Hueco Tanks Women’s weekend was a great success! We had 10 women join us for a weekend of on rope climbing and bouldering. Special guest instructors were Katie Brown and Brittney Griffith (who also doubled as a gourmet chef!). One of the guests was a yoga instructor, so we started the days with a little bit of yoga, and wound down the day with a little bit of dancing. I even did a bit of break dancing! All the guys were ogling at us girls having fun (later they joined in the fun).

Happy holidays everyone! I received an incredibly thought provoking Holiday card that I wanted to share with you:

I myself am convince that there has never been a greater need than there is today for the reporter and interpreter of the natural world. Mankind has gone very for into an artificial world of his own creation. He has sought to insulate himself, in his cities of steel and concrete, from the realities of earth and water and the growing seed. Intoxicated with a sense of his own power, he seems to be going farther and farther into more experiments for the destruction of himself and his world.

There is certainly no single remedy for this condition and I am offering no panacea. But it seems reasonable to believe — that the more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us the less taste we shall have for the destruction of our race. Wonder and humility are wholesome emotions, and they do not exist side by side with lust for destruction.

-Rachel Carson for acceptance speech for the John Borroughs Medal in New Your. April, 1952