Origins
So there's probably a whole 2 or 3 people out there in the universe who wondered why this blog and my racing comedies are tagged with 'Alpine'. Well since it's my blog and the cost of reading isn't very high, I'm going to tell you, due to something I found this weekend.
Long ago, in a universe where there was no internet, I was a passionate climber of mountains, cliffs, rocks, ice, boulders and buildings. I still get out occasionally to the crags and ice climbs after all these years. But back then, when a day at the cliffs didn't mean a handful of Ibuprofen along with the beer afterwards, I wanted to climb all the time. One of my passions was a sub-genre of climbing, called alpine climbing. Alpine climbing is the face of climbing where multiple climbing disciplines intersect: Rock; Ice; Snow; Glacier Travel and sometimes all four at once! Usually practiced in the high mountain areas of the world, a typical alpine climb involves hiking into the snow region; traversing over glaciers (watch out for those crevasses!) to the base of a rock wall or ridge; onto the ridge to the summit, climbing rock, ice and occasionally the hanging glacier. Sometimes the route is mainly snow and ice; other times a short walk on snow and the rest is rock. Whatever the combination, its always challenging and fun.
At that time I was also starting my business as a computer consultant. The world of computers was pretty new back then and the opportunities were large. So the plan was made, very simple with just 2 parts: 1) work for 6 months and make large amounts of money, and 2) spend the other six months traveling around the world climbing. Simple yes? So it was a no-brainer to label my company Alpine Enterprise, which begat Alpine Management Services (condo mgmt), Alpine Software (design and consulting) and eventually Alpine Motorsports, the current non-profit endeavor.
And while I didn't quite meet the 6 months on, 6 months off goal, I did get about the world and visit a lot of cool mountain areas. While cleaning my office this weekend, I found this pic from my travels, buried in some old files. This is from 1982, deep in the mountains of Tibet on a glacier at about 18,000 feet. Behind me is one of the sacred mountains of the Buddhist faith, Mt. Amne Machin, kinda like being in Jerusalem at the Wailing Wall for the Jewish faith. Tibet was closed by the Chinese after they invaded it in the 50's and the Dali Lama fled. We were only the 2nd group of Westerners to visit Tibet when it was reopened again in 1981. It was a pretty cool trip.
So that's where the "Alpine" comes from.
Long ago, in a universe where there was no internet, I was a passionate climber of mountains, cliffs, rocks, ice, boulders and buildings. I still get out occasionally to the crags and ice climbs after all these years. But back then, when a day at the cliffs didn't mean a handful of Ibuprofen along with the beer afterwards, I wanted to climb all the time. One of my passions was a sub-genre of climbing, called alpine climbing. Alpine climbing is the face of climbing where multiple climbing disciplines intersect: Rock; Ice; Snow; Glacier Travel and sometimes all four at once! Usually practiced in the high mountain areas of the world, a typical alpine climb involves hiking into the snow region; traversing over glaciers (watch out for those crevasses!) to the base of a rock wall or ridge; onto the ridge to the summit, climbing rock, ice and occasionally the hanging glacier. Sometimes the route is mainly snow and ice; other times a short walk on snow and the rest is rock. Whatever the combination, its always challenging and fun.
At that time I was also starting my business as a computer consultant. The world of computers was pretty new back then and the opportunities were large. So the plan was made, very simple with just 2 parts: 1) work for 6 months and make large amounts of money, and 2) spend the other six months traveling around the world climbing. Simple yes? So it was a no-brainer to label my company Alpine Enterprise, which begat Alpine Management Services (condo mgmt), Alpine Software (design and consulting) and eventually Alpine Motorsports, the current non-profit endeavor.
And while I didn't quite meet the 6 months on, 6 months off goal, I did get about the world and visit a lot of cool mountain areas. While cleaning my office this weekend, I found this pic from my travels, buried in some old files. This is from 1982, deep in the mountains of Tibet on a glacier at about 18,000 feet. Behind me is one of the sacred mountains of the Buddhist faith, Mt. Amne Machin, kinda like being in Jerusalem at the Wailing Wall for the Jewish faith. Tibet was closed by the Chinese after they invaded it in the 50's and the Dali Lama fled. We were only the 2nd group of Westerners to visit Tibet when it was reopened again in 1981. It was a pretty cool trip.
So that's where the "Alpine" comes from.
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