Solar Pioneers Party
I'm goin' to the first-ever Solar Pioneers Party in Redway, California. Redway is in the giant redwoods, in the heart of the Emerald Triangle. The Emerald Triangle is Humboldt, Mendocino and del Norte counties, the three most northwest counties in rural California,...
And Back in Lamy, New Mexico
This is to be the closing blog post of the "2015 Mountaintop Adventure" (a rather pretentious title, I'm afraid) thread. After this it'll be something more akin to "Allan's personal life and its complications and joys...". On Monday evening, September 21st, I made it...
The Ancient Ones in our Back Yard
I stopped, and camped one night, at Hovenweep National Monument, on the southern Utah/Colorado state border. Established in 1923, this is the only monument in the Four Corners ares that hasn't been excavated as an archaeological site; a concession to the tribes back...
Heading Home across the Canyon Country
Whoops! I've been back in Lamy, NM for nearly a week, so I must get the rest of this great road trip logged here before I lose track of it. So this is actually written on Sunday, September 27th. After Cedar Breaks NM, I continued east. Red Canyon is on the way to...
Lehman Cave and Great Basin National Park
The next morning I packed up, then walked over to invite conversation with a lone man car-camping in a nearby site. Friendly, named Marios, I soon learned that he was from the Greek/Turkish island of Cyprus, lived in Scotland, and had been working in solar in...
Onward Across Nevada
This morning I awoke to gentle rain on the tent, for which I was prepared but hadn't really expected. I returned to the hot spring, filled the tub and took a nice morning soak. Although the ranch buildings are long gone, the hot springs remains on private land, thus...
Earth and Sky and Hot Water, Oh My!
From my first days planning this summer, I wanted to visit a particular remote hot spring in Nevada. Larry Crutcher, a longtime solar installer out of Yuma, Arizona, last year sent me a picture of some old graybeard (him) in a tub outdoors with mountains in the...
Wrapping Up at White Mountain Research Center
In the last few posts I have described my experiences away from the solar work for White Mountain Research Center, all based on my Labor Day weekend at Echo Lake Camp and the riding to get there and back. In this post I'm describing the changes that accompany my...
Tuolumne Camp Post-Fire and Yosemite Park with Fire
The last two days have been full - especially of riding the Beemer. In reverse order: I'm camping tonight at Porcupine Creek CG on the high road in Yosemite NP. This is one of the three most primitive campgrounds in the park. I haven't camped here before, as I...
Berkeley Camp in Spirit
I spent three days at the City of Berkeley's Echo Lake Camp. Even though I knew nobody, I felt at home with the spirit of family camp that I had known as a child and teen, and that I shared with my own family maybe ten years ago. That camp had been Tuolumne, just...
Labor Day Weekend Motorcycle Trip
This long-delayed post begins on Thursday, the evening of September 3rd. I haven't posted what has been happening in my life on the mountain for nearly two weeks; the last post about Bodie chronicled my last motorcycle trip. I took that 5-day trip while waiting for...
Bodie, the Quintessential Wild West Ghost Town, and the Real Tesla
My post about my motorcycle trip week before last stopped the night before I visited the ghost town of Bodie, and before continuing with current posts I want to share some photos I took there. Several people had encouraged me to visit this preserved ghost town, which...
Four Days of Focused Off Grid PV Installation
Well, dammit, I wrote a whole post last night, clicked on "publish", and it was gone. Gotta remember to click on "save draft" first. So here I go all over again... Ooh, lots of good pix today... This has been a focused four days, and yesterday was a very good day. We...
Back Roads by Motorcycle
Before building the Summit Hut power system last week I took four days to explore the eastside region. I simply wandered by motorcycle, maybe 500 miles in total. I began by heading down Silver Canyon, rather than the main paved road. The drop is about 6,000' to...
Solar at the Summit
I have been away from this blog for over a week, so it's past time to catch up. I'll do best to post in random order. I had been having no success uploading any of the many photos I have taken, receiving only error messages when I attempted an upload, and that also...
First Trip to the Top of White Mountain
I had called this summer's blog my 2015 Mountaintop Adventure, and I finally got to the mountaintop on Tuesday the 11th. I rode up with Jeremiah, the Operations Manager here; it turns out that I can't drive any of the research center's vehicles because my driver's...
Six Days in the High Sierra – Up, Over and Out
The last 1,200' of climbing came easy, followed by six miles of easy trail after a steep and rocky upper descent. The lower I descended toward the trailhead, the more people I encountered heading up. But now many were dayhikers, and I saw more small groups, more belly...
Six Days in the High Sierra – the Final Full Day
The morning dawned clear and calm after the previous night's storm. It turned out that twice I was safely ensconced in my tiny tent and stayed dry before the storms came. Days later, when I was down in Bishop and mentioned having been up in the high country, several...
Six Days in the High Sierra – the Heart of the High Country
Lots of photos today! Clicking on each will enlarge it. It rained during the evening and night. I stayed dry, but made no contact with others camping nearby due to the rain. I was slow to get out in the morning, but the climb up 800' of switchbacks proved easy. And...
Six Days in the High Sierra – Along the Muir Trail
Today was my first day shared with the John Muir Trail/Pacific Crest Trail community, backpackers who get to know each other over the days and weeks. I don't count, of course, as I'm just in for a short loop, but I pas many more foot travelers in this section. Some...
Six Days in the High Sierra – Reaching the John Muir Trail
On paper it was all downhill today, for about 11 miles. I made my day's goal, which was to reach the junction with the John Muir Trail, which is also part ofthe Pacific Crest Trail. The JMT starts in Yosemite Valley, climbs to Tuolumne Meadows and then heads south...
Six Days in the High Sierra – Intro and Heading In
I had planned to play this summer, as well as work, and I had brought my backpacking gear. As we have been waiting for the PV hardware to arrive, Jeremiah suggested that this would be a good time to take a week off. I asked him for a suggestion of a good backpacking...
Update on Jamie, the British Runner
Readers of my bicycle tour blog last year may remember my entries about Jamie Ramsay, the 34-year-old Brit who was running from Vancouver BC to Buenos Aires, Argentina. His unsupported mileage was typically a marathon or so a day, pushing a jogging stroller with the...
Heading into the High Sierra
We're now at the stage where we have ordered most of the solar equipment that's to be installed, and are waiting for it to arrive. So the time is right for me to take some play time, as August is likely to be a time of focus on the installation of the PV systems....
Getting up High to Look Around
On Thursday Jeremiah ended work in mid-afternoon in order to hike to the top of Mount Blanco, a nearby peak of 12,280' or so. I asked to go with him, and it gave us a chance to get to know each other better. He and Autumn, his wife, have a two-year-old and her two...
Settling Into a Different World
By the next day I found myself wondering if I’d just gotten to heaven without having to die first.
Back to the White Mountains
Sheesh, ten days since last post! OK, let's do a bit of catch-up here. I managed to inadvertently give my camera to a street person in Eugene (by leaving it in a planter where I parked in front of the library) so photos are from phone and ipad in the meantime... This...
The 46th annual Oregon Country Fair
This was a deeply felt homecoming for me. I have identified with the Vietnam-era counterculture from my high school social misfit days on. My deeply-held values were formed in the fertile cauldron of post-hippie culture; even starting Positive Energy was an act...
Onward to the Fair
Next morning I rode up to Crater Lake National Park, reaping the reward of simply being on the planet for awhile as I flashed my new Golden Age Passport at the entrance station... I rode the long way around the lake, appreciating the bumpy original road even as I...
Just another scene along the road…
I happened along this scene somewhere near Adin, California. The four horsemen of the apocalypse?? It appears to be someone's gesture of support for the US Marines... hmmm...I happened along this scene somewhere near Adin, California. The four horsemen of the...
2014 Bicycle Tour
May 2015 Update: Welcome Home Power Readers!
Yes, you're on the right web page, if you're looking for Sindelar Solar. "Taking a Tiny House Off Grid" is just coming out in Home Power, more or less today. For now, everything on this site following this blog post is the story of a long bicycle tour I took last...
Recollecting the Trip in its Entirety
A selfie, at a county park on Lopez Island, Washington Along the Big Sur Coast in California I had published here an earlier draft of this synopsis, but apparently I also managed to inadvertently delete it all... oh well, I guess I can fall back on the excuse...
And Finally Home
Each time I have encountered a "ghost bike" memorial along the road I have photographed it and posted it here. To me this is an important, indeed necessary, ritual. Beside honoring the memory of yet another cyclist killed while riding, it serves to remind me that at...
Following Old Route 66 into Burque
I have lacked a decent New Mexico road map, so leaving Grants I depended on Google Maps' route mapping for cycling, and that turned out to be a mistake. I followed the old Route 66, which paralleled the interstate highway. In the tiny town of San Fidel I stopped to...
Back Home in New Mexico
I bought a bus ticket to Albuquerque but got off the bus in Gallup. I want these final four or five days of riding to be the roads home across New Mexico, until I roll down the rough dirt road to my home. This will form a final closure to the trip, and help me return...
Leaving Las Vegas: Whose Idea Was This Anyway?
En route to Barstow I determined that I was more likely to be able to hitchhike out of Las Vegas than Barstow so an extra $20 to the driver landed me in Las Vegas at 9 pm. I found a cheap room, and headed out toward Boulder City and Hoover Dam, figuring that I could...
One Hundred Days on the Road
From San Simeon I continued down the coast through Cambria and Cayucos to Morro Bay State Park. This was another gold-standard park, well-maintained with showers, a large and quiet biker/hiker section and even a golf course. The showers were in operation, too: At...
Riding Down the Big Sur Coast
My last entry was posted from a coffeehouse in Carmel before heading down the Coast Highway through Big Sur. This rugged coastal area has little or no cell service. Three evenings later I'm at San Simeon State Beach, another hiker/biker campground, having ridden...
Monterey Bay and Cannery Row
From Santa Cruz I rode slowly around Monterey Bay, remembering old haunts from four decades ago. So much remained familiar, just more developed, with more bike lanes but also many more homes and much more traffic. I was close to Watsonville before the homes...
Can o’ Screws- er, Santa Cruz
I lived in Santa Cruz in my early twenties, from 1972-1977. I was nowhere near ready to grow up and the town didn't ask it of me. I was immature, self-absorbed, single, countercultural and quite sexually active. Indeed, as I look back on those years, it's likely that...
On the Way to Santa Cruz: Pigeon Point Lighthouse and Hostel
After riding only about twenty miles, I came to the Pigeon Point Lighthouse and International Hostel. I have been curious about modern hosteling, so decided to stay for a night to see what it's about. For $31, I had a bunk in a shared room. There were two other...
A Few Rest Days in the SF Bay Area
After crossing the Golden Gate Bridge, I rode around Fort Mason in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, the Marina, the Fisherman's Wharf tourist area, and the piers to the Embarcadero, where I caught the BART train to the East Bay. I then rode along a very...
Drought, Marin, and the Golden Gate Bridge
California is in the midst of a three year drought, and it shows. The coast has always been lush and green when i have passed through in the past. Water levels in many of the state's reservoirs are at record low levels, and forest fires an take out whole towns, as...
Travel Along the Northern California Coast
I have not written about travel since I left Fort Bragg Thursday morning. I left around ten with a cloudy but breaking sky. I had a homemade leftover chicken pot pie carefully wrapped in my hydration pack. I rode to Highway One, then hitched to the Manchester KOA to...
Scenic Side Trip: Hock Tools and Larry Kellogg
Before I became a licensed electrician working in solar PV, I made my living as a carpenter. One of the joys of the trade is assembling a set of tools, especially hand tools. I also did some woodworking and cabinetmaking, so I had collected many tools for the...
Back to Fort Bragg, Joyously
The day's riding goal was to be the biker/hiker camp at Manchester Beach State Park. But on arrival, other cyclists and I found that the park had closed for the season just the previous day. A KOA was just up the same road, and so I had my first-ever experience of...
The Climate March and Mendocino Solar
The Climate March turned out to be a Stand, and I was glad to participate. Mainly a group of perhaps 25 old hippies and lefties, coming together for a variety of causes including climate change. George had stood for peace at that location for two hours every Sunday...
Prayers for Ted
On August 23rd I posted this paragraph and photo and paragraph about Ted Gifford of Port Townsend, Washington: On the ferry I met Ted Gifford, a retired physician of "nearly 70" who had ridden to visit his son following a six week tour. He gave me a tour ("my first as...
Beginning the Ride Down Coast Highway One
Today was a ride to remember: 44 miles, starting at the northern terminus of Highway One, California's Pacific Coast Highway. I have more to add to the previous long and wandering post, some of it already written and waiting for upload, but this just needs to be...
Paying my Respects in the Emerald Triangle
Michael welch is the longtime Senior Editor of Home Power magazine, and the moderator of the RE-Wrenches email technical forum for solar installers, a group in which I have been active for fourteen years. He is also a man with whom I have found an easy and...
The Inherent Risk
I stopped to pay my respects at this roadside "ghost bike" descanso (New Mexican for a roadside memorial where someone died) along Highway 101, just north of the state park. My assumption is that John Mello died cycling along this section of highway, most...
Ridin’ and Runnin’ Stories
Evening of the same day... Let's see, it's Saturday, September 13th, 2014. Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park, between Crescent City and Arcata. 36 miles today, that included one climb of 1,200' and one lesser climb, plus numerous smaller hills. This was my...
A Side Story: Paul Schot of The Netherlands
I received this message from Paul Schot today: Hi Allan, Great to read your blog! This alternative route looks wonderful. Pity your bike is letting you down but very loyal to keep it and continue bouncing . Didn't you once ride down this coast on a bike with a dog in...
Wednesday 9/10, Still in Oregon
Tomorrow, September 11, has long represented an important anniversary for me. This day thirteen years ago was the first installation day of the first batteryless residential grid-tied PV system, the system type that is now mainstream dominant in the U.S. We were on a...
Humbug Mountain State Park, Monday 9/8
Oregon has a wonderful state park system. I have never kept count, but I expect that I have passed forty or more state parks of various flavors since I entered the state at Astoria. The Pacific Coast Route maintains an entire series of state parks with biker/hiker...
Comments Worth Sharing
I have received some wonderful comments recently from old friends and new. I have permission to share a few of them: From my bes' fren' Windy: "Thanks again for "bring us along" on your magnificent and joyful adventure! Keep on chooglin'" --- Windy From one of my...
The Hobbit Trail
Russ from Taos wrote me about some hobbit trails north of Florence that he had remembered from years past, so I made a point of seeking them out. He wrote: "I've been to some really cool places on the Oregon coast, but I can't remember where most of them are. One...
Bicycling the Central Oregon Coast
The last two days have been filled with tremendous beauty and contrast. I rode from near Newport to a few miles south of Florence, a total distance of only 60 miles over two days. What I first noticed is that the highway traffic dropped way off once leaving Newport....
Riding by Grace
To complete the bike repair side journey: i had ridden fifteen miles or so from the park to the outskirts of Tillamook, where in fewer than ten minutes I caught a ride to REI with Scott, a custom home builder from Garibaldi. We hit it off well. Like so many, he told...
Bikes, Bike Troubles, and Brews
My iPad, that I bought to blog this trip, is more trouble than joy. It loses things, like draft posts. I write when the chance occurs, which is usually somewhere (like a campground) lacking wifi, and then add photos and upload when passing through a town with good...