Sunday, July 13, 2014

Invaluable

I'm a 26 year-old hiker from Roseville. I never knew Russel, but I wanted to offer my condolences and thanks to him for publishing such a wealth of information about the trails here. I'm currently working my way through his blog, which has taken weeks, and every post seems to answer one of my questions or tell me something I didn't know about the region - and this despite having spent the last several years compiling information about the trails here. I'm fairly sure that his work on the area at least matches the rest of the internet combined, and it's given me a long list of trails - and historic and geologic points of interest - that I hope to visit soon. Even though I'm only someone who randomly found the blog on a Google search, I've read enough that I feel like I knew him, and some of the words in the journal transcripts that you've posted might as well be my own. I hope that you keep his blog and website up to inspire the next generation of hikers and environmentalists to get out and do something other than Steven's Trail, and discover for themselves Northern California's Yosemite. -Matt

Friday, February 7, 2014

A Song For Russell

I posted this a couple of years ago but the old link is no longer available so I wanted to post a new one. I would like to dedicate a song I wrote many years ago to Russell. I have read Russell's Blog many times as I am an avid hiker/environmentalist/prospector and I have always found his writing to describe these beautiful places as very inspirational. Because of his writing I have hiked some of these places he has described and have been able to experience these wonderful places. I hope the rest of us can pick up the torch he carried and continue to preserve these wild and historic areas. This song is called "First Light". This song came to me as a vision of the sun rising over the mountain tops somewhere in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It really could be anywhere as you hear this song play. http://www.reverbnation.com/dougreagin/song/6895987-first-light