Colockum elk meeting Jan. 6 in Ellensburg

Where and how Colockum elk spend their winters — innocuously on state-managed lands or, flushed from that safe haven, expensively noshing on privately owned Kittitas County ranches — will be the focus of a public meeting Jan. 6 in Ellensburg.

One reason for the meeting is to update area residents on the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife’s ongoing research on the 4,500 elk that populate eastern Kittitas County.

But the primary discussion will almost certainly revolve around whether the state should extend its motorized-access closure designed to help keep the elk on the 44,000 acres of the Whisky Dick and Quilomene wildlife areas during the late winter-early spring months.

For the past three years the WDFW has closed those areas northwest of Vantage to motor vehicles from February through April.

“There (had been) all kinds of people out there in February, March and April on that winter range trying to pick up those shed antlers the male elk have dropped,” said Anthony Novack, a deer and elk control specialist with the WDFW. “(State biologists) felt that activity was pushing the elk onto the private property.”

At a public meeting last winter to reconsider the closure, the turnout was divided between recreationists who wanted that winter access reopened and landowners who wanted to maintain the closure.

“Where that location is, that Whisky Dick wildlife area, is probably the first area that dries up enough that people can start driving up into it, the motorcyclists and Jeepers,” Novack said. “But the landowners were the ones saying, ‘We’re the ones with the problem here.’”

That issue of elk foraging on the privately-owned ranches west of the WDFW land prompted the wildlife department to initiate its elk study in 2008. That year, six adult female elk were captured and equipped with Global Positioning System (GPS) devices to track their movements. Since then, 105 elk have been monitored with the devices, giving the WDFW reason to believe the motor-vehicle closure is having the desired results.

“What we’ve seen is that before, problems (of elk marauding on private property) were showing up at the end of February or early March,” Novack said. “And now those problems haven’t been showing up until later, like April. That’s kind of anecdotal, but we have seen that trend since the closure started.

“That would say the closure is doing some good — (the damage) appears to be less, and for a shorter period of time.”

The Jan. 6 meeting will start at 7 p.m., at the Hal Holmes Center, 209 N. Ruby St.

12/28 What’s Happening

Forest Service adds Jim Creek property

A land purchase between Trust for Public Lands and the U.S. Forest Service will help consolidate national forest land ownership in the Jim Creek area of the Cle Elum Ranger District.

The Forest Service purchased the 640 acres of timber land, the bulk of which has already been logged, from The Trust for Public Lands for $845,000. With the purchase, the full 4.6-mile length of the Blazed Ridge Trail is on national forest land.

“Acquisition of this property will greatly increase our ability to manage this area and decrease boundary maintenance costs,” said Cle Elum District Ranger Judy Hallisey. “When this property was in private ownership we had to maintain four miles of boundary of separate national forest lands around it. Now, this area can be managed as a unit with no interior boundaries.”

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Snowshoe outings begin at Snoqualmie

The Forest Service’s annual program of guided snowshoe treks on the trail systems near Snoqualmie Pass will run Jan. 8-March 27

this year, with the outings tailored to various skill levels for adults and children.

The 90-minute walks intended for beginner or intermediate snowshoers will focus on winter birding, animal tracking and general winter forest ecology. More advanced half-day trips will expand on those themes to include mountain weather and avalanche safety.

Kim Larned, who has been leading snowshoe walks in the area for more than 25 years, recommended layered and insulated clothing, hats and gloves, with waterproof boots for the snowshoes. A donation of $10 per person is suggested for all tours except the extended hike, where $20 is suggested.

Make reservations by calling 509-852-1062 Monday through Friday until Jan. 7. After that, call 425-434-6111 Thursday through Sunday.

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Barbless not a rule; would you, please?

Columbia River anglers who fish for salmon and steelhead will not be required to switch to barbless hooks next year, but state fishery managers are asking them to do it voluntarily.

“Going barbless only makes sense in these fisheries where we’re trying to maximize survival rates for released wild fish,” said Phil Anderson, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife director.

Anderson made his appeal to anglers after informing the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission of plans to delay a new rule — originally set to begin Jan. 1 — that would require anglers to use barbless hooks in salmon and steelhead fisheries from the mouth of the Columbia River to McNary Dam.

Washington’s commission approved that requirement, but Oregon’s did not. The prospect of having incompatible fishing regulations on a portion of the Columbia River jointly managed by the two states prompted Anderson to delay the barbless rule for at least a year.

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BIRD ALERT

The silence of a snowy morning was broken up by the  call notes of about eight red crossbills feeding atop a big Douglas fir tree near MacLaren Street and South 18th Avenue in Yakima.

Both male and female red crossbills were in the group noisily feeding until a merlin came out of nowhere, scattering them. Crossbills eat mostly conifer seeds, as well as insects, berries and other seeds. They will come to bird feeders for seeds.

Two red-necked grebes were observed a quarter-mile west of the tunnel at Rimrock Lake. Slightly smaller than the western and Clark’s grebes, the red-necked grebe may be distinguished by its thick neck, chunky head, and white patches along the leading and trailing edges of its wings.

A few more highlights of birds seen on the Toppenish Christmas Bird Count: 12 bushtits, noted for the first time in the last seven Christmas counts; an extremely large count of 48 purple finches, apparently attracted to the ornamental ash plantings at the Mount Adams Golf Course; and the few montane species recorded, including hermit thrush, brown creeper, pine siskin and varied thrush.

Please call your bird sightings into the Yakima Valley Audubon phone line at 509-248-1963

— Kerry L. Turley

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AROUND AND ABOUT

RAZOR CLAM DIG: Clam diggers can ring in 2011 with a three-day razor clam dig on Washington’s coastal beaches over the New Year’s holiday. Long Beach, Twin Harbors, Copalis, Mocrocks and Kalaloch will be open Friday and Saturday, with Twin Harbors also open Sunday. Friday’s low tide will occur at 3:40 p.m., setting the stage for the first daylight dig of the season.

REITER PLAN: ORV enthusiasts wishing to comment on a new motorized recreational trail system plan at Reiter Foothills Forest (outside Gold Bar in Snohomish County) have until Jan. 31 to do so. The Reiter system, known affectionately as “the Pit” to off-roaders, was closed in November 2009 because of creekbed damage and unauthorized trail use. The proposal, which covers a variety of opportunities (single-track/motorcycles, quads/all-terrain and 4-by-4), calls for development of a new motorized trail system including 10.5 miles of trail, 3 temporary parking areas, and one trial riding area.

EAGLES HAVE LANDED: According to the Spokesman-Review, raptor watching heated up just in time for the annual Eagle Watch Week (last Sunday through this Saturday). At least seven dozen bald eagles were congregated last week in the Wolf Lodge Bay area of Lake Coeur d’Alene, where they typically gather to feast on kokanee that swarm into the area to spawn and die. Eagle Watch week activities are set for 10 a.m.-3 p.m. at the Mineral Ridge Boat Launch and the Mineral Ridge Trailhead (Exit 22 off I-90).

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ON THE CALENDAR

TODAY: The Cascadians’ “Tuesdays” and courageous wannabes will meet at 8 a.m. at the 40th Avenue Bi-Mart parking lot and head out to whatever ski/snowshoe/hiking trek the trip leaders pick for the day’s adventure. Come prepared for anything, and pack a lunch.

THURSDAY: The day’s schedule for the Pokies group will be slightly different from the Cascadians’ newsletter — it’ll be a snowshoe/cross-country ski trek on Oak Creek Road, which is the same destination as originally planned but a different activity because of all the snow. For meeting time and place, call Rudy Labernik at 248-7304. People who aren’t snow bunnies can opt for the Pokies’ alternate outing, hike on the Greenway. For that one, call Jeanne Crawford at 509-966-8608.

SATURDAY: This happens to be New Years Day, when is when the Pokies hold their annual Round Mountain cross-country ski trip. For meeting time and place, call Mike or Sue Gunderson at 509-972-2615.

Zillah doesn’t take it easy at Shootout

YAKIMA, Wash. — Since Zillah puts on the SunDome Shootout, an annual affair which will have its 11th two-day run at the Dome this Wednesday and Thursday, the Leopards are in it every year. So it’s only natural they have the lions’ share of the victories — Zillah’s boys tied with Naches Valley with nine victories each, and the Leopard girls alongside East Valley at 11 wins.

But Zillah teams have had to earn that limelight, because tournament director and Zillah boys coach Doug Burge hasn’t filled the Leopards’ match card with lightweights.

In 2000, the Shootout’s inaugural year, Burge had his team face Wapato, which had played for the Class 2A state title the spring before, and defending Class 1A champion Seattle Christian, which would reach the 1A final again that season. In each of the next two Shootouts, the Leopards faced Chewelah, which was in the middle of three straight 2A semifinal runs (including the 2001 title), and a couple of years after that faced Cashmere, then a perennial 2A trophy team.

Likewise, Zillah’s girls have lined up in the Shootout against a slew of larger-classification schools — Hanford, Prosser, East Valley, Selah and Grandview — as well as small-school juggernauts like Colfax and La Salle.

This year, the Leopard boys will face Vashon Island, which won the 2009 title and finished third last year. The Pirates feature 6-foot-7 senior guard Alex Wegner, a second-team all-state-tourney selection last year who is averaging 21 points this year.

On the girls side, Zillah will open Wednesday against perennial small-school juggernaut Colfax on the same SunDome court where the Bulldogs won five Class 1A titles (prior to returning to the 2B ranks and winning state championships in each of the last two years in Spokane). Thursday won’t get any easier for the Leopards, who will face perennial 3A contender White River.

Colfax’s girls will face another familiar foe Thursday, a 9 p.m. game against La Salle. Thursday’s other late game on the boys’ side will be just as intriguing for fans — a showdown between former SCAC rivals Granger and White Swan, both of which are trophy contenders in their respective classifications.

One-day tickets are $8.50 for adults and $7.50 for students, or $13.50 and $10.50 for a two-day ticket.

WEDNESDAY’S GAMES

Girls

12 p.m. — Connell vs. Vashon Island

1:30 p.m. — Burbank vs. Riverside

3 p.m. — Colville vs. White Swan

4:30 p.m. — La Salle vs. Deer Park

6 p.m. — Lakeside vs. Granger

7:30 p.m. — Zillah vs. Colfax

9 p.m. — Woodland vs. White River

Boys

12 p.m. — Burbank vs. North Mason

1:30 p.m. — La Salle vs. Colville

3 p.m. — Connell vs. Colfax

4:30 p.m. — Ridgefield vs. Riverside

6 p.m. — Zillah vs. Vashon Island

7:30 p.m. — Deer Park vs. Granger

9 p.m. — White Swan vs. Lakeside

THURSDAY’S GAMES

Girls

12 p.m. — Deer Park vs. Burbank

1:30 p.m. — Vashon Island vs. Colville

3 p.m. — Riverside vs. Woodland

4:30 p.m. — Lakeside vs. Connell

6 p.m. — White River vs. Zillah

7:30 p.m. — Granger vs. White Swan

9 p.m. — Colfax vs. La Salle

Boys

12 p.m. — Riverside vs. La Salle

1:30 p.m. — Ridgefield vs. Deer Park

3 p.m. — North Mason vs. Colfax

4:30 p.m. — Colville vs. Burbank

6 p.m. — Connell vs. Vashon Island

7:30 p.m. — Lakeside vs. Zillah

9 p.m. — Granger vs. White Swan

State basketball tournament shake-up, local Heisman finalist picked as year’s top stories

YAKIMA, Wash. — One will mark a return to the old days — which some would regard as good while many, including traditionalists such as myself, consider otherwise.

The other has been much less controversial and much more uplifting, providing inspiration to prep athletes lacking in traditional blue-chip college credentials from places like, say, Prosser.

So as we near the end of an eventful year in local sports, two substantially different stories received equal billing as the most important of 2010.

In a vote of the Herald-Republic sports staff, the WIAA’s restructuring of state basketball tournaments and Kellen Moore’s naming as a Heisman Trophy finalist finished in a flat-footed tie.

The first story, which broke last April, saw Washington’s governing high school sports body reduce state hoops tournaments from 16-team, four-day events to eight-team, three-day competitions.

Yakima, which last season hosted the Class 1B, 1A and 2A tournaments during successive weeks in the SunDome, will thus lose nine days of tournament play and, of among other things, the economic boost that goes with them.

The WIAA’s reasoning? Money, and the amount it costs to rent facilities for and operate six 16-team, four-day tournaments.

A format similar to the new one was used for big schools (Class AA and Class AAA) until 1988, but was generally less popular than the recently discarded one.

Next year, Yakima will host the Class 1A and 2A tournaments, both in the Dome, March 3-5.

Much happier news, thankfully, followed.

Moore’s third successive standout season as Boise State’s quarterback not only propelled the Broncos into the national championship discussion, it brightened the spotlight on a player considered by big time college recruiters to have been too small and/or, too slow among other perceived deficiencies.

As one of four Heisman finalists, Moore flew to New York for the ceremony. That he finished fourth to Auburn’s Cam Newton, Stanford’s Andrew Luck and Oregon’s LaMichael James seemed less significant than his inclusion among the finalists.

Next year, maybe?

If Moore was considered a longshot for such recognition coming out of high school, consider the Bears and the Northwest League. Yakima hadn’t had a winning season since 2003 and had not made the playoffs since 2000.

Last summer, however, thanks to a revised format that saw the 76-game NWL season divided in halves, the Bears won the East Division’s second-half title under third-year manager Bob Didier. In a best-of-three series with first-half titlist Spokane, however, Yakima was swept 2-0.

Oh well. As with Moore’s situation, at least they got there.

Ranking fourth, meanwhile, was the story of two teams that finished first — from the same school in the same sport, no less.

Eisenhower’s cross country teams, coached by veteran Phil English, claimed both the boys and girls Class 4A state championships last November in Pasco.

The Cadet boys were ranked 18th in the nation, and no 4A school had won both titles in 22 years.

Across town at Davis, a young Pirates football team fed off momentum formed toward the end of 2009 and, under fifth-year coach Rick Clark, finished 6-4. Davis’ first winning football season since 1998 included the Pirates’ first defeat of Eisenhower in 10 games and was voted the year’s No. 5 local sports story.

Sixth was a tale of four prep wrestlers, most notably Chris Castillo. The Zillah junior won his third consecutive state championship last February, putting himself in a position for a fourth.

A Castillo teammate, Skylor Davis, joined West Valley’s Alyssa Calhoon and Kittitas’ Dustin Dean in claiming a second straight state title.

No. 7 on the list involved Ike’s Ian Wheeler, who in his senior season shattered Valley records in the 500 freestyle and 200 freestyle, winning a Class 4A state championship in the latter. Wheeler’s times in both events qualified him as an All-American.

The next story involved a homecoming, but one that occurred in a round-about way.

Hall of Fame basketball coach Pat Fitterer first stepped away from Eisenhower after seven seasons with the Cadets with plans to return to his native Ellensburg. A family health problem intervened, and Fitterer announced his retirement.

An ensuing family meeting then convinced the former three-sport Bulldog standout (class of 1971) to change his mind. So Fitterer, in his 34th year of coaching, has come full circle as Ellensburg’s head man.

And as of this writing, the Bulldogs are 7-0 and their coach’s career win total stands at 671.

Story No. 9 involved a first for Central Washington’s fastpitch team which, for the first time in the program’s 18-year history, won the GNAC championship and accompanying NCAA Division II playoff berth.

The Wildcats triumphed in coach Gary Frederick’s 16th and final season as coach. He stepped down afterward and was replaced by former CWU slugger and sportsmanship celebrity Mallory Holtman.

As for story No. 10 — another tie. And this time it’s a three-way affair.

Included are Sunnyside Christian’s third Class 1B boys state basketball championship (and sixth overall), one which saw the Knights rally from 19 points down to win their quarterfinal; the Yakima Valley Warriors debut in the American Indoor Football Association (AIFA), which saw the team fail to make the playoffs but vow to return for 2011; and West Valley’s record-setting girls track and field team that finished fourth in last spring’s Class 3A state meet.

The Rams’ 1,600-meter relay team clocked a meet-record 3:15.45 — second in state history only to Sammamish’s national record mile relay in 1978.

So there you have it.

We can close the book on the 2010 local sports year — almost. Central Washington’s 9-1, nationally-ranked men’s basketball team, after all, hosts Alaska Anchorage on Thursday night.

That and other developing stories promise to make 2011, meanwhile, a year worth waiting for.

• Roger Underwood’s Under the Radar blog is at sportsyakima.com He can be reached at 509-577-7694 or runderwood@yakimaherald.com

Looking to comment on this story? Click here and add your comment at the bottom of our Top 10 list.

The Top 10 local sports stories of 2010

1 (tie). State remake

WIAA restructures state basketball tournaments, making the finals eight-team events over three days at three sites. Yakima will lose nine days of tournament play, including all of the Class 1B event.

1 (tie). Moore honors

Boise State junior quarterback and Prosser High graduate Kellen Moore was named a finalist for the Heisman Trophy, earning a trip to New York for the nationally televised presentation of the award. He finished fourth in voting and guided the Broncos to a 12-1 record.

3. Bear market

Yakima Bears top the second-half East Division standings of the Northwest League to earn their first playoff berth since 2000.

4. Kings and queens

Eisenhower’s boys and girls win state cross country championships, becoming the first Class 4A school in 22 years to accomplish the feat.

5. Pirates rise

The Davis football team finishes 6-4, winning its most games since 1976, and posting its first winning season since 1998.

6. More on the mats

Zillah’s Chris Castillo wins his third straight state title and sets up a run for a fourth. West Valley’s Alyssa Calhoon, Kittitas’ Dustin Dean, Zillah’s Skylor Davis also win their second titles. Calhoon and Dean repeated as champions.

7. Pooling talents

Ike’s Ian Wheeler sets multiple Valley swimming records and wins a Class 4A state title (200-yard freestyle) and is second in another event (500 free).

8. Back home

Pat Fitterer retires as Ike boys basketball coach, but comes out of retirement a couple days later to take the top job at Ellensburg High, his alma mater.

9. A diamond first

CWU fastpitch teams wins the GNAC and advances to the postseason for the first time in program history.

10 (tie). Another title for SC

Sunnyside Christian’s boys rally from 19 down in the quarterfinal to stay alive, then win two more games to capture their third Class 1B state title and sixth overall.

10 (tie). Dome ball returns

The Yakima Valley Warriors begin and complete their first season in the SunDome. The team plans to be back in 2011.

10 (tie). Rams on the run

The West Valley girls track and field team posts several impressive marks — including the fastest 4×400 relay in any classification since the late 1970s. The Rams take fourth place at the Class 3A state track and field meet.

Click here to vote for your favorite local story of the year.

Coincidental divide for pair of adventurers

Kurt Refsnider knew whatever he was seeing wasn’t supposed to be there. It didn’t seem possible.

Because it was red.

In an endless landscape of snow, dirt and rock.

Refsnider was 180 miles from the nearest village, 300 miles north of the Arctic Circle and 1,700 miles north of Maine, in the middle of Baffin Island, one of the most remote corners of the already far-flung Canadian province of Nunavut.

And there, where he was far more likely to see yet another polar bear than come upon anything remotely human, he was seeing red.

Refsnider didn’t know it, but he was closing the distance between two parallel existences from different times. He was finally about to connect with someone whose adventurous ethic he shared and whose audacious path he had unknowingly followed — for more than 2,500 miles, on a mountain bike, over mountains and deserts, along the Continental Divide.

Someone he had never met.

And never would.
YMIS and those who have it

Emergency room technicians and Grand Teton National Park rangers share an acronym, YMIS, for something they often encounter in their lines of work: young male’s immortality syndrome.

Mike Moe had it.

So did his brother, Dan, younger by one year. So did many of their buddies in Laramie, Wyo., a town nestled between the mountains’ siren call and the howling winds of the prairie.

They were always outdoors, testing themselves against the elements and their own limitations in every way imaginable. By the ninth grade, Mike and Mark were climbing into the Medicine Bow Mountains on winter campouts, often choosing the coldest, stormiest weekends simply to maximize the prospect of adventure.

“We got through a lot of things by the skin of our teeth,” recalls author/adventurer Mark Jenkins, Mike Moe’s best friend since their high school days. “And we loved that.”

During one of their winter excursions the temperature in Laramie plummeted to 56 below zero, worrying their parents back home. The boys? Relatively cozy inside the snow cave they had dug.

And Mike was probably chuckling.

“The worst things got, the more he made jokes about them. That was his signature,” Jenkins says. “The stickier it would get, the more fun he’d be having.”
Seeking out adventure

Kurt Refsnider wasn’t born to adventure, but he was weaned on it.

His dad, Ron, would go cross-country skiing near their Minnesota home with little Kurt, then too young to walk, nestled into the pack on his back. As soon as Kurt could stand, he was on skis, and not long after that he was backpacking, canoeing and skiing.

When he began riding bicycles, it was only when he left the pavement — heading out on mountain-bike trails or even places where trails didn’t exist — that he was hooked. At 12, he told his mother he thought he was addicted to bicycling.

Kurt began, as his father says, to “seek out adventure that probably goes beyond the edge of danger.” Extreme mountain biking. Elite-level competitive cyclocross racing. And, later, rock climbing.

One afternoon early in his freshman year of high school, he stumbled into the family home pushing his mountain bike, having no idea how or why he was in so much pain.

“He said, ‘I can’t remember, but I think I crashed,’” Ron Refsnider says. “He had no short-term memory. We took him to the emergency room right away, and for two hours we were wondering if he was going to get his memory back.”

Kurt got most of it back, but much of that day remains a blank page. He doesn’t remember crashing, or pushing the bike home, or even having that conversation with his parents.

“What I remember about that day was being wheeled around on a gurney going in to have a CAT scan,” he says. “It was one of those weird accidents. Nothing else was really messed up.”

Oh, except for his bike helmet. That was smashed.
Moes cross the Divide

In 1982 the Moes and a couple of friends traveled the Continental Divide, on foot and only occasionally on an established route. “Less than 100 miles was actually signed as the Continental Divide trail,” recalls trek participant Bill Kuestner. “For most of it, we just made up the trail as we went.”

Two years later, Mike and Dan Moe completed that rugged route again, this time on mountain bikes.

They were two guys on fat-tired bikes that were no doubt heavier and less trail-worthy as those of today, doing something no one else had done, well, just because. Mike Moe recounted the trip the following year in two articles, accompanied by Dan’s photographs, in now-defunct Bike Rider magazine.

Like Pacific Crest Trail through-hikers to their west, the Moes were in a race against time, needing to complete their journey before the early-winter snows covered their route.

In the desert, they hit the trail by 6:30 a.m. to beat the brain-baking heat. They bathed in windmill holding tanks in the desert, avoided elk thundering past, marveled at a strolling family of peccaries and removed a tarantula from one of Mike’s sidebags after a rest break in New Mexico’s Gila National Forest.

Once in the mountains, they pioneered trails that didn’t exist over long miles of seemingly impassable terrain. “Some people might view this as a real headache. We prefer to see it,” Mike Moe wrote wryly, “as ‘the charm of the Divide.’ ”

With the mountain-biking boom not yet born, this seemingly aberrant behavior was not lost on people they met along the way. When they asked a Montana storekeeper about a route they wanted to follow, he laughed and retorted, “Well, ya sure as hell can’t go there!”

Well, they sure did.

Mike and Dan Moe didn’t know it at the time, but they were blazing the route of what two decades later would become the Tour Divide — a 2,700-mile mountain-bike race that annually attracts a few dozen hardy, adventurous souls.

In 2009, one of them was Kurt Refsnider.
Refsnider crosses it, too

After moving to Colorado to pursue his doctorate in geology, Refsnider discovered endurance mountain-bike racing.

He heard about and became fascinated with a race called the Grand Loop, a circuit in western Colorado and eastern Utah that was “360 miles, one little town with a general store along the route, and that’s pretty much it. Route-finding is a huge challenge on that. Supposedly there’s posts every mile marking the route, but most of them are missing.”

This was 2008. The Grand Loop drew a grand total of four entrants that year, including Refsnider, and there was so much snow at the higher reaches of the route that two of the other three dropped out before the end of the first day.

Still, Refsnider pushed on, despite riding into “snow drifts (that) were up into the trees. I didn’t even see how you could follow the single-track up there, much less navigate it.” His body began to betray him the next day, no longer willing to survive on Clif Bars.

“If you can’t eat, you can’t ride,” Refsnider says, looking back. “It’s just this downward spiral. And I wore the wrong shoes, so my feet were hurting so much after all that hike-a-bike.” He finished the race at 1 a.m., the broken portions of his bike now held together with duct tape, and swore to himself he would never do anything like that again.

Instead, the next year he did something far more physically and emotionally daunting: He took on the Tour Divide and finished in 18 days, 11 hours and 13 minutes — making him the second fastest rider in the history of the race.
Making one’s life count

Refsnider’s refusal to drop out of the Grand Loop and his subsequent willingness — fervor, even — to take on the Tour Divide would have brought an approving nod from Mike Moe.

“Mike was very hard-core, and just never wanted to turn around unnecessarily,” says Diana Kocornik, who married Mike in 1988.

But where she and Mike were living when they fell in love speaks volumes about them both: They were in the African country of Swaziland, Kocornik teaching high school and Moe working for CARE, a humanitarian organization fighting global poverty.

For people who knew Moe, that was nothing new. His 1986 trip to Mount Aconcagua in the Andes was a fundraiser for Save The Children, and he organized numerous hunger-awareness projects in Laramie. By the mid-1990s, he was executive director of the non-profit Wyoming P.A.R.E.N.T., dedicated to improving the well-being of the state’s children and families.

“That was all rooted in faith. He was a Christian,” Kocornik says. “He didn’t want his life to be all about experiencing the outdoors. He wanted it to count in other ways as well.”

Still, the Moe brothers were most at home when immersed in outdoor adventure, whether together or with other friends. In 1987, while Mike was in Swaziland, Dan Moe mountain-biked the Continental Divide of Australia. And in 1991, Mike and three friends — including Jenkins — traveled to the headwaters of Africa’s Niger River in order to kayak the river from its source to the ocean.

A passage in “To Timbuktu,” Jenkins’ remarkable book about the Niger expedition, perhaps best describes Mike Moe’s spirit.

A harrowing descent through a particularly dangerous stretch of whitewater had left two of the men questioning whether the end was worth the extraordinary risk. One of them — his voice “quivering with rage,” Jenkins wrote — objected, “This isn’t boating!”

Jenkins’ next paragraph:

Mike can’t stop grinning. He turns to me and says quietly, “Nope. This is exploring.”

Bears, scares and something red

Though he rode through hundreds of miles of prime grizzly bear territory on the Tour Divide, Kurt Refsnider never saw one. Ironically, his biggest scares along the route came from the three porcupines he nearly ran over — “these harmless little animals that just kind of came out of nowhere,” he chuckles.

Three weeks after completing that race spanning the full length of the Continental Divide, he was back on Baffin Island, where he had already spent parts of the previous two summers doing doctoral research on ice-sheet erosion.

And this time, bears were the ones creating those heart-pounding moments.

Numerous daily polar bear sightings convinced Refsnider, his advisor and a graduate student to switch from camping outdoors — which they did for the first few nights — and retreat to a small hunting cabin. Their first night there, a bear spent five minutes trying to break in, clawing and pounding on the wall of what Refsnider described as a “weak little structure.”

“We stomped and yelled, trying to scare the bear away,” Refsnider wrote later. “But we must have smelled pretty dang good.”

But that wasn’t what Refsnider, then 27, will recall most vividly about that 2009 summer on Baffin Island.

That moment would come further inland, while Refsnider was crossing a boulder field next to the Barnes Ice Cap, a 90-mile-long hunk of ancient ice that spanned the horizon. “As far as you can see to the north,” he recalls, “and as far as you can see to the south.”

And in that vast, desolate landscape of white and brown and gray, Refsnider saw something else.

Something red.
On their way to Baffin

Mike Moe had the heart to take on any challenge, any mountain. But his lungs were another matter. As far back as 1980, when he and Mark Jenkins set out to climb Mount McKinley (Denali) in Alaska, Moe had been susceptible to pulmonary edema at high altitudes.

He got only as high as 14,200 feet on McKinley — still 6,000 feet below the summit — before fluid buildup in his lungs forced him to turn back. It happened again six years later at Aconcagua, and again seven years after that, on a 1993 expedition to ascend unclimbed peaks in Tibet.

“He really wanted to do big mountains, and I think it was a major disappointment to him that he was susceptible to pulmonary edema,” says Tim Banks, another Laramie friend and climbing buddy. “He was the man of boundless enthusiasm — the kind of guy who thought, ‘You can push this, you can adapt, you can make it happen.’

“When he came home from Tibet, he was really bummed.”

But unbowed. It wasn’t long before he, his brother and his friends were planning another adventure. Navigating a major whitewater river on Asia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, perhaps. Finding something challenging in the northernmost parts of Alaska at the coldest time of the year, maybe.

The destination they eventually came up with? Baffin Island.
The mysterious find

Kurt Refsnider pointed for the others at what he was seeing.

“My advisor is red-green color-blind. He couldn’t see it,” Refsnider recalls.

It wasn’t on the route they were headed, but the mystery was intriguing enough to make it worth the detour. So they made their way toward it.

It was very slow going. “It takes a long time to get anywhere,” Refsnider says, “because you’re hopping from boulder to boulder.”

The red object, whatever it was, was atop a steep, little hill, perhaps only 20 meters tall. Refsnider and his two companions scrambled to the top and were very surprised by what they found.

The red that had caught his eyes was a fuel canister. Next to it were four bicycles he recognized as being mid-1990s-era vintage, and three sleds rigged up with aluminum conduit to be towed behind the bicycles.

Also in the neat pile — which clearly had sat unseen and untouched for many seasons — were two ice axes.

Painted on the handle of one, in what looked like silver nail polish, was something Refsnider decided must be initials:

M  O  E

The boats that never came

Upon reaching that small rise in August 1995, Mike Moe, Dan Moe, Sharon Kava and Brad Humphrey had just completed history’s first bicycle crossing of the Barnes Ice Cap.

Facing the same boulder fields that would make such slow going for Kurt Refsnider’s team a quarter-century later, the quartet decided to leave behind the bikes and sleds. Carrying shotguns to ward off the polar bears, the foursome hiked the rest of the way to a fiord on Baffin Island’s east coast.

Mike Moe had made arrangements for two Hobie Cats — small, twin-hulled sailboats — to be shipped to the town of Clyde River. An Inuit outfitter was to deliver them to the fiord and the group would then sail back, two per boat, to Clyde River and their long flights back to the United States.

But when they radioed the outfitter, the boats had not been delivered.

They waited. For days. Something was holding up the boats’ delivery to Clyde River. Their food ran out, and they resorted to picking berries for sustenance. Finally, with no telling when or even if the Hobie Cats would arrive, the group radioed the outfitter to pick them up for the final leg of the trip.

They never made it to Clyde River.
The singular coincidence

Back at camp, Kurt Refsnider used the research team’s satellite phone to make a few calls, hoping to find what bike-riding Baffin Island explorer might have the initials M.O.E. One of his calls was to his father.

Some online searching led Ron Refsnider to an Outside Magazine article written by Mark Jenkins, which explained in poignant detail what had happened to Mike and Dan Moe and their friends.

This past summer, he found the same article reprinted in “Cordillera,” a Tour Divide literary journal edited by Eric Bruntjen of Yakima.

This time, though, Jenkins’ story was prefaced by an editor’s note that explained the Moes’ unbreakable connection to the Tour Divide.

Upon reading that, Ron Refsnider understood the singular nature of the coincidence. “The hair on the back of my neck,” he recalls, “was standing up pretty high at that point.”

His son, one of only 65 people in the world to have completed the 2,700-mile Tour Divide mountain-bike race, had come upon the belongings of the two men who had pioneered it.

And those men are gone.
Tragedy on the icy seas

The Inuit guide’s small aluminum motorboat was two miles from shore in calm water when the group came upon a pod of a 10 to 15 bowhead whales. One surfaced directly under the boat, flipping it and tossing the guide and his four American passengers into the icy water.

While the guide had a well-insulated survival suit, the others had only life jackets. Their survival suits were to have been delivered with the Hobie Cats, which had never arrived.

The guide survived the ordeal, and his wife related his version of the Americans’ final hours in some detail to Jenkins.

In water only a degree or two above freezing, most people succumb to hypothermia and die within 90 minutes. Dan and Mike Moe survived the longest, holding onto each other —  “hands clasped over the hull,” Jenkins wrote — for a seemingly impossible six hours. When Dan finally slipped away, Mike couldn’t hold onto his younger brother.

Two hours later, he joined him.

The final connection

In 1996, Mark Jenkins, Tim Banks and another friend of the Moes climbed a rock face in the Medicine Bow Mountains to mount a plaque commemorating the four adventurers who died in the waters off Baffin Island.

Last September, Kurt Refsnider and the woman he’s dating went into the Medicine Bows in hopes of seeing the plaque, but couldn’t find it.

He’s OK with that.

“I don’t think (the Moes’ friends) left it there for other people to find,” he says. “Maybe it was just for themselves.”

He and his friend camped two nights there, experiencing the once-upon-a-time stomping grounds of Mike and Dan Moe, where they had stoked their passion for adventure. He felt drawn there, “which is strange. I normally don’t have compulsions like that.”

Going where the Moes had gone, he says, “just felt like something I needed to do.”

Of course, Kurt Refsnider had been doing that for most of his life. He just hadn’t known it at the time.

• Outdoors editor Scott Sandsberry can be reached at 509-577-7689 or ssandsberry@yakimaherald.com

Finally, Luke’s enforcer photo surfaces

YAKIMA, Wash. — When Maurice Lucas passed away recently, I combed the internet for a 1977 Sports Illustrated photo of the ex-Portland Trail Blazer and Seattle SuperSonic which depicted the 6-foot-9, 215-pound, mustachioed power forward decked out in an all-denim outfit and standing defiantly in an alley.

With his arms folded and wearing a menacing gaze, Lucas was portrayed as an enforcer. While Lucas was clearly that, he was anything but a thug — playing hard and physical, but clean.

I never found the photo, but Thursday was pleased to notice it in this week’s SI. It appeared in a section of the magazine that mentioned  notable sports personalities who died during 2010. Check it out.

So again, to a Rip City legend, a great player and an all-around good guy, RIP.

Also, to Paul Silas, a late-70s Lucas adversary while a Sonic who later became one of Luke’s close friends, best of luck on your new coaching gig with the Charlotte Bobcats. During 23-plus seasons of covering the Sonics and the NBA for newspapers in Olympia and Bremerton, I was fortunate to observe many great players — Michael Jordan being the greatest. But I never saw a greater competitor, in any sport at any level, than Paul Silas.

FROM THE QUOTE FILE

“Those are pants? I thought he had his legs tattooed.”

DAVE TWARDZIK, starting guard on Portland’s 1977 NBA championship team, on the garish plaid pants worn by coach Jack Ramsay.

Dog fight goes to Ellensburg: Bulldogs top Wolves in CWAC showdown

ELLENSBURG, Wash. — Down nine late in the third quarter, in foul trouble and up against a fast team finding its stride, Ellensburg’s boys needed help. A reminder, actually.

Before you can win games like this, you must always believe you can.

That’s what first-year coach Pat Fitterer was hoping to see — stouthearted belief — Wednesday night as his new charges nearly lost contact with Wapato. And that’s exactly when the Bulldogs delivered the goods in the most effective and productive way possible.

From the inside out.

Joe Montano went to work in the low post for a career-best night and Reece Ravet stretched the Wolves’ defense with his 3-point daggers to rally Ellensburg to a 67-63 victory in a makeup showdown of two CWAC unbeatens.

Montano was nearly indefensible with his post-up fadeways, hitting his first nine shots en route to a 29-point night, and Ravet atoned for a scoreless first half with four 3-pointers after the break, helping the Bulldogs post their first 7-0 start in 17 years.

“When it came down to it, I was feeling good and I wanted the ball,” said the 6-foot-2 Montano, who connected on 11 of 14 shots against a Wapato crew with no 6-foot starters. “My fadeaway was there and I was hitting free throws. But really, when we had to, we all made some huge shots.”

Like Kurt Davis coming off the bench to drain a 3-pointer with 24 seconds left. That put Ellensburg up 65-63 just 20 seconds after Efrain Reynoso’s trey gave Wapato a 63-62 lead.

Wapato missed the front end of a 1-and-1 with 9 seconds left, and Montano iced the outcome with a pair of free throws with 5.7 seconds to go. Montano made five straight free throws over the final 2:46.

Mustering just 22 points in the first half, Ellensburg more than doubled that in the second half with 45 points on 17-for-24 shooting.

“In the first half we were timid against Wapato’s pressure and quickness,” Fitterer said. “It got to us, and we were like a deer staring at headlights. At halftime we told ‘em — you better get rid of that look.”

While Montano came out firing in the second half, making five consecutive shots, Wapato was still able to pull away. With 6-foot-4 Nick Gigstead benched with four fouls, Ellensburg was without its long-armed point man in its 2-3 zone defense and Wapato cashed in with 3-pointers from four different players in the third quarter.

When Clifton Smiscon cast in the fourth trey of the period, the Wolves were up 46-37.

“We got it turned around by first going inside, then outside. That was the key,” Fitterer said. “When they got some shots to fall, they started to believe. From there it turned into a great game.”

A 10-0 burst fueled by two Ravet 3-pointers erased the deficit, and in the fourth quarter there were nine lead changes.

“We kept making big shots and that’s a huge confidence boost against a team like Wapato,” said Montano, who also grabbed eight rebounds. “Down the stretch both of us played hard. Now we know we can win a game like this.”

Wapato’s Jacoby Howe, who averaged 29 points through six prior games and was a big reason why the explosive Wolves had been held under 80 points just once, hit that number exactly. The senior guard worked hard to find shots against Ellensburg’s nimble and long defense, making 8 of 17 field goals and 11 of 18 free throws.

Reynoso added 13 points with three of Wapato’s nine 3-pointers.

Wapato (4-1, 6-1) has nearly two weeks to prepare for its next conference showdown, a Jan. 4 home game against Grandview (4-0, 6-0).

Ellensburg (5-0, 7-0) has another CWAC game during the winter break on Dec. 30 at Selah. The Bulldogs get their first look at Grandview at home on Jan. 8 to conclude the first half of the conference slate. They play both Wapato and Grandview on the road in the second half.

12/23/10 Wapato-Ellensburg boys basketball photo gallery

Photos from Wednesday night’s CWAC boys basketball game between Wapato and Ellensburg in Ellensburg. All photos by Sara Gettys of the Yakima Herald-Republic.

Prep basketball roundup — White Swan wins in double overtime

CONNELL, Wash. — Leandro Huereca’s 3-pointer in the final minute of the second overtime gave White Swan the lead and the Cougars added a free throw in the waning seconds Wednesday night en route to a 65-62 victory over Connell in non-league boys basketball action.

Lawrence Fiander led all scorers with 29 points as Class 2B White Swan improved to 6-1 with the victory over the Class 1A Eagles. Fiander also had nine of the Cougars’ 18 steals.

Huereca finished with 15 points and seven rebounds and Alex Sampson had 12 points for White Swan.
KIONA-BENTON 63, CLE ELUM 35: At Kiona-Benton, Cristian Aguilar had 24 points for Kiona-Benton, which jumped ahead 16-7 after one quarter and extended the lead to 34-13 by halftime.

Carson Talerico had 11 points to lead Cle Elum (1-7).

SUNNYSIDE CHRISTIAN 62, TOUCHET 49: At Touchet, Steven Broersma scored 14 points and grabbed 14 rebounds as the Knights improved to 6-2.

Kevin De Jong had 15 points and nine boards, and Trevor Wagenaar added 12 points for SC, which led 51-24 through three quarters.

GIRLS

CWAC

ELLENSBURG 54, WAPATO 47 (OT): At Ellensburg, posts Kaitlin Quirk and Nathalie Gruber scored four points each in overtime, and Shannon Bland capped a 24-point night by making three of four free throws to seal it.

Wapato had tied the game on a putback in the final eight seconds of regulation, after which the Bulldogs (2-3 CWAC, 3-4 overall) missed a shot to win it.

Bland was 18 of 26 from the foul line and also grabbed 13 rebounds. Sammi Jo Blodgett had 13 points and Stephanie Velasco 10 for Wapato (3-2, 5-2).

NON-LEAGUE

WHITE SWAN 38, CONNELL 35: At Connell, Kassie Espindola and Amber Jones combined for 33 points as the Class 2B Cougars knocked off the previously unbeaten Class 1A Eagles.

Espindola had 17 points and Jones 16 for White Swan (5-1), which outscored Connell (6-1) 22-15 in the second half.

Maci Whitby led the Eagles with 12 points.
SUNNYSIDE CHRISTIAN 48, TOUCHET 26: At Touchet, Analisa Van Oostrum scored 10 points and Stormee Van Belle collected eight rebounds as the Knights improved to 5-3.

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