#Camp Muir

[mountrainiernps]

Mount Rainier National Park Archives Photo of the Camp Muir Guide Shelter in 1932 framed by the Cowlitz Glacier.

The stone Guide Shelter at Camp Muir was designed by a member of The Mountaineers, Carl F. Gould, and constructed in 1916. It is part of the Mount Rainier Historic Landmark District both for its association with early recreational development of the park but also for its distinctive stone masonry design. The stone was harvested from nearby slopes, creating a camouflage effect, and the flat roofs kept the building profiles low to better withstand the high winds of the upper mountain.

NPS Photo of climbing rangers preparing to leave the Guide Shelter for a search and rescue in 1969.

Mount Rainier National Park Archives Photo courtesy Val Lou of the Guide Shelter in the 1990s (right). A second concessionaire guide shelter to the left of the stone guide house was built in 1970.

The building was restored in 2005. Today it serves as a ranger station. Have you made the climb to Camp Muir and visited the historic Guide Shelter?

~kl

[vintagecamping]

Hiking down the switchbacks to Garnet Lake on the John Muir Trail

California

1989

[wildernessjournals]

Council Lake, East Pinnacles Lakes Basin, John Muir Wilderness, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA. Photo by Van Miller

[gideonisms]

cytherea, #25

25. What was my first impression of this character? How about now?

I feel like I have set myself up over time as a cytherea hater but when she first appeared I was actually really interested in the whole angle of how the houses deal with terminal illness. and I found her initial conversations with Gideon a really intriguing combination of sweet and strange, as though she knows something Gideon doesn't. well, turns out that was the case! Now I appreciate what she does for the story and I hate her for the bit. She knows what she did !!!!

Ask game here

[uispeccoll]

#Miniature Monday

55 / text by John Muir; Donna Thomas; Peter Thomas.

This is part of a series focusing on a small fraction of the lovely artists books by Peter and Donna Thomas!

This interesting little accordion book features four classic printers' cuts of nature scenes. Behind that lays a 'secret' text by John Muir, and a short colophon with a colorful background. The little text is stored in a deerskin case.

"To celebrate Donna's 55th birthday, Peter made 55 copies of a book that speaks to her favorite thing in the world: going to the mountains. The images are vintage printers cuts from an old print shop in Butte Montana, combine to tell a story of heading for the enjoyment of an outdoor life. The binding hides a secret text, a quote by John Muir (Donna's favorite author) 'Going to the mountains is going home' and even though she lives in Santa Cruz on the Pacific Ocean this is really true for Donna.

...The binding is an invention of Peter's. The covers are made using Peter's handmade paper that was decorated using a technique of spraying pulp through a stencil onto the wet sheet of paper as it is being made." --Artists' website.

Peter and Donna Thomas are "book artists from Santa Cruz, CA. They work both collaboratively and individually; letterpress printing, hand-lettering and illustrating texts, making paper, and hand binding both fine press and artists’ books." They have made over 100 limited edition books, often with Peter making the paper, and Donna doing the illustrations.

Check out more of Donna and Peter's books at Uiowa here.

--Diane R., Special Collections Graduate Student

[pamietniko]

I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news.

-John Muir

Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, Washington

[abookforeverymood]

Polling For Next Read

currently re-reading The Elementals by Michael McDowell, but polling for what to put at the top of the list next

[nibrasdesigns]

The Mountains are calling and I must go

By NibrasShop

[peacemore-springs]

Epic Camping

Can't wait for the warmer winds to arrive on the east coast of Scotland. This year of 2024 will be known as Epic Camping Year. I am really looking forward to camping out among the hillsides of Scotland and overlooking the epic grandeur the wilderness of Scotland offers.

[mountrainiernps]

Mountain Memories: Early Summit Climb

Join these early 1900s climbers as they ascend Mount Rainier. They stop for the night at Camp Muir, before continuing the climb by torch light. Views feature Mount Adams and Mount St. Helens prior its eruption. Exact date of footage unknown. 

Mount Rainier National Park Archives Footage (mora_24689). No audio. Available with audio description at https://go.nps.gov/MMem-EarlySummitClimb ~kl

[vintagecamping]

Adventure complete! Arriving back to their truck after 16 days on the John Muir Trail.

Sierra Nevada, California

1990

[wildernessjournals]

Morning near Huchinson Meadow. John Muir Wilderness, Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, USA. Photo by Van Miller

[runawaytherapy]

Yosemite National Park in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains

Famous for the granite cliffs of El Capitan and Half Dome. This park is an icon. I still remember the speech we got from the Park Ranger, when getting registered for our campsite, on bears and how to store food stuffs.

When he was finished he must have realized our complexions went pale. He began emphasizing he just didn't want to see our motorhome get torn apart. That didn't help.

A visit to this park and you'll completely understand what drove John Muir's and Theodore Roosevelt to fight for the right thing to be done and make sure this got passed down through generations.

[duckprintspress]

Let’s Go Lesbians! 32 Books for Lesbian Visibility Day

TODAY! is Lesbian Visibility Day, the first day of Lesbian Visibility Week – April 26, 2024. We are, I’m sure you’re shocked to discover, celebrating with LOTS of lesbian books! 15 people contributed to making this list, all of us sharing our absolute faves, from graphic novels to epic novels, from memoirs to horror fiction, with explicit rep and implied. With this many awesome books to share, we’re prepared to guarantee that everyone who loves wlw lit can find something new to them on this amazing list!

Interesting Facts About Space by Emily Austin

The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For by Alison Bechdel

Belle of the Ball by Mari Costa

Kiss Number 8 by Colleen AF Venable & Ellen T. Crenshaw

She Wears the Midnight Crown Anthology

Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake

The Scapegracers & The Scratch Daughters by H.A. Clarke

Spinning by Tillie Walden

The Girl from the Sea by Molly Knox Ostertag

The Ruin of Angels by Max Gladstone

The Traitor Baru Cormorant by Seth Dickinson

The Red Scholar’s Wake by Aliette de Bodard

Siren Queen by Nghi Vo

She Gets the Girl by Rachael Lippincott & Alyson Derrick

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

One Last Stop by Casey McQuiston

Those Who Wait by Haley Cass

Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree

Into the Bloodred Woods by Martha Brockenbrough

From Here by Luma Mufleh

Alice Isn’t Dead by Joseph Fink

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel

Are You My Mother? A Comic Drama by Alison Bechdel

A Memory Called Empire & A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine

Female General, Eldest Princess by Please Don’t Laugh

Clear And Muddy Loss of Love by Please Don’t Laugh

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Max Gladstone & Amal El-Mohtar

Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire

A Restless Truth by Freya Marske

The Princess and the Grilled Cheese Sandwich by Deya Muniz

Everyone in This Room Will Someday Be Dead by Emily Austin

Can’t get enough books with lesbians? Yeah, us neither – this new list for 2024 is on top of THREE rec lists of titles featuring lesbians that we posted last year.

Lesbian Visibility Week Recs Part 1

Lesbian Visibility Week Recs Part 2

Duck Prints Press Short Stories with Lesbian Characters

You can also view this list (along with all our other wlw faves!) as a shelf on Goodreads!

See a book you want to buy? You can grab it through the Duck Prints Press Bookshop.org affiliate shop!

What are YOUR favorite reads with lesbian characters?

[paladinbaby]

running home

tamsyn muir / plainwater: essays and poetry, anne carson / camp damascus, @drchucktingle / @grasslandgirl / temporary job, minnie bruce pratt / the stream of life, clarice lispector / mirror traps, hera lindsay bird / our curious position, charles bukowski / @heavensghost / @toli-a

[Image Description: Ten images of text.

1: Cream text on a dark brown background. “You were so afraid she might touch you. You were so afraid anyone might touch you. You had always been afraid of anyone touching you, and had not known your longing flinch was so obvious to those who tried it.”

2: “”I suppose you do love me, in your way,” I said to him one night close to dawn when we lay on the narrow bed. “And how else should I love you-in your way?” he asked. I am still thinking about that.”

3: A photo of a page of a book. “I’ve been plodding about through this journey like a disembodied spirit: no family, friends or community left to remind me I actually exist. I was starting to think that I might’ve just disappeared completely, a phantom in some endless loop of unfinished business.

But I’m not a ghost, and someone who knows that has finally caught sight of me. Whether or not I fully recognise him is inconsequential.”

4: “people notice and people care and they’ll help if you let them. (will you let them? will they try to help, next time? what id, one day, they don’t try?)”

5: “Leaving again. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t be / grieving. The particulars of place lodged in me, / like this room I lived in for eleven days, / how I learned the way the sun laid its palm / over the side window in the morning, heavy / light, how I’ll never be held in that hand again.”

6: “I’m restless and harsh and / despairing. Although I do have / love inside me. I just don’t know / how to use love. Sometimes it / tears at my flesh, like barbs.”

7: “there is something wrong with you / there is something wrong with you that is also wrong with me” There is a lot of space between the two lines and they’re both highlighted in blue.

8: Black text on a pale green background. “I think of myself forever sitting upon the edge of the bed”

9: A photo of bright green bushes in the woods. A white subtitle at the bottom reads “You still have time to change”

10: “What’s that quote? There are only two kinds of stories: a man goes on a journey, or a stranger comes to town.” End ID.]

[sketchy-saram]

I am so deep into the Locked Tomb again, oh my god, and I'm suffering for having nobody to freak out over it with, but for the fans:

Would anyone else just be SO PSYCHED to get full versions from Muir of the three alternate universes Harrow's brain invented in book 2? Like, I would absolutely *love* to read about adept Gideon and cavalier Harrow, or the Bachelorette season, or the coffee shop AU at space army camp. All of them. Someone help me petition to get a 5th book after Alecto that is just a collection of the three, I'm begging.

@tazmuir