Category Archives: Altitude

Some “Winter” Photos

by in Altitude, Environment, Photography, Tahoe | 6 Comments

“Everything made by men will be destroyed by nature in the end.
Mountains and river, the creations of nature — they will remain.“
–Richard Lloyd Parry, Ghosts of the Tsunami (2018).

Just a few photos… maybe a nature-will-do-whatever-it-wants theme. There hasn’t been much snow this winter, so the views are unusual for the season. Unfortunately, we did get a heavy snow about two weeks back that resulted in an avalanche that killed nine back-country skiers. Nature isn’t concerned with human pursuits. But this is still a beautiful place.

From the end of January. Sitting on some rocks near the water, I was just messing around with aperture and exposure settings while the sun settled into the clouds across the lake. The haze over the water is from controlled burns in the basin.

“Artist’s Point” – With no snow in February! This is usually only accessible on skis this time of year. Right out of the camera, without any editing other than to downsize the image to 50% for WP. This is from just about the same spot in 2020.

I tend to shoot panoramic views, but decided to crop this one into a square. This was another of those cases of just sitting on the rocks and messing around with settings while the sun and the clouds did their thing. The lens was a 20-millimeter, so this was simply cropped down to a pretty small area at full resolution.

Heading toward the Fredericksburg area on bike rides, I’d always noticed this tree off to the left of the road. Looking southeast on a late December morning.

From an overnighter. Making hot water for dinner in a snow pit next to the tent, I took out my avi beacon for a couple of shots. The thermometer read 7-degrees F. You could have put a zero after that number in town yesterday.

 

 

Nature does whatever it wants.

Descent

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Environment, Fear, Risk, Snow | 21 Comments

“Every worthy act is difficult. Ascent is always difficult.
Descent is easy, but often slippery.“
— Mahatma Gandhi, Courageous or Cowardly, New Delhi, 23 November 1947.

My dad first taught me how to ski in cross-country gear when I was maybe eight or nine years old. As I became older, the boots became heavier and the skis became wider, as I learned how to get them to turn on down-slopes. My dad also taught me how to use “skins” to ski uphill…
and how to locate buried skiers with an avalanche beacon.

Years later, I accompanied my dad on a winter trip to the state of Washington, where we learned how to ski on glaciers. The instruction included a review of crevasse rescue, something I’d first learned about several months earlier. Thinking about this, it probably explains the claustrophobia I sometimes feel in confined spaces. 

Still, I’ve never been a particularly good downhill skier. I never really learned how to properly use ski-bindings that hold a boot’s heel down, something useful for safely negotiating steeper or more technical terrain. But that didn’t necessarily keep me from trying in some moments of more-or-less painful instances of experiential learning.

For me, skis are mostly a way to escape while accessing a kind of beauty that not too many people get to experience. They can also make for an easier return after reaching a high-elevation objective. That trip to Washington with my dad would prepare me for a roped and cautious ski descent down a glacier on Alaska’s almost 5,000-meter tall, Mount Sanford. But that trip would also cure me of any further ambitions to reach those kinds of altitudes.

Last May, I wrote about an expedition to Mount Everest that had been covered in media, mostly due to press-releases. The summit attempt was intended to publicize the use of medical technologies and pre-conditioning to allow four men to reach the 8,849-meter high summit in a record time. But the whole thing struck me as more of a publicity stunt intended to promote expensive selfies as opposed to actual “mountaineering”. Regardless, another recently promoted Mount Everest summit attempt actually left me deeply impressed.

As I mentioned in my May post, nearly all climbers reach the summit of Mount Everest while using supplemental oxygen. But on September 22, 2025, the Polish mountaineer, Andrzej Bargiel, summited the mountain without supplemental oxygen. Moreover, he carried up a pair of skis which he then used to ski back down via the South Col Route. The following day, he then skied down the “Khumbu Icefall”, a feat I didn’t even know was possible. The icefall consists of the massive shattered ridges and deep crevasses formed by the constantly moving Khumbu Glacier, which blocks the bottom of the approach to the South Col.

Much of the attempt was filmed, and sometimes guided by a drone that was flown by Bargiel’s brother, Bartek. Some of the drone footage is utterly astounding, really showing the scale of the endeavor. In other places, we get to see Andrzej Bargiel’s perspective as he struggles merely to stay standing in the thin air of Everest’s “death zone”, coughing as fluid slowly fills his lungs.
And knowing what it would mean to fall into a crevasse alone, the icefalls were simply terrifying.

Worthy of a full screen…

 

Yosemite’s Back Door

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Environment, Hmmm..., Photography | 16 Comments

“This country, with its institutions,
belongs to the people who inhabit it.“
–Abraham Lincoln, First Inaugural Address (1861).

Taking advantage of a local October tradition to shut down the town for a week, combined with the US government’s decision to see which political party can hold its breath longer, we decided to make a dash into the Yosemite high-country while no one was watching. Heading south down US-395, our route took us over a pass known for its autumn trees. Still a little early for full color, the area is at 8,143 foot (2,482 m) Conway Summit. The view is to the southwest, toward the peaks of the Hoover Wilderness.

From the eastern side of the Sierras, the national park’s entrance is reached via Tioga Pass on California State Route 120. This is the southernmost pass for traveling entirely over the Sierra Nevada Range. With most of the route lying within a high-elevation section of Yosemite National Park, the pass usually closes for the winter in late October or early November (closed today as I’m writing this). And overnight parking along the road isn’t allowed after October 15.

From its junction with US-395 at the south end of the town of Lee Vining, the route ascends 3,000 vertical feet over twelve miles to the eastern park entrance. The Yosemite National Park entry at the 9,945 foot (3,031 m.) summit is usually backed up with traffic while visitors have their reservations checked and and hand over a $35 “parking fee”. However, the reservation requirement had been lifted for the remainder of 2025, and no one was manning the entry station. And since the park is “cashless”, there was no way to pay. Oh well… 

Our only real destination for this trip was 10,620-foot Tresidder Peak, which was named after the 1943 to 1948 President of Stanford University. This mountain actually has two prominences, a lower northern peak, and a somewhat higher and more difficult to reach southern peak. There’s also another interesting tower of rock along a ridge to the south known as Columbia Finger. This mountain had been on our radar since a trip up nearby Cathedral Peak in late 2017. Reaching our destination would require staying in the higher elevation, Tuolumne Meadows region of the park. 

Northeast toward Tenaya Lake, which is at an elevation of 9,039-feet.
Tresidder is on the other side of 10,266-ft Tenaya Peak, which rises to the right of the lake.

Tresidder Peak from Upper Cathedral Lake.

The Columbia Finger, flipping off bureaucracy from its 10,360 foot perch.

High country hiking.

After a couple of days in the high country, it was time to head back to the alternate reality of “civilization”, thus justifying a trip into the Yosemite Valley part of the national park for grub and gasoline. This is the part of the national park with which most people are familiar. Despite the government shutdown, the valley was mostly business-as-usual since its public services are mainly run by a contractor, “Yosemite Hospitality” (aka: Aramark). This meant that everything from gasoline to groceries, and even the valley shuttle busses were fully operational.

Half Dome from the Curry Village area of the valley.

It was the usual traffic into the valley, with people stopping to take pictures. But this time of year avoids the back-ups and traffic jams that are why Yosemite started requiring reservations to enter the national park several years back. Still, the crowds were far less than we expected; and it was fairly easy to get ourselves parked right in the central, Yosemite Village area. That left us with plenty of time for lunch and to be tourists.

Yosemite Falls and the Lost Arrow Spire.

A leisurely drive home over Tioga Pass would take us back into Lee Vining by late afternoon. And after a dinner at one of the local mom-and-pops, we made a stop by the US Forest Service, Mono Basin Scenic Visitor Center… which was closed. It’s an interesting facility with good bathrooms; however, it’s usually shut down in the winter. This time, however, the website hosted a rather more terse message. Meh… whatever.

So, we walked ourselves around the back of the building where we could watch the shadow of the eastern Sierras settle over Mono Lake…

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Just Some Photos

by in Altitude, Environment, Luminous Aether, Photography, Tahoe | 17 Comments

Haven’t been so inclined to sit in front of a computer this summer. So these are just a few recent photos from some local excursions around the neighborhood. I’m trying the “block editor” this time around. I’d mostly given up on it since it was deleting my first paragraphs whenever I tried to hand edit anything (like this ridiculous text size). But I think I’ll give the “expand” function for photos a try this time around.

The south meadow at Mount Rose Summit. Just below the pass at about 8,900-feet, the boardwalk heads out toward “Chickadee Ridge”. The unofficial name is due to so many tourists feeding the birds in the area that they have learned to land on people’s outstretched hands.

A dead tree along the Rim Trail, right at about the alpine limit. It impresses me that anything at all can grow here. This will be under at least ten-feet of snow in the winter. (This one links to the image file.)

Lake Tahoe, from above the northeastern shore. The mountains on the left are the Carson Range of the Sierra Nevadas. The Sierra Nevada high country, which marks the divide between the California watershed and the Great Basin, is on the other side of the lake. That means that none of this water ever reaches the sea.

The Spooner Lake loop off the Tahoe Rim Trail. This area is adjacent to Highway-50 at Spooner Summit and pretty easily accessible. Unfortunately, the northern Lake Tahoe side of the Carson Range has been closed this summer due to work on the higher elevation Marlette Lake dam, which was originally built in the late 1800s.

Spooner Lake, looking north. The dam on the opposite side was also built in the late 1800s. The water was used in flumes that moved timber down the slopes to the east to Carson City. The lake is a regular stop for migrating birds, and it’s a popular fishing spot. However, I wouldn’t recommend swimming here. The lake is, unfortunately, also home to some kind of invasive leech.

The end of the trail.

Belief

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Fear, Hmmm..., Identity, Philosophy, Risk | 20 Comments


“Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution.
It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.”
-Niels Bohr

Leaning back into space, weight shifted slowly from my feet onto the rope that would keep me from falling. Finally, pushing off from the rock, I loosened my grip on its connection to the earth and allowed my body to fall… just a little. It was a moment of faith, balanced by reason.

“Reason” is that characteristic of mind through which we come to rational conclusions. “Faith” is merely an acceptance of that not empirically provable. A combination of both is the source of all foundations upon which we build our lives, whether functional, intellectual, moral, or religious. And once established, they become the beliefs, or the set of rules from which trusted expectations are drawn. So it’s no small thing when those foundations fail.

Constructing a reliable climbing or rappel anchor requires a fair amount of informed consideration. And among the first things learned is not to place much faith in those structures relied upon by others. Rusted bolts and sun-rotted nylon webbing are but crumbling invitations to disaster. That worthy of trust requires knowledge, understanding, and the effort to create and to verify for one’s self. But in science, this defines the trade-off in avoiding “Type II” error; minimizing the risk of bad ideas comes at the cost of overlooking potentially good ones.

“Cognitive Dissonance” is what we feel when established expectations suddenly fail to describe reality. Opening the front door of my old house one morning, the snow-covered tree that had fallen across the front porch during the night’s blizzard resulted in a moment of startled confusion. The rational expectation of a familiar world was suddenly replaced by a profoundly disturbing experience.  It was as the unexpected sensation of falling in a dream.

There are two ways to avoid such moments. The first is to plan carefully, and to prepare backups for those times when things fall apart anyway. Likewise, a good climbing anchor is not only sturdily constructed, but it’s also built with no single point-of-failure. Regardless, there will always be risks beyond our ability to control.

But the alternative is merely not to climb.

In the mountains, acceptable risk is understood to be subjective; and it’s usually assessed by looking at four factors: probability, consequence, exposure, and tolerance. The first three multiply to increase actual risk. And this is where things like building a good anchor, or tying knots at the ends of a rope can make a difference.

Still, there are always risks in the approach to a summit. Some are physical. Others are the consequence of a clear view, the experience of nearing the boundaries of both reason and faith, and peering into the abyss. Plato called them the “beautiful dangers”. Heidegger called it “metaphysical vertigo”.  And the degree of willingness to accept such risk can only be determined by an individual.

Tolerance is consequently founded in something deeply personal. It represents a threshold for an acceptance of risk in exchange for what it promises in return. For the honest and informed, it’s a belief in one’s self grounded in experience, ability, fortitude, and goals.

But there’s always some aspect of a Kierkegaardian-like leap as one leans back, trusting in the thin strand that holds a spirit to the mountain.

Todd Skinner leaned back into space, just as he had thousands of times before. This particular day in October of 2006, he and his climbing partner, Jim Hewett, had been exploring a route for a first free-climb of the 3,000-foot, “Leaning Tower” in Yosemite. Deciding to call-it-a-day in the heat of the afternoon, they ate a lunch and then began a series of easy rappels back down.

As Skinner neared the end of his second rappel, Hewett heard a strange sound. “I looked down really quickly and just saw him falling… and I knew he was dead.” Skinner had experienced an almost unheard of equipment failure of the “belay loop” on his harness, the sturdy and utterly reliable nylon ring through which climbers secure themselves to their ropes.

Thin Air

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Environment, Hmmm..., Risk, Science | 24 Comments

Mount Sanford (I think)

“I am nothing more than a single, narrow, gasping lung, floating over the mists and summits.”
-Reinhold Messner, Everest: Expedition to the Ultimate (1979).
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Air

When I was a teen, my dad spent two months preparing to reach the summit of Denali in Alaska, the highest peak in North America at just over 20,000-feet (about 6,200-meters). A physician, he was well aware of the need to acclimatize to the altitude.

During that time, I accompanied him and several others to the summit of Mount Sanford, at just under 5,000-meters, the highest elevation I’ve ever reached. I was fairly well acclimatized up to 3,500-meters at the time. Still, I well recall the thin air during the last day up to, and back from the summit.

A month in Japan, mostly in near sea-level Tokyo and Osaka, and I’m reminded that the Earth’s atmosphere is little more than a thin blanket. And the oxygen that I like to breath accounts for only about one-fifth of it.

Still, the atmosphere presses with almost fifteen pounds per square-inch (14.7 “psi”) at sea-level . The weight of all the air above, that’s more than a ton per square-foot!  And though we don’t notice, our bodies push back with the same force.

Travel higher, and there’s less air above. So air-pressure decreases with altitude, by roughly one-half for every 18,000-feet (5,600-meters). At around 63,000-feet, it drops to a mere 0.9-psi, not even enough to keep human-body temperature water from boiling. (The “Armstrong limit”.)

Aside from keeping the fluids in our bodies from vaporizing, atmospheric pressure also pushes oxygen molecules close enough together for breathing. But with only half the pressure at 18,000-feet, only half as much oxygen is available as at sea-level. And at 29,000-feet, or the summit of Mount Everest, it’s only about one-third. And that’s not enough for human life.
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Humans at Altitude

In the US, I live at around 6,300-feet (≈2000-meters), so there’s about 20% less “oxygen pressure”. That’s enough to affect the human body, especially when exercising. Humans can adapt; but it takes time. And a month at sea-level is more than enough time to lose that adaptation.

Those not adapted may reflexively breathe more deeply (“hyperpnea”), or faster (“tachypnea”), and the heart may beat faster (“tachycardia”). But this can throw-off blood “pH” (acidity or alkalinity), eventually leading to a medical condition known as “alkalosis”. But this is only temporary.

Over about a week, kidneys will work to re-balance blood pH, a process that mountaineers can speed up with certain drugs, such as acetazolamide. But the kidneys also respond by secreting a hormone called “erythropoietin”, or “EPO”.

Most notably, EPO causes a gradual increase in red blood cells [“hematocrit” on a blood test]. Blood plasma also decreases, and more capillaries form in skeletal muscles. And the heart’s right ventricle may enlarge, increasing blood-pressure to the lungs. This all helps to more efficiently move oxygen.

Traveling to high altitudes without giving the body time to adapt can cause an illness known as “acute mountain sickness” (AMS). Severity can depend on elevation change, altitude, and rate of ascent. But AMS can be deadly.

Most who ascend from sea-level to 10,000-feet will experience some AMS symptoms for a few days, usually a headache and fatigue. Severe headaches, nausea, and difficulty with coordination might require descending to a lower elevation.

An inability to “get enough air” even when resting, and severe difficulties with coordination require immediate descent and medical attention, as they signal two potentially lethal forms of AMS.

A common thumbnail calculation for the time needed to fully adapt to an altitude is to multiply the elevation-change in kilometers (1,000-meters) by 11.5 days. So to fully adapt from sea-level to my home in the US at about 2,000-meters should take around 23-days.

Likewise, adapting to Base Camp at Mount Everest at around 5,200-meters (about 17,000-feet) should take about 60-days, assuming a start from sea-level. However, that pushes a limit. Most healthy humans can only adapt to long-terms up to about 5,000-meters (16,500-feet).
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Thin Air

The summit of Everest might now be reached by hundreds each year. But only a handful have done so without supplemental oxygen. Elevations above 8,000-meters are commonly called the “death zone” due to the thin air. In fact, until the mountaineers, Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler, reached Everest’s summit without supplemental oxygen in 1978, it was a feat considered impossible.

Still, after months of acclimatization, the two mountaineers only barely succeeded. Falling to their knees in the snow to catch their breaths, Habeler began hallucinating. And Messner later described feeling as though he had lost his sense of “self” before literally crawling onto the summit.

In a later recollection of that moment, Messner declared that, “In my state of spiritual abstraction, I no longer belong to myself and to my eyesight. I am nothing more than a single narrow gasping lung, floating over the mists and summits.”
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V̇O2 max

“V̇O2 max” is a measure of how much oxygen a person can utilize during a physical activity; and it’s constrained by the rate of blood oxygen transport. Many aerobic athletes, such as bicyclists and runners, will train at high altitudes in the weeks before events to naturally increase this capacity. However, the use of synthetic EPO to artificially induce the effect is almost universally banned in sports as a form of “doping”.  But there’s an odd gray area.

“Xenon” is a chemical element with the atomic number 54, and symbol “Xe”. It is a dense, colorless and odorless “noble gas” found in very small amounts in the Earth’s atmosphere. As a noble gas, like helium or argon, it’s generally non-reactive. However, the atom’s large size allows for some weak chemical interactions, including some that affect the human body.

Most importantly, breathing xenon can easily prove fatal. Not only can it displace the oxygen necessary for life, but high concentrations will also put a person to sleep in seconds. In fact, xenon is used for general anesthesia by trained physicians with proper equipment and careful administration. But a side effect is that it also stimulates the body to produce EPO.

The Russians apparently tried this with athletes at the Sochi Olympics, causing the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to later ban xenon use. But whether xenon-elevated EPO really improves performance is still an open question, with no scientific studies demonstrating any advantage.

Regardless, four British military veterans just summited Mount Everest in a single week by using xenon to boost their red blood cell count while at sea-level. Under medical supervision, the four men inhaled a xenon-oxygen mix in a single administration that lasted less than an hour, with the hope that the greatest effects would occur 10 to 14 days afterward.
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Gas

Personally, I think this is mostly a stunt, with media (again) treating a press-release as “news”. The four men have also been sleeping and exercising for weeks in low oxygen environments, simulating the high altitudes. So this was more likely how they pre-acclimated their bodies. Still, Reinhold Messner has expressed his support of the process, including the use of xenon. 

These guys did manage to make it from sea-level to the summit of Mount Everest in a mere week, a record to be sure… with months of medically-supervised preparation, a massive support team, and supplemental oxygen. To what extent this represents a “human” endeavor I suppose depends upon what technologies one considers as a part of the human identity, whether high-tech clothing, synthetic ropes and aluminum ladders, bottled oxygen, or medically administered xenon gas.

The whole point of “mountaineering” was once considered to be the challenge. Granted, I’m nowadays happy to make it up a local hill to enjoy the view. But Mount Everest, at least, seems to have been reduced to the status of reaching the top of a tabloid news cycle with an expensive selfie.

 

References (though there’s plenty of media coverage):

Dias, K. A., Lawley, J. S., Gatterer, H., Howden, E. J., Sarma, S., Cornwell, W. K., Hearon, C. M., Samels, M., Everding, B., Liang, A. S., Hendrix, M., Piper, T., Thevis, M., Bruick, R. K., & Levine, B. D. (2019). Effect of acute and chronic xenon inhalation on erythropoietin, hematological parameters, and athletic performance. Journal of Applied Physiology, 127(6), 1503–1510. https://doi.org/10.1152/japplphysiol.00289.2019

Horwath, H. (2020, January 3). Blood Doping and EPO: An Anti-Doping FAQ | USADA. U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA). https://www.usada.org/spirit-of-sport/blood-doping-epo-faq/

Malcolm, C. (2021, December 30). Into thin Air: The Science of Altitude Acclimation. iRunFar. https://www.irunfar.com/into-thin-air-the-science-of-altitude-acclimation

UIAA Medical Commission. (2025, February 5). Statement on xenon and high-altitude mountaineering – UIAA. UIAA – International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation (UIAA). https://www.theuiaa.org/statement-on-xenon-and-high-altitude-mountaineering/

Wilkerson, J. A. (1985). Medicine for mountaineering. Mountaineers Books.

 

 

Tōkyō

by in Altitude, Environment, Japan, Luminous Aether, Photography | 7 Comments

“I think Tokyo is going to sink under water soon. All those stupid high-rise buildings will sink and maybe all the traffic will be gone. And everything will be peaceful and quiet.“
–Hayao Miyazaki

Scenes from Tokyo, spring ’25…
(Please forgive the phone shots and editing.)

Higher elevation cherry blossoms.

Flora

Trails

 

Fauna

 

O-Jizo-sama, guardians of children and travelers,
and the Seven Lucky Gods of (front left to right):
fortune, longevity, wisdom, talent, protection, prosperity, & commerce.


Fujisan

 

Back to “civilization”…

Gratuitous Displays

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Hmmm..., Risk | 28 Comments

“I know it when I see it.
-Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart,
Describing his test for “pornography”, (1964).

Perusing the discount inventory of a nearby big-city purveyor of outdoor-fetish fashion, I came across some surprisingly inexpensive locking metal hardware intended for use in risky activities involving ropes and harnesses. Usually, such bargains are the stuff of Amazon brands with unpronounceable names and descriptions like, “Locking Ring Clip Heavy Duty Large Chain Hook Link Automatic Indoor Outdoor Application…  To be safe, don’t load any subject over 300lb.”

These, however, looked to me like the real thing. They were marked with an appropriately French, Union Internationale des Associations d’Alpinisme, “UIAA”, indicating an online catalogue where I could verify their authenticity. So, I decided to take the chance of picking up ten of them as something inexpensive enough to be left in tie-offs.

My husband, who actually works for a company that makes these kinds of devices, calls fascination with this sort of stuff, “gear porn”. Regardless, I’ll occasionally catch him gawking at some rather graphic, if not highly risqué displays of its use in videos. Apparently, he’s in good company.

According to 2024 statistics from one study cited in the Maze of Love, 92% of men and 60% of women in the US check out porn at least monthly, while 46% of men and 16% of women are regular consumers. And something like 8-to-10 million Americans are apparently addicted to it. However, I think the kind of porn is at least as important as the addiction.

I’ll admit to a political porn addiction that had me starting my days with ever increasingly disgusting images over my morning coffee. Despite knowing that I was enduring scripts written by Machiavellian sociopaths and social manipulators, it was difficult looking away while wondering, “How did they do that!?“… or if what I was seeing was even real?

Happily, I’ve kept to a New Year resolution to stop… or at a minimum, severely restrict my consumption of at least the more revolting displays. It’s certainly reduced my stress, along with the shame of imagining that it actually represents real life. But I’ll confess to having recently become hooked on something new.

An attractive, young and fit Japanese woman self-produces the videos, almost all of which are performed solo and through some interesting camera work.  My husband caught me watching one of her productions a few weeks back. But as it turned out, he liked it too; and we ended up gawping together at her crossing the “umanose” (馬の背), or the “horse’s back”.

It was surprisingly stimulating, kindling a flood of exciting memories.  I first crossed the horse’s back with my dad when I was a teen, though most everything was concealed under snow. Then I did it one summer with a group while I was living in Japan… and again with my husband several years ago. I’ve always used a rope; but it was still very exciting!  I’ll link the video here.

It may be little more than perversely addictive, vicarious entertainment. But then, so are the hormonal displays of pro-wrestling, the tacky fan-service of pop-star fashion and award ceremonies, the lewd grunting of football and its “Superbowl”, or wallowing in others’ sufferings in the “news”. 

Merely gratuitous and unproductive, it’s perhaps nothing more than another socially maladaptive appeal to some baser instinct. But at least what I’ve been viewing lately makes me feel good… even after I finish watching. Still…
any excuse for a little spontaneous gear porn…

 

Acceptance and Courage

by in Altitude, Boundary Behavior, Dad, Death, Environment, History, Identity, Japan, Mystery | 13 Comments

“When one loses the deep intimate relationship with nature,
then temples, mosques and churches become important.”
—–Jiddu Krishnamurti

Japan is known for its mountains. And its mountains are known for the extraordinary numbers of Japanese who climb to their summits. Probably the best known of Japan’s mountains is “Fuji-san”, or Mount Fuji. A 3,776 meter (12,388-ft.) dormant volcano, Fuji-san is considered the traditional symbol of Japan, as well as the dwelling place of the goddess, Konohanasakuya-hime (shortened, “Sakuya-hime”), the “Cherry-Tree Blossom Princess”.

Fuji-san’s summit hosts several shrines to Sakuya-hime, whom the Japanese Shinto religion reveres as a bringer of healing, rebirth and spiritual happiness, encouraging many to seek peace by climbing the mountain. And during the 2024 summer climbing season, almost 205,000 people attempted the journey.


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“Yamabushi” 山伏 (ones who bow to the mountain) are Japanese ascetic monks who worship the mountains as the dwelling-places of powerful spirits. Their practices combine ancient Shinto beliefs in nature spirits, or “kami”, with esoteric Buddhist traditions in a practice known as “Shugendō”.

Shugendō dates to the 7th-century, when it was ostensibly founded by En no Gyōja (役行者), or “En the Ascetic”. At Kongōsan Tenhōrin-ji, a Shugendō temple near Osaka, En is regarded as a “Bodhisattva”, or a spiritually awakening individual approaching Buddhahood. Most depictions of En, however, date from the Kamakura period (1185-1332) or later, and are usually associated with the mountain ascetic traditions practiced in Japan’s Ōmine mountains.

Accordingly, the traditional center of Shugendō is considered to be the sacred, Mount Ōmine, in the Yoshino-Kumano National Park, south of the city of Nara and west of the central Shinto shrine complex in Ise. And while the edict can’t actually be enforced in modern Japan, Shugendō still considers the mountain and its shrines and temples as sacred grounds, and thus off-limits to women.

Shugendō is a syncretic, “Kami-Buddhist” practice developed during the Heian era (794-1185), blending both Shinto and Buddhist beliefs. Shinto is an indigenous religion to Japan that recognizes a vast pantheon of gods and natural spirits, or “kami”, which may inhabit various locations, or even natural phenomena. The emperor of Japan was believed to be a direct descendant of the heavenly Shinto Sun-Goddess, Amaterasu.

After Buddhism was introduced into Japan during the 6th-century, Buddhist temples began to be constructed alongside Shinto shrines on many sacred mountains. The powerful Shinto kami considered to reside on these peaks were then also treated as Buddhist deities, thus merging both Shinto and Buddhist beliefs. This fusion of Shinto with esoteric Buddhism thus allowed the two religions to coexist without challenging imperial authority.

Shugendō’s Buddhist aspect is strongly influenced by both Tendai and the more esoteric Shingon sects of Buddhism. Tendai promotes faith in the Lotus Sutra, Amida (Pure Land) worship, and Zen concepts. And Shingon philosophy centers around complex esoteric, mystical and occult practices. Combined with Shinto beliefs, the practice treats the natural environments of mountains as sacred spiritual locations.

Among the more well-known (and public) of these mountain-top complexes is the temple of Enryaku-ji, located on the summit of Mount Hiei, northeast of Kyoto.  The temple is central to the present-day, “Marathon Monks”, mountain ascetics who practice a Shugendō meditation known as Kaihōgyō, or “circling the mountain”. In its traditional form, Kaihōgyō practitioners spend 1,000-days over seven-years walking more than 45,000-kilometers along mountain trails, all while following a very strict regimen.

The several thousand historical Yamabushi warrior-monks of Enryaku-ji were far from pacifist, and renowned for their tenacity and endurance. Any who resolved to continue beyond the 100th day of Kaihōgyō’s walking meditations committed either to completing the entire course, or to taking his own life. But in 1571, the warlord, Oda Nobunaga, decided to put an end to the temple’s power by laying siege to Hiei-zan with a massive army, eventually burning its temples and slaughtering its entire population. 

The current temple complex was reconstructed during the late 16th to early 17th centuries, and is central to the Tendai sect of Japanese Buddhism. Contemporary practitioners may still carry a dagger and hemp rope as a reminder of their commitment. But having reached the limit of my own endurance at the summit of Hiei-zan in 100-degree F (38C) heat and the steamy mists of 100-percent humidity, neither would have been required to have ended my own meditations.

Far to the north, however, are the seasonally snow-covered “Dewa Sanzan”, three mountains that also remain sacred to Shugendō and the Yamabushi… Mount Haguro, Mount Gassan, and Mount Yudono. The historical Yamabushi of the region were notably less militant, but no less committed than those of Hiei-zan. There are 21 known “Sokushinbutsu” in northern Japan who trained at Dewa Sanzan’s Mount Yudono. These were monks who observed a form of ascetic meditation the point of eventual self-mummification.

The contemporary Yamabushi of northern Japan follow a more life-affirming approach to Shugendō through the philosophy of “Uketamo”, which emphasizes developing both acceptance and courage. In many ways, this might be considered analogous to the Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr’s 1930s philosophy that would later be encompassed in the Serenity Prayer: “The victorious man in the day of crisis is the man who has the serenity to accept what he cannot help and the courage to change what must be altered.”

Each mountain of the Dewa Sanzan has a shrine, with the main shrine located on the summit of Mount Haguro. Each year, many Shugendō practitioners and Yamabushi monks make the pilgrimage to the Dewa Sanzan. However, unlike Mount Ōmine, lay practitioners, including women, are also permitted to make the journey to the various mountain shrines, so long as it’s done with observance and respect.

After purification ceremonies on Mount Haguro, travelers make their way the summit of Mount Gassan, the highest and least accessible of the three peaks. This is where the spirits of the dead are said to reside before moving on to the “Pure Land”, the realm of the Amitabha Buddha, who is also seen as a manifestation of the Shinto Tsukuyomi-no-Mikoto, the Kami of the Moon. Mount Gassan is consequently known as both the “mountain of the moon”, and the “mountain of death”.

Mount Yudono is the final destination. Considered the “mountain of rebirth”, it is treated as especially sacred. And yet, there is no shrine building. Rather, the shrine is the mountain itself, making it a sacred area in its entirety. Shoes may thus not be worn on the mountain, requiring visitors to walk barefoot along its trails. No photography is allowed, and visitors are not to talk about anything they see or hear there. Experiencing the mountain and its environment is consequently entirely personal… something unique in an age of selfies on social media.

At the conclusion of the Dewa Sanzan, the Yudono-san Sanrojo is located beside the massive tori gate at the bottom of the Mount Yudono Mountain Shrine. The facility offers a place for those who have traveled the mountains to stay and to contemplate the journey, as well as a hot spring for bathing.
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Following the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the Japanese government officially disallowed Shintō-Buddhist amalgamations, declaring Shintō alone as the official state religion. Shugendō consequently became an officially banned practice until after World War II, when it re-emerged as a minor spiritual movement.

In its contemporary form, Shugendō is fundamentally an ascetic meditation based in the development of self-discipline through an interaction with the mountain environment, combined with a complex set of esoteric practices. As an alternative to the Western Stoic version of mindfulness and acceptance, it offers a more direct and visceral approach to meeting the unknowns and the challenges of life through its deep and intimate relationship with nature.

Accurate Photographs

by in Altitude, Culture, Environment, Existentialism, Hmmm..., Humanity, Identity, Luminous Aether, Philosophy, Photography | 11 Comments

“All photographs are accurate.
None of them is the truth.”
– Richard Avedon

I’d been wanting to go up one of the eastern Sierra high-country canyons to get some photos of the wildflowers this spring. But then, we had a fairly heavy snow on the 4th, and a hard freeze that night. Watching the wisteria blooms in my back yard wither and die over the next few days sort of killed-off that idea as well.

Then the Aurora Borealis became visible to the north in the hours before sunrise last Friday, and the photos on Facebook were beautiful.  In fact, some of them were a little too beautiful.  One in particular, with brilliant sheets of red reflecting off the waters of Lake Tahoe’s, Emerald Bay, was spectacular.  Familiar with the area, however, the photographer would have been facing in the wrong direction.

Regardless, we decided to head up into the high country to see if we could catch something on Saturday morning. But after freezing in the open all night, about all we managed to catch was a chill under a view of a Milky Way streaked with satellites and jetliners.

In some ways, nature photography is a lot like life.  You can do your best to try and see something spectacular.  But then the universe makes its own plans, and those rarely include human schedules.  So all too often, the beautiful moments happen when you’re looking the wrong way… or after falling asleep.

So when taking photos, the first trick is to be there at the right time.  But even then, you have to point the camera in the right direction…
the direction other people want to see.

Maybe that’s the attraction of a virtual existence?  The fields of wildflowers and glowing night sky wait to be seen as the vicarious experiences of others.  And the posted snippets can simply edit out the miserable part, the long hours of waiting and the work, the numb fingers and dead batteries… if not the A.I. exchanges and late night Photoshop sessions.

Regardless, I’ll still wax philosophical at the beauty of a sunrise, even if I have lived through about twenty-thousand of them.  Then I’ll pull out the camera, stick an eye up against the viewfinder, and take another crappy shot displaying a pathological inability to level the horizon.

Suddenly, it occurs to me that I’m looking the wrong way.
And I put down the camera for awhile.