A Bob Dylan Digression

I am going to take a break from the Shasta trip to talk about the Sacramento Bob Dylan concert last night. For the record, here is the set list:

1. Maggie's Farm
2. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
3. High Water (For Charley Patton)
4. When The Deal Goes Down
5. Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum
6. Tangled Up In Blue
7. To Ramona
8. It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)
9. Rollin' And Tumblin'
10. Ballad Of Hollis Brown
11. Highway 61 Revisited
12. Nettie Moore
13. Summer Days
(encore)
14. Thunder On The Mountain
15. Like A Rolling Stone
16. All Along The Watchtower

Having seen Bob a number of times over the year I would say this was the best. Once I saw him in the 90's and it looked like they stuck a stick up him and wheeled him out. Last night he was almost animated. He no longer seems to be playing guitar on stage, but sticks to keyboard and harmonica. The show was at Arco and the place was about a third or less full. How all these people can miss the opportunity to see an icon is beyond me. He keeps up an amazing concert schedule. Check this page put for all the dates he has played this year: http://my.execpc.com/~billp61/dates.html#cur
They were selling a unique poster at the show highlighting the venue and printing only several hundred each night. I got mine, and it is sure to be a collector's item:

A GIARDI PRIMER:

This is a picture of the nasty intestinal parasite known as Giardia Lamblia. Here is a link to an informative Wikipedia article on the beast: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giardia

It commonly infects cats. It can cause infection in humans and you are best to avoid it as it causes bloating and flatulence, which are socially unacceptable. It is the MOST frequent cause of non-bacterial diarrhea in North America (I'll bet you did not know that). The little bugger particularly likes to live in the water behind beaver dams and so it is affectionately known as "Beaver Fever." It was first discovered by Anton van Leeuwenhoek in 1681 as he had it himself and was examining his own diarrheal stools with his newly invented microscope! You think you have weird hobbies.

Professor Brain Ford of Cambridge writes eloquently: "Human giardiasis can be divided into two disease phases: acute and chronic. The acute phase is usually short-lived, characterised by flatulence with sometimes sulphurous belching and abdominal distension with cramps. Diarrhoea is initially frequent and watery but later becomes bulky, sometimes frothy, greasy and offensive. The gas may cause the stools to float." http://www.brianjford.com/Giardia-14-06.pdf I think this may qualify as TMI (too much information)

I was sucking wind almost as soon as the climb started. The altitude was 7000 feet greater than what I am used to as a sea level dweller in Sacramento. In addition I was wearing too many layers, as the photo suggests, so I started sweating almost immediately. The first part of the climb is really quite easy, from the parking lot up to Horse Creek. It is probably 2-3 miles with both flat and up hill sections. I dropped off the pace a bit and stopped to shed some of my layers. At Horse Creek is a small building and a spring fed water fountain. We avoided this water due to the risk of Giardia lamblia, a nasty intestinal fresh water parasite that we felt is likely to occupy a stream in an area with as may visitors as Shasta, although this evening we had not seen anyone else up to this point. When we got to Horse Creek I decided to let the others go on at a faster pace as I had a strong feeling that I was not going to make the summit and I did not want to hold them back. I took the car keys from Dan so I would have someplace to lie down.

There are a number of routes that you may use to climb Shasta. The most used is the Avalanche Gulch or "AG" route, which is one of the most climbed routes on any mountain in the U.S. The route is marked on the map in red arrows. You drive to the trail head at "Bunny Flat" which is 6950 feet and walk from there. Some people choose to camp out at Lake Helen which is 10,400 feet and then make their summit attempt first thing in the morning. This requires that you carry all your gear up there and it is always windy up at the so-called lake (there is no water in the liquid form). I can't imagine that there has ever been a good night's sleep at Lake Helen. Based on our guide's experience we started at midnight from our hotel after a few fit full hours of sleep and were going to go up and down in one fell swoop. We all started with some dexamethasone at midnight. It was a beautiful big full moon.

What made me think I could climb Mt Shasta?

Last week I was talking to one of the anesthesiologists with whom I work on a regular basis. he mentioned that he was taking 2 other guys to climb Mt Shasta this weekend. This mountain, at just over 14,000 feet is not considered a technical climb but rather a very difficult hike. I have wanted to go up there as I have driven by many times on the way to Salem, OR and I almost always stop in Mt Shasta City to gaze up at the mountain admiringly. He indicated that they would be happy to have me along, so despite the fact that I was totally unprepared, I decided to tag along...