Checking In With…

Tammie Barta

If you were at the GLS holiday party in December, you know that Tammie was named GLS Sierran of the Year. (Unfortunately the editor lost track of that fact when writing about the party in the last issue of Tracks.) The award was in recognition of the work that Tammie has done for GLS recently, along with Kyla, but particularly the work Tammie did to create the new GLS Tracks website, glstracks.org.

Tammie and Kyla were first connected with GLS through a welcome package of information from the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club. Many of us got to know them at the GLS 25th anniversary weekend at Harwood Lodge, which they attended and where they were volunteers. Some of Tammie’s early memorable outings were GLS bike rides, Santa Cruz Island with Mike, and going up and down Los Angeles stairs with Nancy and Eva. For three years now they have hosted GLS for a winter weekend in Big Bear. And for something a little different, Tammie is particularly interested in future outings that involve geocaching.

Both Tammie and Kyla are now on the GLS management committee and both are active, O-rated leaders.

Susan Campo

Susan has been active with GLS since its beginning in the 1980s and still leads new and interesting hikes. So where has she been in recent months? She’s been in South Dakota.

Susan is originally from Rapid City, where she still owns her childhood home. Since Susan retired from teaching junior high school science, one of her bucket list goals was to spend an entire season in South Dakota doing things she wanted to do but just hadn’t been there long enough recently to do. This included having friends for Thanksgiving dinner at her house there, and having a snowy South Dakota Christmas with Diane.

Some of the things that Susan did during her extended South Dakota stay: repeat visits to Mt. Rushmore, Harney Peak and many other local peaks, a buffalo roundup, a powwow, museums, caves, rivers, badlands, visiting childhood friends and classmates, a buffalo kill, a Lakota sweat lodge, and many activities with Outdoor Women of South Dakota. When she left South Dakota, there were still plenty of things to do the  next time she gets back there.

And then there were more adventures.

Susan is the GLS leader who has taken GLS many times to Phantom Ranch at the bottom of the Grand Canyon for New Year Eve. On the return trip from South Dakota after the new year, Susan and Diane went to the Grand Canyon to do that hike again on their own. It turned out that it was so snowy at the rim of the Grand Canyon that the Bright Angel Trail was closed to the mule packers who supply

Phantom Ranch and hikers were not encouraged to hike down. Given the choice of their money back or an adventure, Susan and Diane put their grippers on their shoes and headed down. They made it down safely, had the trails more or less to themselves, and then made it safely back up as well.

Susan’s first GLS hike after her return to Pasadena was on the Chaney Trail, which you can read about elsewhere in this issue. It was a day hike close to home, unlike the hike to Phantom Ranch, but, unfortunately, that did not mean that everyone on the trail made it home safely.

Soon after the Chaney Trail hike, Susan and Diane went skiing in the Sierras and Susan took a tumble on the slopes. She didn’t think it was a big deal until she got home and found that she had actually cracked a vertebra! Which means that, after all her adventures, Susan is now resting restlessly at home in order to recover quickly. She still has a number of outings planned because she expects to be back on the trail in a few months.

Barbara Edwards

Barb has been the queen of GLS car camps in recent years, as well as our most frequent urban walk leader. But Barb and SK are now leaving Los Angeles. We will never again have a Barb car camp in Anza Borrego or at Morro Bay. There is, however, one last arboretum visit with Barb scheduled in this issue of Tracks.

Barb and SK are moving to Port Townsend in Washington. Barb sounds very happy with the friendly atmosphere in town, lots of retired gay people, lots of art in town. She says that she will miss familiar places in California like Morro Bay, Pismo Beach, Rock Creek, and Joshua Tree, but is looking forward to new bays, beaches, creeks, and trees. Mt. Baker and Mt. Rainier are within sight of town, Fort Warden State Park is a few minutes away, and Olympic National Park is about as far away as the Buckhorn trailhead was in L.A. Barb is already planning to hike around Lake Crescent and to ski above tree line on Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park.

Barb says that she and SK will miss all their GLS friends a lot and hope those friends will come visit. Barb says she is ready to make room in the driveway.