Tag Archives: best laid plans

The Best Laid Plans

07 Saturday Aug 2021

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I had all these plans for today.

A few weeks ago, my regular local meet-up group that has been meeting virtually for nearly a year and a half planned an in-person event: a picnic in a local park. I’ve been looking forward to this event for weeks: being around people again, but also being able to distance appropriately, while still being in proximity to their energy. It looked like the weather would be perfect…. until 9:00 this morning when a series of loud thunderstorms boomed over the city. With two hours to spare, the picnic was called off. There are plans to reschedule; I hope the weather cooperates.

My sandals are getting old. I’ve worn them constantly for two summers, now my feet hurt, and the bottoms are feeling almost flat. Once the storms cleared out, my partner and I took a trip down Whyte Ave, where we ate lunch on a sidewalk patio, then crossed the street to a local shoe store that specializes in orthotic shoes and sandals. I must’ve tried on 15 pairs of sandals, and there was something just slightly off with every single pair. They were either too wide or two narrow. They pinched my heels, or my feet flopped around in them. I found the PERFECT pair of sandals… except the strap near my left foot rubbed uncomfortably against my toes. After more than an hour, and a bunch of frustration, I walked away with only the shoes I walked in with, and despair at ever finding new sandals that fit.

I walked in my front door, ready to relax and write an interesting blog post prior to a long-standing Saturday night virtual game night. Instead, I had to figure out the source of the pieces of lightbulb strewn across my house, from the kitchen to the living room to the hallway. While looking for the pieces and hoping no one cut their feet or paws on broken glass, I also had to figure out where Simone’s kitty harness disappeared to. We found the box of broken lightbulbs in the basement; my partner used the shop vac to clean up the glass, while I went on the hunt for the cat harness. We eventually found the harness stuck under the couch – the ring with Simone’s bell and her city license got caught underneath, and she must have squirmed her way out of it. Thankfully, on all counts, everyone is safe. We just won’t be walking around the house in bare feet anytime soon!

It has not, in any way, been the day I’ve hoped for. But I am still grateful to have lived it. I will look back on this day and realize that even though it hasn’t gone anything like I’ve planned, that I have lived it well. I may not have enjoyed my picnic, but I will eventually get to spend time with my tribe. I may not have new sandals, but I hope I will eventually find some, and they will be worth the frustration in finding them. I may be down half a dozen light bulbs, but no one was hurt, and hopefully the cat has learned that not everything’s a toy.

Maybe hope springs eternal. Maybe optimism is what gets you through a day. Maybe that’s all OK. And maybe, tomorrow, I’ll have a chance to write the post I hoped to write today. but if not, something different will come along… and it might be better.

The Intrepid Journey 2018: Preparing by the Seat of My Pants

06 Saturday Jan 2018

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A dream of a solo journey through Montana was born while driving down a highway in the summer of 2017, passing cities I thought might be fun. I hadn’t even unpacked my bag from that trip before I started looking up bus routes to make this next trip happen.
Four months later, I’ve waffled almost constantly between excitement, ambivalence, and apprehension. The first thing I booked was my train ticket from Seattle to Whitefish, Montana, splurging on a sleeper car; it seemed like an appropriate celebratory purchase when my work position went from a term contract to a permanent position. Any time I had some extra spending money, I put it into bus tickets – as of this writing, five of them had been booked. My wonderful husband gave me an Alaska Airlines gift card for Christmas, so I’m just waiting for my flight from Edmonton to Seattle to possibly decrease in price; and I’d have no money at all if I booked my flight right now from Denver back home. But that will come.
As for accommodation, my goal is to meet people, which pretty much rules out the segregation and sterility of hotels. An accommodating AirBNB host in Cheyenne put up no resistance regarding Jenny, though he did express concern regarding me navigating his basement steps (and lest anyone think it’s a blind thing, he posted about it in his listing itself, so I doubt it). A friend in Denver has offered to put me up for a weekend (though I won’t identify them at this point). I snapped up pet-friendly accommodations within my (admittedly cheap) budget in Seattle, Helena and Great Falls, with hosts who appear to be more than welcoming. Just this morning, I booked my one night in a hostel in Whitefish – who can go wrong staying in a spot with storage for bags and a vegetarian restaurant and smoothie bar?
And then there’s Missoula.
I’ve had service dog refusals before, but I’ve had two notable AirBNB hosts in Missoula who have been incredibly unwelcoming and rude (not to mention discriminatory and in violation of AirBNB’s inclusion policy regarding assistance animals). Correspondence with AirBNB on this issue has given me little more than reiterations of the policies I already know.

So I promised myself – both as a way to save my pennies for now and a way to preserve my own mental well-being – to put my 25-AirBNB-listing Missoula wish list (and my smaller ones for Bozeman and Billings) on hold temporarily.

And it’s a darn good thing I did!

I got a call from Greyhound this afternoon, telling me that my scheduled trip from Missoula to Great Falls had been canceled outright, and my revised trips from Helena to Bozeman and Bozeman to Billings (thanks to cancellations of my purchased daytime routes) would involve arriving at the bus station in Bozeman in the middle of the night. I had hoped to avoid overnight travel altogether as much as possible, and I found myself standing in my bedroom, laughing uproariously at the absurdity of all this; if I didn’t laugh, I guarantee I would’ve been crying. The Greyhound representative refunded those tickets that had been impacted by the route cancelations, and I’m in contact with Jefferson Lines (the partner company) to see if there are plans for revised daytime schedules in the near future.

My sister-in-law, Sarah – who many readers got to know through my Epic Road Trip of Awesome series – recently described me (and this journey) as “intrepid”. I am resolute and dauntless about this trip, even though I have no idea how it’s all going to pan out. Never has it felt more true – or more freeing or more scary – at this moment.

So, I’ll be putting bookings on hold for the time being, just to wait and see how the stars align in the next few months.

But, hey, I’ve got some extra cash thanks to those refunds, and can start saving more. Maybe I should book those flights!

The Epic Road trip of Awesome Day 6: “YAY! EARTH!”

14 Saturday Oct 2017

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Thursday, August 31, 2017
I don’t notice the time, but I can hear vehicles driving down the highway. A slight breeze ruffles my hair and I burrow deeper into my sleeping bag. For some reason I can’t quite explain, I am more content than I have been in a long time, and I drift off to sleep again.
The next thing I hear is someone’s alarm. It’s 6:30 (though my phone, stuck on Pacific Time, tells me differently). Ben says he woke up at about 2:00 and saw this full complement of stars above his head, and wishes he could’ve shared that moment with Sarah. Sarah, for her part, says SHE woke up at 2:00 AM and saw those stars. I think of those drowsy contented moments with the breeze playing with my hair, and think that maybe, just maybe, we all unknowingly experienced simultaneous magic.
I stretch and we start rolling up sleeping bags and deflating our mattresses. Jenny, annoyed at being cooped up in the car all night, bounds out of the back seat and starts sniffing the area vigorously. After a quick pee and breakfast, she’s further annoyed at being put back in the car so we can load up the roof bag and search for showers. We’ve stuffed our dirty laundry into the bags that normally contain our air mattresses. The glorious foot room from yesterday is no longer available, and I hope this changes soon.
We find washrooms… but no showers.
Ben has cell reception, and he confirms the campsite lists “showers” as an amenity. We drive around the campsite in case we miss something and…
No showers.
After the long drive yesterday, there is no way we are going without showers!
We pull up alongside a couple of women – campers? – and ask if they know where there are showers. They pause (“oh, gosh!”) and consider it, before recommending a nearby campground, or possibly a truck stop in Idaho Falls. Ben rolls up the window and thanks them.
Idaho Falls looks like our best bet.
After fifteen minutes or so of driving, we locate KJ’s Travel Center and pull in to the parking lot. Ben goes inside to see if there are showers. And hallelujah! THEY HAVE SHOWERS!

We pay $7.50 per shower and are handed keys, towels and face cloths. one of us needs to wait for the fourth shower to be cleaned, and Ben says he’ll wait.

I have what I can only describe as the most amazing shower of my life. I want to stay under the spray for hours, but everyone else will be annoyed, and I’m hungry, so I turn off the water and nearly slip in the puddles my feet leave on the floor. It’s only now that I notice a mat I could have used to avoid this…

Changing in to clean, dry clothes, I shove yesterday’s clothes into my toiletry bag, pick up the towel and washcloth and make sure I’m holding the key before I let the door close behind me.

To my astonishment, I am the first one out of the showers! As the others meet me in the hall, everyone agrees that those showers were incredible! Ben notices a little room off to the side, and we’re thrilled that it contains washers and dryers! We tromp back downstairs, move the car to a better location, and four humans and one dog haul all of our dirty clothes up the stairs. Sarah gets quarters for the washer and dryer and buys soap from the little store downstairs, and we load two washers with the dirty camping clothes of four people.

While the washers spin, we go back down the stairs to locate the diner. When Jenny and I enter, you’d have thought no one had ever seen a dog before! We are stared at, but otherwise left alone to pile into a booth and order our food.

The waitress comes by and asks us if we’d like coffee. We all say “yes!” so emphatically that she asks us if we’d like a pitcher.

A pitcher of coffee!?

Yes, please!

 

Sarah holds the magical coffee karaf

 

We drink our coffee, marvel at the showers and our night under the stars, and order our food. I’m itching to try Idaho potatoes, so I order a basic breakfast with eggs, potatoes, bacon and toast. The intermittent Wifi signal brings me a notification “written” by our cat, Annie (translated by our friend Keith), stating that she’s mourned our departure and thinks we’ll NEVER come back, but is glad for all the space on the bed and the new guy who seems to come regularly for kitty scritches. I chuckle and share it with Ben.

Just before our food arrives, Ben goes upstairs with a bunch of quarters to move all of our clothes from the washers to the dryer.

Our food arrives, and we tuck in. In my opinion, the food isn’t quite as good as the coffee. It’s greasy and heavy and hits the spot, but my potatoes are all clumped together and my bacon is only warm, not hot, and definitely flabby rather than the crispy bacon I prefer.

We finish our breakfast, and Ben and I pay the bill, leaving a generous tip. It’s now time to souvenir shop!

Jenny’s struggling with this building for some reason. Either she’s discombobulated by the open space that gives way to sudden tiny pathways or she’s mad at me for last night’s “abandonment” in the car. She keeps taking me to exit doors and is seemingly disinterested in guiding, though she’s calm and collected, so I work with what I have.

There are key chains in the gift shop. I’m thrilled to find a big heavy one with a spinning centre piece showing the Idaho state flag. There are no badges for jenny’s travel blanket, so I make a mental note to order one online. Ben and Sarah try on trucker hats, laughing uproariously before each choosing one.

We climb the stairs to the laundry room, where our clothes continue to tumble around in the dryer. After a few minutes, I go downstairs to use a washroom and get Jenny some water. I’m just about to pick up her water bowl and empty out the excess water when a woman pushes open the door, sees Jenny, and lets out a shriek. I say nothing, dump the bowl into the sink, wipe it dry, and put it in my purse. The woman apologizes for her reaction. I still say nothing and leave.

Jenny’s still not taking me to the base of the stairs. There’s something blocking easy access to them, and they’re incredibly narrow and steep to begin with. We ultimately make it upstairs, where I join the others lounging on the comfy couches. We all tease each other some, wrestle a bit, then sprawl out on the couches again and tune each other and the world out for a few blessed minutes.

The dryers are done and we pry them open…

And our clothes are still soaked!

We have a brief team meeting. Our options are limited. We can either run the dryer again and hope this dries our clothes or suck it up and hope we find a dryer on the road.

It’s a quick decision. It’s pushing close to 10:00 and we really want to get to Old Faithful sooner rather than later. We load our damp clothes into the mattress bags and stuff them in the trunk, fill the car with gas, and change our riding configuration for the trip to Wyoming.

 

KJ’s Travel Center (Idaho Falls, ID) – Old Faithful

Distance: 136 Miles (219 km)

Travel Time: 2.5 Hours

 

For the first ride of any distance, I’m in the front seat. Ben is driving, while Sarah has taken up a position with Jenny and Dwight in the back. Once we’re ready to go, it’s easy to marvel at the landscape we’re leaving behind. We see more wildlife as we cross through Idaho, which continues for at least another hour from Idaho Falls. There are more Mormon temples seemingly in the middle of nowhere, and a Holy Rosary (church?) likewise situated. Once we cross from Idaho into Montana, the speed limit increases from a quick 70 miles an hour to a blistering 80 on the Interstates. We call our hosts for tonight at Grandview Campground and play phone tag due to the spotty reception Ben’s getting. We finally connect with them and let them know we’re planning a late evening checkin, and are asked to call back when we have a more solid ETA.

The scenery is gorgeous as we travel through a small corner of Montana and into Wyoming. Sarah passes out GoPicnic lunches, but we snack on them sparingly; we’re still full from breakfast. We pay the entry fee to Yellowstone National Park on the Montana side of the park, and it doesn’t take long before we’re suddenly into Wyoming. In less than 90 minutes, we’ve crossed three state lines. We see tons of wildlife. A bison stands in the middle of a field close to the highway, just hanging out and minding its business, and Ben adds that to his tally of animals seen on our trip. There’s more beautiful senery, including other geisers, that Ben and Sarah definitely want to photograph on the way back down. No complaints from me; they’ve earned these pictures!

We reach Old Faithful just after 1:30. I expect us to have to take a small hike to get out there, but instead we pull into a parking lot and travel along sidewalks to small cafes, shops, and the visitors center. We stop in a souvenir shop where I find two awesome tactile keychains (one for me and one for a friend back home) and a badge for Jenn’s blanket. I’m paying for my purchases when Sarah tells us she’s heard that Old Faithful might erupt in a few minutes! I’m afraid we’ll miss it, because (again) I’m expecting a hike and a trail, but it’s only a brief paved walk to a wodden outlook.

I’ve imagined Old Faithful for months. I’m expecting some great rushing force of water, like a reverse waterfall. But instead, I hear nothing but fellow tourists as I stand on the boardwalk.

It’s 2:16. Time for the expected eruption.

And nothing happens.

A hush falls over the crowd as a faint smell of sulphur fills the air and Old Faithful bubbles slightly.

More time passes.

Another brief scent of sulphur, another slight eruption, more silence.

As time passes, people inch away and go back to the shops and their cars. Murmurings of Old Faithful being a tease and a let-down can be heard behind me. I inch closer to the edge of the overlook just as Old Faithful, in a final show of strength, erupts.

After a 20-minute tease, Old Faithful erupts!

It’s not at all what I expect. The faint scent of sulphur is not present here. The strong powerful sounds of gushing water I expected are definitely absent as well; instead, it sounds like faint ocean waves.

After a couple of minutes, Old Faithful settles down, and many people clap and start to move away. It’s kind of weird to think about, Sarah says. It’s like everyone is congratulating earth on being earth… “YAY! Earth!” But I just HAD to get a picture with Old Faithful in the background.

Me and Jenny crouched down with a calm Old Faithful in the background

We zip inside another store for road snacks. Dwight buys a bag of grapes for $8 and Ben buys more road cheesies. I get a Gatorade and Sarah buys her snacks – we all spend a small fortune on road food.

We take our last bathroom break before piling into the car. Jenny – as she’s done all the way through this trip – finds the accessible stall without my asking her to do so. Sarah keeps telling me how impressed she’s been with Jenny on this trip, and while I can dwell on Jenn’s mistakes and missteps, I have to agree with Sarah. Jenn laps up the water I set down for her by the sink, and we’re all ready to hit the road.

Old Faithful – Grandview CampGround

Distance: 308 miles (496 km)

Travel Time: 6 hours (including stops)

 

We keep our travel configurations from this morning as we pile into the car. Ben’s got a Google map on his phone and is hopeful that he can still navigate in these areas with no cell service. Just twenty minutes out of Old Faithful, Sarah spots the geisers they wanted for pictures, and Ben pulls in.

Dwight and I stay in the car, talking. We haven’t really had an opportunity to do so on this trip, and I confess my feelings of uselessness. I’m not a seasoned camper, and Ben and Sarah seem to frequently have everything under control. Sure, I’ve rolled a sleeping bag or two, or helped set up the tent, but to me it doesn’t feel like nearly enough. Dwight offers some perspective that I desperately need – that I have been contributing, but that I need to temper my need to be needed with the practicalities that come alongside camping with experienced campers. My blindness has nothing to do with it. I’m not sure I feel any better, but I feel better for having talked about it.

Sarah and Ben come back to the car, thrilled with the pictures they’ve taken of this area. It’s called the Painted Pots. There are signs that state that you must stay out of the water; it’s so clear and so hot that you would never come out.

The Painted Pots

We’re ready to go again. Sarah and Dwight chat in the back while Ben follows the route he sees on Google maps. There’s a motorist in front of us who keeps speeding up and slowing down and speeding up and slowing down. Ben finally gets so annoyed that he takes the first available turnoff and hopes it’s the right one.

The highways are well-paved and well-maintained. We’ve driven for about half an hour before Ben thinks he made a mistake – turning left instead of right. His google map is useless up here, and he asks me for directions. I pull up Nearby Explorer, put in the address of Grandview Campground, and start giving directions (basically, keep going straight and take one turn or another).

As we travel, Dwight and Sarah nap while Ben and I chat. I talk to Ben about my feelings of inadequacy, and he’s quick to reassure me that I have pulled my weight – heck, I’m the one navigating on this leg of the journey!

The signs for Bozeman appear, and we are all tired. It’s 20 minutes to Bozeman now, and someone points this out. Dwight says that’s a perfect name for a band, and we all laugh and agree.

In Bozeman, we stop for gas. We’re getting hungry and find a burger place with a drive-through. We order massive burgers and fries, and we’re all impressed as we munch. Only Ben seems disappointed by his waffle fries (I try one and agree that my traditional fries are better). Sarah has cell reception, so she calls Grandview and tells them our ETA appears to be about 9:30. They thank her for her call and tell her they’ll see us when we get there.

As we drive through Bozeman, Ben and Sarah express a strong liking for the city. The architecture looks cool, and now I think we’re all sorry we won’t get a chance to explore it further.

Nearby Explorer continues to map our route – go straight. we pass small towns and lovely scenery as the sun sets. Even I can see the sunset filtered through the trees, with mountains in the background on either side. I’m blown away by the majestic beauty of this sunset as I munch my fries and tell Ben to continue to go straight, through county after county, past unpopulated areas or tiny hamlets.

We reach Billings. It’s a big city, too, and we all agree that tomorrow, we will go into Billings, split up for a couple hours, and do our own thing. As we leave the city limits, I start to worry about directions to Grandview. The email says GPS can sometimes be wrong, and we have no cell service to contact them if we get lost.

I worry for nothing. As we pull into Hardin, pass the gas station indicated on the email, the sign is clearly marked. We pull in to the drive at 9:00, and Ben and I get out of the car. Lori arrives just a couple minutes later and opens the office/gift shop. She’s warm and welcoming and she’s thrilled we got in earlier than we’d estimated and gives us a rundown of the campsite information. We’re given directions to the showers and our campsite, change for the laundry facilities (open 24 hours), a Wifi password, and kitty cuddles from the resident cat. We can dry our clothes! AND see kitties? With showers and wifi, we’ve hit the camping jackpot!

We get back to the car and tell Sarah and Dwight about our good fortune. We pull up to our assigned space, and the guys get to work on pitching the tent. Sarah and I haul the mattress bags full of wet clothes to the dryers. The first dryer eats Sarah’s quarter, so we have to go back to the car and get more. We move the wet clothes from one dryer to another, and I constantly drop them. Sarah and I laugh giddily as she loads the second= – hopefully functional – dryer with our clothes. They fit in one load, and the dryer takes our quarters with no fuss.

We get back to the tent, which has been completely set up. Our air mattresses are inflated and sleeping bags unrolled. Jenny is bounding around the camp site like she’s never seen such a beautiful grassy area, and I’m struck by the sound of crickets I hear. If you’ve ever seen a movie that has a night-time scene with crickets in the background, these crickets sound like that. It feels like I’m in a movie, and I’m so happy I could burst.

We check on the clothes in the dryer, and they are – miracle of miracles – all dry. We stuff them into the mattress bags again and put them in the car; we’ll take care of them in the morning.

It’s 10:00 PM, and I’m ready for sleep. I crawl into the tent and bury my face in my pillow. Jenny will not leave my side, squishing my legs under the weight of her Labrador frame. The movie-crickets sing me to a restful, contented sleep.

The Epic Road Trip of Awesome day 5: bad Wardrobe Choices

30 Saturday Sep 2017

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Wednesday, August 30, 2017

I wake up well-rested, thrilled that we can all squish in the tent. For an air mat that’s barely an inch thick, my body has felt remarkably supported. Why didn’t we buy these mats sooner?

Jenny has decided that sleeping with me is over-rated. She’s moved her way over to where Sarah is sleeping, squishing Dwight halfway off his air mattress. I’m more amused than offended.

The smoke that has been hovering in the air the past few days has finally started to decrease. For the first time in days, the sunrise is not singed with orange. This, coupled with yesterday‘s run and jiu jitsu, have put me and Sarah respectively in a better mood. We both express our extreme gratitude to the guys for their patience with us yesterday, grateful to feel so relaxed. I know that Ben, in particular, needs some solo time; being in close proximity for five days now – with almost no pictures to show for it and no other outlet – has frustrated him greatly. The plan is to stop in Boise this afternoon, go our separate ways for a couple hours, and come back together as a well-rested, rejuvenated team+.

But Tami and Wayne have other plans. While I am in the tent, getting dressed, and Ben and the others are out by the picnic table, Wayne approaches Ben and asks if he and Tami can treat us for breakfast. Absolutely! Schedule be damned; today’s gonna be a long haul, and the more time we can spend with these new friends, the more fun we will have, and the more prepared we will be to slog through what promises to be one of the longest single-day drives on this trip.

I exit the tent and immediately regret my choice of clothing. Because today’s drive through Oregon and Idaho will be long and hot, I figured I would be best served by wearing a comfortable cotton skirt and lightweight top. I hadn’t considered… the wind. I spend more time messing with my skirt, wrestling it into some sense of order, than just about anything else. But I’m short on comfortable clean clothes (our hope is to do laundry in Boise), so my choices are nonexistent. I just hold my skirt firmly, put Jenny in the back seat of the car, and start getting ready to go. We roll up our mats and sleeping bags, stuff our backpacks, and load up the roof bag.

Loading up the Roof Bag

 

We follow Tami and Wayne the 17 miles to the closest Denny’s, in the Dalles. Dwight really wants to get “honned” at some point on this trip, and he’s pretty sure the server will oblige him by calling him “hon”. The six of us – and two dogs, pointedly ignoring each other because, PROFESSIONAL – pile around the table and order coffee. Sarah and I are both thrilled that we can order fruit with our breakfast. No one calls Dwight “hon.” We eat and laugh and drink coffee and chat some more and drink more coffee. By the time someone notices the time, it’s 10:00, and we need to hit the road.

It takes us fifteen minutes to say our farewells, give hugs and well-wishes, and pile all humans and dogs into their respective vehicles. We’re well-fed, well-rested, and ready for the long haul.

 

The Dalles, Oregon – (campsite name redacted), Idaho

Distance: 643 (plus ???) miles (1035 plus ??? km)

Travel time: 11 hours (including stops and detour)

 

It feels good to be on the road. Sarah takes the wheel, while Ben takes the passenger seat. Dwight and I are at the mercy of Jenny, who alternates between scrunching up into a tiny ball and using our bodies to resituate herself. The mental map I have in my head tells me that Idaho is close by. We can have our “me-time” in Boise, maybe do laundry, and still make it to our campsite on time.

Not long after leaving Tami and Wayne, we stop at a service station near Rufus, Oregon, where we buy snacks (including a replacement for the “road Cheesies” that have gone stale from sitting open in the car for days) and an adapter to charge Sarah’s cell phone. Going to and from the station, I’m holding my skirt, because the wind keeps blowing it around, and I crack a joke about wearing totally the wrong underwear today.

Ben doesn’t have to fill the tank with gas; the station is full-serve! We haven’t seen this in Alberta in ages, and it feels quaint and charming. With a full tank of gas and snacks in hand, we pile back into the car and get ready to meet Idaho.

A sudden “pop!” startles me just a few miles after we get going. A trailer in front of us has lost a tire, and it clearly needs to be replaced. When Sarah sees the occupants of the truck hauling the trailer are an elderly man and his wife, she pulls over to the side of the road. Ben gets out and helps the man change the tire in the blistering heat. When Ben gets back into the car, he says he’s glad to have helped someone out, and was amused by how the man introduced himself by name and home state. Sarah and Ben are both impressed by the manners of the motorists on the highway. No one stops and stares, they merge into other lanes so that no one is in danger of getting hit, and they keep on going. once we see that the truck and trailer are safely back on the road, we start up the car again and continue our journey.

Oregon lasts forever. Once our breakfast has worn off, we open more GoPicnic lunches, swapping for our preferred foods, and snacking on the way. I’m thrilled that, at the next stop, the 1-foot-square box that’s taken up a ton of space by my feet will be halved. LEG ROOM!

We drive east on I-84, away from the smoke that’s infiltrated our vision and/or our lungs for days. Because of this joyous fact, Ben is finally able to get some good pictures. At seemingly random moments, he rolls down the passenger window and snaps multiple frames in quick succession.

 

A stone House

 

We drive from the green (if hazy) scenery of the Dalles, past mountains, and into high desert. We pass the turnoff to where Tami and Wayne live just as it starts to get cloudy, and we wave fondly at the turnoff. A few miles later, seemingly from nowhere, we find ourselves under a cloudburst which pummels the car with rain, then quarter-sized hail. We worry about the potential condition of the car, and wonder how the roof bag is taking this first barrage of bad weather we’ve seen. It doesn’t last long, though, but it’s at this point that I realize that the chocolate bars we bought before the trip – that have stayed out of the sun in the air-conditioned car – have all melted into soupy, unrecognizable puddles inside their wrappers. It’s been an hour since the hail stopped, and we stop at a rest stop seemingly in the middle of nowhere. Exiting the car, we encounter a blazing sun and fierce desert winds. My comfortable flowing skirt is blowing in the wind, and Sarah and I each hold one side of it down while running for the closest washroom.

Hurrah! We’ve thrown out the big box! I have leg room now, and we still have snacks. Ben has checked the car and the roof bag, which have both held up nicely against the hail and rain that now – an hour after driving through it – seems like a distant memory.

We point the car eastward again, finding more varied terrain from deserts to mountains and valleys to rivers, through baking sun and further cloudbursts.

Oregon has Mountains!

 

Exhausted, we make it to Ontario, Oregon, where the time jumps from 4:30 to 5:30. Just like that, we’ve lost an hour, and I’m starting to wonder if we’ll make it to our campsite on time for check-in. It’s becoming abundantly clear that our “me time” and laundry stop in Boise is not going to happen, but it’s supper time and the car needs fuel. We stop at another full-serve gas station and buy dinner at Chester’s Chicken. Our chicken is so hot that the steam makes the paper sacks rip. We walk from the restaurant, holding our sacks awkwardly to keep from spilling chicken on the sidewalk. The air is electric around us; it feels like it’s going to storm.

From the car, Ben calls the campground we’ve booked for tonight, telling them we’ll likely be slightly late for check-in. They tell us that’s no problem; if we can’t get in the main gate, we can still access the facilities from another entrance.

We cross the state line into Idaho. Almost immediately, drivers stop to look at pulled-over vehicles. At about the same time we realize the seemingly instantaneous loss of driving skills, we notice wildlife everywhere, and it’s brave wildlife. Coyotes dash across the highway, a turtle (tortoise?) risks its life in the middle of one of the traffic lanes, and more than one bird attempts to make contact with our windshield. It’s starting to get dark in Idaho as we drive past Boise, noticing a massive wind farm that we think might provide power to the city. This stretch of highway is buffeted by wind, and it feels like the car is fighting the gusts as we fight the clock, driving mile after mile through Idaho.

 

Idaho Scenery

 

We stop for gas again in Carey, and while Ben fills up the car – no full-serve here! – Sarah spots an owl sitting on a telephone pole. Leaving the town, we notice a large Mormon church, which we find surprising for a town this size (apparently, population 604).

We drive.

And we drive.

And we drive.

Every time it looks like we might just make it in time for our campsite closing, we have to fight some weather or traffic or otherwise annoying quirk of the road. The sun has set now, and Sarah is driving on a highway with no street lights. Music is a means to an end, providing a much-needed break to conversation (something that’s lacking at this moment). We’re all so tired that we sing “I would Walk 500 Miles” in bad Scottish accents, converting the 500 miles into their metric equivalent. A few songs later, I’m belting out “Crocodile Rock” at the top of my lungs, which prove to be rather reedy. Then I just become sad when I really listen to the lyrics of David Bowie’s “A Space Odyssey”; I’d nevver heard the words before and they make me really sad.

This drive will never end.

Sarah pulls into our pre-booked camping area thirty minutes after the posted check-in time. The gate is closed. We pull over to the side of the highway and put our heads together. As we see it, we have three options: find another camp site, walk in through the pedestrian gate, or drive in through the exit. We are so exhausted after the long drive that options 2 and 3 seem the most desirable. Ben checks the exit gate and sees that it’s clear – no spike belt to prevent us from entering. We agree to drive in through the exit, circle the tenting sites several times and cannot find our name on any of the “reserved” posts. When Sarah locates an unoccupied tenting spot, we pull over and bring down the roof bag.

I can think of few things I would want to do less than set up the tent. It’s late, I’m tired, and I just want to close my eyes. It’s a beautiful night, so I propose sleeping under the stars – for practical reasons more than a true desire to do so. The others agree readily, and we blow up our mats and unroll our sleeping bags, using the car as a buffer to protect from some of the highway noise and lights. Because we’re so close to the highway, we leave Jenny in the car for the night – much to her displeasure. I drift off to sleep almost instantly under an open Idaho sky.

The Epic Road trip of Awesome Day 3: “I visited the Cascades! I Almost Died… but It was Fun!”

16 Saturday Sep 2017

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Monday, August 28, 2017
Once again, Jenny has decided that it’s her job to wake up EVERYONE in the tent.
At 5:30 in the morning.
She’s happily wriggling and tail-wagging and making a general nuisance of herself, and finally Sarah opens the zipper on the tent and lets Jenny kill some grass. She’s now happy to snuggle with me a few minutes, until she can’t possibly wait for food for one more millisecond.
I crawl out of the tent and walk with Jenny to the car. Dwight is awake after having slept in the car last night. He says it “wasn’t that bad”, but I’m not sure I believe him.
Jenny’s much less beetleheaded now that she’s been fed. Ben, Sarah, Dwight and I deflate air mattresses and roll up sleeping bags and otherwise get ready to face the day and the road ahead.
max REALLY wants to play with Jenny, but Jenny’s disinterested in him; she’s got her eye on the beehives. Mom and I call her back to us and she listens reluctantly, deciding to sniff all the grass she possibly can.
We load Jenny into the car and start packing the roof bag. Mom has some great suggestions on packing it so that more fits in the bag and we take up less room in the trunk and the back seat. Yesterday we asked Dad about our vibrating roof bag, and he suggested knotting the straps so they don’t flap loosely in the wind. We’ve taken his suggestion to heart and are hopeful for a more quiet ride into Washington.
We all pile into the car and follow Mom to a McDonald’s near the border. Mom’s not a coffee drinker, so if we want some as soon as possible, you can’t beat a Canadian McDonald’s for good road coffee.
I’m annoyed by an email that I’m trying to respond to, but my phone won’t take my password. I spend far too much time fiddling with it, drinking my coffee and wanting to curse Google for being annoying.
It’s 8:00, and the Aldergrove border crossing is open. We say goodbye to Mom, thank her for her hospitality, and pile into our car.

Aldergrove, BC – Seattle, Washington
Distance: 186 km
Travel Time: 2.5 hours (including stops)

 

We pull up to the border crossing at Aldergrove and hand over our passports. because Dwight is not a Canadian citizen, he has to get further processed through customs, so we have to pull over and walk into the building to talk to customs officers. It’s been years – maybe decades – since I’ve had to stop when driving across the border. The customs officer is friendly and chatty while Dwight’s paperwork is processed. He asks where we’re spending tonight, and when we tell him we’re staying at Cascade Peaks Campground, his enthusiasm is obvious. “Oh! I went through the Cascades once!” he says cheerily. “I almost died… but it was fun!”

After a brief pause, we all clamber for the story. He tells us about when he was moving to take his current job, and he had to move a bunch of his stuff. He didn’t realize his truck wasn’t in the right gear for the curvy mountainous terrain, and he white-knuckled it most of the way through until he realized he could fix the problem. He cracks a joke about his life flashing before his eyes, but at least the outside scenery was great.

We all laugh, collect our passports, and head back to the car.

Since gasoline is much cheaper in the States than in Canada, we fill up the car. While Ben’s filling the gas tank, I take out my phone and swap my Canadian Sim card for a USA one… that’s too small! By the time I realize my mistake, the American sim card has lodged itself into the sim card reader on my phone, and I can’t get it out!

Sarah tries to see if she can put one in her phone, but her phone is locked to her carrier. Ben tries to get the card out of my phone, but it’s lodged in there good. Of the three sim cards we purchased, only one (Ben’s), it seems, will be used in the very near future.

The first thing we notice after crossing the border is the amount of traffic circles (roundabouts). Every mile for five miles has another roundabout, and (unlike back home) everyone seems to know how to drive on them.

The second thing?

“Cheap weed!” Ben cries from the driver’s seat. We all laugh, wondering if you have to be a resident to get some. We keep driving. There’s another pot shop… and another down the way. We pass a Walmart and Ben regrets not stopping. Someone cracks a joke about him driving past the only existing Walmart in the USA. Ben laughs and drives on.

Sarah spots a creepy-looking handmade sign for Giggles the Clown Fun Park, and we somehow find it hilarious. As we drive down the highway, we read out signs of businesses and cities and schools, wrapping our tongues around many words with Ws and Tcs and Ms.

We pull in to one of the parking areas at Pike Place Market and are glad to stretch our legs. Ben grabs his camera, and I strap a GoPro to Jenny’s back. We haven’t made it twenty feet before the camera – which in any previous testing attempts has tilted slightly to the right – has tilted to the left so far that it’s literally resting against Jenny’s side. I tighten and reconfigure the straps and keep on going.

We stop at a coffee shop for coffee and water, then walk down the narrow, crowded streets. We step into meat markets, produce shops, and Jenny tries to take me into three cafes. A friend told me to find a spot with the giant cookies, and I’m thrilled to find one so easily. I buy two cookies (that are the size of my face and are immediately dubbed “face cookies”), get frustrated with the GoPro again, and put it and the cookies in Ben’s camera bag.

Pike Place Sign

 

We make it to the fish market, where we stand just outside and listen to a busker with an acoustic guitar. he’s singing a Foo Fighters song but his voice sounds more like Green Day. I like it.

The market is bustling, with fishmongers throwing fish to the customers who order them. The atmosphere is chaotic, and we move away after a few minutes.

We stop at a Target store to see if my sim card can be removed by a phone technician. The clerk is hesitant to do anything, stating unconvincingly that he doesn’t want to ruin my phone. The fact that I told him that the phone is basically a tablet now doesn’t change his mind. So we pick up eyebrow tweezers and a few other items we need for the road.

Sarah likes the look of this pub down the street. We walk down and enter Elysian Bar, an amazingly open space with wooden floors and tables and high ceilings. Ben asks if he can take pictures, and he is told he can. While we wait for our lunch, Ben teases the sim card out of the card reader with the eyebrow tweezers and I attempt to re-insert it (with an adapter this time), no joy. I try my Canadian sim card, and no success there, either. My phone is effectively not a phone anymore, and I wonder how useful it will be. But I need to let it go; nothing I can do about it now. We order our food – smaller portions that are still massive – and enjoy the atmosphere.

Elysian Brewery has great Atmosphere

 

It’s 2:00 now, time to hit the road; we want to beat rush hour out of Seattle.

 

Seattle, Washington – Mount St. helen’s Visitor’s Center

Distance: 122 miles (196 km)

Travel Time: 2 hours, 15 minutes

We eat the “face cookies” on the way to the Mount St. Helen’s visitors center. We enjoyed our time at Pike Place, but definitely found it crowded and congested in very small space. Glad to be back on the road, we settle in and hope for some views of the mountains. Unfortunately, wildfires from BC (and other areas as well) have given the air a hazy tint, making the view of the mountains much less majestic.

We pull in to the visitors centre just after 4:30. A wall of heat greets us as we exit the car. It’s a short walk from the car to the building, but even so it feels like we’re breathing fire.

The centre closes at 5:00. We are told that we can pay the $5/person entry fee and see the end of the film that is playing, or we can browse the souvenir shop for a couple minutes and then see the exhibits for free before closing. We take the second option, and I’m thrilled to find a Mount St. helens key chain and a badge for Jenny’s travel blanket. The film has concluded, so we walk down and view the exhibits, seeing the progression of the eruption. It is sobering, and the building around me has a hushed sense of reverence to it.

We hear an announcement that the doors are closing, so we head outside into the heat and get ready to head to our campsite for the night.

 

Mount St. Helen’s Visitors Center – Cascade Peaks Campground

Distance: 80 miles (130 km)

Travel time: 2 hours (including stops)

 

Ben’s phone doesn’t have good GPS service right now so he asks me to locate a grocery store. We need food for tonight and propane for the camp stove. I load up Nearby Explorer on my “semi-intelligent brick” (as we’ve affectionately dubbed my phone), and give directions to the nearest grocery store. We walk in and notice a lot of snack items, but no propane and nothing we can use for supper. We ask for recommendations and are given slightly complicated directions to a larger grocery store only a mile away. We find everything we need – propane for the stove, everything to make burgers for supper, adult beverages to go with those burgers, bacon and eggs for breakfast tomorrow – and take it all to the cashier. We know we’re in a small town, where you stop and chat with your friends and neighbors. A couple of people beside us say hello to each other and carry on a conversation as though they are in a meeting hall or a county fair. It’s quaint and charming, and I am enchanted.

We load up the cooler with our newly-purchased food and head to our camp site. at the main building there’s a weak wifi signal, so I shoot a couple of messages to a couple of people I had planned to meet along the way. We are given directions to a site that’s close to the washrooms and showers and we drive over to it.

The burgers are made as the crickets start to sing their evening song. The mountain air feels cool and clear to me, though there’s still a visible smoky haze. We each take a few minutes to just be alone before we come back together as a group to enjoy our burgers with macaroni salad and beer.

It’s time to set up the tent. We borrowed this one from a friend, and we’re thrilled that it seems to sleep six people (four people and one dog take up a lot of space). Sarah and I start to put it up, clipping the poles to the tent and the fly to the poles. The tent looks huge, and Sarah and I are pretty convinced that there’s plenty of space. We bring out the air mattresses…

And they all still don’t fit.

I am frustrated.

The obvious solution is to get rid of our double air mattress in favor of something smaller, but that doesn’t solve our immediate problem. It’s 9:00 at night and nothing in the immediate viscinity would be open. It isn’t fair to have someone sleep in the car again, so we decide to deflate the bigger air mattresses as much as possible, and we cram them all in. The double mattress has enough air in it to feel like a water bed any time someone moves. I take a deep breath of clear mountain air and hope for a restful sleep as the crickets sing their lullaby.

The Epic Road Trip of Awesome Day 1: Hitting the Road

09 Saturday Sep 2017

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Saturday, August 26, 2017

I wake up at 5:30 this morning with a strange combination of intense anticipation and a splitting headache. Anticipation for the road trip that seems to have snuck up on me all of a sudden despite months of preparation; the headache from a little too much alcohol at last night’s party.

My backpack has been packed for two days and is ready to go – along with those of my fellow travelers, a tent, sleeping bags, and air mattresses – into the roof bag that will clip to the top of our car. Ben arranged camping chairs, a cooler, a flat of water, and other necessities into the trunk three days ago. Dwight and Sarah are bringing down backpacks, sleeping bags and pillows. We’re almost ready to hit the road.

I’m emptying out the dishwasher when my cell phone chimes with a text message. Our friends – who are returning from a road trip of their own with a box of food for us – were waylaid near Medicine hat last night. They’re on their way to us with a box of pre-packaged lunches from GoPicnic, and we have their emergency house keys.

ben reloads the now-empty dishwasher and runs it so we have clean dishes when we get back. Sarah ties up the kitchen garbage bag and puts it out for collection next week. Then Ben and Sarah fill the roof bag, rearrange it, zip it up and situate it on the roof of the car. Ben is frustrated because some of the trim has come loose from the car, and his efforts at gluing it back have not been a resounding success. The roof bag is up, its straps as tight as they can be. Jenny is sitting perfectly at my side, waiting for her next instructions.

We’d planned to leave between 6:00 and 6:30, but the clock is inching past 7:00 and our friends are almost here. They arrive with a 1-foot-square box of food for us, greet Jenny, wish us well, and head home to sleep themselves.

It’s 7:30… and we’re off!

 

Edmonton, Alberta – Richmond, BC

Distance: 1200 )plus ????) km

Travel Time: 13.5 hours (including stops and Detours)

 

Ben is driving this leg, with Sarah in the passenger seat (with Ben’s camera bag by her feet). Jenny permits Dwight and I to take over the back seat while she takes the middle. The box of food fits nicely by my feet, a backpack containing a picnic set and miscellaneous food sits on the flor (where Jenny’s feet would be if she were human), and Dwight has taken custody of the “communal jacket” (a leather jacket that Dwight got second-hand, left at my house two years ago so I borrowed it and gave it back to him, and now it seemingly belongs to all of us).

We barely make it to the highway when we hear a very loud hum coming from the roof bag. A subsequent check at a Canadian Tire store (where Ben buys adhesive for the trim), reveals the bag is holding its position nicely, but the ends of the straps are flowing in the wind, causing very loud vibrations.

We all laugh giddily, sing along with songs from Ben’s MP3 player (drowned out by the roof bag’s hum), and take our first selfie in the car near Edson. Snacks are procured in Edson, we stop for fuel in Jasper, then settle in for the long haul to Kamloops. Dwight, Sarah and I catch naps, and I can’t decide whether or not that makes the ride shorter or longer, because I’ve taken that trip before and it’s never ever felt this long.

In Kamloops, we fuel up again and take a break to stretch our legs. It’s hot today and there’s some smoke (though not much) from wildfires burning across the province, so our exposure to outside is minimal. We stop in to a McDonald’s for food, where a woman loudly proclaims that NOW she understands that my dog is a “SERVICE DOG” and then “sssssshhhhhhhhh”es anyone (no one?) who dares to call further attention to us.

Sarah takes over the driving from Kamloops. We’ve been planning to take the Fraser Canyon, since we’ve never taken that route, but due to timing we decide to take the Coquihalla instead (it’s shorter).

Just outside of Hope, Ben looks at Google maps and notices there’s a collision blocking Highway 1 between Chilliwack and Abbotsford. It will delay our trip almost 45 minutes. We make a collective decision to detour around it, driving from Hope to Mission and taking the Mission-Abbotsford Bridge to the highway.

We arrive (exhausted) at my Dad and Stepmother Karen’s house. Their dog, Ayce, greets us noisily, while Jenny runs outside to run and sniff and steal all of Ayce’s toys and taunt him with this fact. Ayce doesn’t care that she has his toys; he DOES care that she’s showing off.

Dad and Karen have set up a Chinese hot pot for us. The food has just started to cook, but it doesn’t take long for six hungry people to crowd around the table, filling their bowls with spicy or savory meat or vegetables or noodles. As soon as the hot pot is empty and we are all eating and laughing, more food is added to the pot. This goes on for over an hour, the tension of the long travel day retreating into the background. We are almost stuffed to bursting, but we can’t say no to little cups of chocolate mousse for dessert.

Ben and Sarah had planned to visit a family friend tonight, but they are all so exhausted that making their way there at 10:00 at night sounds like an unwise decision. They’ve made arrangements to get together with him tomorrow, which is probably better for everyone.

The roof bag is removed from the top of the car and our backpacks are dispersed. We shower, set up beds, and fall into an exhausted happy sleep.