A major focus of the next month and a half is to give talks in the Southern California area, presenting my research, meeting other astronomers, and chatting with them about their research and mine.

I spent this past Friday at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena. Before my lunch talk, I spent a bit of time in their library (pictured above) and met folks at their morning tea. The lunch talk went well and I had a nice afternoon meeting people.

I’ve got a few more talks planned for the coming weeks; I’m looking forward to those as well. In between, I’ll be working on getting some more data analyzed for my next paper (and I’ll write something about that once I have a nice result to show).

I arrived first, set up camp, and waited for their arrival.

An hour or two later Ryan plus two friends (Steve and Nick) arrived and set up their tents. After a quick discussion of hiking possibilties, we settled on the Upper Yosemite Falls trail and called it a night.

After a bit of a leisurely breakfast we got into the car and headed over to the trailhead for Upper Yosemite Falls. The hike was essentially uphill the whole way (my favorite!) and featured awesome views of the valley, Half Dome, and the falls. Every view of Half Dome was better than the one before so I wound up with many pictures (don’t worry, I didn’t upload them all). After a couple hours we arrived at the top

On the way down the sky opened and thunder boomed. I was quite surprised to see people continuing to hike up towards the very exposed area on top; it’s a dangerous place to be during a thunderstorm. But we got down safely and spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the less outdoors portions of the park, including the Ansel Adams Gallery. We capped off the evening with a campfire.

After an impressive overnight storm (with thunder rolls exceeding 10 seconds), we woke to a morning with clearing weather. Our objectives for the day were more waterfalls: Vernal Falls and Bridalveil Fall. Vernal Falls involved a nice steep hike through a scenic canyon. We were treating to spectacular views of rocky cliffs being revealed by dissapating clouds.

Bridalveil Fall, being a 3 minute walk from the parking lot was a bit of a different experience: a trail swarming with people. It’s obvious why, the fall is impressive!

After visiting the second watefall we split ways; they returned to the Bay Area and I drove back to Pasadena. On the way out of the park, I stopped at the “Tunnel View” for the obligatory (and awesome) view down the Valley.

I’ll only be echoing what many others have said before, but Yosemite is an incredible place. I’m looking forward to going back and climbing or getting into the backcountry.

For more pictures see Yosemite on flickr.

I spent my first day in Switzerland exploring Geneva. It’s a bit of a fog since I landed arrived in the country at 8am and almost immediately started walking around town, but there were some very fun sights to see, including the archaeological site underneath the main cathedral in town as well as the “Palace of Nations” which houses part of the United Nations. It rained for a good chunk of the morning, but not hard enough to ruin the fun.

The next day I traveled from Geneva to Villars-sur-Ollon, taking advantage of the efficient Swiss train system. In fact, one of the conference attendees from China had never been out of his home country before and said he couldn’t keep track of the stops so he just got off the train when the time matched the time on his itinerary. He arrived in the right place thanks to the punctuality of their train system!

After dropping my things off at the hotel in Villars, I returned partyway back to Aigle and meet up with my elementary school science teacher. That was great! We hadn’t seen each other since I was in her class, so it was fun to chat for a while.

On Sunday, the day before the conference started, I dedicated the day to skiing. It was spring skiing conditions, firm in the morning and softening up in the afternoon sun. I’d love to be there in the depths of winter with some fresh snow!

Then things turned a bit sour. During the first conference dinner, on Sunday night, I started feeling a bit iffy and by Monday morning it was full-blown illness: fever, dizzyness, etc. Not the best way to start a conference. I’m happy to say I managed to make it to all the lectures and take in the science, but the afternoons (which were free for skiing) were mostly spend sleeping and resting. I was feeling somewhat better towards the end of the week and managed another hour or so of skiing.

All in all, the conference was excellent (aside from being sick). The scientific content was great and I learned a lot; plus I met some new folks working on similar topics. If you’re curious, the lectures are online (videos, slides) in all their techincal and jargon-y glory.

After 6 days of lecture I headed back to Pasadena by way of Geneva, with a last view of the scenic mountain towns in the Alps…

There are more photos from the trip available on flickr:

• Photos from Geneva
• Photos from Villars-sur-Ollon and travel

More photos of the hike can be found on flickr.

This meeting comes at a great time for me, as my PhD thesis is aimed at constraining simulations and our understanding of the physics involved in galaxy evolution by comparing the simulations with data. As if there was any doubt, I am clearly not alone in this interest.

It will be awesome to spend the next week learning more about simulations and how I can improve my research. I expect to be consumed by science (and skiing) over the next week, but there will be full recap afterwards!

Almost a month ago, I was excited to see an email on the Caltech Alpine Club’s email list with details on an informational meeting for a winter climb of Mt. Whitney. After packing in with over 30 other excited Caltech and JPL folks to get the scoop and decide on weekends, we set a training weekend on Mt. Baldy (the highest mountain the San Gabriels) and a targeted weekend for the attempt on Whitney.

This past weekend was the training event: two one-night climbs of Mt. Baldy. I opted for the Friday-Saturday option, which meant driving to the trailhead after work and hiking up to camp. The moon wouldn’t rise until after 10pm so the trek upward was done by headlamp.

We arrived at the ski hut around 10pm and after a bit of searching, set up camp for the evening. We planned for a not-too-early 6am start to try and reach the summit of Baldy. It was a beautifully clear night and I snuggled into my sleeping bag as the moon rose into a crystal clear sky.

After a good night’s sleep (the moon woke me once, it was so bright) we greeted the rising Sun. Twenty minutes of prep time later my partners, Nate and Alex, and I struck off uphill, finally getting into the snow. We quickly caught up with the rest of the group, who were learning ice axe techniques. The rest of the climb was a relatively uneventful climb up a ridge to the 3067m summit of Baldy, which I reached just after 10am.

After reaching the summit, folks from our group learned/practiced rappelling and prussiking up fixed ropes. Just before noon we started back down the mountain, arriving around 2:30pm. It was a bit of an exhausting day, but it was awesome to get back into the mountains. It was also great to reach a summit!

But, the weekend didn’t end with Baldy. On Sunday I was to join a couple of my collaborators and friends on a hike closer to home. So I called it an early night and managed to fit 11 hours of sleep in before the morning. It was much needed!

We met at Bailey Canyon Park at 9am to start the hike to Jones Peak. We began with a short excursion to a waterfall (which unfortunately turned out to be little more than a trickle), then began gaining altitude. The hike was essentially all uphill until it reached the top of Jones Peak. After savoring the view we hoofed it partway up a ridge, before crossing down and over to the Mt. Wilson trail (part of which we had previously hiked), which we took back down.

The views were amazing and there were quite a few wildflowers in bloom along the trail. That, plus the lower temperature at the higher elevation, made for a very enjoyable hike.

All told, my weekend consisted of roughly 22km of hiking and 2000m of elevation gain/loss. Not too bad for training outings. Looking forward to a few more before hopefully attempting Whitney at the end of March!

For more pictures see the Mt. Baldy set and the Jones Peak set on flickr.

Four of us spent the afternoon climbing in the Slab City, Fun Factory, and Schoolhouse Rock sections. It was a fun day out and good to spend some time outside. I wouldn’t recommend it as a climbing destination, but if you’re in the area and have a day to kill or are looking for a local training crag, it will fill that niche. I imagine I’ll be back.

There are a few more photos in the Riverside Quarry set on flickr.

One of the hiking goals for the Spring (which I share with some of my hiking friends here in LA) is to hike to the summit of Mt. Wilson. Naturally enough, the Mt. Wilson trail is one way to get there. Snaking uphill for 11 km with over 1km of elevation gain, it will be a full day out. We’re doing some hikes to work up to it and the selection for this past Saturday was on the Mt Wilson trail, but only going halfway up, to Orchard Camp.

We set off just after lunch, planning to take advantage of the trail being on the east side of the ridge to put us in the shade for parts of the walk. The trail climbed almost always upward and was generally found in the middle of a steep slope.

The trail was well traveled, but not so busy as to be frustrating. There were people of all types walking and running; it was nice to see so many folks enjoying the outdoors.

After nearly 3 hours of hiking we arrived at Orchard Camp, now just a few foundations that have survived longer than the cabins which they supported. We stopped for a snack and a short rest at the site before returning down the hill. All told, the 13km out-and-back took us 4.5 hours of walking. Halfway there to the summit of Mt. Wilson!

More photos are available in the Mt. Wilson Trail set on flickr.

There are more hikes planned for the weekend; check my flickr collection for So Cal hiking if you want to see more photos from these adventures.