOWSTONE
So we were persuaded by more than a few friends not to skip yellowstone, even though that was our initial plan. And we're so glad we didn't - while it was super touristy, the geysers were unreal and we actually walked up to old faithful just a few moments before its spectacular eruption. I want to learn about how geysers are formed!

Next up: jackson, WY: grand teton ntl park; moab, UT

~~~~~~~~~~~
"You can't stop us
We're on the road to freedom
You can't stop us
Cause our eyes can see"
- van morrison (tupelo honey)
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Some (of so many) Photos from the West Coast!

me jumping off a rock on the oregon coast
we hiked out to these rocks; our own "mermaid's lagoon" - it felt like never never land!
krista shows off the bouquet we bought at a farmer's market in oregon for Elizabeth! it has artichokes, dill, king garlic, and lavender in it - A-mazing! we also bought blueberries and delicious pastries at this market that we just stumbled upon!
I walk through the redwoods, mesmerized. I'm still not sure what came over me there, but I felt something inside me stir...

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"there's a rhythm deep inside of you, and you must get reacquainted"
-cee-lo green

Speaking to the Trees: the Redwood Forest and the Evergreen State

Because I feel like I didn't quite do them justice in my last post and because in this forest I felt a deep connection to another world, place, or time - we could almost feel the energy of these giants flow into the mossy ground around us and into our bodies as we ran our hands along their rough trunks.



Yesterday, we hiked in the North-Western part of olympic national park on Hurricane Ridge. This up and down hike took us along Sunset Ridge and past it - giving us views of Mt. Olympus amongst a spectacular mountain range, many of which are 6000+ feet high! as well as the Puget Sound and several glacial lakes. At the top, exhausted and thirsty, we ran into - literally - a pack of mountain goats!

After a lovely night spent camping in the evergreens, we headed to explore the rain forest of the olympic peninsula and found ourselves on the mossy trail in hoh valley - whose moss-draped trees and brooks filled with floating plants made the world feel Seussian. I kept expecting the lorax to jump out and tell us to stay on the trail. We took a quick trip out to the ocean (in La Push, made famous by a recent novel about vampires) and were mesmerized by the huge rocky islands just off-shore surrounded by fog. the seemed to form a protective barrier around this northwestern most tip of the continental US, daring anyone to try to get through.

finally, we headed back to Seattle via the ferry to stay with a friend who is in his first year of residency in family medicine - chat about life, do some laundry, and eat some veggies.

next up: Idaho, Montana, Wyoming!


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Mister!", he said with a sawdusty sneeze,
"I am the Lorax, I speak for the trees.
I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues,
And I'm asking you, sir, at the top of my lungs" --
He was very upset as he shouted and puffed --
"What's that THING you've made out of my Truffula tuft?"

-Dr. Seuss (from The Lorax)

California and Oregon Cruising

krista drives us out of San Francisco!

Chris resets our odometor to zero!

Emily shows us where we are in the world

me posing in front of a building on haight st.

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hi-lights from this section of the trip:

BIG SUR - hot springs of esalen; an experience that can only be described as surreally beautiful. from 1am to 3 am Esalen opens its hot springs for reservations for 20 lucky people. clothing optional. 2 friends and I drove out there (our first foray into driving stick on the West Coast), stripped down, and meditated in the moonlight to the background music of the waves hitting the coast.

REDWOOD NATIONAL PARK - I think I had my most spiritual moment amongst those trees; we camped there for the night and then went on a hike the next morning, offering gratitude and energy to the majestic beauty around us

OREGON COAST - the coast changes distinctly as you drive north. there are huge red rocks and boulders that look like they were thrown by huge monsters millions of years ago off the coast and have since been smoothed out with salt water. we found caves, kelp forests, and a trail that took us out to the edge and made me feel pretty dizzy.

we also stopped at a farmer's market to buy flowers for our host in oregon (a bouquet of artichokes, dill, garlic, and lavender), and at a beach to dip our feet in the Pacific before we leave the coast.

PORTLAND, OR - we pulled into this beautiful city around 6:30 and went straight up another mountain to a mansion that has the best view of the city landscape and took photos with our host! then we went to Deschutes Brewery with some friends and had possibly the best beer (I recommend the Wowzenbock!) and burger ever. but that could have been influenced by the fact that it was 1) all organic, 2) in such good company or 3) 9:30 and we hadn't really eaten since morning. After a trip up to Elizabeth, our lovely host's roof deck to check out the fire pits (yes, fire pits), living roof, and another spectacular view of the city, we curled into bed feeling exhausted and grateful.

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"remember what bilbo used to say: it's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. you step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to"
-Gandalf (from the lord of the rings, jrr tolkein)

the adventure begins!

it has been a wild week of introducing friends from one part of my life to friends from other parts of my life - and watching as they start to love each other too.

checking off the list:
cape cod, MA: play with little kids and jump in the 80 degree ocean
santa cruz, CA: eat freshly picked oranges and go tidepooling
drive down highway 1 in a big red truck (stick shift!)

san francisco, CA: play with old and new friends all over the city!

more updates soon!

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"I wanna be a man, mancub
and stroll right into town
walk around with the other men,
I'm tired of monkeying around"

-king louie, from the jungle book

How to look at the human body

This is my last week of my preceptorship in gynecology before I embark on a huge road trip that will have very little to do with medicine and lots to do with adventuring.

One of the thoughts that has been on my mind a lot during these few weeks is the sexualizing and un-sexualizing of the human body that takes place in every doctors mind all the time - and more often if you're a gynecologist or a urologist or probably a gastroenterologist too.

There's apparently a friends episode where Rachel is dating a gynecologist and they are sitting on the couch in her apartment, starting to make out, and he stops and says, "I can't, I just can't today". And she's like, "oh no. what's wrong?" and he says, "you're a waitress, right? (she nods) well, do you ever have days where you're like, if I see ONE more cup of coffee..."

kind of kills the vibe, right?

Learning medicine makes me appreciate the human body so much more than I did before - but I'm not sure . While we were in the gross anatomy part of our first year, for example, we spent 2-10 hours in the lab, with 20 human bodies in various stages of dissection. during that time, any time I went to even so much as hold someone's hand, I would think about all the layers of fascia, all the muscles and tendons, all the nerves and blood vessels running through it. don't get me wrong, some times this is super sexy, but I spent so much of the day thinking about all of those things in a NOT sexual way to switch my mind over to saying, "this is okay to think is sexy" was more of a conscious switch than I wish it had been.

I don't want this to make you uncomfortable at your next gynecologists office - if anything, it's easier for me to UN-sexualize and MEDICALIZE the human body. It's more personally disturbing to me that I feel like it's progressively more effort to not think about the classifications of different STDs when about to kiss someone (which is not even how STDs are passed, anyways, for the most part).

This is probably an inevitable effect of having a deeper understanding of how anything works - like learning about art history, your appreciation of Rodin's statues deepens in some ways, but it's hard to just look at them and say, oh I like that one. You're too trained to look for cracks or symmetry or whatever.

I'm not sure how physicians approach this, as sex lives are not really talked about in the office - even at the gynecologists. I'm going to ask my fellow med students if they feel any of this and if so, what they think/do about it.

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"cause when I arrive, I will bring the fire
make you come alive, I can take you higher"

-kevin rudolf (from "let it rock")

your thoughts?

so since I was convinced to spread the word about my blog to a few more people, now I have to ask a favor from all of you: keep talking to me about it in person, but feel free to post a comment on the blog, that way, I don't have to keep remembering what you say to me about all these topics until I can write it down myself AND can forever look back and say, what was that brilliant thing that [insert your name here] said.

this might be even more important once I get back to school and talk to you all less... :) pass the link on to anyone with whom you like having these sorts of conversations - I'd love to hear more ideas!

thanks thanks thanks
e

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to inspire you further (at the risk of seeming very cheesy):

“If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.”
~George Bernard Shaw

a flying leap

I forgot how nice it is to be able to really appreciate the day stretched ahead of me - as time I have to use however I choose. This past weekend has been full of insightful conversation, getting all sweaty, ice cream, and lots and lots of playing.

simply heavenly.

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"long live the flying leap!"
-anna quindlen

Women with Moustaches

"a woman with a mustache is always happy"
-italian proverb
(referring to the fact that increased androgens = increased libido...and extra hair)



At work this week we've talked with a lot of women about libido. It's fascinating the things women feel able to talk about pre-pelvic exam vs. post-pelvic exam. In the pre-exam discussion, I have noticed that women sit up very straight and even though they answer all questions - and sometimes ask their own - there's a propriety that sort of divides the patient and the doctor. But there's something that changes - I won't say relaxes because that's definitely not the right word - but maybe shifts? - while a woman sits with her legs spread wide and lets you look at her most intimate parts - most of which she has not seen herself.

For example, the cervix looks like a soft, silky pillow with a small hole in the center about the size of the tip of a chopstick. That's where a baby's head is when they say "it's CROWNING". Yes. Out of the hole the size of a chopstick in the center of the soft, silky, pillow-like part. This thought occurs to me every time I see a cervix and I stare in wonder and awe. As I see more and more cervices, it also consistently occurs to me that I have not seen my own cervix. Someday I'm going to have to figure that one out.

The doctor I'm working with makes terrible jokes throughout the entire exam. Not terrible in an inappropriate way, just not entirely funny. We talked about this and she said that gynecologists and urologists have to make jokes because they have to keep people both distracted and comfortable while talking with them and touching their most sensitive parts.

Which I think is a valid point.

After the pelvic exam, we leave the room so the woman can re-robe, and then re-enter to review the results of the exam with the patient and answer any questions. For some reason it is at this point when all the good questions come out. Everything from, "sooooo...my boyfriend doesn't really ejaculate. ever. is that normal?" to "what's trichimonas?" to "have you ever met a woman whose gone this long without having sex? I mean, I'm honestly asking you, have you?" and "how common are hemorrhoids anyways?"

It's pretty hard to talk about the female reproductive system without talking about sex. And it's pretty hard to talk about sex without talking about relationships. So this is my favorite part of working with a gynecologist - I really feel that I'm hearing (and sorting through) women's most intimate fears and concerns.

Even though it's my favorite part, it always leaves my mind reeling from the day, so I'm grateful to have the hour bike ride home along the river to take everything I've seen and heard during the day and just let it roll around itself in my head.