Tag Archives: travel

(Cape) Flattery Will Get You: A Loop Around Our Olympic-(Peninsula)-Sized Backyard

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As Staycations go, this one would’ve had a hard time failing.

Not CGI

A few months ago we paid for two nights at a rental house at Lake Quinault, only to have our travel companions cancel due to illness.

The view from that house

The renter allowed us to change our dates, so we invited intrepid friends: Ben & Lynn from Asheville, whom we’ve known for decades. They said YES!

Walking in W. Seattle’s Lincoln Park while we waited for their flight, we discovered this altar to LOVE. Seemed a good omen–Brussels sprouts & all.

Since our friends were coming clear across the country, the least we could do was take them all the way around the Olympic Peninsula—a.k.a. part of our Big Backyard, across the Strait from our island.

Ben & Lynn–helping give some scale to the Lincoln Park madrona trees

Starting with the rainforests, at Quinault and the Hoh River, we all re-introduced ourselves to some big friends.

Well hello up there!
Ben & Gretchen agree, things are looking up.

In those wondrous, drippy forests, the enormous conifers–fir, spruce, cedar & hemlock–get most of the attention…

…whether alive or helping younger trees to be alive…

…but shoutout to the hardwoods, okay? The mosses seem to love the maples best.

Is that a hobbit hiding in there?

One of the nice thing about traveling with another couple is…

…couple photos! We tried not to take TOO much advantage.

Moving up the Olympic coastline from Quinault, one has an embarrassing pick of beaches. Beach Three’s our favorite, for its tidepools, but the tide was too high this time of year. So we got to focus on other wonders–like this natural water feature.

Isn’t that the coolest little pool? We needed a 4 year-old to play in it.

Rialto Beach might be the most in-your-face breathtaking, if ya like that kinda thing

I have another photo of Lynn doing pretty much the same thing!

It was hard to leave the serenity of Lake Quinault. The northern shore of the lake was 95% deserted–all those empty vacation homes, what’s up, people?

And the sunrise didn’t hurt either.

But after our two nights, it was on to the furthest northwestern point on the Lower 48: the Makah Reservation at Neah Bay.

Along the way we stopped in Forks for groceries [not pictured: amazing apple fritters] and a hike to Third Beach (not to be confused with Beach 3).

Third Beach is the jumping-off point for a magnificent hike, out toward a garden of seastacks, up & down some rope ladders.

We just stayed put and admired ’em from afar.

Somehow, we did just fine.

Never any shortage of seats on these driftlog-piled beaches!

Up at Neah Bay, more choices: Cape Flattery, the very tippy-tip of the Rez, involving a 1.5 mile round trip walk, or Shi Shi Beach…which would’ve required a 2-mile slog through mud just to get to the start of the pretty stuff.

Guess what we chose?

Cape Flattery is difficult to describe without gothic-novel purple prose: surf crashing upon crags, mist and spray and boiling, roiling, heaving, breathing seas…

…or you could just look at the pictures.

After we’d been there an hour, taking every conceivable photo, the sun came out. So what else could we do but start over?

Fine, if we must…

The best photos from Cape Flattery are videos, which capture all that roiling/boiling/heaving stuff I mentioned. But those are harder to embed into this blog, so I’ll just leave you with this one Lynn took:

Is it just me, or do you also see a whale in that rock? Right?

After our dalliance with the Cape and a lengthy visit to the Makah Museum (which was hosting a holiday craft fair), our crew was ready for a rest. But with the sun making such an unexpected appearance, I simply couldn’t resist one more beach visit, this one a simple drive & stroll on my own, to Tsoo-Yess Beach.

See what I mean about that sun? Tsoo-YESSSSS!

I couldn’t stop taking photos of the least little beachy items, which the sun rendered…let’s go ahead & use the term “glorious.”

“just” a piece of kelp, with foam on it
gargantuan log, turned into yet another water feature/sandbox (oh, where is that 4 year-old?)
Sand arrows? Maybe kind of appropriate, on the Rez

Once more, it was hard leaving Neah Bay, especially with the sun out, and the thought of un-visited Shi Shi Beach. So we’ll have to come back one day…with better mudboots.

Meanwhile, it was on to a midday walk at Dungeness Spit, in Sequim (pronounced “Squim”):

It’s FIVE MILES long! No mud to slog through, but also not the most changeable scenery, eh? So we mostly stayed put.

Our final overnight stop was the ridiculously pretty town of Pt. Townsend.

also nice & quirky

The upper half of town, where the “proper” folks lived (as opposed to the rough & tumble crowd on the waterfront) is famous for its Victorians.

This was NOT our inn…at least not on this trip. I did stay here once with my HS Besties, years ago.

Oh, and did I mention the deer? I counted fifteen on a ten-minute walk through the leafy part of town.

These never budged as I walked past.

Our weather stayed amazingly clear, gifting us both a Mt. Rainier-silhoutted sunrise…

…over the ferry dock…

…and a Mt. Baker mid-morning, looking north from Ft. Worden State Park.

And if you moved the camera a little to the left, you’d be looking at Lopez Island!

Back in Seattle, we had one last hurrah of a meal w/ our adventure buddies, then left them at their airport hotel while we spent the night with Son Two. Our great fortune: he was dogsitting!

Even better than a 4 year-old!

Back home next day, after a week away, The Mate & I marveled at the deeply exotic beauty so close to our home. Then we looked around our little village and saw these community-crafted, recycled-bottle luminaries everywhere…and thought,

Y’know that “no place like home” thing?

I’ll say it again: (Cape) Flattery will get you. So will Tsoo-Yess, and Beach 3, and Third Beach. That whole peninsula is magical –and we didn’t even visit Lake Crescent, or the Elwha River, or the Sol Duc hot springs. We didn’t even drive up to see snowy Hurricane Ridge (road closed).

There’s just SO MUCH.

So if you go? Bring your camera. But try & bring a 4 year-old too.

Gone to Carolina, Part III: Glorying in the Non-Political

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I’m writing this on Election Eve in America.

No, scratch that. I’m writing this BECAUSE it’s Election Eve in America. And even though I went back to my home state of NC a couple of weeks ago largely for political reasons, I’m feeling the need tonight to celebrate a bunch of non-political stuff from my time there.

Herewith, in no particular order: WONDERFUL THINGS IN NORTH CAROLINA.

  1. Red leaves in October. We do have fall color, here in Washington State: gold, yellow, and, uh, yellow-gold. Not red.
Maples!
Dogwoods! OK, you get the idea. I miss red.

2. Rolled ice cream. What the heck is rolled ice cream? is what I asked when one of my fellow canvassers in Greenville started raving about it. So I had to find out.

First, they pour your choice of flavored syrup + mix-ins onto a super-cooled surface.
Next they add cream…chop and stir…
…flatten and spread to the width of that circle, and then–voila!–use that spatula to scrape curls…
of ice cream into rolls of yum, with toppings! Didn’t get the proprietors’ names, but I was so impressed with their delicious innovation. Look them up in Greenville, NC!

3. NC-style BBQ. This place in Greenville is such an institution, the road is named after it.

Turns out eastern NC “cue” is about as good as the Triangle’s…

…but those weird-shaped hushpuppies got NOTHING on Allen & Son’s in Pittsboro.

4. My high school buddy Mimi Herman, whose recent novel, The Kudzu Queen, is winning prizes and taking names…including the name of one of my MOST ADMIRED authors, Luis Alberto Urrea, seen here promoting Mimi’s book!

See what I did there? Promoted two of my favorite people at the same time! Buy their books, y’all.

5. My folks, and the ability to keep coming home to them.

‘Nuff said.

Stressed out? Make your own WONDERFUL THINGS list. It sure works for me.

Gone to Carolina, Part II: My Home State Canvasses ME

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I came to Pitt County, in eastern North Carolina, to ask questions of folks who hadn’t yet voted.

Specifically: Greenville, where the Tar River meanders, in no hurry to be anywhere

“What are the top issues on your mind and heart, heading into this election? Tell me more about that.”

“Do you agree that the economy works better when everyone has access to opportunity?”

“Have you heard of Josh Stein? He’s running for governor.”

In four days of canvassing, I had probably 75 doorstep conversations: most short; some dispiriting, more uplifting. But in the process, I came to feel that my home state was actually canvassing me…ringing my doorbell, asking me these questions.

“What does it mean to be from a place?”

“How much of a Southerner are you, really?”

A: enough of a Southerner to recognize cotton; not enough of one to realize how much grows in my home state!

I combined this canvassing trip to NC with visiting my parents and my three high school besties, in Durham—the wealthier, more educated center of the state. But once I said goodbye to my dear ones, I was 100% in the zone with my blue-state teammates from Common Power (if you want to get involved w/ them yourself, now’s the time! Click here) in flat, cotton-fielded Greenville—a place as new to me as it was to my non-Southern team.

Seriously: was all that cotton here all this time? How come I never noticed it while driving to the beach in the 1970s? Answer: I probably didn’t recognize it w/o the white fluffy stuff.

Common Power’s model is to team with local organizations and become their worker bees. Our org was Advance Carolina,

…and our liaison was Ms. Danisha.

…or you can just call her Ms. Powerhouse

We rotated carloads of door-knocking teams each day. Here’s mine from my second day, taking our lunch break:

The guy who offered to take our picture cheerfully told us he didn’t think a woman was able to lead the country. Sigh.

Even though we were talking mostly to registered Democrats, we ran into some bummers. Bummer #1: Donald Trump came to town, to rally at Eastern Carolina U.

His merch tables were all over town.

Those folks sure like their merch!

Bummer #2: young Black men who told us, A) I don’t believe voting matters; B) God’s in charge anyhow, so whatever happens will be His will; C) some combination of A & B (which I personally took to mean, C): I don’t wanna vote for a woman, I just don’t want to say so).

Some neighborhoods were less well-to-do…

But after a day or so, I got good at turning those interactions into real conversations–by pushing back a little, with humor; by asking more questions; by remembering the mantra “Every conversation an invitation.” And every one of those men hung out and talked with me, so open, so friendly…like we were visitin’ on their front steps.

Because of those conversations, I’m 100% sure I “moved the needle” a little with at least one male voter per day. Multiply that by the # of volunteers out there, and there’s our “margin of effort”: the thing that will make the difference in this election.

…while other neighborhoods were much wealthier. I enjoyed the contrast between these houses with those ol’ cotton fields right behind them. Black families live in these homes.

When Team NC packed up and left, I volunteered to stay an extra day and a half to make up for joining late (because of my family/friends visit). And that’s when the tables turned a little.

Advance Carolina sent me even further east, to Bertie County, a place I knew only because I’ve ordered raw peanuts from this place:

…without ever knowing it’s pronounced “BerTEE County”

There, in the tiny town of Windsor, I was supposed to be a poll watcher, not a canvasser. Only problem: there was nothing to watch.

In fact, I had a good long wait before we even went to the polling place…so I took myself for a walk along their cool swamp boardwalk.

More learning: this is a Tupelo tree! I never knew that’s where the word came from (remember: Elvis was born in Tupelo, Mississippi).

Then, when we finally got to the polls, it was just a bunch of folks sittin’ and visitin’. No scary MAGA pickup trucks circling the block. Locals of both races were greeted, most by name, as they arrived, and thanked for voting as they left.

[not pictured: the polling place; I didn’t care to violate folks’ privacy. But imagine the shade of a nice, big magnolia tree.]

a sentiment most eastern Carolinians would probably agree with, MAGA or not

Me? I was as useful as a fly on the wall. At first I was frustrated. I drove all this way to get WORK done! I could be out there pounding the pavement, chalking up more doors! What a waste of time! Etc.

But as I drove back to Greenville, I considered: those folks were modeling exactly what I had found to be the most effective political work. They were visitin’. Telling stories. Asking how so-and-so was doing. Teasing, laughing. Doing community.

What’s your all-fired hurry? the Bertie County folks seemed to be asking (not that they were paying me any attention). What’s with all the checklists & efficiency? Can’t you see this is how we’ve survived all these decades, here of all places?

Photo from the NC/VA border, ca. 1970 (courtesy musicmaker.org)

Ten years ago, after driving across the country to NC, I wrote a song about my complicated relationship with the South. Most of the lyrics are on the dark side:

Gone to Carolina in my mind, but my heart’s gone mute

One look at a poplar tree and I’m thinking of strange fruit.       

This red clay was my stompin’ ground—hardly a boast

When every cotton field is haunted by sharecropper ghosts.

Chorus:

Yeah, it’s another song about the South, y’all,

Just trying to sort my feelings out once and for all.

How can someone feel so in and out of place?

That sweet sunny south where I first saw the light,

If she’s my ol’ mama, I’m a teenager in flight.

Do I want to hug her neck…or slap her face?

big cypress dressed in flounces of poison ivy

 But now, as I head home to my blue state, filled with new thoughts about my old red—no, purple!—one, this verse feels more appropriate:

The woods are thick with poison ivy and trumpet vine

More tangled up and twisted than this loyalty of mine

For a countryside that’s suffered more hardship per square mile

Than any place I know—sucked up with sweet tea and a smile.

I still doubt Kamala Harris will win North Carolina, even after all the efforts made here. But I do think she will be elected. And if that happens, I’m going to summon all my powers of visitin’ to help get us through the next steps.

This sign’s in Durham, not Pitt County, not Bertie. But we’re getting there!

Donkeys’ Years: Measuring a Life in Farm Animals

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Stevie passed away last week, at the age of 37, in his rural North Carolina home. You may remember Stevie from various posts over the years:

Stevie, World’s Cutest Ass

I missed the chance to say goodbye, arriving at my folks’ farm a week too late. Son Two, who happened to be visiting his grandparents then, did get that chance.

Son 2 (and Son 1) go way back w/ Stevie; this is 11 years ago.

For the first time in decades, there were no furry ears to cuddle–usually my first stop after dropping my bags upstairs.

When my folks bought this land way back in 1959, my German father named their little farm Tierreich, which translates to Kingdom (or Realm) of the Animals. They proceeded to fill the place up with critters, and it’s remained that way for 65 years.

Horses. Goats. Barn cats. Chickens, geese, ducks, guinea fowl. A couple of bottle-fed deer (from the research herd at Duke). Somebody’s sheep who got left here. One tempermental llama, whom only my dad liked.

Not pictured: Salvador Dalai Llama. But here’s Hank the goat

Once or twice we raised an animal to eat–Chuck the steer, Sir Toby the pig–but my father hated killing and butchering so much that we abandoned that path.

LOTS OF CRITTERS. And that was just the barnyard. In the house you’d find: more cats. Canaries, budgies, finches. Guinea pigs, rabbits, gerbils, hamsters, tropical fish, a flying squirrel, and a hedgehog. And roaming between house & yard…two to four Norwegian Elkhounds.

…like Erda, in her youth. Joined by an occasional Standard Poodle.

They ran the place. If you look at the photo wall in my folks’ family room, you’ll see that most pictures include animals. They still run the place.

My family & other animals

But there are fewer of them every time I come home. Gone are Stevie’s various goat buddies…

Like Daisy–pretty, but pretty bossy!

…and soon, all too soon, Erda the Ancient Elkhound will be making her own departure.

Mad props: she made it to 15!

Among the larger animals on the farm, that will leave two smaller, younger elkhounds, and two elderly horses: Trefino, nearly 28…

Seen here with my Amazing Mom, waiting for a new set of shoes (probably his last)

…and the little Arab, Raj, who Mom thinks is even older than Stevie–maybe 38!

Madder props to Raj!

I’m not at all sure that either of these gentle old equines will be here by my next visit, next spring–an arresting thought.

On my walk in the autumnal woods today, I was musing about how that will feel, when I saw this double ruin: old broken springhouse on the left, old broken oak on the right:

How the mighty are fallen

Man-made or Nature-made, everything falls to ruin eventually. Where do beloved pets and farm animals fit in this spectrum? Of nature, yet shaped by humans, all–our dear Stevie, old Erda, old Fino and oldest Raj–are part oak, part springhouse.

And may they all rest in peace for the peace (and joy, and comfort, and rides, and laughs, and hair) they have given.

Heavy Lifting: What Mushrooms Have to Teach Us About Democracy

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For the past couple of weeks on this beautiful island where I get to live, I’ve been enjoying the appearance of some rambunctious fellow inhabitants.

Foot included for scale. If this is a Fairy Ring, those must be some hefty fairies!

I would call them visitors, but it’s obvious that these Short-Stemmed Rusula have been here all along…at least in spore form. Underground. Waiting…for some signal inaudible to the rest of us, which must have been given—suddenly, urgently—about three weeks ago.

Come on up, the air’s fine!

I’ve been walking these trails for fourteen years now. Mushroom seasons come and go, but I’ve never seen anything like these: so many, so huge, so close together.

Hahaha, the forest is ours!!

These shroomy monsters come bursting through the crust of the soil full-sized—no cute babies that you get to watch grow or unfurl. And in their thrust, anything on top simply gets lifted: soil, rocks, even good-sized tree trunks.

Like this.

Which, of course, sets my brain along its favorite metaphorical paths.

Next week, I am heading to my home state of North Carolina to join a host of volunteer canvassers already spread out around the country. They—we—knock on doors, talk to folks, try to energize them to vote and help them over any voting obstacles they might face. Sure, we’d prefer them to vote like us, but the real goal is democratic participation, which is…

…not such a heavy a lift!

The organization that I canvass with is Common Power, founded in 2018, headquartered in Seattle. I’ve blogged about it before; click here to read more about CP, especially if you’re interested in volunteering yourself.

But my point here is how much CP is suddenly needing to act like the mycelia beneath those mammoth mushrooms: it’s calling for heavy lifting.

You mean like this? Oof.

See, before, when I canvassed in 2022, we knocked on “friendly” doors: registered Democrats. People whose only beef with us, if they had any, would be that they’re tired of being nagged, or maybe we woke up the baby when we knocked.

But these days, given the potential suddenly presented by the 1-2 combo of 1) Trump-fatigue (or outright revulsion) among traditional Republicans (especially women) and 2) the big-tent welcome of the Harris-Walz ticket (hey, they own guns!)…these days, I say, CP is being asked by its on-the-ground state partners to knock on doors of registered Republicans. Even homes with Maga flags out front.

Which means my time in NC might be more challenging than I was expecting. (See previous photo)

The other day I attended a training for folks like me, headed into the field. A handful of volunteers fresh from the white suburbs of Philadelphia and some even-whiter counties in Montana had this to say:

“This is about talking to people. We’re all Americans. We have to start there.”

“Every conversation an invitation.”

“After you knock—listen more than you talk.”

“Folks are looking for any excuse to vote for a person whose character they respect.”

They cited example after example of folks who might have appeared “hostile,” based on their yard signs or their vehicles, actually opening up and talking.* Maybe not agreeing to vote for Harris/Walz, but finding common ground on a certain issue with a down-ballot candidate.

*[Sometimes, if a woman answered the door, these volunteers said, she might murmur, “Come back when my husband’s not here.”]

I thought: wow.

That’s a lift I can handle!

I also thought, Not only is this good canvassing advice, this is good human being advice. This is the kind of human I want to be–able to knock on any door and hold a conversation with almost anyone. (Note the “almost”: folks who are outright hateful to your face? Nope. See ya.)

I don’t know where those mushrooms get their power. But I do know that when I head on out there next week, I’ll be using those volunteers’ advice as my own heavy-lifting mojo. Every conversation an invitation.

Let’s see where that takes us, shall we?

BC, Canada = Back to Campering? Best Campsite? Or just Be Cool?

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Maybe I should drop the whole finding-a-better-meaning-for-the-initials-BC thing. It’s called British Columbia, Gretchen. Get over it–and get on with your blog post.

We took Vanna back to BC. Because we Could.

Mt Robson Provincial Park, Kinney Lake

This was what our departure looked like, ferrying east from Lopez Island:

Red sun in the morning…

If that red sunrise was a bad omen, it was a day late. We’d actually tried to leave the day before, but a) missed the 6:15 ferry b/c we didn’t realize how many trucks depart the island on Thursdays, leaving few overheight spaces for our tall Vanna Grey, and b) they cancelled the 9:30.

So we awarded ourselves a “free day” at home and had one fewer day in BC. Best Choice.

We went straight to a park we’ve usually passed by on our way to the better-known Jasper National Park: Mt. Robson Provincial Park. Named for the tallest of the Canadian Rockies.

Fun fact: Mt. Robson’s glaciers are rare “live” glaciers, meaning they are growing rather than retreating. Go Mt. Rob! Go ice!

Despite our campsite’s thick shelter of trees, we still had a view of the mountain’s peak:

Rob, meet Vanna

There’s really only one MAIN hike in the park, so, saving it for our longer day, we spent our first afternoon checking out the falls of the Fraser River. Hard to believe something this bright becomes the familiar brown body of water passing by Vancouver.

Oh, this old thing? It’s just something I threw on.

The weather was dry and hot (for Canada, and for The Mate & me), but that didn’t stop the mushrooms.

OK, who ordered the mushroom bagel?

Too late in the season for most wildflowers–but I did manage to find a few ripe thimbleberries to add to my yogurt.

The hot new flavor!

Mt. Robson appeared to soaked up all the sun he could; can you blame him?

“I mean, it’s probably gonna rain tomorrow…”

Next day we headed up the trail, following the Robson River to its source, Kinney Lake.

Kenny at Kinney.

That incredible mountain seemed to follow us every step of the trail, even in what seemed like a pretty dense forest. I guess it’s just THAT tall (just shy of 13,000 ft…close to Mt. Rainier height!).

Up top, the trail skirts the lake in ridiculously postcardy vistas.

…or ridiculously Christmascardy?

It was hard to make ourselves turn around and go back down. But even more impressive to follow that wild river, imagining the calm from which it came.

After two full days at Mt. Rob, we headed back south on the Yellowhead Highway (5), stopping to check out the small part of enormous Wells Gray Prov. Park that’s accessible to a big van.

Can I just say, it’s worth seeing? These falls are barely 10 miles from the highway.

Wells Gray’s campground was on a rougher road that we wanted to drive Vanna on, so we opted for a private site down below, in the town of Clearwater.

I guess this will have to do.

Next, we left the boreal forest behind, heading back into BC’s dry region, in the rain shadow of the coastal mountains, west of Kamloops. Some of it bore signs of last year’s terrible wildfires.

I believe the word I’m looking for is “stark.”

Not only did we score a campsite at a rafting company that was preparing to close for the season, but the owner let us camp for free.

We had the place to ourselves…including our own personal canyon.

Yes, that’s the same Fraser River as in the waterfall shot, above. Getting a little darker…still blue enough.

Oh, and those trains? There are tracks on both sides, demonstrating the stubbornness of capitalists, as we learned from this sign:

Well, hey. It only took 100 years for us to learn to share.

Here’s where I should note that those trains did a mighty good job of keeping us company. All night. Both directions. Bad Choice.

But how can you not choose your own personal canyon, at sunset?

Beautiful Canyon

Our last day, it was back to the wet: both in terms of ecosystem, and weather. We went to Hope, close to the US border, just an hour or so east of Vancouver. There we discovered an old friend: the Kettle Valley River rail-trail.

Well hello, buddy!

Unfortunately for us, construction work prevented us from riding all the way over to the Othello Tunnels, which we’d visited on a past trip. But Vanna took us there.

This kind of engineering brings to mind words like “chutzpah”…or “hubris.” Or: “really?”

In under a week, we were back home. Too short a trip? Not at all. Vanna’s whole raison d’etre in our lives these days is to keep us reminded what’s in our big backyard.

Better Closer. Back to Canada! By Choice.

Campering vs. Backpacking, Or, One of the World’s Most Strained Metaphors

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Here’s the thing: I ended my last post with a promise to get back to work on my novel.

Here’s the other thing: I did just that. Which is why that last post was almost a month ago.

Which is why I find myself with a teensy dilemma: use my limited non-novel writing time to blog the easy way–basically just “Look at my travel pics, now with witty commentary!”–or do I use this medium to deal more thoughtfully with current events or Big Ideas?

Ooh, did somebody say travel pics?

Then this thought occurred to me: the back-to-back camping trips I most recently took might function as a metaphor for this dilemma of the comfortable, “look, pretty!” vs. the more weight-bearing “let’s think about something” blog post.

Trip One, with The Mate, involved Campering in Vanna Grey.

Vanna, meet Silver Springs Campground, at the base of Mt. Rainier!

Silver Springs Campground proved to be more than hyperbole, as we found this large and yes, silvery spring springing straight out of the mountainside above our campsite.

Cue the Stevie Nicks

We also got an up-close view of where the White River got its name, as some overflow met the clear water of the springs.

On your right, ladies & gentlemen: the White River.

But…you see what I’m doing here? I’m narrating pretty travel pictures. How easy, how convenient! Just like Vanna Grey. Drive, park–congratulations, you’ve arrived. Nothing much to think about.

And this view? We just drove up here. Twice. Because we could.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying campering is shallow. Beauty abounds, even from a camper, and beauty is moving.

Especially at sunrise.

What I am saying…I think…is that campering, by dint of being so easy, does not tap into the kind of thoughts that spring from having one’s body fully committed. Yes, we went on some fabulous day hikes, which made me think about stuff like…

…why do I insist on making The Mate take my picture with flowers all the time?

…or even ponder the impact of global warming on the nose of a glacier…

Oh dear…pretty sure last time we were here, the ice reached all the way to that gravelly wall 😦

But putting your entire camp + food on your back and humping it up a pass, as I did with my Ironwoman Goddaughter Allison…

…who, lucky for me, takes even more pictures that I do!

…that kind of effort delves into a whole different level of thought. (Which does indeed feature a good deal of “what’s for dinner?”)

Why is this? I wonder. Is it that being away from vehicles leads to deeper, more stripped-down conversation?

Hayes Lake, near Kulshan (Mt. Baker). Allison pumping water in the background

Is it the braggadocious joy of thinking “I got myself to this beautiful place!”?

…where your Ironman T-shirt matches the wildflowers?

Is it the relative quiet of roadlessness that allows one to sink more deeply into the stark reality of melting glaciers?

…which still look so stinkin’ pretty as they melt

It’s not like you can’t see cute animals while campering.

Someone say cute animals?

Of course, it IS true that some wild animals are generally further out of reach than others. We were actually pretty shocked to meet this many mountain goats only a few miles away from the Mt. Baker ski area parking lot.

But generally speaking, while I spent nearly equal time campering as backpacking a couple weeks ago, the backpacking trip felt more CONSEQUENTIAL.

Meaningful. Harder but more rewarding.

Yes, this patch of paintbrush was easily accessible from the parking lot…
…but this half-frozen tarn was not.

Now, August is coming to a close, and so, for me, is backpacking season. Because we now own Vanna Grey, The Mate and I will continue to “camper” as the weather turns harsher.

Hopefully with occasional vistas like this of Mt. Shuksan. Look carefully: you can actually see the road & parking lot in the background!

But as the political season enters its autumnal stretch, I feel the need to use this blog for more than showing off trip pictures. (Even though I LOVE showing off trip pictures.)

So much is happening in this country. So much to think about, talk about, work for. What joy to throw some of that in my blog-pack and see where we end up. See you down the trail!

Consequential? Is she talking about me?

About That Trip to Sacramento: Oh, So THAT’s What Everyone’s Complaining About

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My 89 year-old mom’s record-setting performance on the track–mid-July in triple-digit heat–was the culmination of rare summer road trip for me & The Mate. Here’s the rest of the story.

What?! I’m not the one who has to run a 1500!

It was hot. That SO goes without saying…except for people like me & The Mate, who live on an island surrounded by a nice, chilly Salish Sea. On Lopez, our summer temps rarely make it into the 90s. So this drive was a bit of a shock to our systems.

First stop, seeing old friends in Eugene…where it was a mere 94.

I resisted the urge to plunge into the Willamette, but later I regretted that choice.

As we drove, The Mate & I made use of our Toyota’s A/C. Again: DUH. But again: We are NOT summer road-trippers. We haven’t used A/C regularly in DECADES. I can see how that stuff might catch on.

Next up: Redding, CA.

Our favorite bike path along the Sacramento River, which we rode @ 7:30 am, due to the 104-degrees we’d driven into town on.

Down in San Jose (more old friends), the mercury fell to a blessed 80 or so. Thanks, San Francisco Bay! We rode along Los Gatos Creek, where I was heartened by this sign at a homeless encampment:

Of course I wouldn’t violate the privacy of the inhabitant, but she didn’t mind me sharing her sign.

California never ceases to offer up visual encapsulations of itself. Like these citrus fruits left to be picked up by the San Jose Sanitation Department:

When life gives you lemons…have them driven to the landfill???!!

From San Jose, we made our way up to Marin County, where our Oakland cousins scored a dog-sitting gig for the summer. Well…we THOUGHT it was a score, till we learned that Marin is actually a good 10 degrees hotter than the northeast side of the Bay. Guess all that water really does the trick.

Pretty, yes…but pretty HOT, being so far from that nice big body of water!

Walking was better in the evening, we found.

…especially with a full moon rising next to Mt. Tam

Next up, of course: Sacramento, and Mom’s meet, which you’ve probably already read about. Thank GOODNESS her final event ran @ 7:30 in the morning…after which we hugged, took pictures, made sure her plans were secure, and hit the road before the sun could get too high.

Quick, back to Redding!

the famous Sundial Bridge, where the bike path takes off from

Get the bikes out, there might still be some shade!

Amazing how much difference shade makes when it’s 100 out.

This time I played it smarter, hopping off my bike to stand in the nice cold Sacramento before riding on.

Ahhhh….

In the week between our southbound & northbound rides on this path, though, wildfires had ballooned. Compare the sky in this picture with the one near the start of this blog post:

Oh jeez. Get me back to my island!

Worn out from a hot day of driving (but energized by a certain lightning bolt of political news, July 21), we spent the night in Roseburg.

*not pictured: Roseburg & their darn good pizza

Our final day took us back into Washington, where the sky clouded up, the temperature sank back to a nice, “normal” high 60s…and we celebrated by going for a long walk down the incredible boardwalk of the Nisqually Delta.

Well yes, that’s the Delta (reclaimed for Nature, from previous dikes)…but what’s that about a boardwalk?

Oh, you mean THIS boardwalk.

We spent that night catching up with Son Two, enjoying wearing shirts with sleeves again, and snacking on quintessential Pacific Northwest snackage in his Seattle-area neighborhood:

YES. Home.

Now, in case you’re wondering, “Gretchen, didn’t you just blog about earning your MFA in Creative Writing and working on your novel? so what the heck are you doing road-tripping? Shouldn’t you be getting BACK TO WORK?”…Mother Nature had the same idea.

Waiting for the ferry to take us back to Lopez, I took a walk along the shore, where I was greeted by these stunning goldenrods. Since “Goldenrods” is the name given to my graduating cohort at Antioch (they’re doing flower names now–Hydrangea, Iris, Lilac, etc.), I took these flowers as a sign.

Get back to work, Gretchen!

This blog post is a down payment. Back to the novel tomorrow! But good luck out there, all y’all non-islanders out there dealing with “normal” summer heat. Stay safe, stay cool. (Go wading!) And thanks for riding with me.

Mamma Mia: My 89 Year-old Mom Sets An American Track Record

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(Spoiler alert.)

Also, I need to correct a mistake from my previous post, wherein I stated Mom was going for the WORLD record. That one, turns out, is WAY beyond reach (a ridiculous 3+ minutes faster, currently held by an amazing Japanese woman). But the US 1500 meter record for women 85-89? That’s the one Mom had in her sights.

Yes, my attendance at the US Masters Track Championships in Sacramento was part of a mini-road trip with The Mate. But you don’t want to bother with the road trip now, right? Let’s cut to the chase.

That record: 10:55. One year ago, Mom ran 11:06. But she’s been training.

Up first, though: the 800, not her best event (Mom was always more of a 10k or marathon-type gal). It was scheduled for Saturday afternoon. At 2:15. In Sacramento. In July.

At race time, it was 104.

*not pictured: bleachers that were too hot to touch, let alone sit on*

That’s Mom’s friend Jackie–they’ve known each other for over 8 decades. (The Mate actually took this photo next morning…it was MUCH too hot for posing.)

Actually, she was lucky–by 5 pm, the temp had risen to 109. And we were pretty shocked to find that the organizers had no cooling tents set up for the athletes–no fans, no misting machine. Nothing. Welcome, Senior Athletes: you’re on your own!

“Are we really doing this?” (actually this is a post-race pic, I just couldn’t resist)

But Martha Klopfer is smart; she played it cool. Stayed indoors all day. Stayed hydrated. No need for warmups, right?

Let’s get this party started. And FINISHED. (They run all the women, 70 and up, in the same race.)

For the 800, I took videos, not stills, but really I was just praying Mom’s North Carolina-based heat tolerance would be kicking into high gear. And it did.

She ran a 5:33…breaking the American record by 35 seconds! HOWEVER, that woman in the green up there? That’s Lynne Hurrell. She ran 23 seconds FASTER, and she’s the same age! So extra kudos to Lynne, who got the gold.

Next day, thank GOODNESS, the 1500 was scheduled for 7:30 in the morning. There was SHADE on the campus of American River College, where the meet was held.

Where were you yesterday?

The 1500 is harder to keep track of (no pun intended), as it starts on the far side of the track, just past the curve, so you can’t quite tell when they’ve run exactly one, or two, or three laps. I spent the race alternately narrating the action to my dad and my sister on the phone in NC, and cheering so loud Mom said she could hear me on the back stretch.

Coming around the turn for the bell lap. (Both those ladies she’s passing are in the 80-84 group.)

Her splits seemed even…but slowing slightly. Would she break 11:00? Not without a kick.

Mar-THA! Mar-THA!!!

Just in case it made a difference…I screamed myself hoarse. (j/k; I couldn’t help it.) And Mom crossed the finish line in 10:54.45. She broke the record by less than a second.

YES!!

I had to give up running before 60, thanks to my knees and back. My mother has literally outrun me. When I’m asked about her ongoing running prowess, I sometimes say, “Good genes, good habits, good fortune.”

But usually I just say I how proud I am to be the daughter of such an inspirational lifelong athlete.

Way to go, Mom. Now how about those 90-94 records, next year?

[Next post: the actual road trip!]

“Sit In This”: Best MFA-dvice Ever

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“Sit in this.” That’s what Lisa Locascio Nighthawk, Dean of Antioch LA’s Masters in Fine Arts in Creative Writing program, told us graduates the day before our ceremony.

Here on Lopez Island, some of my own writing group, the Women Writers of the Salish Sea, had the same advice: “Celebrate your achievement. Write it all down–everything you did!”

I decided to heed all of them. I sat in my achievement for a whole week. I wrote it all down, on a big piece of butcher paper. And I celebrated–with my writer friends, and with cake.

Note my grad tassel as centerpiece

The cake, I made. But the Orange Twists were a special request from me to Iris Graville–as noted in her memoir Hiking Naked: A Quaker Woman’s Search for Balance.

Here’s what’s written on that butcher paper:

  • 17 chapters—232 pages, 67,000 words—of my novel-in-progress Who’s a Good Girl (revised multiple times)
  • 50 books read (mostly novels; some short stories, nonfiction, and craft books)

  • 30 x 3-page literary analyses of fiction

  • One 5-page research paper

  • One 20-page research paper

  • One dozen (approximately) poems translated into English, plus commentary on peers’ translations

  • 20 (approximately) critiques of peers’ 20-page fiction submissions in workshop

  • 20 book group discussions (of which I led 4)

  • 80 weekly email check-in discussions

  • Five 3-page self-analyses of learning

  • Five 7-page summaries of learning from residency classes

  • One 30-minute PowerPoint presentation/seminar
  • One 12-minute public reading
  • Four 3-page annotated bibliographies
  • One 12-page annotated bibliography
OK, enough of that! Let’s eat.

While we were noshing & drinking, my friends asked me to reflect on my main takeaways from the past two valuable, packed, and expensive years. Here’s what I came up with:

  1. My instinct to immerse myself among a community of diverse writers–diverse in EVERY SENSE of the word, from age to class to life experience to race to gender identity, and more–was 100% correct. As a writer, I need to be around people different from myself. (As a human being, it doesn’t hurt either.)

[not pictured: all the diversity at AULA. I don’t like violating people’s privacy in showing photos]

2. Confidence is good, in art. Pride is not. I had to have the latter stripped painfully away before I could soothe the raw spots by applying the former. That’ll be a lifelong engagement.

3. Novelists need the help of other novelists. Poets and nonfiction writers can offer EXTREMELY valuable critique. But in the end…see sentence one.

OK, we got it. You worked hard. Now, about that novel-in-progress…

After a week of “sitting,” though, I’m ready to get back to work. Of course, it’s high summer now–a season that always has other plans for me than writing. But the last thing I learned will get me where I need to go, and that is:

4. Writing is writing. JUST DON’T STOP.

(You other writers: right? Feel free to chime in here with your own Writerly Takeaways.)