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12.28.01 Steve got a wide angle lens for his camera so we decided that Exodus would be a good place to check it out. We got there a little after 2 and sessioned 'til about 8. I just can't get enough of that bowl. If it were closer I would skate there every chance I got. My wrists have been sore recently, but I don't like wearing wrist guards. I tied a bandana around my left wrist and it seemed to do the trick. I pulled some nice f/s and b/s airs over the hip and some carvegrinds in the pocket. Steve pulled some sick f/s airs too. Some locals showed up for a bit and we had a rippin session going for a bit. 12.22.01 There has been a lot of talk (both good and bad) about the Lancaster, PA skatepark, so Steve and I decided to get a first hand opinion. Lancaster is about 2 hours away so we headed out at around 10am. We got there a little after noon but the directions we had were way off (damn mapquest!) As we were driving back to the main road to ask some local for directions we passed two skaters walking on the side of the road. They happened to be looking for a ride to the park, so they got in and directed us there. We walked up to the park and were pretty stoked on its first impression, but were still skeptical due to its poor reviews. There is a snakerun which connects to a 4' bowl and a 5' bowl to 16' full pipe to 10' bowl. The 5' bowl is really mello. I dropped in, carved through the full pipe and hit the waterfall into the 10'. The waterfall is nice and steep and I got some nice speed on it, only to lose it all on the super-mello opposte wall. I barely had enough speed to re-enter the full pipe. After some runs I found some lines that allowed me to keep my speed, but everything was so mello it was hard to due any liptricks, let alone airs. There were a couple walls in the bowls that were steep, which made them all the more confusing. After you find these walls you can maintain some speed, but you still have to work. The full pipe is nice. Its about 16' with a concrete bottom half and a metal top. Both Steve and I got about 6" of oververt and we spent the majority of our session there. There are a couple weird spots near the bottom of the transition, but it is pretty good for the most part although it is kind've short. It would be better if it was twice as long. The snake run has similar problems. Each wall has different transitions, so it is hard to skate until you know how every wall feels. The snake run is steeper than the bowls for the most part, and you can get some sick speed. I managed to pull a couple sweepers in the end of the snakerun, which were about the only tricks I pulled except for a couple axlestalls in the 5'. I think Steve described the park best when he said its "fun but frustrating." If you were to see an overhead of it, it would seem to be a sick park. A snakerun, fullpipe, and 10' bowl, what more could you want? Once you actually start skating it and you feel how everything is too mello and there are bumps here and there you get pretty frustrated that such a great design ended up like this, but you still have a lot of fun. 12.20.01 Steve came up today before he had work to skate the ditch. I got a new deck yesterday and was stoked to try it out. Its got some sick sidecuts but still has the new school nose. It was pretty chilly but we warmed up pretty fast after we started skating. This was the first time Steve saw the extension, and the first time he beleived me when I said the coping sticks out too far. I had a pretty good session. I pulled some nice 50-50 stalls on the extension and pulled a disaster without the 2x4 behind the coping. I was quite pleased. After a nice session we were looking at the coping, trying to decide what the best way to fix it would be. Steve tugged on the coping a bit to see if it would be easy to get off or not, and to our surprise it came off in his hand. That solved half the problem, but now new coping needs to go on. The original pipe is 2.5", and we think a 1.25" or 1.5" would suffice. Putting it in at this point would be difficult, so we considered other options. The best option in my opinion would be pool coping, but that is too expensive. Another option would be bullnosed bricks. This would still cost a bit, but wouldn't be too expensive. The last option is to get a long parking block and cement it on to the top. I like this option but Steve likes the bullnosed brick idea better. I guess the solution will depend on who gets off his ass first (I'm betting on Steve). 12.19.01 Steve and I hit Vans today before work. My sleep schedule is all messed up, so I was awake today but hella tired. Steve worked a bit on his laybacks. The first one he tried looked so sick I thought he'd been doing them all week. He's gettin damn close but just can't seem to put it all together. He pulled some sick f/s airs in the deepend. Another few sessions and he'll be completely out. I was doing a lot of speed lines today, just seeing how fast I could get going. I was grinding a lot more, which helped me stay in the bowl. Steve starting trying fakierocks in the deepend, and after a couple tries he pulled a sick one. He kept pushing me to try b/s airs in the deepend, and after a couple sketchy tries I managed to get in the tile. After some more verbal encouragement (aka assault) from Steve I got my deck halfway out of the bowl. There were 2 mother/daughter rollerblade teams there today, which was pretty odd. All in all it was a good session. 12.18.01 Tim and I have been doing some training at work and we got out early so we decided to skate (not that we had a choice). We stopped at home to pick up Matt and headed over to the ditch. I was able to skate the new extension much better than last time. I landed a lot of disasters and was trying some grinds. I got a nice 50-50 stall. Matt did a 180 Boneless to fakie grind across the whole thing. I found a nice line - f/s grind to disaster on the extension, but then I come at the next wall too fast and go over the coping. The parking block there needs to be reset. That may not happen 'till we redo the transitions, which might be awhile. 12.15.01 Ryan, the drummer of Tims band Subsist, came down to skate today. We had planned to head down to the Stafford bowl, but it had been really wet recently and we were uncertain of how dry the bowl would be, so we decided to hit the ditch instead. Don, Scott, and I worked last friday to finish the extension so I was anxious to try it out. We realized as we were doing it that the coping was sticking out kinda far, but I didn't realize how far it actually was until I started skating it. The coping is also not set very well, so it moves around a bit. Ryan had only been to the ditch once before, but was rapidly picking it up and busting some sick stuff. I convinced Matt to come too, who hasn't skated it since before the Crispus Attucks Euro Tour. We were all trying the extension out but not doing much on it. Some other guys came up and but didn't do much on it either. I managed a couple rail slides to rock-n-rolls. Ryan was trying to board slide off the end of the coping (which currently sticks out farther than the extension) and into the channel. A pretty burly task, but before we left he nailed it. We put a 2x4 behind the coping to stabalize it and I pulled a nice disaster on it. We left quite pleased. 12.14.01 Matt just returned from the Crispus Attucks Euro Tour on his birthday (the 13th) so today I took him to get burritos and then to skate Vans. We picked up Steve on the way to Vans and got there for the 2:30 session. Steve's been working on his laybacks but doesn't have them down yet, but he's gettin damn close. We skated the concrete part a bit with Matt instead of spending the whole time in the bowl. Its nice to skate Vans when you're actually awake. The session was pretty empty, so we weren't running into tikes. Matt and I hit Smash! on the way back and I picked up a bunch of DEVO vinyl. Sweet deal! 12.8.01-12.9.01 The beach isn't the best place to go in the winter, but it does have some nice parks. Steve, Jen, Anne, and I headed out to Ocean City this week. Steve and I planned to go pool hunting, hit the Ocean Bowl, and hit Exodus. It was raining Saturday when we got up, so we decided to head over to Exodus. On the way over we stopped to check out some pools, one of which we skated last spring. All the ones we checked out were full, but we later heard that there are a couple pools going in the area. Exodus was pretty packed, although I guess we should've expected that since it was a rainy Saturday. I was skating pretty well, landing some nice f/s and b/s airs over the hip and a lot of sweepers. I landed some sweet Texas plants, which are a hell of a lot less scary in the wooden bowl. Steve landed some sick nose grap f/s grinds off the hip. He also landed some indy to mute early grabs over the hip. Steve and I both rolled in to the bowl for the first time. It was pretty easy compared to the Vans bowl. I was able to roll out and roll back in, and I was also able to roll out and grab back in. Steve rolled out and in a couple times too. It was definitely a killer session. The following day was dryer and colder. We decided to skip the cold session at the Ocean Bowl and hit Exodus again. I was pretty sore from the Saturday but still got a good session in. Sue and Aaron showed up to skate for a bit but left soon after. There were less people at the park today but more people skating the bowl. Although we intended to skate pools and the Ocean bowl too, skating Exodus all weekend was still hella rad. 12.04.01 We are having some crazy weather this December. Steve and I headed down to skate the salamander today. We were in shorts and short sleeves and were still getting hot. We brought a broom and a sponge today, and after sweeping the leaves out we sponged the little bit of water in the bottom. It's looking cleaner than it ever has. Steve was tearing it up over the light and getting some nice frontsides on the flat wall. I was doing a similar line and getting some nice frontsides on the opposite flatwall. I worked on some airs, but wasn't going too high today. Steve was getting really high over the light and got in some sick grinds. It was a great day of skating, I'm glad I got up early. 12.03.01 Steve and I went down to the Salamander before work to bucket it out, and if there was time, skate the Ivy Bowl. The Salamander had a couple hundred gallons in the bottom. It took us about 40 min to bucket it out. That left us with plenty of time to hit the Ivy Bowl. Steve cleared the light today, which is a lot harder for the goofy footed skater. We both worked on some new lines. I'm working my way up to grinding the loveseat, and I got some tile today. Steve got some grinds in, but not without bailing once or twice. 11.28.01 Steve, Tim, and I hit Vans this morning for the early session before work. Tim concentrated on the bowl today, and really started to learn how to skate it. By the end of the session he was hitting tile in the deepend on b/s carves and getting some nice f/s carves in the deepend and the shallowend. Steve was working on laybacks and airs. He wasn't able to get the laybacks down but he got some nice f/s airs in. He is definetely getting more comfortable doing them in the deepend. I spent the majority of the time working on Texas plants. It took me a bit to get the nerve up to barge back in. The first try I almost landed it and was ready to do it all over again but couldn't get the board in position. The second time I went back in I took a brutal fall on my wrists and ass. It took me a bit to get out of the pool. I was really bummed, because I was really hurting and we only had about 10 minutes left in the session. I sat for a bit and I was pretty pissed at the bad session I had today. Then I realized if I didn't land that Texas plant, or at least go for it again, I would feel bad all day. I took a couple runs just carving to get comfortable after my fall. I tried a couple Texas plants, but chickened out on diving back in. Then I got one in a nice position, hopped back in and nailed it. I continued the run and pulled great f/s and b/s airs in the shallowend and a medicore f/s air in the deepend (and maybe a sweeper in the shallow - can't remember). It was a great run and I felt incredable. I'm sure glad I didn't accept defeat. Steve put a nice crack in his board last time we were at Vans and it was slowly getting worse. On his land run he was powering through a b/s carve in the deepend and the board snapped in half and sent Steve flying. He was on the flatbottom before Tim or I (or Steve) new what happened. 11.26.01 Steve and I headed down to the pools in hopes to skate them, but its been pretty wet over the weekend so we knew there might be water in them. We got to the Ivy Bowl and the walls looked dry. We walked around and checked out the deepend and found a couple hundred gallons of rain water in the bottom. We found some buckets and got to work. It took us about an hour to empty it out. We didn't have time to let it dry and skate it before work, so we headed over to the Salamander to check out how much work has to be done. There was a similar amount of water there, so we expect another hours worth of bucketing at the salamander before its skateable. 11.23.01 Steve, Tim, and I headed down to Stafford to get a good bowl session in. I was hoping to get some time in on the bowl with not many others there but since it was the Friday after Thanksgiving there was a pretty big session going. I was still able to get a lot more runs in than last time. I got my line down better and started getting some more speed. I tried to do a couple sweepers over the hip and managed to land a couple, albeit sketchy. I managed to land a double shin plant on the coping after my board slipped out on a b/s carvegrind. Man, was that painful. The pain was unbearable when I was sitting down, so I had to walk around. Then I realized that the best way to get my mind off the pain would be to skate more, so I kept skating. Steve pulled a nice f/s air off the escalator. Tim took some runs but (as we all do) really needs a session there that isn't a snakesession so he can learn some lines. I tried a couple new lines but didn't find a good one. I can't seem to hit the hip b/s with much speed. The ECRW kids were there, and as always, were ripping. We skated 'till dusk and then headed over to Vans for the 7:00 session. There were a lot of people at this session but the bowl was pretty empty. Only about 4 of us skating it at one time. Steve worked on his f/s airs, and managed to get some nice ones in the shallowend. He is getting more comfortable doing them in the deepend but is not up to the coping yet (although I suspect he will be soon). Tim took a couple runs in the bowl and is really learning the roundwall. I worked on my airs and my sweepers. Steve and I skated vert for a couple runs too. I was really getting sweepers (in the bowl) down today. I thought about trying a Texas plant, and after a couple trys managed to grab in the right place and be in position to dive back in. Going back in is by far the hard part, and after a couple more trys I got up the nerve to actually do it, and I fell and landed pretty hard on my knee. After a couple more trys (and a couple more hard falls on my knee) I pulled one. Steve and Tim cheered and threw their boards down in the bowl as I was on the far wall. I did a couple carves around them and hopped out, feeling very satisfied. I tried some more, and took some more hard slams, but managed to land three. I went home with 2 bruised shins, a bruised knee, a sore back, and sore arms from climbing out of the bowl so many times. I was in pain but it was worth it. I had a blast. I can't wait to hit Stafford again and try some Texas plants there. 11.21.01 Steve and I headed down to Vans before work. It's the day before Thanksgiving, so a lot of kids had off. We had a good bowl session going and moved over to the Vert ramp for a bit too. I'm getting a lot more comfortable at dropping in on the vert ramp, which makes dropping in on everything else in the park a lot easier. I took a couple runs in the bowl where I dropped in from the deepend, but I haven't found a good line yet. 11.19.01 Steve and I headed down to the pools before work again. We hit the Ivy Bowl first. It took me a bit to get used to this bowl today, and I took a couple of slams trying to go over the light before doing it again. I had some nice carves in the shallowend. Steve got some nice grinds on the loveseat. After a decent session at the Ivy we headed over to the Salamander for quick hit and run. There were a lot more leaves in the Salamander than in the Ivy, leading me to beleive that no one has discovered our pool yet. Steve carved over the light on his first run, but it took me a few. I also had a bit of trouble doing f/s airs. Steve was getting some pretty high f/s carves on the sidewall. Steve was thinking about dropping in from the loveseat, which put the idea in my head too. I dropped in and bailed on the opposite wall. Steve did the same, and then on his second try he attempted to carve over the ladder. He didn't have quite enough speed and his front truck slammed into one of the steps, shattering the corner of it. Chunks of plastic were airborne as Steve bailed. It was quite a sight. After a couple more runs we headed out. Here are more pics of the Ivy Bowl and the Salamander. 11.17.01 The Stafford Bowl opened about a week ago, but today was the grand opening party. Its 6' with a 7' extension, 4 bowled corners, a nice hip, and pool coping all around. All the ECRW boys came out along with a lot of other bowl skaters in the area. Steve, Don, Anne, Jen and I got there around 2 and the session was in full gear. I watched for a bit before taking some runs. There were a ton of people skating so it was really hard to get many runs in. Everyone was tearing it up, so I was a bit nervous about taking my first run ever in this bowl in the middle of a snakesession. I dropped in and managed to find a line almost immediately and get in a f/s carvegrind. My next couple runs I found a line that hit the hip f/s and got some airs in. I tried to hit the hip b/s, but I just couldn't find a line that took me there, so I just dropped in and hit it. I didn't have much speed, but I managed to pull the airs anyway (not very high though). I pulled a couple nice sweepers too, fooling everyone who was trying to get the next run. Steve was hitting the corners like mad and grinding everywhere. Don took a couple of runs and got a couple grinds in. I decided it was time to break out the pitchfork. The pitchfork is longer than an average board (37.65") and has a longer wheelbase (19"). I adapted pretty well to it and was pumping the corners and getting some carvegrinds in. I pulled a couple f/s airs over the hip too, but couldn't get as high as with my normal deck. I tried to pull some sweepers with it, but couldn't get ahold of the prongs. We were losing daylight, but Steve was still going strong, and started grabbing his nose on his f/s grinds. After Stafford we all headed over to Vans for Old School/Longboard day. We saw some nice collections and talked with some older locals. We got some directions to ditches that haven't been skated in years, so we hope to check them out and clean them up soon. The bowl had just been acid washed, and it was sweet. I was able to skate a lot faster since I wasn't sliding so much. I was pulling f/s airs out of the deepend and landing sweepers like mad. I was getting my b/s airs out of the lowend and grinding much more than usual. I got a nice f/s indy grind in the deepend. Steve pulled some more nosegrab grinds. Don was learning the round wall a bit and taking some video. Psycho was killing the pool as always. Jaime brought some '70s boards and took a couple runs on them, and Ben rolled in on one. Just as the session was ending Don did a brutal faceplant on the 6' and cut his cheek. His eye swelled a bit but he seemed alright. We had 2 great sessions on 2 great bowls. I can't wait to go back to Stafford and I want to hit Vans again before the bowl returns to its normal slickness. 11.16.01 Steve and I had planned to hit Vans today, but we decided to hit the pools instead. We hit the Ivy Bowl first. I got some nice runs in today. It took me a couple runs to get back into the groove of this pool, but it came back to me pretty quickly. I got some nice carves in over the light, and hit the shallowend pocket like mad. Steve was determined to grind the love seat today, and grind it he did. After being there for about 20 minutes we heard some people approaching. We were a little sketched out, but figured we might as well just keep skating. Some guys in official looking clothes came up and started chatting with us about skating and the pool. After about 5 minutes they walked off to inspect the house next door. We are pretty sure they were looters, checking out all the abandoned houses in the neighborhood. After a nice session at the Ivy Bowl we headed over to the Salamander. The Ivy Bowl is pretty tucked away and the houses on either side are abandoned, but the Salamander has a neighbor on one side, can be seen from the road, and has a gravel driveway next to it that cars drive down now and then. Skating the Salamander is always much more sketchy than the Ivy, unless you are speaking about the transitions. I brought my broom today, so the Salamander got a good sweeping. My f/s airs were much higher today, perhaps because it wasn't so early in the morning. Steve was hitting tile over the light on pratically every run and made a couple of attempts to carve over the ladder. More pics of the Salamander here. Before we left I gave it a good final sweeping to spread the little bit of water out so it will dry. After the Salamander we hit the newly opened Zion Skateshop. Its a pretty small but killer shop located not too far from Vans (one exit away on 95N). After Zion I dropped Steve off and headed home. I made excellent time on the way home, which allotted me an hour to skate the ditch. I called Don up and we headed over. Don's roommate, who hasn't skated for 10 years, came along too and managed to get some grinds in on Don's Jessee. 11.14.01 We hit both pools today.. We hit the Ivy Bowl first. The Ivy Bowl has three kinks in the deepend, making it a challenge to carve. It has two nice pockets in the shallowend. I was able to get over the light and hit some tile. I had some nice carves in the shallowend pocket, catching some tile there too. More pics of the Ivy Bowl here. After the Ivy Bowl session we headed over to the newly drained Roman Salamander. This pool has some sweet transition!! We got there and Steve immediately started carving over the light and hit some tile. What a beautiful sound. I made it over the light too, which is much easier in this pool than the Ivy Bowl. I started doing some f/s airs low in the deepend and worked them higher until I was going over the light. More pics of the Salamander here At lunch Steve, Tim, and I hit the Franconnia ditch. It was completely dry (it hasn't rained in about a month) and we had a blast skating it. 11.13.01 Rumors of the pool were true! The county is widening the road and has bought all the houses on the one side via Eminent Domain. Yoder was in from Texas, and Steve and him found another pool down the road from the first one, so we went this morning to check it out and get it skatable. We got there around 10 and scoped the place out. We checked up and down the road but did not see any other pools. We hit the nearest Home Depot and rented a pump. It took us about 2 hrs to pump all the water out and bucket the final 8 inches. It was about 20,000 gallons. We found 7 frogs and 1 salamander. The pool is a roman bath style, about 10 feet deep. Steve has named it 'The Roman Salamander.' I had to go to work at that point (an hour and 45 minutes late) but Steve and Yoder went back in a bit and finished cleaning the leaves and skated it. They said it rips and I hope to hit both pools tomorrow before work with Steve and Tim. I bought a digital camera yesterday (online) so I hope to get it in a week and be putting lots more pics up. 11.10.01 My brother was in town so Matt and I took him up to the ditch for a session. We skated for about an hour and had a blast. It was a beautiful day out and I even started getting hot. This was my first ditch session with my new Scum 'Beer Run 2' deck, and it was a great ride! My brother just moved back from Portland, OR and has some land to build a ramp now. He isn't looking to build a half though, and was thinking about something of a ditch style ramp. Hopefully we can get something up in the spring. 11.09.01 Steve and I headed down to Vans for the 2:30 session. The pool was extra slick today, but it was still fun. I worked on some backside airs in the low end, but had a lot of trouble getting out of the bowl. I ended up doing a grind while grabbing b/s a bunch of times. Halfway through the session one of the Vans employees began cleaning the pool, so I headed over to the Vert ramp to work on doing inverts in the transitions. Steve was thinking about dropping in, and went up to the top to check things out. I went up there too, to see what it looked like. I jumped down and knee slid through the transition once to see what bailing would feel like. After that I decided to go for it, and after a little bit of hesitation I dropped in on a vert ramp for the first time. It was a lot easier than I thought. I dropped in a couple more times and managed to get some small b/s grinds. I also pulled a couple f/s airs below the coping (ok, so they weren't really airs, but I don't know what else to call them). I got a couple in the vert. Steve pulled some nice b/s grinds too. After the pool had dried we headed back over. I took a look at the deep end and it looked like the shallow end compared to the vert ramp. I dropped in (on the shallow end) and took a run. It felt really weird. The vert ramp was so much smoother than the pool, and bigger too. I was doing grinds when it felt like I wasn't near the top. After the run I walked over to the deepend and dropped in. It felt small compared to the vert ramp. Steve dropped in from the deepend too. After Vans Steve and I headed over to Casa ECRW. Jaime wasn't there, but we hung out with Ben a bit and took some runs in the bowl. There is now coping all around, and tile in the shallow and mid sections. The deepend is poured, but not plastered, and is still unskateable. It was hard finding a good spot to drop in, but I found a decent one in the mid section. I got in a couple good carves and heard that familiar sound of urethane over tile. Rumor has it that a new backyard pool has opened up in the area. Hope to skate it soon. 11.07.01 Steve, Tim, and I hit Vans for the morning session. Joe showed up so we had a pretty good session going. I worked more on my f/s airs in the deepend, and pulled a couple nice ones. Steve and Joe both landed the rail, and Tim was trying sick ollie-indys off of the nipples and snapped his deck. Steve and I dropped into the pool with the broken deck and I managed to get a grind and a small air (not outta the pool).. 11.02.01 Steve and I headed down to Vans to hit the 2:30 session. Steve was tearing it up and starting rolling into the pool. Rolling in used to scare the hell outta me, but lately it is getting a lot less scary. Steve also learned 50/50 axle stalls, and pulled some flawless ones. I worked a bit more on the f/s airs in the deepend. Pulled a couple were I think I got my whole board out, but not my ass. Did a couple where I was definitely completely out, but couldn't pull them back in. Sonny bought a bunch of pumpkins to smash/blow up, but I saved one to carve. 10.31.01 New board!! I bought a Scum 'Beer Run 2' complete off my pal at work, who never rode it cos it was too wide. Got the deck, which I set up, Indy 166s, which I gave to Tim for his Firm 'Lancer' deck, and 2 sets of ATM wheels, which I'm giving to my former neighbors, Sam and Travis. Also included where a set of Nicotine bearings (boo!) and a set of Bones Swiss (Yaay!). The Swiss are fast as hell. I love them! Tim and I hit Vans today before work. Steve was supposed to meet us there but flaked out to sleep. Joe showed up, so we had a pretty rad session going. I worked on pulling f/s airs in the deepend and pulled a couple where I got partially out. I took off work early to catch a halloween show at the DC Greenhouse. Crispus Attucks, The Voorhees, and De Nada. This was a reunion show for De Nada and they ripped like the days of yore. Evan kept his clothes on and Dave only clocked one person with his guitar, so it wasn't quite like old times, but fun none the less. Sonny (my newest housemate) wore a duct tape thong. Matt was dressed as a Lollapalooza dude (the first one of course!), Evan was the singer of Limp Bizkit, Dave was the crow, Jamie was a Filipino whore, and Sonny, well, he was Duct Tape Thong Guy. 10.26.01 Matt and I hit the ditch for a nice session today. I was pretty out of it but managed to skate ok. After the ditch and some burritos Matt headed to the last Wilson Center show and I met him up there a bit later for a second skate session. It was pretty cold out but we headed over to the school near the Wilson Center to skate the banks. They are steeper than the ditch, but not steep enough to emulate a wall ride. They are still pretty fun. There was a parking block on top of one of them that I managed to do a couple b/s axle stalls and f/s grinds on. They felt really good. I skated a lot better at the school than I did at the ditch. It was damn cold out so we headed back to the show after a 20 minute session. Crispus Attucks ripped!! 10.20.01-10.21.01 We got up at 8am to go the first session at the Orange County Vans. Orange has a sick combi bowl modeled after the bowl at Upland. It was rad to carve the squared corners in the deepend and whip around the squared corners in the shallow end. I wish we had more time but there, but we had more things to skate. From Orange we headed to the Jungle Bowl (aka the Rash Bowl). We skated this for about 4 hours. It was hella fun. I got over the light a couple times. So did Steve and Pat. Reed took a nasty fall and ended up pretty banged up. From there we headed up to the Ontario Vans for the last session. We got a motel right near there and skated the last session. This Vans has a nice crazy 8 shaped pool, a snake run, and a ditch with wallride outside. The bowl was slick, and the snakerun was slicker. I had a lot of fun in the bowl and pulled some f/s carvegrinds in the shallowend and a f/s air in the deepend. I pulled a couple of nice wallrides on the ditch which rises to meet a cinderblock wall. After 8 hours of skating we were pretty tired and fell asleep quite readily. The next morning we woke up at 8 again and headed out to Mt. Baldy. We found it without much problem and were really excited walking the trail to get there. There is a 10' gap to jump before you get there. It is easier to jump over than back, since there is a incline on the fall wall going over, and a gap returning. Pat and I made the jump, and I hopped down in the pit to get some wood. The planks weren't long enough, so Steve and Reed had to get some rope so we could get back. We skated the pipe for a bit, not nearly as long as we would have liked though. We had one last pool to skate, so we headed back. From Baldy we went to the Bart Bowl, which is a permission pool in Vista. Steve was ripping, pulling b/s grinds. Pat was doing some sick frontside carves and I was loving sliding over the hip and pulling some carves in the tight shallow pocket. This pool was so fun but it was getting dark fast. We headed home, bruised but not beaten. We had a hell of a time in San Diego. We headed home the next day. I was glad to be home, but I can't stop thinking about the jungle, Mt. Baldy, and Bart. More pics of the whole adventure here and here. 10.19.01 Pat had to work today, so Reed took us out to Ocean Beach park. It also has two bowls. Both are really spread out with lots of flat bottom so you need to really pump to get around. They were really fun and the street coarse wasn't bad either. After Ocean Beach we met up with this guy named Hunter who we met at lunch and he took us to the Arcade Skateboards Warehouse. this was a couple nice quarters, some boxes, and a nice launch. We skated this for a bit to a soundtrack of Maiden, Sabbath, and Metallica and then headed over to the Cattle Decapitation show at the Che Cafe. 10.18.01 San Diego. Steve and I head out at 3:30 in the morning to go to the airport and begin our mecca to the promised land. We take off at 6:45am and get there around noon. We were staying with Pat and Reed (who we used to stay with in Boston) After a nap we head out to Coronado skate park. Its pretty rad. It has two bowls that are pretty open but hella fun. We were a bit too jet lagged to really enjoy it to the fullest. 10.12.01 Matt and I were determined to check out the Arbutis ditch. We heard you could see it from the highway, so when we saw a ditch off of 695 we scoped it out. It took us a bit to locate it, but after about 20 minutes of driving around we found exactly where it was. We parked and went to scope it out. It was on the side of a building and there were people about, so we walked through the woods next to it to get close. We got up near the ditch and there was a barbed wire fence. Conveniently, the fence had been left in disrepair, and a section of it had fallen so you could walk over it. We walked over the fence and scurried over to the ditch. I tried to get a pic, but we were spotted before I could even get the camera ready. Matt got a better look and said it was pretty much unskateable. It was wet and had plants in it and was quite rocky. We dashed back in the woods and headed back. As we were walking to the car one of the workers stopped us and told us that it was private property and we had no business being back there. We explained to him that the ditch sucked and we wouldn't be going back there anyway. We left and headed for Lansdowne were we could surely get a legal session in, or so we thought. We got to Lansdowne and there were 4 skaters there. We walked around the fence to the entrance only to find it locked with a new list of rules posted. You now need a skate registration and full pads. Nuts to that. The park is now closed on school days during school hours, which blows since that when we go. We hopped the fence and started sessioning. We got a good couple hours in and headed for home. We took another look around for the ditch but with no luck. Rumor has it that you can see it from the B/W Parkway - not 695. 10.10.01 Tim and I actually got up early enough to skate Vans this morning. Its been about a month since either of us have been out there, so it took a bit to get back in the groove. I managed to land most of my tricks at least once in the bowl. I'm really glad I got this session in 'cause I'm planning to go to San Diego to skate some pools so I need to ready. We were hella tired so we skipped out 15 minutes early. 10.05.01 Matt and I, being tired of the same old ditch, ventured up to Towson to skate the little known Pot Springs ditch. I have only skated this ditch 4 or 5 times in my life. In the early 90s my friend got directions to it and we checked it out. Keep in mind that we were skating some pretty small wheels at this point. We had a good time - this is the first ditch I ever skated - and returned once or twice more. Around last fall I took my friend Don there, who had recently moved from Philly and didn't know any of the area spots. I took Steve there once when we were up in the area, but it was raining that day so we couldn't skate it. The ditch is pretty rad. Its a bit steeper than most ditches, but also has a mello section on the opposite side of the road. There are a couple parking blocks, a metal pipe, and a buried stair there to thrash. The side of the bridge hits the ditch in such a way that it makes wall rides possible. I first learned wall rides there when I went with Don and it took me forever. This time they came much more naturally to me and I was able to pull a bunch. It is hard to tell how often the ditch is skated. There are 'No Trespassing' signs up (which weren't there the last time) that have been spray-painted over. There was a small amount of debris there, which leads me to believe that the ditch is not sessioned daily, but possibly semi-weekly or montly. One of the most intriguing things about this ditch is that it goes off in either direction into the woods. I once skated down one way for about 100 feet and it kept going. It is about 5'-6' high next to the bridge, and drops to about 3'-4' as it moves into the woods. It is very possible that the ditch leads to some sick little known, forgotten, or as yet undiscovered spots. I would really like to explore it one day. 10.03.01 Tim and I planned to hit Vans this morning but I couldn't get him up early enough.. so I fell back asleep too. We got up at 11 and managed to get a quick ditch session in before work. Tim took a painful fall on his knee, which immediately started turning colors and swelling.. He seems alright now though. 9.21.01 Man I gotta skate more. Crispus Attucks had a photo shoot at the ditch today.. pretty cheesy but you gotta get pics for the record somewhere. Anywho, I went up to session with the boys. Pretty good session overall, although I had to stop for a bit while they were posing for pics. Matt pulled a sick ollie to frontside smith on one of the parking blocks. 9.13.01 No one was around so I went for a solo session at the ditch. Skated pretty hard for being by myself. Pulled some nice high bonelesses and worked on some laybacks. A very fun session. 9.11.01 Crazy day. I went down to Jaime's to meet Steve and do some prep work on the bowl. They plan to pour tomorrow. Steve didn't make it down. While driving on 27 towards 395 (27 goes right by the Pentagon - closer than 395) he sees a plane fly 100 feet in front of him and smack into the Pentagon. Check out some pics of the immediate aftermath. I managed to get some work done on Jaime's bowl with Omer and Psycho. 9.8.01 My friend was in town from Portland, OR so we took him to the ditch. He hasn't skated much in last couple of years, but he had a lot of fun. Matt and Vogel were there too. It was really hot, although a lot cooler than usual. We split after an hour to get some food. Later on I took off to Exodus Skatepark for ECRW benefit. I got to the Bay Bridge at 7:30 and it was a complete stop. I turned around at 8. Traffic didn't start moving until 9:30. 8.31.01 Quick session at the ditch before the Crispus Attucks show. Shows are much more fun after a ripping ditch session. It was far too humid though. Fall is almost here and I can't wait. 8.29.01 Tim, Steve, and I stopped by Jaime's this morning to dig out the dirt under the rebar in the deep end. Steve has done this so many times Jaime appointed him CEO of the deepend. They are really close to shooting the gunnite in the deepend. I can't wait! 8.22.01 Tim, Steve, and I went for our weekly morning session at Vans. Steve was trying some early grabs off the quarter pipes onto the bank ramps. I pulled a couple backside ones but didn't break the coping. I worked a lot on my wheel slides in the pool and Steve took a couple vids of my runs. I have forced myself to rollin to the pool at least once EVERY time I go. It still scares me but I think I have it pretty much down now. 8.18.01 Steve came up to get some overview pics of the ditch. We skated for about 45 minutes but it was pretty muggy out so we didn't stay too long. I worked on planting my hands on the transition and grinding the top. I got some nice b/s grinds and a couple f/s disasters. Steve went down to Vans to hit the 7pm session, but I did not feel like doing anymore driving this weekend. I ended up getting a ride down for the 9-11 session so I skated Vans afterall. I worked on my sweepers and frontside cess-slides while grabbing the coping. I managed to pull some in the deepend but I can't get any speed coming down off them. I tried to some Ally-Opp Cess-slides while grapping the coping but I didn't pull any off. A pretty rad mellow session. I am really liking these harder wheels. 8.17.01 Steve woke me up at 10 in the morning to head out to Exodus. We ate Mexican food on the way up, which was most likely why I felt pretty bad for the first 2 hours of skating. We got to Exodus around 1 and stayed 'till close (10pm). Steve took a lot of pics, and they came out much better than the Vans ones. Once I started feeling better, I started pulling some nice backside airs and a couple of frontside airs. It is hard to hit the hip at the right angle to do frontsides airs (if you are regular), but I managed to find a good line. I pulled a couple carvegrinds in the tight pocket. I worked on my sweepers again. As you can see, I still don't have them down but I'm getting a lot more consistant. I started backside ollieing the hip and managed to pull some over the coping. They are a lot easier than I expected. Steve pulled some big frontside airs and bailed on some burly ones. He also did some nice fakie carves. 8.16.01 I took one of the neighborhood kids, Travis, up to Lansdowne. When we got there there was a fence around the park. I thought they might have closed it off, but there was a gate on the far side. Travis immediately took a spill and received a burly war wound to show off when he got home. I think everyone comes back bloody from Lansdowne. We skated for a couple of hours. I hadn't been up to Lansdowne since I started riding hard wheels again, so I had a lot of fun doing bert slides and laybacks. I can't wait to go back. Some workers from the county came and were digging up the vegetation that is coming through the asphalt. I'm not sure what other renovations will take place. 8.15.01 Steve got a new digital camera over the weekend, so we snuck it into Vans with us. I had gotten my order from ccs last night, so I was able to grip my Scum pitchfork deck. I managed to get in some carvegrinds. Steve took a lot of pics to test out the camera. Heres a small air and another carvegrind. I'm not sure whats wrong with my wrist in that last pic. Joe showed up and was trying to learn tail blocks. He didn't pull that one off but it looks pretty sick! 8.11.01 It cooled down a bit after the rains, but not enough. It is still humid as hell. Matt and I headed over to the ditch, but after a half an hour we felt disgusting. We got something to eat and headed over to the Tear It Up show at the coop. We just missed them... 8.10.01 One of the hottest days of the year and Steve and I head over to Jaime's to help out. I think we may be legally retarded. We hauled some rock that had been delivered, but gave up after a couple of hours and gallons of sweat. 8.08.01 Pat and his bro came down from Boston on their way out to California. They hit Vans with us before work. This is only the second time Pat had skated a pool (the first time being at Skater Island), but he was skating it like it was in his backyard. He started off pretty shaky, getting used to the lack of grip, but in no time he was getting some nice carves in. He ended up getting b/s grinds in the deepend, b/s & f/s carvegrinds in the lowend, and a couple of 5-0 grinds in the deepend. This man is sick. Luckily, he moved next to a sick park in California with multiple bowls. I overcame my fears and dropped in on the deepend. I was also able to pull off a couple sweepers in the lowend. Tim dropped in and took a couple runs in the bowl today. 8.07.01 Steve, Tim, and I headed out to Berlin, MD to skate Exodus Skatepark. I worked on my backside airs over the hip and started trying some sweepers. By the end of the day I was able to pull some off. Steve pulled some sick frontside airs over the hip. We put a broom handle out over the hip and both Steve and I made it over. You get a lot higher when you are trying to make it over something. Tim took a couple runs in the bowl, learning how to hit the corners and the tight pocket. We ended up staying until closing (8pm), wishing we had more time. 8.03.01-8.05.01 Steve and I headed up to Boston for our friend Pat's going away party (he's going to Cali) and to do a bit of skating. We left at midnight Friday morning and arrived at Pat's at 8am. We crashed for a couple hours and then headed to hyde park. Super rad 5' bowl (descriped below somewhere). It was threatening rain so we headed to Skater Island, RI, which just happens to be a kick-ass indoor park. We got there about 9, right when it closes. The guy closing up was sympathetic and let us skate for 30 minutes. Saturday we planned to hit Nashua, but it was ready to rain again so we headed to Skater Island again, this time with Pat. We got a good 4 hour session in before heading home. I worked on some f/s airs in the deepend of the bowl, breaking the coping a couple times. The Snake run was killer! I managed to pull some b/s and f/s airs over the elbow and get some burly carvegrinds on the pool coping. Pat had never skated the big bowl before but was pulling douple carves in the deepend and lowend and getting some tiles in the deep. For some reason there was a 2" hole cut in the shallow end about 3" down from the coping. What else can you do but grind over it? Steve pulled a b/s grind over it and I pulled a f/s slasher over. Saturday night was Pat's party. One dude there was so wasted that he peed himself and didn't know it. Ahh.. good times, good times. Anywho, Sunday morning we helped pat move his furniture out, said our goodbyes, and then headed to Nashua. Nashua is a burly bowl! We sessioned it for a few hours. I was trying some f/s airs in the deepend but couldn't get out of the pool. Pulled some nice f/s carvegrinds in the lowend. I tried dropping in on the deepend, but wrecked at the bottom and bruised my hand. Its all in good fun. Steve was pulling some sick f/s airs over a hip in the street course. The lights came on and we kept on skating. Nashua has to be one of the best parks in the east. Killer bowl, nice street course (lots of flow), its open after dark, and its free! What more could you want. Plus everyone up there skates Scum and Consolidated. Seems like a rad scene. There are gonna be some sick pool skaters coming outta NH in 5 or 6 years. We left Nashua at 9 and arrived home at 5am. 7.27.01 Steve and I headed out to Exodus Skatepark (Berlin, MD) at around 10am. We got there at about 1pm. We skated the bowl for about 9 hours straight before heading home. I ran into an old friend from high school there, its great to know hes still skating. I spent most of the time getting backside airs down. There is a hip (more like an elbow) in the ramp that launches you off. Its easy to learn on 'cause you can start about halfway up and work up to the coping. By the end of the session I was getting completely out of the bowl. I was doing some carve grinds in the tight pocket all day, but I was always getting on the coping half way through. I decided I was gonna get on just before I hit the pocket. I had a good amount of speed and I managed to hit the coping exactly when I wanted. It swung me around so fast that I was riding away on the flat wall before I even knew what was happening! I couldn't beleive how fast I whipped through the pocket. I'm still not used to that metal coping. At around 8 all the OC pool dogs came out for a evening session. Even though we were really tired we seemed to get a boost of energy when everyone showed up. Some of those guys were really destroying the bowl. 7.20.01-7.22.01 Steve, Jaime, Doug, Ben, Psycho, and I all cruised down to Ocean City for some fun in the sun and some sick skating. We hit the beach Saturday afternoon and headed over to the Ocean Bowl afterwards. A bunch of locals came out as the sun went down and we rounded up our posse from the local bars and a session was born. We had a good hour long pool session before it got too dark to skate. We hit the beach again Sunday morning for a quick swim and then headed out to Exodus, a new indoor skatepark about 30 minutes outside OC. It has a mediocre steet coarse but a rad 6' wooden bowl w/metal coping. The bowl is sweet! It has a square section w/rounded corners, an elbow, and really tight pocket on the far side. Its definetly worth checking out if you're into roundwall. Sorry, no pics. 7.16.01 Tim and I hit the Riverdale Ditch for a quick session before work, which got me warmed up to skate the Franconia Ditch on my lunch break. We got some directions and Steve checked it out Sunday and said it was skateable. We've heard its skateable after a week of no rain, but that its a bust if you go more than a few times a month. Its a pretty rad ditch - nice and long with a slight curve. A couple cracks and a lot of rocks but still very skateable. There were a lot of small pipe openings at the base, which were kinda hard to avoid but you can usually ride over them. There were large pipe openings every 30 or so feet which were rad to carve/ollie over. We started grabing the base of the pipe and doing carves/wheel slides over the pipe and then riding away. It was hella fun. If only we could skate it every day... 7.6.01-7.14.01 We've been putting a lot of labor into getting Jaime's pond done. Its half poured and you can skate the mid/shallow end. Already finding some killer lines in it. We hit a small skatepark in woodbridge. It has a small mellow bowl (more of a ditch actually) and a vert ramp. A couple of quarter pipes and a box have been built and put there too. The bowl is about 4'-5' deepend with no lip and a 3' shallowend. There is a monstrous speed hump in the middle of the deepend. Some parking blocks have been placed on the top for make-shift coping. It is a great park to mess around in but not something you should go out of your way for. 06.22.01-6.24.01 Road Trip! Steve and I headed up to New England at 8 am Friday morning (I didn't wake up until 10). We stopped in Delaware to check out a small park near Steve's mom's house. It had some ramps, a Vert ramp, and a metal bowl. We wanted to get going so we didn't skate it. Next stop FDR. We skated it for about an hour or so. We really sessioned the pool bowl this time. We left FDR at 1 and after a hell of a lot of traffic in NY and Connecticut we made it to Skater Island at 9. This is conveinently when they close, but they let us in anyway since people were sessioning the vert ramp. The bowl there is hella rad. Its an all wood crazy 8 with metal coping. After sessioning that for a bit we went over to the snake run. The snake run is Awesome! At the end it has a big wall with pool coping. I managed to pull a couple f/s grinds on it. We left Skater Island at about 10:30 and headed towards Boston. After getting severly lost due to MapQuest, we got to our friends house. Saturday morning (well afternoon) we headed out for Nashua. The Bowl at Nashua is crazy. It is a left-hand Kidney with vert all around and a death box. My first drop-in I hit the hip and fell right on my ass, bruising my tailbone. That shit hurts! I managed to avenge myself with some f/s 50-50 carve grinds in the shallowend, and a couple b/s grinds in the deepend. Steve road thru the deathbox once. We ran into Kevin from paincheater kneepads (they rule!) He was rippin it up! It began raining so we had to end the session short. We headed back to Boston. Sunday we headed to Hyde park, a small park in Boston with a shallow but wide bowl. The bowl was super fun and we sessioned it all afternoon before heading back. We hit DC at around 2am. My ass still hurts, and we are all pissed at Don for wussing out on the whole trip! 06.15.01-6.16.01 When will the rain end? We were trying to put in some manual labor at Jaime's (ECRW) but it rained all weekend. We got some good sessions in at Vans though. 06.12.01-6.14.01 Three quick ditch sessions before work. It was hot as hell but we kept skating. 06.09.01 ECRW had a contest down at Vans. Steve and I headed down there to check it out. Most of the skaters were locals - and they ripped it up. This was probably the most chaotic contest I can imagine. Afterwards the pool session continued and I snuck in and got some runs in. 06.08.01 Steve, Don, and I hit the ditch. We did some general maintenence. Its been raining too much so it wasn't quite dry. We did our best to spread the water out in hopes it would evaporate, but the sun wasn't out enough. We took measurements for the quarter, so hopefully we can pour it soon. Some kids have been coming around and leaving trash after they skate. We've told them once to take it with them but they ignored us. God damned posers - they're too lazy to clean up after themselves and they risk getting the place shut down. I've skated with them once - they suck. The one kid who leaves most of the trash doesn't even skate - he just stands there holding his board. The other one trys kickflips repeatly (and unsuccessfully). 06.01.01-06.02.01 The rains continue... Didn't stop us from getting in a couple of sessions in at the ditch between showers! 05.25.01-05.26.01 More Rain! We managed to get a session in at the ditch before the thunderstorms. Some high school kids put up some SKETCHY extensions. We fooled around with them a bit, but didn't want to push our luck as they are falling down every time we hit them. A steep bank ramp provided the most entertainment. We also managed to dumpster a lot of cinder blocks and plywood at U of MD after all the kids moved out of the dorms. We're using the cinder blocks at the ditch for a base to the concrete structures we plan to make. On sat. we hit Vans. After a couple months we're finally getting Don interested in the pool. I think its because of the pool he hit with us a couple weeks back. He's still getting used to the transitions and carving. I took a burly fall trying to roll in and really bruised the front of my hip bone. Damn that smarts. Don pulled a Texas plant into the pool like a madman. Overall it was a rad session but hella crowded 'cause of the rain. 05.16.01-5.19.01 Rain, Rain, Rain. My days off and it rains the whole time. We managed to hit the ditch everyday between storms. Its finally draining properly, well at least half of it. 05.12.01 Tim and I hit the ditch today. As soon as we got there it started raining. We got 2 runs in before it was too slick to skate. It downpoured for about 10 minutes and then stopped. Once the roads dried up we headed back with Don to do some more concrete work. We fixed some more transitions and set a couple more parking blocks with concrete. We skated the part of the ditch with no wet cement for awhile. Tim managed shoot his board through wet concrete twice. We fixed it up and headed home at dusk. Later on Steve came over to hit the pool from last night again. We headed over around 11pm, but it was full when we arrived. As if that wasn't bad enough, a cop showed up as we were checking it out. He told us to leave and drove off. We had to leave without Tim and hang around down the street. Tim, who was in hiding had to wait 15 minutes for the cop to stop circling the parking lot. He met up with us and we headed home disappointed. 05.11.01 Steve, Tim and I headed over to the ditch to do some maintenence. We cleaned out the corner that was full of dirt and swept everything up. We also set some more parking blocks at the top. There are now 7 parking blocks and one railroad tie. I managed to hit every one in one run. On the next run I rock-n-rolled every one. I up'd the ante and started trying to disaster every one in one run. After a bunch of tries I pulled it and was exhausted. Later that night Tim, Matt, Don, and I headed out to check out some pools. We checked 11 pools, and only one was empty. It just so happened that the one that was empty was lit enought to skate at night. We sessioned it for about a half hour. The deepend was 12.5 feet. It was like a giant wedge ramp to a giant quarter pipe. 05.10.01 Tim and I woke up at 4:30am to hit the Pool that Matt and Steve found. We had already tried twice before at around 10am, and both times there were people working on it. We got to the pool at around 5:30am. We hopped in and swept up. There was a small circle of water, about 4 feet in diameter in the basin of the deepend. While we waited for the sun to come up we began bucketing the water. We took about 5 inches off the diameter of the water and decided it was light enough to skate. This is a 10 foot deep pool, so it wasn't easy to get to the coping - which is really just a gutter around the side. We skated it for about a half hour. I took a pretty nasty fall into the water and cut my arm open. Luckily my board stayed dry. Tim wasn't so lucky and had to fish his board out. We left without getting caught and headed home at about 6:30. After going back to sleep for a good couple of hours, Tim, Matt, and I checked out another pool in the area. This one was very unique. There was absolutley no transition on it. The walls connected to the bottom at right angles. The deepend was like an upside down pyramid ramp. It had some flat bottom and four banks connecting to the walls. We skated it for a bit and headed on to check out some more pools. All the others were full, so we sessioned the ditch for a bit. After dinner Tim and I headed back to the ditch with Don to lay some concrete down on the transitions and cement some parking blocks. 05.06.01-05.07.01 Steve and Matt went searching for Pools in Rockville. They checked 8 pools, and found 2 empty ones. The first pool sucked. It was pretty much unskateable. The second pool was rad, but they got kicked out after about 10 minutes because too many people saw them go in. The following day Steve took Tim and I back to the good pool. We got there at 10am and the neighborhood was dead. We walked up to the pool and there was a car outside with the trunk open and a bunch of tool lying out. We walked around and got a good look at it but never saw anyone. We figured if it was a young guy he might let us skate, so we yelled 'hello' hoping someone would come out but no one did. We decided to leave and try again tomorrow. On our way home we spotted another empty pool. We stopped and walked up. There were two older fellows working on it, and we definetly got the vibe that they were not gonna let us skate. They let us take a look around. The pool was square in the deepend but nice transitions. It had about 8 lanes. It was a pretty big pool. Not the best thing to skate, but we'll take anything we can get. This one definetly looked harder to get into (barbed wire all around) so we probably won't hit this, but you never know. 05.04.01-05.05.01 Steve, Tim, and I headed out to Ocean City for the weekend to skate the Ocean Bowl. We got to the park around 2 and were excited as hell to start sessioning. There were 2 other people there skating the street coarse, so we had the park pretty much to ourselves. Steve and I immediately took a couple runs in the pool, which is way different from the Vans pool. To start off with, the Vans pool is the slickest thing you'll ever ride. The Ocean Bowl was definetly a rougher. Steve was skating 92a wheels which were really preventing him from getting speed. The Ocean Bowl also has a lot more flat bottom, and the walls are not as rounded. At first this was a real hinderance, but we started getting the hang of it. The Ocean Bowl has corners, which Vans doesn't, and you can really whip around the corners and get a lot of speed. I was able to get some f/s grinds in the shallow end and pulled off a couple b/s ones in the deepend. Steve was getting some nice b/s grinds in the deepend. The deepend is 8' with 1' of vert, and the shallow end is 5' (I think) with pretty mellow transitions. They were a bit too mellow for me to try any airs on, plus I didn't have the speed. I started trying them in the deepend, and pulled a couple where I didn't get out of the pool, but got all 4 wheels off the pool. I then started pushing them higher but only got 2 wheels out of the pool. Lack of speed was definitely the major hinderance. There is a pretty rad street coarse at the Ocean Bowl, probably one of the best in the area (in my mind at least). It is all concrete and it doesn't have a lot of big stuff, but what they do have isn't too small (like the Vans concrete street coarse). The street coarse connects to a small bowl. The small bowl is kinda square, but you can get a lot of speed in the corners. Skating it definitely helped us skate the big pool. After rollin in on a couple of ramps in the street coarse, I attempted the pool. Through some strange act of the gods of skatin, I pulled it on my first try. I was hella stoked. Around 6 some of the locals showed up and began rippin up the pool. They were really rad dudes. Tim took a pretty burly fall on his hip, which was already purple, and decided that he better not skate on it for awhile. I was trying to hit some f/s grinds in the deepend when I totally lost it and fell right on my knee. Even with the pad on my knee was still bleeding. It was pretty sore, but there were pools to skate! We skated 'till dusk and headed back to Steve's soon-to-be father-in-law's beachhouse. The next mourn we got something to eat and headed up to the Ocean Bowl again. We passed a small wood park in a parking lot (a mini-ramp and some bank ramps) which had about 10 kids skating it. There was only about 5 people at the Ocean Bowl. When will kids learn? Concrete is where its at. Anywho, we got to the park and hit the pool again. Tim was in a lot of pain, so he walked off to check out the boardwalk. My knee was killing me. It was alright when I skated, but if I sat down for a couple minutes it hurt like hell when I stood up. I figured the only thing to do is continue skating. A local by the name of Wes showed up and sessioned with us. He was a really rad guy. He was pushing us to test our limits..and had steve rolling in the pool (which he nailed) and me trying disasters, which I couldn't quite pull back in. It was a hella rad session. Some more locals showed up and we had a nice pool session going for a bit. Wes started skating some vert, so Steve went over and took a couple runs too. He had a couple nice grinds. All weekend we saw ton's of pools, and we knew some had to be empty. We asked the locals, who gave us some vague directions, but when dusk came around Wes decided to take us to one. It was a pretty sketchy situation, there were apartments surronding it and the fence was chain-linked so you could see right through it. We hopped the fence and got a good look at the pool. It was 5' in the deepend and 3' in the shallow and it was pretty small. It had about 1.5' transitions, which made it like a wallride. We started taking runs.. Wes was ripping the pool up. I was getting some good carves in the deepend, usually 2 each run. Steve did a sick carve over the light. There were some neighbors watching us from a balcony window, but they seemed pretty cool about it, just wanted to check out what was happening. We got about 5 or so minutes of skating in when a car pulled up and we split. They took down our license plate but we were out of there way before they could call the cops. We drove home on a super adrenaline rush from hitting the backyard pool. Over all it was a hella rad weekend. We got to skate 2 pools and met some really rad people. Best quote of the trip: "I hope its jellyfish season 'cause I could go for a good stingin'!" -Tim. 05.01.01 A beautiful May Day. We honored our fallen anarchist brothers by skating! Steve, Tim, and I hit Vans this morning. I had just switched my wheels from 92a's to 95a's and boy is that pool slick. Our friend Joe was there today, and we were the only 4 people in the whole park! Joe showed us how to roll into the 3' shallow end of the kiddie pool and I urged Joe to try it in the big pool. Seeing Joe tried made me want to too, so after riding up to the coping a couple of times I finally got the nerve to try. Needless to say I fell, but not bad. After a couple more tries I nailed it. Its pretty damn scary. I did it a couple more times but it still scares the hell out of me. Joe landed a couple too before we left. 04.28.01 Matt and I headed up to the ditch. Matt's friend Jim came along who hasn't been skating much in about 10 years. He started picking it up again with some nice grinds on the parking blocks. It began to get too hot so we headed over to a mini-ramp we had got a lead on in Mt. Rainer. One of our friends helped build it and he took us over there. Its a nice ramp - about 4' with a 5-6' extension and a roll-in. It was pretty fun but I just can't skate miniramp. I managed to roll in (not on the roll-in) so I was quite happy. 04.27.01 A pretty boring day. All of the psycho-plattoon were off doing something so I couldn't find anyone to skate with. I eventually ran into Matt and we headed to the ditch for a nice session. Some other kid came up with his girlfriend and her two friends. It's kinda awkward skating in front of a bunch of girls who are just sitting there watching you. That didn't stop us though. What did was the Fugazi show that Matt wanted to go to (am I the only one who doesn't like them?). 04.26.01 A beautiful day. Tim and I headed up to Bel Air to pick up my brother and then headed down to Lansdowne. It was a pretty rad session, my bro hadn't been there since summer (he lives in Oregon) so he was having a great time. I took a pretty nasty spill in the bowl and slid about 4 feet on my shoulder. I came away with some gnarly battle wounds. We dropped my brother off in Baltimore and passed the Washington Avenue skatepark. It is outdoor and all wood. It is fenced in and you have to pay. It didn't look that great, but I guess if you're a kid (with no transportation) in Baltimore its a pretty good place to skate. It has really weird hours (I think it opens at 3 or 4pm) so we didn't skate it. We hit the ditch on the way home and were excited that it is finally dry and it appears it will be until next spring. After this session we went home and ran into Don who wanted to hit the ditch. We got a bite to eat and returned to the ditch until dusk. Don pulled some nice handplants on the banks. 04.25.01 We were really psyched to go skate the Halen Pool. Steve, Tim, and I raced home from work. We stopped by my house to pick up Matt and then drove over to Tim's. As we turned the corner around the pool Tim shouted "Pull over!" and jumped out of the car before it was even stopped. They had began filling the pool! There was about 4' of water and a spicket spraying water in the deepend. We returned home (un)bruised but not beaten. There's always next year! I used the extra time to set up a new deck (Scum Trashcan) and switch back to 95a wheels. 04.24.01 Steve, Tim, and I hit Vans this morning. My brother is in town from Portland, OR so we took him down there. This was the first session in awhile that there were no little kids at. (Schools have been having spring break for a bit). It was nice to have a mello session without anyone there. Steve still pulled off 4 grinds in a row on 1 run in the pool (b/s, f/s, f/s, b/s). 04.23.01 We hit Tim's pool again, this time late at night. Tim's neighborhood is super sketchy, there are lots of thugs walkin around in the middle of the night. There was about three inches of water in the bottom, which we had to carve around. Tim's board went in twice. I took a nice fall and took a lot of skin off my knuckles, but managed to avenge myself with a nice b/s grind on my last run. Overall we got about 20 minutes in and left before being caught. We plan to hit it again tonight! Oh yeah, heres a pic of the Deep End. 04.20.01 Don and I hit the ditch today. It is still having major drainage problems, but we were able to skate half of it. It was still pretty wet and after every 3 or so runs we had to let our wheels dry so we didn't slide all over the place. Looks like it should be ready by early to mid may. After that Don and I met up with Steve and hit Vans from 7-9. It was a pretty rad session, a lot of pool dogs and even some vert dogs showed up. Don snuck a camera in and we got some pics, so hopefully they should be up soon. 04.19.01 Steve and I picked up Tim from work at around 2pm. We headed over to Tim's to check out his apartment complex pool, which had be recently drained. This pool is incredable. We hopped the fence and started taking runs. Steve got a nice backside grind right at the 8'6" mark. We got a solid 15 minutes in before being kicked out by the rental office, which is right next door. From there we headed up to Lansdowne for a nice long session. We skated 'till dusk. 04.18.01 Once again Steve and I found ourselves at Vans. This time we convinced Tim to come along. There was a group of 6 people skatin the pool, which is quite unusual for a 10-12 session on a Wednesday. A lot of old school decks out today for some reason. One of the pool dogs had a nice lookin Shut Shark deck, the only problem is that he put the really cheesy naked-lady griptape on. Surprising, he had the smallest wheels out of all the pool dogs. We also caught a glimpse of a Powell Peralta McGill Stinger. Another guy had one but the graphics were too thrashed to see what it was. Overall a pretty rad session, I ended with pullin my first frontside 50-50 grind in the deep end. 04.17.01 Another session at Vans with Steve. Our pal Joe showed up today, who we met up there. Its so nice to have a third pool dog to skate with. I think that my berrings have gone to hell. I'm puttin some oil on them tonight in hopes that it'll revearse the effects of my board fallin in the Lansdowne puddle. Steve tried out his Channel One Monkey Biz wheels (64mm 92a) today. They look like they are made of plastic. I have my suspicians... He bought the set for $4 though, so he's not complaining. We'll see how they look after a good Lansdowne session (my guess is they'll be 40mm!). 04.13.01 My board dried today, so Steve and I hit Vans for a third time this week (third for me, steve's gotten in 7 sessions in 7 days!) A nice pool session, but I took a brutal fall, which had my palm black & blue in minutes. Just payin my dues... 04.12.01 Where did spring go? Tim and I headed up to Lansdowne today for the muggiest session this year. It felt awful out. We still got some rad skating though. Lansdowne was pretty dry except for a couple random puddles here and there. The snake run had about 5 puddles, so you had to time your carves to miss them all, which is hella fun. Around the bowl was a huge puddle that my board flew into. It was completely submerged in water, and thus ended my session. 04.11.01 Another session at Vans today with Steve. It was raining out and still spring break so all the tykes were there. Still nobody to share the pool with though. I worked on my airs while steve ripped up some more coping with some more sick 50-50 frontsides. I also got a new line down to carve backside over the hip. Managed to get in the tile before taking a pretty gnarly slam for the last run of the day. There was a 10 year old kid riding a Tony Hawk skull and cross mini. Also some rollerbladers in full hockey mask (with face guard) and full shin guards that went from his boots to above his knees. 04.10.01 Steve and I hit Vans today for a nice early session (10-12). I guess it is spring break for grade schools cos there were just a ton of kids there. We had the pool to ourselves, though, at least for the most part. Steve pulled some sick frontside 50-50 grinds in the shallow end, and one gnarly one in the deepend. I was busy joining the skate airborne as I finally got myself completely out of the pool on some airs. I pulled a couple backside 50-50 grinds in the deepend too. 04.06.01-04.07.01 Two rainy/overcast days. Don and I were up in Philly to see the Shepard Fairey art show at the 1pixel gallery. On Friday we got a little bit of skating in at FDR before the puddles took over the park. Love carving over that tongue! On Saturday we headed to the Dust Bowl, which had also been taken over by puddles. We managed to get a small session in on it though. From there we headed to a small (really small) skatepark near Atlantic City, NJ. It had a couple rails, 2 pyramids, a nice launch ramp, and a miniramp. The miniramp was the melloist one I've ever skated, and this was my first real miniramp session. It was 4' with 8' transitions. I was able to pull off some fakie staple guns, so I was very happy. 04.05.01 A beautiful day. Tim and I went up to Lansdowne for a rad 4+ hour session. It was relatively empty when we arrived, but there was a crowd of skaters soon enough as everyone got outta school and work. We ran into Dave (an old amatuer for Zorlac back in the early 80's) who was rippin it up as usual on his Powell Dagger longboard. Even better he brought out an old G&S deck (the smallest deck I've ever ridden - probably about 5" width). Riding that was definetely an adventure. You know its an old school session when the oldest deck is also the smallest! Overall, it was an awesome session with plenty of older guys up there. Even the snakeboarders came out. Also, two gangs of youths came out into the field and we had front row seats to a fistfight!
Questions and comments - Email or IM Josh. ##naught five##naught four##naught three##naught two##naught one##