Tahquitz Peak

Idyllwild! 

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Mount Baden Powell

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Katharine Lee Bates who  wrote " America the Beautiful"  must have had  that familiar feeling of awe and wonderment every hiker experiences as she bagged Colorado's Pikes Peak in the summer of 1893.  O beautiful for spacious skies,  For Amber waves of grain,  For purple mountain majesties,  Above the fruited plain America, America  God shed His grace on thee,  And crown thy good with brotherhood  From sea ro shining sea.  It was I who have been calling on mountains. No mountains ever called me back but I love them just the same. As usual, it's just me and  myself sauntering the 40 switchbacks of the 40th hike  of the 52 hike challenge I am doing this year. Twelve more and I would complete the  challenge.  I belt out a slightly modified Rachel Platten's refrain making sure nobody was within hearing distance.  This is my fight song Take back my life song  Prove I'm not old song  My power's turned on...
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George Washington Bridge. Bronx. Cabrini Boulevard. Washington Heights. 175th Street, Manhattan, NYC. Interstate 95 or I-95, the main interstate highway of the east coast. New York State Route Highway 9A. US Route 9. US Route 1. Fort Lee, New Jersey. Palisades Interstate Park, New Jersey. White blazes.  Concrete jungles where dreams are made of  There’s nothing you can’t do Now you’re in New York  These streets will make you feel brand new The song “Empire State of Mind” admittedly typical “New York hip-hop shit” by its writers resonates again as I hike my  second bridge for the  family East Coast visit. I’ve had enough of the tourist crowd of the  iconic Brooklyn Bridge and finding the bike path  that would get me to New Jersey on foot got me deeper into  this Jay Z-popularized hip-hop shit.  If  I can make it here, I can make it anywhere, that’s what they say. AllTrails rates the 1.6 mile George Washington Bridge hike easy. The unbroke...
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Tenshi comes out. Beyond gay terms, Tenshi takes the place of Holy Shi Tzu, the happy monkey tree sack buddha from the cordilleras of my homeland who has gone ahead, like lost or left behind on the trails. Tenshi means messenger from heaven in Japanese. The icon is a representation of the monks who are called "tenshin" at the Yokoji Zen Mountain Center near Idyllwild.  In Zen  Buddhism terms, Tenshi comes out in search of the bull. "In the pasture of this world, I endlessly push aside the tall grasses in search of the bull. Following unnamed rivers, lost upon the interpenetrating path of distant mountains, my strengths failing me and my vitality exhausted, I cannot find the bull. I only hear the locusts chirping through the forests at night." The glorious Holy Shih Tzu started off as one of my "traveling gnomes", a corny mimicry of a plot in Amelie, the movie.  The lowly happy monkey tree sack Buddha  took  the place of Pha Khin Phat wh...
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