Howdy from Bob Duff,
I am a bit late this week and here is a picture suggesting just why. This is a place called THE CATHEDRAL LEDGE near North Conway, New Hampshire. I visited my son ROB III at his home there this past week with my youngest STEPHEN II. We had a blast including my first time thrill of seeing THE CATHEDRAL LEDGE. I only skied when coming here years ago and missed all this beauty which was under the snow.
Notice the girl sitting at the far top left. Then, look for the two climbers hanging near the picture bottom. They are near the little trees which also cling to life. They pulled themselves to these incredible heights from the valley floor. My friend JOEL KINNEY claims to climb here. I seriously doubt that he or the others joining him have good sense. JOEL once described me as "an elderly gentleman" while seeking sympathy in a legal dispute. I will not put into print the thoughts I have about JOEL's actions in regard to THE CATHEDRAL LEDGDE. Click on any picture to enlarge your view and solidify my opinion.
Initially I was planning to include a couple of shots of STEVE performing surgery on a giant Elm tree at ROB's house. Alas, this blog of mine defeats me again. None of those good shots will make it tonight. STEVE was graduated in Landscape Architecture from URI and has special training and skills for tree work and climbing. He fantasizes about every tall tree or steeple in New England. When the steeplejacks rigged the tower on Marblehead's Old North Church for painting, I feared it might take knotted ropes to keep STEVE from heading out back and doing some moonlight repelling.
But at this point we were dealing with a great big tree. This giant Elm next to ROB's house was inviting varmints such as squirrels, etc. into the attic causing a mess. The Elm's great big limb also threatened winter damage to the house. Solution? Call in MACDUFF! STEVE, that is!
We were completely amazed at STEVE's performance. He dressed with an array of equipment and ropes to make an astronaut blush. Spurs adorned his feet like a fighting rooster. He moved with grace and quiet confidence. He whipped straight up the tree to a high fork for the leverage needed to control many small limbs and the big one which was about six inches in diameter. It all came drifting (or banging) down for stacking like firewood.
I labeled him "ARBORIST", but STEVE says he must pass a rigorous examination before even his father is allowed to call him "ARBORIST". Until he takes this examination making it appropriate to call STEPHEN BOVELLE DUFF II an "ARBORIST", please call STEVE anyway at 1-781-631-0033 if you need tree work. E-mail rduff19@comcast.net. I will not tell anyone that he is not yet a licensed "ARBORIST"unless they ask! Meanwhile, I may bring up this subject again in the future. Also, trained Landscape Architects make rather nice plans if you find yourself interested in something other than an "ARBORIST".
Saturday night we joined a raucous bunch of frustrated skiers at WILDCAT MOUNTAIN buying lift tickets for the winter and watching some outrageous "Hot Dog" ski movies. ROB III claims he skis that way all the time. I must tell you that he (and today's ski equipment) has come a long way since our first run together on ZOOMER CHAIR at CANNON MOUNTAIN when he was just two. Here he is teaching skiing this winter at WILDCAT. He must have had a pretty good instructor himself.
Now that we have dealt with New Hampshire mountains, here we have LEIGHTON O'CONNOR's beautiful photograph of TERI & HERB MOTLEY's IOD #49 KUNGSORMEN. With one of her crew concentrating on the spinnaker laundry, HERB, TERI and the rest have her heading up wind. There are blue and white chutes ranging down on her bow during this 2008 Marblehead NOOD Regatta race. I trust that the red, white & blue chutes of other International One Designs are far behind like they often were when I crewed #49 with "BIG DON" MACINTOSH in the good old days.
# 49 showed a 6,7 & 8th in the NOOD scores I scanned. A side issue for MOTLEYS is the spelling of the yacht name. MRA has it as "KUNGSORMEN" with an "M" where the NOOD shows "KUNGSORNEN" with the "N". LEIGHTON O'CONNOR has picked up the "M" and it is shown that way in the IOD web site which erroneously shows TANGO as wood. Is it "M" or "N", TERI & HERB?
Check out some of LEIGHTON's sites to keep your sailing juices flowing as we plunge into winter:
I will be visiting LEIGHTON a great deal between now and Spring! See you again next week!
