Ken Campbell, Author at The Last Wilderness

Surf’s up

Posted by Ken Campbell January 13, 2011 0 Comment 1068 views

I’m going surfing later. Don’t know exactly when, but I’m guessing about 3:30. Maybe get a twilight session in, come back to shore just as it’s getting dark, warm wind blowing the stars around. The waves are small, real small. But this afternoon? Who knows?

Upcoming

Posted by Ken Campbell January 13, 2011 0 Comment 1104 views

Just a calendar check, really. No wonderful stories or charming anecdotes today. Sometimes you just need to write things down next to their specific dates, just to give yourself a chance to see them happen. Feb 18 – Slide Show @ Tacoma Mountaineers Hall Around the Rock; A Newfoundland Sea Kayak JourneyFeb 25-27 – La […]

Copper Creek revisited

Posted by Ken Campbell January 11, 2011 0 Comment 1021 views

One of the reasons I started this blog – it seems like a dozen years ago or more, but it’s not – is that I wanted a place to write that would serve as an “idea well,” a place where I could put down some thoughts and go back and draw from them later. It’s […]

One particular harbor

Posted by Ken Campbell January 8, 2011 0 Comment 1122 views

Because I am interested in (you might even say “addicted to”), the Olympic Peninsula and the happenings there, I often read the online version of the local newspaper, the Peninsula Daily News. Just to keep a finger on what’s happening out that way, to check the real estate market for what I hope may someday […]

Wow!

Posted by Ken Campbell January 7, 2011 2 Comments 1018 views

At 6040 feet, Mount Wow is tied for 122nd place on the height chart for Washington mountains. Located just inside the southwest boundary of Mount Rainier National Park, the name apparently arises from the involuntary expression that climbers give out when they take in the view from the summit ridge. It isn’t a heavily visited […]

A River runs over it

Posted by Ken Campbell January 6, 2011 0 Comment 1117 views

The local paper ran a piece about a month ago that detailed the threats to the roads of Mount Rainier, and began with the following: “The greatest threat to the busiest road in Mount Rainier National Park is the mountain itself.” It was a good article and I don’t want to restate the whole thing […]

Baidarka tales

Posted by Ken Campbell January 4, 2011 0 Comment 1186 views

In the waning days of 1986, I was living in Ketchikan, Alaska, in a decrepit old house on Front Street with about 27 roommates. (Ah, those carefree days of intense poverty and random all-nighters.) I remember picking up a book that was laying around and thumbing through it for a while, a picture book about […]

Big blue boats

Posted by Ken Campbell January 3, 2011 0 Comment 1115 views

I’m not really a rafter. I’ve done it a couple times before, as a passenger, but this time was the first that I’d ever been the guy in charge. Marc Mahoney was guiding the other raft and his advice to me consisted mainly of telling me that I would know what to do and, in […]

Brrrr

Posted by Ken Campbell January 2, 2011 2 Comments 1075 views

A perfect day for a paddle! I didn’t get the exact head count, but there was a group of about 20 that made it on the water today for the second annual Polar Bear Paddle… the frigid weather undoubtedly kept some away, but for those who did brave the temps, we had a great out-and-back […]

Diablo

Posted by Ken Campbell December 31, 2010 0 Comment 1621 views

At one time, the Diablo dam was the tallest in the world. At 389 feet, it towers over the Skagit River far below, and the waters that it holds back form the lake of the same name, one of several in a chain of artificial lakes engineered for the sake of Seattle’s appetite for electrical […]