Last night Scott Kelly and I took advantage of the rain and hit the Root in Racine after work.  Unfortunately, a nice cold blast has followed the rain so we were getting wet on an extremely windy 30 degree night.  I was going to have a nice picture of the frost on my skirt to post, but the batteries in my camera decided it was too cold to work.  Guess I should have changed them before we left.  The water was the biggest I have seen closer than a 7-hour drive.  Being a swollen creek there wasn’t much in the way of eddy service, so if you don’t have a good ride you have to hike it back up.  Fortunately, it is a short walk. 

 

From looking at the gauge online it looks like we started off in the area of 1100 cfs and increased to around 1300, maybe even 1400 by the time we got off.  We could tell that it was surging, and the one spot that we played the most there were some definite changes.  The wave would go from frothy with a good pile to smooth and real fast.  Though at these levels the bottom wave is pretty bouncing and hard to stick on.  It was changing a lot, and sometimes would change in between rides.  We tried the monster in the middle a couple of times.  It was really cool crossing the river on a wave and dropping 3 feet into to the pocket.  Watching Scott from downstream he would disappear behind the wave, I couldn’t see his head.  But man was it a cold walk to the car after.  Can’t wait until the warm rain starts.

 

World light

This book by the most famous author from Iceland - Halldor Laxness - is supposed to be a great example of Icelandic literature. At least that is what the book store clerk in Reykjavik told me. Literature in Iceland is an interesting thing. This small island was populated by Vikings, runaways, and criminals yet has the highest number of published authors per capita. It probably has something to do with the fact that for around a quarter of the year they are all trapped inside with nothing to do.

Most of their books deal with suffering and hard work (concepts familiar to a people that had to scratch out a living in Iceland) and with rogue criminals. They are a law-loving people, they don't like rule-breakers - unless you break it in a spectacular epic way. These are called sagas. They're great.

Laxness won a Nobel Prize for his book Independent People but World Light, according to the book store clerk, is a better story. I found myself really identifying with the themes of suffering and hard work - as I struggled to finish this book. This book is an insight into a little piece of the Icelandic culture. It is full of hard working simple people. They are willing to help, but afraid to overextend themselves in an unforgiving world. They are social and all a little paranoid. It is reminiscent of the Wild West. Unfortunately the main character is a person that fancies himself a poet destined to a life of suffering for his art. Since he is enlightened and above societal norms and material things he basically mooches off of anyone that he can. Given the Icelandic sweet spot for writers, he finds a lot. Until he finally goes a little too far and then gets in trouble. Not the best story, but it does give you a 600 page insight into Iceland.

Getting started

So after watching everyone else do it, I figured I'll give this a shot. This will probably be more of a travel log that anything else. This is Beth during a walk along the lake in February. But I'll probably throw some other stuff in here to mix it up.

But as this is my first shot at this, I am open to suggestions for what will make this a little more user friendly. Other than more frequent posts - that is an established goal but I am pretty sure it will be less than I want to.