Aim For The Heart: June 2007

A continuation of our Great Sand Dunes National Park trip report. More pictures are available (along with captions) on my MySpace photo album.

Friday

We woke late on Friday, because we were going to hit the dunes in the afternoon. Everything we read said to climb the dunes in either the early morning or the evening, to keep away from the worst of the heat.

Our first trip was to Zapata Falls, a thirty-foot high waterfall hidden within a small cave. The hike was a short half mile, and the temperature change once you reach the trees and river outside the falls is drastic. It's like walking into an air conditioned building.

If you actually want to see the falls, you'll have to wade into the water and pass into the small cave. A word of warning: that water is cold! I'm talking "hurt your feet until they're numb" cold. You have to wear shoes, so wear something that can get wet. I wasn't sure whether it was necessary to get into the water to see the falls, so I wore the shoes I was planning to hike in. The waterfall was gushing pretty hard, and the mist filled the cave, so it was difficult to get pictures without risking your electronics.

When we'd had our fill of "looking at water," we headed on over to the park. Our main goal for the day was to hike to the top of High Dune, one of the two main dunes (the other is Star Dune.) The Essential Guide I linked to in my earlier post said to allow two to three hours to go from the parking lot to the top and back.

Where the Medano Creek flows is a great place to take the kids. It's the ultimate sandbox. The children we saw were having a blast building sand castles, forts, and where the water was deep enough and the child small enough, splashing around.

We walked past the creek to the first dry area and sat so my shoes could dry and we could eat a bit. Another thunderstorm was forming, so the weather was nice and cool, but we were worried about getting rained out of our climb.

Once we were ready to go, we decided to time our ascent. We started at 2:23 p.m. One thing I noticed: in the time we were out there, only about a dozen people climbed to High Dune. Out of all the people there, I'm guessing less than a quarter actually attempt to reach the top. And I'll tell you why.

It's hard.

Walking in sand is not easy. Walking in sand uphill is even harder. Plus, you learn one thing really quickly: the sand lies. Do not believe the sand. I'll explain more later.

So anyway, we're walking to the top of High Dune, making good progress. The wind picks up. The sand stings our bare legs. We're breathing hard and our leg muscles are burning. And then we're at the top. For us, from the very base to the top, was fifty-three minutes. That include stopping to catch our breath and take pictures.

It was a nice view, but we were a bit disappointed. We were expecting a little more work than that. We stood at the top for about fifteen minutes, and then we tried to decide what to do next. Go back to the hotel room and bum around?

What if we headed for that dune? Yeah, that one way over there. That's Star Dune, right? Turns out it is.

Star Dune is another popular destination in the dunes. But here's the interesting thing. The entire time we were walking toward it, and the time we were on top of it, we never saw another person who headed out past High Dune.

It was a lot of fun to plan our own route rather than taking an established trail. We would stand on a crest or the top of a dune and discuss our next route, then head that way. It was usually better to avoid a valley, since that just meant having to climb back up again.

The wind at times was fierce. I would recommend against trying to take a small child onto some of the dunes, especially the ones with narrow crests at the top. Those wind gusts could easily cause a small child to lose his balance and fall, and some of those slip-faces (the steeply sloping leeward surface of a sand dune) are hundreds of feet high. During the worst of the sandstorm, the wind picked up the sand and rolled it around, so the appearance was much like ocean waves during a storm.

These pictures just don't do the dunes justice. It's impossible to see just how steep and long many of the dunes we traveled were in a 2D image. At times, the climb was close to vertical, especially at the end. We would travel a few feet, stop to rest, go a bit more, etc. When we saw how steep the final ascent and how narrow the crest we would have to walk along was, we weren't entirely sure we'd even make it.

It took us another two hours from the top of High Dune to the top of Star Dune. We'd been making near-vertical climbs for close to three hours now, and we still had to get out. We decided to choose a low valley that would take us out toward Medano Creek, where we could walk along the flat sand back to the parking lot.

There are a few ways to get down from a dune. You can walk down. When the sand is deep and soft, that's the easiest way. You'll make long, soft strides. When the dune is steeper and the sand a little more packed, you can go down like this:

Coming down is also where we learned the hidden truth: the sand lies. Those low, gentle sloping dunes that looked so easy from the top of Star Dune? They're sheer cliff faces! At least, that's what it seemed like at times. At one point, we stood on a crest and tried to decide between two areas. Area one was closer to the parking lot, but the climbs were higher. Area two had a gentle sloping dune that was a bit further from the lot, but at least the climbs weren't as rough.

Except that wasn't true. As the pictures below show, it was almost vertical.

Stupid lying sand.

When we finally escaped the dunes, we still had the trek back to the parking lot. Five and a half hours after we stood at the bottom of High Dune and decided to start climbing, we finally made it back to our truck: sore, tired, wind-burned, blistered, and sand-blasted.

I can't wait to go again.

A few tips for the dunes: Don't forget your sunscreen, sunglasses, and a hat! Bring plenty of water. Again, even though it wasn't especially hot, we went through about a half gallon each. Make sure your electronic devices have cases you can store them in. That sand kicks up pretty severely, and you don't want to ruin them. Finally, when you're walking a crest, put your feet on either side of the ridge and do a sort of duck waddle across.

As you can see by the number of pictures and the length of this post, we enjoyed the dunes the most. It's not possible to describe how amazing it is to sit on top of Star Dune and look out across the entire dune field. You just have be there.

This is part one of my two-part trip report to the Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado. I also took video, but it'll be a while before I get it ripped off the camcorder. If it's anything like our last Disney World trip, a while means about five years. But I'll try to be a little quicker this time.

Wednesday, 7:00 a.m.

Beep. Beep. Beep. "Honey, time to get up. If we want to get on the road by eight, we'd better get a move on."

8:45 – Leave.

Drive. Drive. Drive. Really, what can you say about a seven hundred mile road trip, most of which is through Texas?

After an ungodly number of hours, we're almost in Colorado. We see a volcano in the distance and decide to make a side trek to stretch our legs.

We pay our five bucks, drive to the top, and take the crater rim hike, a one-mile loop around the rim of Capulin Volcano. The path to the vent at the bottom was closed for re-paving, but that was fine, since all the cool views are at the top. This is an easy, paved route for just about anybody.

After that brief diversion...Drive. Drive. Drive.

Finally, we arrive in Alamosa, CO (pop. 8,700). We pull into our motel--Days Inn--check in, eat some pizza, and watch some old C.S.I. before bed. The motel isn't all that great, for the record. Old, sort of rundown, but it was better than sleeping in a tent, if only because there were hot showers and a microwave in the room.

Thursday

We drive to the Great Sand Dunes National Park. It's about thirty-five miles from Alamosa. You can either take Highway 160 east until you see the sign for the park, or Highway 17 north until you see the sign. The Highway 17 route offers gorgeous views of the mountain ranges and the dunes. Make sure you have enough gas to get to the park and back, because the gas station nearest the park is about $3.50/gallon.

After stopping at the visitors center to talk with a ranger about possible hikes, and to purchase this book (which I highly recommend,) we drove to the Point of No Return. This is the last place two-wheel drive vehicles can reach. We decided to hike the Sand Ramp Trail, a moderately difficult hike of approximately 3.8 miles one way. If you've ever walked across a beach, you know how difficult it is to walk in sand. Now do that for seven miles, with some of it uphill.

You can see our truck in the background of the shot of Joe. Don't be fooled by the sand. We were often sinking past our ankles.

The views of the mountains and dunes were magnificent. We saw a pair of elk (I think they were elk) resting beneath the shade of two trees. Since it was the middle of the day, the wildlife was scarce, of course, but that was fine.

In case you're wondering, we weren't as close to those elk as the picture seems. We were probably a couple hundred feet away from them.

We reached the next trailhead, where the Medano Pass Primitive Road meets the Sand Ramp Trail, and turned around, since we were getting tired and we still had almost a four mile walk back. The mosquitoes were terrible. Clouds of them whenever we were near a body of water. Bring plenty of bug spray.

On the return hike, thunderclouds formed over the mountains in the distance. The wind blew up, and it started to rain. Cold rain. There's nothing like being on top of a hill when you see lightning in the distance to get your heart pumping. It's not as if you're the tallest object around most of the time.

We spent about five hours on the trail and drank about half a gallon of water each. By the time we crashed back at the hotel, we were exhausted, blistered, and mosquito-bitten.

A few general hiking tips: You need sunscreen, bug spray, a hat, and sunglasses. And don't skimp on the water. Joe and I have both noticed we don't get particularly hungry during a hike, so we bring very little food compared to the amount of exercise we're doing. If you're backpacking, you'll get hungry when you stop, but for the entire five hours, I think I ate a couple servings of trail mix, a couple of small snack cakes, and a granola bar.

Part 2 after this short commercial break.

Trip report coming up about our four-day vacation to the Great Sand Dunes National Park, with special guest stars, Capulin Volcano and Zapata Falls.

This is the last installment of my four-part article about the HHCC conference in Dallas. It'll probably be the shortest.

The keynote speaker was David Morrell, most famous for writing First Blood, the book that eventually became the movie, Rambo: First Blood. His speech dealt with finding the emotion that drives you to write. Fear, for example, or lust.

After the speech, he and Jerrilyn Farmer had a book signing. I'd purchased Ms. Farmer's first book, Sympathy For The Devil before lunch, and managed to be first in line in signing.

The first session after lunch was Crime Doesn't Pay - Enough. Cindy Daniel moderated, and the panelists were Jordan Dane, David Morrell, and Chris Roerden. All three panelists sort of put to lie the idea that writing doesn't pay, though, since all three are full time writers. David Morrell has had books turned into movies (and admitted that he did have a percentage deal with the Rambo movie(s)); Jordan Dane has two three-book contracts with major publishers (and her first book hasn't even come out yet! Major congratulations!); and Chris Roerden is a freelance editor, writer, and non-fiction ghostwriter. This particular session didn't impart a lot of useful knowledge, but it was interesting to hear about the different levels of success from different writers.

The final session was On The Road Again. Moderated by P.J. Nunn, it had Dan Hale, Jeff Shelby, and Jerrilyn Farmer. Elaine Viets was also supposed to show, but she apparently had some serious medical issues. This last session discussed signings. All the writers talked about being nice to the bookstore employees, because you want them to hand sell your books after you're gone. They talked about launch parties. Ms. Farmer is a big fan of them. She suggested having the party at a bookstore (independent is best, since they're even more likely to hand sell your book after). You provide the cake and snacks, of course.

Well, that's about it. Like I said, the fifty minute sessions were overall less useful, though I still enjoyed Saturday's sessions.

Gotta get up early in the morning, so g'night.

This is part three of my four-part article about the HHCC conference in Dallas. I'm going to go light on the links today.

But first, a word from our sponsor. Not really, but one thing I forgot to mention about the session with Jane Dystel was the announcement of the winner of the pitch and synopsis contest that was held at the conference. For a fee (which went to MWA, not Ms. Dystel), writers could pitch their books to her. In exchange, she would select one writer to submit a full to her agency. She didn't select one manuscript to read. She selected three. Congratulations to the three whose books piqued her interest, and best wishes on securing representation. That kinda blows that whole "agents aren't interested in new writers" theory espoused by PublishAmerica authors out of the water.

Now on to Saturday's schedule. These were fifty minute sessions, whereas Friday's sessions were ninety minutes. The shorter sessions were less effective, and there was rarely time for audience questions. Instead of the two paths from the previous day (a how-to-write path and a publicity path), there were three. The two already mentioned plus one for readers of mystery novels. I thought the reader-oriented panels would've been interesting, but I thought it would be more effective to stick with the publicity and writing sessions.

First up: Making A Splash. This was a panel discussion with Denise Dietz, Jordan Dane, Laura Starks, Cindy Daniel, and Dep-Wah Davis. This was another Internet related session. The discussion again concerned MySpace, having a proper domain name, and cheap service providers. Mostly the discussion mentioned how there isn't really any excuse for a professional writer not to invest in a real domain name, and I have to agree. And for goodness' sake, stay away from the Flash, the blinking colors, dancing teddy bears, and backgrounds that glitter. And that goes for your MySpace page, too.

Next up, I slipped over to the writer's side of things for a panel discussion on Constructive Criticism. The panelists (Laura Starks, Marion Moore Hill, Randy Rawls, Larry Shriner) talked about their writers' groups, what they think makes a good writers' group, and an effective size. Interestingly enough, the largest group any of them belonged to was six. (As an aside, at lunch I sat next to Laura Starks, and she talked about having odd-numbered groups, because it helps prevent pairing up.)

As for the how, some met and read aloud, others emailed samples early in the week and then got together to discuss the critiques. There's not really a right or wrong way, so long as everyone agrees on the method.

The final panel before lunch was Top Shelf. It was moderated by P.J.Nunn. The two panelists were David Thompson from Murder By The Book, an award-winning Houston mystery bookstore, and Kathy L. Patrick, owner of Beauty and the Book, the only hair salon/bookstore in the country. Ms. Patrick is a hilarious, vibrant speaker, and while there wasn't as much general knowledge passed along during this session, it was the most fun to listen to. I got two things out of this session: I want these two bookstores to carry my books some day, and I would love to do a booksigning at both of them.

As you can see, I didn't get as much out of these sessions, possibly because of the shorter time limit.

In part 4:

Keynote speaker, David Morrell (creator of Rambo), Crime Doesn't Pay - Enough, and On The Road Again.

This is part two of my four-part article about the HHCC conference in Dallas. This is a link-heavy article.

Lunchtime! After the Breakthrough with Promotions session, it was time for lunch. Food first: chef salad, dinner rolls, and strawberry cheesecake (yum!). Then guest speaker: Jerrilyn Farmer, author of the award-winning Madeline Bean novels. She spoke about the persistence, luck, and dedication necessary to become a writer. She was an entertaining speaker, very down to earth and amusing.

The first afternoon session was Finding Fans and Keeping Them with Carol Fitzgerald. She runs a review site called BookReporter.com. This session concentrated mostly on the importance of writers creating clean, informative websites and how to contact reviewers to request reviews of your books (hint: be nice; don't annoy them; and be grateful even if the review was negative). Representatives from another review site, Fresh Fiction, were also there.

Ms. Fitzgerald also discussed having a press biography, something clean and straightforward in addition to the cute or amusing bio you might have on your site. It should be something that could read aloud at a speaking engagement or used in a column.

Jordan Dane brought up a little information on using MySpace as a marketing tool. Barry Eisler wrote an article on Buzz, Balls & Hype recently discussing this very concept.

Ms. Fitzgerald also mentioned the Shelf Awareness newsletter, a free email newsletter "dedicated to helping the people in stores, in libraries and on the Web buy, sell and lend books most wisely." Subscribing will help you stay informed on what's going on from the booksellers' points of view.

The final session of the day was Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Agents and Editors - But No One Would Tell You. The guest speakers were Jane Dystel of Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, and Denise Dietz, a writer and freelance editor for Five Star Publishing. While this was a good session, I'm afraid I didn't get much out of it. Just hanging around the Absolute Write boards has pretty much given me a good knowledge of agents and editors, and I already have an agent.

It had good information for newer writers, like making sure your manuscript is cleanly formatted (double-spaced, one-inch margins, print on one side of the paper, etc.) Don't include your acknowledgements and dedication pages. Don't tell the editor how the book should be formatted (Ms. Dietz related a story of a writer who not only included an acknowledgements page, but indicated how it should be laid out in the book.)

Book signings were held after the session, but I left.

In part 3:

The Saturday morning session Making A Splash, Constructive Criticism, and Top Shelf (with booksellers from two popular independent book stores.)

This is part one of my four-part article about the HHCC conference in Dallas.

The conference was held in the Radisson hotel on Mockingbird Lane. The building looked a little old, though it was clean and neat. The thermostat was set somewhere between sub-zero and absolute zero.

After registering and getting a book bag full of goodies (including two issues of Glimmer Train), I was just in time for the first session. The choices were between Free Publicity with Jeff Crilley and Finding an Agent with Harry Hunsicker. Since I had an agent, I went to the Free Publicity session.

Jeff Crilley discussed how to get newspapers and magazines to write about you. He talked about finding columnists who are writing about topics relevant to your book. For example, if your novel is about runaway teens, a columnist doing a two-part series on the subject might be willing to interview you on your research. In the process, they'll likely mention your book. He also gave a little hint: your press releases to the local newsrooms are probably not being read. At most you're gettin a half a second of their attention. The guys in charge are more concerned with the exciting stories, like the double homicide they just heard about on the police scanner.

He has a book available on his site, and he's available for speaking engagements (and he doesn't charge speaking fees).

And to let you know how well his ideas apparently work, I visited my parents (who are wedding videographers and portrait photographes) after the conference on Friday, and when I mentioned "this TV reporter who spoke about free publicity," my mom said, "Was it Jeff Crilley?"

The next session was Breakthrough with Promotions, by publicist P.J. Nunn. The main idea I took out of that session was to make a twelve-month "slow and steady" promotion schedule rather than do a heavy promotion for the first few weeks after the book is released. The reason is to keep your name out there while you're working on your next book. You want people asking for your book all year, and you want the bookstores to make sure the book is there whenever they do ask for it. That doesn't mean a world-wide book tour. It's more about local signings, radio interviews, and articles in magazines and newspapers.

In part 2:

Guest speaker Jerrilyn Farmer; Finding Fans and Keeping Them; and Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Agents and Editors - But No One Would Tell You.

June 15 & 16, I'll be attending the Mystery Writers of America Hardboiled Heroes and Cozy Cats writers conference in Dallas. This will be the first writing conference I've ever attended, so I'm not sure what to expect.

If you have any advice, suggestions, or tips to make it an enjoyable experience, please feel free to share.

Ever read a book and like it so much you want to just turn back to page one and start over? That's how I felt when I finished Max Brooks' World War Z. I loved it. Absolutely loved it. It's such a unique twist on zombie horror (it's an oral history from some of the survivors of the world-wide zombie war). Reading it is like reading a non-fiction account of a fictional event. Everything is so vivid, you can't help but feel some measure of fear for the people you're reading about, even though, of course, they survived.

Plan B Productions (Brad Pitt's production company) has the filming rights. I hope they don't screw it up. This could easily turn out to be an awesome film. The hard part would be figuring out which of the stories in the book to turn into the movie. There are so many great ones to choose from.

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Also, if you haven't picked up your copy of A. Lee Martinez's A Nameless Witch, you're missing another great book. It was a one-sitting read.