Visiting Family In Lafayette, CO

After the Ultramap User Meeting dinner on Friday I was picked up downtown by Uncle Roger, Aunt Catherine, and Cherie whom I hadn’t seen in over 15 years!  I had a choice between going skiing or spending time with family and decided it would be great to really spend time with them as I’ve always hit off well with my aunt and uncle.  We seem to think very similarly about things in life.  On Friday night we all stayed up pretty late catching up on our lives, my wedding, and their big move to Boulder to be closer to Cherie and their grand daughter Asia.  

On Saturday we all rented a van at Enterprise and headed to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs, just over an hour south of Boulder.  I had no idea what to expect and was completely blown away by the zoo.  It was great to be there with all 5 of them and finally get to spend some time with Asia whom I’d never really met before (maybe as a baby?).  

The zoo is known for having the biggest captive giraffe population.  I counted at least 20+ before I lost track of them.  Visitors follow an elevated wooden pathway above their enclosure and they are completely free to come up to the railings and stick their faces right in yours.  With 14” tongues always sticking out looking for food they looked pretty hilarious to us.  We bought some lettuce and crackers from a stand and spent a long time enjoying feeding their constantly searching long black tongues.  We even got to see a little baby inside a building that was less than a few weeks old!  Asia got a kick out of me messing with Catherine by putting crackers on her head for the giraffe to smack off with its tongue.  

We then spent the rest of the early afternoon strolling up the hill the zoo is built on to see the many different animals which surprisingly seemed mostly to be fine out in the cold weather.  We visited the inside of an aviary and got to feed the little canaries with tongue depressors as they flew all around us.  We even got to get up close and personal with a male peacock that was constantly on display trying to scare off any competitors to the hens he was looking at.  

We spent some time checking out snow leopards, bengal tigers and a whole slew of mountain lions on our way up the hill which had a ski chairlift running to take people back and forth.  What amazed me about the zoo was that all of the animals seemed to be happy and out and about in their enclosures.  Almost every other zoo I’ve been to always had a few big animals that just didn’t want to come out of the safety of their homes or just didn’t seem very active but here they all were acting like they wanted to give us a real show.

My favorite moment at the zoo, even beyond the physical feeding of the many giraffes was how close a massive grizzly bear came to the window of its enclosure.  It slowly lumbered down from its cave to sit on a rock just a foot or so away from us on the other side of a plexiglass window.  I had never before been so close to bear that size and it even with the barrier between us it was truly humbling.  Asia and I both took turns taking a lot of photos!  

From there it was on past the lizards, snakes and other reptiles to the ape exhibit.  Once again, all of the animals seemed to be out and about swinging on ropes or eating snacks left around their enclosures.  There was a brand new baby gorilla at the zoo that remained hugging its mother as she walked all around the enclosure providing great photo opportunities for me.  The only thing I was sad about was that I didn’t have my long lens.  All animals except one sad looking little monkey looked like they were well treated and in good moods.  

After the zoo we headed to Garden of the Gods to see the towering red spires of rock in the golden hour light of sunset.   The towers of rock are actually sedimentary layers of red sandstones and light limestones that have been tilted skyward by the youthful (geologically-speaking) growth of the Rocky Mountain Range.  The area was littered with massive fins of bright red rock and reminded me a lot of Smith Rock in Bend.  Just like Smith this National Natural Landmark has amazing rock climbers and I could see a few bolted routes and hangers far up on the rock faces as we walked the well built footpaths below.  

In the distance, under growing snow clouds, we could see Pikes Peak and the setting sun on the rocks really lit them up incredibly.  We stopped at another location on the park road that wound it’s way between two towers of red sandstone for some more pictures of the family all together.   From there we headed to The Stagecoach Inn restaurant in Manitou Springs, CO for some dinner.  The town was celebrating Mardi Gras and there were a lot of people running around with beads on heading to bars in town.  

We noticed a big police presence.  I ordered local trout and a really good pheasant chowder.  Adam and I also split an order of real Rocky Mountain Oysters (look it up) which was certainly interesting and actually didn’t taste that bad when dipped in cocktail sauce (no pun intended).  After a pleasant ride back to Lafayette where I learned Cherie and I have the same music tastes, we ended the night watching a movie together.  

On Sunday I had a very relaxing day just chilling at the house with Roger and Catherine.  Later in the afternoon Adam came over and we watched All.I.Can, a ski film with incredible cinematography.  Cherie had homework and wasn’t able to make it over but I was pleased that Adam and Asia wanted to see me again before I left.  Adam is a world traveler and into the same outdoor sports Emily and I are into so we hit it off well over the weekend and I look forward to seeing them at the wedding.  

They dropped me off at a convenient bus stop for a quite ride to the airport and an uneventful, although delayed, flight back to Portland.  I can’t say enough how great of a weekend it was with them and it makes me feel bad I didn’t spend more time with them while I was living in Saratoga.... but I’d like to think I’m wiser and more mature now and I bet they totally understand.  

Ultramap User's Meeting - Boulder, CO

 This week my division lead Arley and I attended the Ultramap User’s Meeting at the Microsoft Bing Mapping headquarters in Boulder, CO.  Ultramap is the software WSI uses to process the 260 megapixel photos collected by our UltraCam Eagle Large Format sensor.  Basically, from 2,000 feet in the air each image captures about 130 acres of land with each pixel representing about 2 inches on the ground.  Yeah, you don’t want to tan topless in your backyard anymore when you hear a plane fly overhead.

This was my first work conference ever so I took the opportunity to network as much as I could.  We were surrounded by CEO’s of other photogrammetry specific companies, several of which Arley and I really hit it off with.  Others were our competition and we were trying to figure out the methods they used compared to us.  A takeaway for us was how respected WSI is in the remote sensing community for our innovative data processing and quality deliverables.  

Arley and I presented on the first day how we incorporate our LiDAR data with that of our new high resolution imagery into 3D and 4D proprietary products for clients and everyone seemed pretty impressed.  We also saw a presentation from a guy named Aaron who runs an entire business completely by himself from acquisition in his single plane all the way to delivery.

It was pretty cool being inside the heart of the Bing Mapping offices.  They really have a nice setup with pool tables, big tv’s, shuffle boards, and even an Xbox360 game room for the employees.  I felt a little awkward at times when I mistakenly blurted out “just google it” instead of “just look it up on a search engine”.  I also had to whip out my Macbook Pro to copy our presentation over which felt a little odd in the basement of Microsoft.

We stayed in an amazing 5-star hotel and spa called the St. Julien in downtown Boulder for both Wed and Thurs nights.  The Ultracam employees paid for delicious meals for us at two very fancy restaurants where we had wonderful conversations over delicious steak, seafood, and wine with others in our industry.  We never got to take advantage of our enormous rooms with amazing bathrooms or the spa facilities as we stayed busy with conference but we certainly ate well. 

The “social event” for the conference was a trip to Uncer Racing near Denver on the first night of the conference.  There was also an event Friday night after dinner but Arley had to fly back and I was getting picked up by relatives.  Uncer Rancing was amazing.  It was basically a go-cart race track in a giant warehouse building where you could reach speeds of 40-50mph in the modified carts and could drift around corners.   We were required to wear helmets and offered fire suits but declined.  We had two qualifying heats each and then a final championship.  I won both my qualifying heats but  placed last in the championship simply because I gave up and wanted to see how much drifting I could do before they got mad and turned the governor on remotely to slow down my cart.  They did it after about 3 laps.... ha!

I really had a great time at the conference and felt like we learned a lot about the new upcoming software and direction the industry is moving in.  This will keep us informed and help to continue our technological advancements at WSI.

Laid Back January

Not many blog posts this month as we laid pretty low on the weekends without any major adventures.  After Leo’s first backcountry experience we took him back up to Timberline with us for a day of bluebird skiing while he chilled in the car.  Emily and I found some great snow out of bounds and took a couple fun runs until I lost her and she ended up skiing far off down the mountain.  She called me and I told her to backtrack up her tracks.  

She then spent the next 2 hours on a spirit quest in the woods making her way out while I was lucky enough to meet up with Rob and Kate from Corvallis randomly and get a bunch more laps in.   Poor Emily.  When we were getting ready to leave we let Leo runaround the snow by the parking lot plenty before we met up with Chris, Arley and her roomates at Charlies in Government Camp for some dinner.  The bar tender was a complete ass so I didn’t tip him or order food while we were there.  Arley’s roomates were totally stoked to meet Leo and he was excited to see Chris again too.  

The following weekend was a surprise 3 day MLK weekend for me and Emily as WSI let us know we could have the day off last minute.  This worked out good for us as Leo got snipped on Friday morning so we needed to stay with him all weekend while he wore his “cone of shame”.  It was so sad to see him banging around the house with that awful plastic around his neck that they called “an elizabethan collar”.... He couldn’t hold any of his toys down with his paws and I think he was depressed with it.  We took him for a walk and every time he sniffed the ground the damn thing acted like a shovel scooping everything right up with it into his neck.  He didn’t seem in much pain and we made sure he got his medicines as he needed them and we picked up a bunch of treats to spoil him with during his recovery.  On Monday night, 4 days prior to when we were told to take the cone off we couldn’t take it any more and removed it keeping an eye on him.  He didn’t bother his stitches so I left it off when I went to work on Tuesday and he was just fine.

On Friday the 25th we headed down to the Dixie outside of Shedd, OR near Corvallis for Sarah’s big 30th birthday bash.  They had tons of food prepared and a whole gang of her friends were there.  We went to the Dixie for some beers and to sing karaoke.  Holm sang Jimi Hendrix if I remember right and Sarah and Adam’s friend Bill was a big hit as karaoke appeared to be his favorite thing in live.  At around midnight Emily and said our goodbyes and headed into town to stay at Kevin and Alexa’s who ironically were actually staying at our place in Ridgefield for the night.  It was a convenient house trade.   

When we got back to our place on Saturday they stayed over again to look for tattoo artists.  Emily and I met with Videographer on our way back to Ridgefield on Saturday so we all decided to get some Sushi in town and chill back at the house for a great relaxing night with our old housemates.  Leo and Dromi got along great together although I think Dromi wanted him to play a bit more with her.  On Sunday Emily and I got up and had a fun afternoon skiing at Timberline again in good weather, this time without her getting lost :).

Finally, to end the month, my friends Logan and Eric headed to Ski Bowl on a Tuesday night after what was supposed to be an epic storm on Mount Hood.  We were hoping for some deep powder but what we found was about a foot and a half of white cake frosting all over the mountain.  So thick and heavy that skiing through it was almost like skiing bumps.  We did find a few fun drops off a cliff band but even with a slope under them we all came to nearly dead stops due to how thick it was.  Instead of skiing the whole time we found ourselves at the base enjoying a couple pitchers of good beer and chatting.  Before the lifts closed we got a couple more runs in while it rained on us.  Regardless of the weather and crazy thick snow we had a great time skiing together.

Leo's First Backcountry Ski Trip

Today we took Leo with us to Skibowl.  We met Holm at the resort around 11am and took some Upper Bowl runs with him until about 2pm when we headed down for some sandwiches and to take Leo for his first trip on snow.  The conditions weren’t that great at the resort so we didn’t hesitate to put our energy towards testing out Leo rather than continuing to ride the lifts.

We left from the parking lot at Skibowl and headed down the trail along the road around 2:45pm.  We kept him on leash just because we didn’t dare risk the chance of him darting out into traffic.  We quickly found out that he was better off behind Emily chasing her and in front of me.  Otherwise he preferred to walk alongside us and our skis which was awkward on the narrow path.  I kept a close eye on him and made sure my skis didn’t run into his back legs in front of me as he pulled me along.  When we got to the trailhead we put on our skins and headed across a narrow bridge over a stream that clearly made Leo very nervous.  

Once over the bridge we let him off leash to test him out on a trail and as usual for Leo he did great!  Not only did he keep an eye on us and stay with us but he also came directly back to us on every call!  As before, he did very well with all the other dogs he encountered on the trail.  What he didn’t do so well with, at least initially, was his footing in the snow he wasn’t used to.  He would often sink in and later while running would faceplant hard with each misstep.  

When we got to mirror lake he learned to his delight that he could eat the snow he was running on and started chompin down mouthfuls until I brought some water over for him.  That was when he also learned the joy of chomping snowballs I threw at him!  After resting for a bit we pulled off our skins and headed down the trail with our heels locked down in alpine mode.  I took the lead as I was faster and to my disbelief Leo kept up with me the entire way down the trail, often at a full run behind me with tongue hanging out and looking extremely happy.  At the bottom he showed no sign of a limp, was free of snow in his fur and actually didn’t look too tired.  This dog IS AMAZING IN SNOW,  We are so happy that he liked it, stayed with us, and kept up with us easily.  Next test: Mountain Biking.

Leo at Oswald West State Park

After being couped up in the car all the previous night we wanted to make it up to Leo by taking him to the beach to romp around for a bit on our drive back home.  After a great breakfast of crab bisque that Megan and Lindsay had made Kevin suggested we check out Oswald West on our way out.  It took some driving up north from Oceanside to get to the park but it was well worth it.  I don’t think Leo had been to the ocean before as he was confused upon licking the water and was definitely scared of the sea foam in the waves.  With some encouragement he followed me out with the waves and then ran back with me when they came crashing in.  

We hesitated taking him off leash but then decided to give it a go and were happily surprised that he both played well with the other dogs on the beach and came back to us on first call every time.  We also found out that he occasionally likes to chase sticks and bring them back to us.  He was certainly concerned more with where we were than the other dogs on the beach which was also a plus.  This dog just seems to get better and better with everything we test him with.

Instead of heading back across the coast range we decided to head north to Astoria to check out the Goonie house and head over the very cool bridge there.  Emily hadn’t been to Astoria yet so it was new to her.  Over the bridge we had a great view back towards Astoria with Saddle Mountain looming over it.  We had no idea how prevalent Saddle Mountain was in the view from Astoria.  If it had been better weather when we climbed it last December we would have had spectacular views.  The Goonie house wasn’t anything to write home about so we didn’t even get out of the car.  We followed the Columbia back from Astoria and I got to briefly see the lights of Emily’s mill in the darkness as we passed by it on the same route she takes home every day.... it is definitely a long commute for her.