Dear Dave,

I remember it clearly, the circumstances of our first meeting. It was in late February of 1996. You had contacted me and suggested Dottie and I meet you at a Tucson restaurant for dinner where we could discuss climbing. You found my contact information in a register atop the Diablo Mountains in Organ Pipe National Monument. April 13, 1995 is when you made that climb, so about 10 months had passed until we finally met. You and your friends were in the midst of a little project that I had conjured up a decade earlier and were asking my advice.

There are a whopping 193 mountain ranges in the state of Arizona, and each range has its highest point. I had created a list of those points, and the goal was to climb every one of them. I was able to give some small advice on the trickier ones, and you guys were taking notes.

The next time I saw you was when you came back to Tucson to do more climbing of the Arizona range high points. It was October 26th of 1996, and the weather was overcast and brooding when we headed south to the San Cayetano Mountains. The higher we climbed, the worse it got. It started to rain and we were soon soaked to the arse – I think it was also trying to snow. Then you did something that really impressed me. You pulled a 2-Meter ham radio out of your pack and started talking to some guy up on the Mogollon Rim. I don’t think he said exactly where he was, but the closest he could have been to us was a good 200 air miles. I was so impressed that I soon started studying for my own ham radio license.

You started making repeated trips to Arizona. At Thanksgiving, you wanted to try Mount Graham, but it was deep in snow and I talked you out of it. Instead, you spent time with us, stayed warm, and we all enjoyed one of Dottie’s Thanksgiving dinners that couldn’t be beat. Since Graham was a peak on your list, you knew you’d have to do it sooner or later. After considerable thought, you came up with the crazy idea to climb it from the north. Nobody did that, ever. I don’t know how but you talked me into going with you. It was May 30th of 1997 when we did it. A hundred degrees down at the bottom at 3,000 feet, but by the time we reached the top at 10,720 feet elevation, there was 4 feet of snow in the forest on the north slope. What a day!

You worked so hard to climb all of those Arizona range high points, making endless trips out here from your home in Los Angeles – I was blown away by your perseverance. I was lucky enough to accompany you on a few of them. The day finally arrived when you invited a small group of friends to share that final climb with you. It was a fine day on March 15, 1998 when we climbed Mount Devine together. You were only the second person to ever finish all of the climbs on the list.

You came up with a clever way to keep us all in touch with each other. Once a year, you put together the Howling Dog cookout where 50 climber friends would meet and camp out in the desert and enjoy each other’s company. Your family would prepare a gourmet meal for all of us, the highlight of the weekend. We always climbed a nearby peak as a group and enjoyed the camaraderie. The 13 years the cookouts ran were eagerly anticipated by everyone.

Your family were always so accommodating to me and Dottie whenever we were through Los Angeles, and also to me when I’d head out your way to climb. I’ve known you since before either of your kids were born, and now they’re both college grads – how time flies!

Remember the time we went to Nevada to climb? I flew to LA, we hopped in your truck and drove all the way there and found out that you had left your sleeping bag at home – that was one cold night you spent, shivering in the back of your truck! And the time we went to the Sierra Nevada with Brian and Carol to try the north-northeast ridge of Norman Clyde Peak. We three guys chickened out while she was still gung-ho to try it.

Back in 2001 you contacted me and suggested we climb the high points of the 11 groups of hills on the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation. On the first day of our trip, my truck broke down and we finished the climbing in yours. We saw a lot of beautiful desert on that trip, and had a few adventures too. Remember sitting at that lookout spot that the Mexican drug cartel used on the high point of the Gu Vo Hills and watching the group of indocumentados being picked up right below us in broad daylight?

One winter you came out to Arizona and we climbed more hills high points near Tombstone and darn near froze our asses off – it was clear to see how both of us were no longer adapted to climbing in cold weather.

Or how about that time we spent in the Mesquite Mountains down by the Mexican border climbing those peaks (Chupan Mountain, Mamtotk Peak and Bailey Peak) all in one long weekend. Bailey was an enjoyable and challenging climb. A dozen years later, I met a Border Patrol agent who said he wanted to climb Bailey but was transferred out of the area before I had a chance to take him there. Just as memorable as Bailey were the two peaks south of it on the edge of The Great Plain. That area was scary. We came upon a veritable automobile graveyard, a clearing where cars and trucks were shot full of bullet holes, flipped over and all burnt up. It was obvious that warring cartels had done battle here, a mere 5 miles from the Mexican border. We couldn’t get out of there fast enough!

Although you live in California and I in Arizona, we’ve climbed plenty of peaks in Utah together over the course of 2 summers. I was impressed how high we could drive on those big peaks, something I wasn’t used to – I mean, over 11,000 feet – how crazy is that? We had a lot of good times and good climbs there, for sure.

Looking back on these 24 years I’ve known you, there have been a lot of good times, a lot of good peaks. Thanks for the memories – hopefully, there are more out there waiting.