Ice, shrooms, blueberries, and Baywatch

5/22/16

I awoke in the early morning hours, about 0100, to a van pulling in behind me.  Loud music and headlights filled the cool night air.  The low hum of passing trains and wind and water that had ushered me in to my slumber were now overpowered by two men talking loudly, about how to best level out the parking space.  I took some deep breaths, and looked out my window.  The full moon was still reflecting bright silver on the white caps of the river, pushed up by the wind.  James snored on in his Costco box beside my bed.  His satin pillow pushed out on to the floor and his down comforter covering his snout.  He was oblivious to the activity just behind us.

We started our day again at nine am.  After a walk in the sunshine along the river, and looking at the egress from our present position.  James claimed all of the marketable timber around with his urine.  Then we were ready to go.  We turned to head back to the bus, as a white pickup with a castle and the words Army Corps of Engineers stamped on the passenger’s side door pulled in to the parking lot.  A tall man in a dark green uniform wearing mirrored glasses, stepped out.  He proceeded to hassle the visitors who appeared to be less affluent.  Starting with the gentlemen in a red 15 passenger van, who I met yesterday while he was walking his very yappy 4 chiwawas.  He was a short, pleasant, Native American man.  It looked like he had been living in his van for a while.  To save face he told me that he was on a fishing trip, and that he came every year.  The ranger moved from his space, to the next one and began lecturing a man and his young daughter, who appeared to be 5ish years old, about their camp fire.  He demanded that they extinguish it immediately, despite the fact that it was about 60 degrees and had been raining all night.  The ground was still damp.  I walked towards the bus and opened the door.  “Jump James.” I asked.  He leaped in to the bus, no need to ask him twice, I thought.  He knows the routine better than I do.  I made him his breakfast and drank my coffee.  I sat and meditated on the waves in the river from my steps, finishing the light tan and bitter brewed coffee that I enjoyed every morning.  

After I finished putting away the dishes I had washed from the night before, I was ready for takeoff.  Turning the key dash flashed.  The INLET HEATER LIGHT FLASHED bright amber as the low air pressure buzzer reminded me that I could not leave, until my brakes were pressurized.  I waited for the block heater to do its thing.  The motor quickly rumbled to life, and soon the air pressure gauge informed me, by its lack of buzzing, that the time to depart was nigh.  Mom and dad had texted.  They would meet me at the horse camp, and were loading the horses.  I headed down the road towards the Mt. Adams horse camp.  Hoping that the space I had reserved was still open, and that the masses from the big horse race had gone.  

As we cruised west on highway 14, gliding over the bumps in the road at a comfortable 55MPH, I could not help but smile.  “LIVIN IN A VAN, DOWN BY THE RIVER!” I thought.  It wasn’t so bad after all. I took a deep breath and felt the calm spread through me.  I drove in to the rain, and it began to coat my windshield, the way only the high desert rains can do in the spring.  I missed my past life.  The smell of the rain, and the verga trailing from the oncoming distant clouds, some of the rain from the clouds above impacting me.  It all took me back.  I remembered a trip to Mesa Verde in the spring.  

There we were sitting in the dust covered dark blue 1999 crown ford Victoria, watching the passing lightning storm, and the drenching spring rains of the high desert in the 70 degree heat.  I and Krista pulled the tent up as quickly as we could and threw it in to the trunk as the storm began to rage over the mesa top.  Evacuating only after the poles had given way, smothering us in the soaked tent.  We slept a little bit in the car, and then drove to town and rented the cheapest motel we could find.  Laughing the whole time, and watching the spectacular lightning storm as it light up the sky with horizontal bolts. 

A lifetime ago, I thought to myself, taking another breath and letting the oxygen nourish my body.  My smile came back.  I hadn’t noticed it turn to a somber and sad face to begin with, but it had.  As we turned to move north on the 140 to trout lake, I began to feel the excitement of trail riding.  I missed the freedom.  It had been years since cooper and I, my horse, had ridden together in the mountains.  To ride is like being the wind.  Moving through the forest, experiencing it from a completely different perspective. An almost ethereal one.  Speed, elevation, the feel of the horse, and the synthesis of body and spirit that the partnership brings.  An almost indescribable experience. 

The straight, and long stretching highway continued into the horizon.  Ahead a caravan of new and very expensive rigs approached.  As they passed I wondered what the value of the entire procession would be.  Millions I thought, as a rig worth at least ¾ million dollars passed me by.  These were the high rollers from the race encampment, returning to ‘society’ where they would change from the gods of the forest racing set, to mere mortals. 

We arrived to an overcast and rainy horse camp.  The circus of the endurance race encampment had gone.  There were support staff, and representatives of the racing authority cleaning up and clearing out what was left of manure and garbage.  I paid for three more nights, and one more set of occupants.  Memories of the last time I had gotten to ride with my family flowed found their way in to my thoughts, a slide show of colored memories.  Sights, sounds, and smells all mixed together and still living deep within my consciousness.   

I got back to my bus.  I read a string of texts mom had sent me.  They were not coming. Dad had been trampled by his horse, and things had not gone well loading the other two.  “Is he ok?” I texted back.  The answer was “yes”, but there was no way they would be coming up this week end.  With my dad, pain in the ass that he was, there was no way to tell anyway.  He once walked on a fractured fibula for a week, before finally being pressured to take time off of it, and use crutches.  He might be severely injured I thought.  

Chucks cousin was still in the site where he had been, and the site I had used still stood empty.  I unhitched the jeep, this time there was no dust, and James and I headed to the ice caves.  A cliff bar and a 1L Nalgene bottle of water worked for a late 1500 lunch.  We cruised through Trout Lake, and I looked at the old abandoned ice houses that lined the main road.  One hundred years ago this had been a bustling metropolis.  The hub for ice.  If you wanted refrigeration, Trout Lake Washington was the place to buy.  The ice mined from the caves was distributed to the main cities in the area via covered wagon, and barge down the Columbia River.

We passed a large open air farmers market and sorting house being set up for mushroom, and huckleberry, season.  The local paper had recently run a story on the mushroom trade.  Over the last few years the big sorting houses had brought in lots of trade.  Boosting the local economy over a million dollars.  Mushroom hunting was big business in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, so was the huckleberry picking.  The forest service had even started teaching delegates from other countries, most recently the Ukraine, how to increase marketing of easily renewable forestry products and decrease their reliance on timber.  

The clouds had cleared off, and the sun was shining down upon the road.  I realized how desensitized I had become to the amazing place I lived.  The trees, some of them well over 4ft across, stood like giants in the well-manicured forest.  The recent fires having cleared off the underbrush.  I remembered a paper I had authored on old growth forests in grade school.  The saying “knock on wood” was born in forests.  The Native Americans used to believe that the great old growth trees were home to forest spirits.  To knock on wood was to call upon and honor the spirits bringing good luck.  Once on a big working fire in the Puget Sound I had knocked on wood.  It worked.  From that fire my team got to deploy to eastern Washington for more fires, and more working hours.  Times in my life had changed. I thought.  “Open range” read a bright yellow sign, as I continued to cruse down the forestry road.  

The long dirt and gravel road that lead to the mouth of the ice caves was lined with the giant trees to which I am so habituated, standing hundreds of meters tall.  We arrived at the trail head, and cave entrance, there were several families in the parking lot, and dogs off of their leash.  I pulled off of the road in to a dirt parking area.  

A jacked up ford F350 pulled up next to me.  The rumble of the diesel engine level with the driver’s side window of my jeep.  I got out of the car and let James out, his home made climbing rope leash firmly attached.  I glanced at the truck, and two small children a boy and a girl got out, followed by their parents and a dog.  The white truck sat high up, and had a pair of truck nuts adorning the bumper, punctuated by chrome naked lady mud flaps.  I couldn’t help but smile.  To each his own, I thought, as I turned and walked towards the ice caves.  

James and I explored the caves.  Descending in to them the temperature dropped well below freezing, the icy stalactites hanging like chandeliers, and stalagmites reaching to the ceiling, some of them meeting to form pillars.  My Samsung phone simply would not do it justice.  I met a mother and her son taking pictures.  They offered to take a picture for me.  James was a super spelunking partner.  Following me off leash as I went ahead he waited, I shed light on his path and he followed.    We moved through the caves together, me marveling, and James patiently tolerating my slow and methodical pace while I took what seemed like a million pictures.  I imagined workers quarrying huge blocks of ice from the caves.  Wagons yoked to large draft horses waiting up top to haul away the precious cargo.  What must it have been like? The life of an ice miner.  I thought about Samuel Hills quote.  How far we had come, but not very, I thought to myself.  

My grandmother on my father’s side had told me stories about her childhood on the farm in Idaho.  The dumb wader in the basement was their refrigeration.  Then the ice box was born! Glory be to ice.  Food, milk, and anything else imaginable could be stored frosty cold.  She told me about how she watched in her lifetime the transition from draft horse and yoke, to tractor and hitch.  The changes, less than a few generations in scope, had increased the quality of life for the common person immeasurably.  From riding a horse and buggy to town, to a model T, to a new car capable of speeds that were had never been thought possible.  Mass air transit, modern refrigeration, industrialized agriculture, and an AC powered electrical grid to make it all possible.  How far we had come from knocking on wood and talking to tree spirits, and yet not very far.  

I couldn't help but build a snow man :-)

James led the way as we returned to the massive snow bank at the base of the stairway exiting the maw of the cavern.  

We walked up, and I could feel the thermocline.  From well below freezing to a warm spring day, in less than 20M.  The Trilliums, my favorite and also an edible flower, were in full bloom.  Some people call them an Easter Lilly, but that’s not half as beautiful as their real name.  I looked at them, remembering their bitter and alkaloid taste from the last time I had eaten them.  There were certainly better tasting things to forage in the woods.  Bear grass, the root at least, being a personal favorite of mine.  

“Are you going to the lava bridges today also?” she asked me.  She, was a well-built fair skinned blonde woman, in her early forties.  Her shoulder length hair pulled back in an athletic pony tail highlighting her ice blue eyes.  I would have had the typical reaction to cast a gaze her way, in the spirit that most men do upon a encountering a well-constructed lady, had it not been for a red indent brandishing an indiscernible logo from a head lamp that she had been wearing.  My eyes were firmly affixed to her face and forehead.  Her son, in his 20’s had been hard at work lighting, and photographing the ice formations in the cavern.  “I’m not familiar with that formation.” I told her.  “It’s right down the road at the snow park parking lot.  The trail is only 2 ½ miles long.  There are supposed to be several bridges formed by collapsed lava tubes.  It’s supposed to be amazing.” She said.  “Well, perhaps I will see you guys there.  Thanks for the information.” I replied cheerfully, still gazing at the logo on her forehead. They left, as James searched for the perfect place to poop in the parking lot.  Dogs are very selective and mindful about where they park their feces, I thought, as we walked for what seemed like 10KM looking for a place to poop.

As we neared the snow park, I started to become excited.  I had never been to the formation the blond lady had been talking about. I had spent the best years of my childhood traveling the mountains with my dad, mom and brothers in the 1953 GM City bus conversion dad had put together as an RV.  I had never heard of the lava bridges trail she was talking about.  I drove about 2km to the snow park, the red SUV that the blond lady and her son were driving was coming out as I was going in.  They smiled and waved as we passed each other.  The trail head read 21 ½ miles.  That was a little bit more than I was up to today! I turned around and continued back to camp.

As I looked to the north I could not help but notice the bottom of Mt Adams peeking through the skirt of thick grey clouds it was wearing.   I could not help but imagine climbing the peak which lay beyond the thick attire of the cloud dress.  I thought about stopping at the forest service office as we entered the edge of town.  Pulling in to the lot, I realized that it was closed.  We continued on to the center of town where the fork in the road diverged.  Right to the main highway, left to the mountain. We stopped at the gas station to fill up with premium.  Only in a small town could you still find a pump first, and pay second gas station.  I went in, to pay, but there was no attendant.  I looked at the pump.  I’ll just pump $20 and leave the bill on the counter inside, I thought.  

A white F250 pulled in next to me on the other side of the pump, on its way down from the mountain side of the fork in the road.  U.S forest service was emblazed on the driver’s side, along with a big forest service emblem.  “Dude! What’s up?”  Came a voice from inside the mechanic shop portion of the service station.  A short dark skinned Native American teenager emerged to greet the driver of the truck.  “Nothing much.” said the driver of the truck as he stepped out of the driver’s side door, taking a moment to unload his lanky frame.  He was tall, and in his mid-twenties, tanned, with a facial tan line where ski goggles had clearly spent a lot of time perched above his nose.  His long blond hair was about to his shoulders, and his aloof facial expression reminded me of my dad’s horse Val.  He looked like he belonged on the set of Baywatch playing along David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson, not on the mountain.  His stalking cap had a trendy brim on it, and his forest service attire, all green, matched the logo on the door of the truck.  They talked for a while and caught up on current events.  

It is strange how the evolution of sport transplanted people to places they would never before have gone.  Snowboarding pulled in skate boarders, surfers, and a new young crowd to winter sports, which had been enjoyed before by mostly the prim and proper ski crowd.  Back country extreme sport had pulled the city dwellers even farther out of their element, occasionally landing them on the summits of some of the most gorgeous peaks in the Cascade Range, and ranges all over the world for that matter.

“Excuse me” I said, when they were done catching up.  “Hi.” Said the park ranger with a surfer like half glazed over smile.  “Do you know if the weather is supposed to clear tomorrow? I was looking at doing a hike up the mountain, but I don’t want to end up on the ten o’clock news.” He looked at me for a minute to process what I had said.  “I just came back from the cold creek base camp on the south climb route.” He said.  “The weather is not supposed to get any better for a while, but I heard it will be less bad tomorrow.”  Less bad? I thought.  “Ok. Well thanks for the info.” I said, “Did you see that snow mobile up there, parked at the trail head?  What’s the deal with that?” I asked.  “Cha, that’s been up there a while, I don’t know what the deal is with that.  It’s a nice sled.  Someone just left it up there I guess.” He replied.  “Where I’m from someone would have lit that on fire, or worse by now.  It’s pretty nice around here.” I remarked.  “Yeah, people around here are mostly laid back.  It’s the out of towners who get wound up some times.” He told me.  “Well, take it easy.” I said, as I climbed in to the jeep, and it roared to life.

The weather would not clear, and after a disappointing morning, and some recon driving to plan an expedition for several weeks down the road we would head home.