September 28, 2016

Lets be clear about one thing to begin with. My record was unblemished for 23 years. True, in 1993 I took my children to see Jurassic Park at a drive-in theater. True, when the movie ended I neglected to "replace the speaker in its cradle" as warned, drove off, and my window exploded into a million pieces. The children's uproarious laughter was at least partly driven by terror, not entirely by derision. Since that time, not one similar incident transpired -- until this week.

The other day, having carefully checked out almost everything, I pulled forward in the rig and ripped out the "electric input unit," still attached to the electric outlet by its fat cord.

                       Electric Input Unit -- Before

I proceeded directly to Bretz, Inc., Missoula's enormous RV sales and repair complex. "We're scheduled out three weeks," said the service manager. I whined and threw myself on his mercy. "Well, if you want to hang out here for a few days, we might be able to fit you in at some point." My expression must have been something to behold. "You mean live here?"  That was exactly what he meant, but I assume he was moved by my stricken look. "Maybe if you stay close today I can get one of the guys to take a look on his break." So for the next five hours I stayed close, and one of the guys indeed replaced the unit on his break. I watched him do it. It took him ten minutes, but I think it would have taken me the rest of my life.

Anyway, we've been in Missoula now for a week and a half. We found a very economical venue -- Sarah's driveway. Although she is charging us $50 for electricity. I pointed out that we had fed and clothed her for seventeen years, but she failed to see the relevance.

Sarah's Driveway

We love Missoula, and we love visiting Sarah here. There's so much going on that a coherent narrative seems impossible, so here are random vignettes:

As always we've spent some time volunteering in the kitchen at the Povarello Center (POV), Missoula's homeless shelter where Sarah works part time. Missoulians seem to care about people with problems. The POV is a magnificent building of its type; hundreds of meals are served daily.

                                          The POV

Sarah runs the kitchen -- We do what she tells us to do.

Sarah's friend Kim has just opened a new Missoula restaurant, Tia's Big Sky, serving local farm to table authentic Mexican food. Sarah helps Kim with her tamale cart at farmer's markets, etc., and has helped her get the restaurant set up. Kate and I volunteered for a day at Tia's -- Kate washed a million dishes while the crew did food prep for the coming week, and I organized the food storage area.

                        Is this organized, or what?

The food at Tia's is the best Mexican food we've ever tasted -- including in L.A. and in Mexico.

Kim at Work

Kim herself is one of those interesting people we come across in our travels. Born and raised in Huntington Beach (where incidentally I spent every possible moment of my teenage years), at various times Kim has been head concierge at the Newporter Inn in SoCal, bicycled on her own for a year and a half in New Zealand and Australia, lived on a boat in Sausalito Harbor for several years, owned and operated a restaurant in Costa Rica, and purveyed world class tamales from Tia's tamale cart in Missoula. She's intrepid in the face of the risks and challenges of her new restaurant venture. "If it flops, so be it. I own my car and my trailer, and I have skills."

One curious thing about Missoula: The "M." The M is planted firmly above the city on Mount Sentinel -- it's been there since 1908, and signifies the University of Montana (main campus in Missoula). The M haunts me. Anywhere I go in the city, if I happen to look up -- there's the M. Missoula is pretty big, about the same population as Palo Alto with more sprawl. But no matter where you are, there's the M. It's like a giant game of Where's Waldo.

On the rare occasions when you don't look up and see the M, there's always BIG SKY over Missoula.

Lots going on here, year around. One evening we went to the storytelling event that kicked off the Missoula Book Festival. It took place at the Wilma Theater, a Missoula fixture since 1921. The Wilma  includes a 1400-seat hall, a lounge, three banquet rooms, a restaurant, and apartments.

The event packed the place. Almost 1500 people gathered to listen to stories. The storytellers were a mix of renowned authors in town for the book festival and regular people who just had stories to tell from their lives. We enjoyed it a lot, from our seats way up in the rafters.

We had a sneak preview of the upcoming Big Sky Film Series at a one time only, free showing of the documentary film "Obit," about the New York Times obituary writers. It seemed like it might be a little weird, but turned out to be very good. Dead interesting (as they say), and actually funny in places. The film maker was there for a Q&A, and as always in Missoula, it was a full house.

And then there's the "Missoula Monster Project." A group of local artists has teamed up with elementary school kids to do art about monsters (Halloween is coming). The kids drew pictures of their own version of monsters, and wrote descriptions of their proclivities. The artists then created their own pieces, elaborating and interpreting the kids' work. The results are on sale as a fund raiser for art education work.

Pretty cool.

Kate and I attended our first "poetry slam" this week. Sixteen contestants speak their poetry (three minutes max). Judges score them on originality, presentation, and crowd involvement. The venue was the Top Hat, a local bar. Again, the place was packed -- several hundred people, drinking and eating but basically as quiet as mice when it came time to listen to a poem presentation. Until they roared approval. Sarah's friend Brian (know as "Pants" to his friends; we don't know why) was the best, we thought. But he forgot to apply until too late, so he was an unofficial participant. 

A little bit of Pants's poem

Pants is another interesting guy. He's a poet, and also a performer/dancer who has studied Balinese dance. Last spring in Missoula at the University we saw a traditional Indonesian dance piece with gamalon orchestra featuring Rangda, the evil spirit, played by – Pants.  He is also the dessert chef at the Silk Road restaurant, producing the likes of mango habanero sorbet and pumpkin rangoons

(pumpkin cream cheese-filled crispy wontons, tossed in Five Spice-sugar, with whiskey-caramel sauce & honey-cinnamon ice cream). 

Pants with Sarah after the Balinese dance performance

Let's see..... Last week Kate went to a reading by two nationally prominent poets at the Wilma, Kate and Sarah attended meditation sessions followed by Dollar Bowling Night on Monday, and they also took in the Peace festival at the Garden of a Thousand Buddhas, near Missoula last week.

Garden of a Thousand Buddhas

Yesterday we spent some time with our friend Ann, another in the "interesting people series." Ann is a U.S. Mail carrier in Missoula. She also has a huge organic vegetable garden which has spilled over from her back yard to several other yards in her neighborhood, and an aquaponics farm in the basement (you could look it up). In her spare time Ann acts in local plays -- we saw her in a presentation of three one act Beckett plays last spring, and she's now auditioning for an adaptation of "The Glass Menagerie." She's collaborating on a children's book for publication; she and husband Mike are motorcycle enthusiasts who frequently take off on weekend road trips when Ann sometimes officiates at rallies. Ann and Mike are also members of a rock band that rehearses every Tuesday night but never performs.

Ann

Just two doors down from Sarah's house where our rig is parked is Greg Boyd's stringed instrument shop, where Sarah works part time. Greg is a bluegrass musician and entrepreneur -- the shop is a mecca for bluegrass banjo, guitar, and mandolin players. Greg keeps his hand in by jamming with groups that gather in the shop and around the area.

Greg and Kate at a jam session.

A moment from one of Greg's sessions.

Not the least of the interesting people we've encountered on our travels is our very own daughter. During her time in Missoula, Sarah has volunteered with the Search and Rescue team, blazed trails in the mountains with a chain saw brigade, sung in a large community chorus, participated in a national competition with a barbershop choral group, performed at various venues around town with another popular singing group, run the huge kitchen at the Povarello Center, worked with Greg in his shop, made and sold tamales with Kim, among many other things. Now she is embarked on a course of study toward licensure as a prenatal massage therapist. Greg says "Sarah is the most good hearted person I've ever met. Everyone in Missoula seems to know her and love her." We do too.

Sarah's impromptu turn with a local jazz group.

We're about to hit the road again. We couldn't decide whether to head south and east or north and west, so we more or less flipped a coin. Next up: Canada, the Olympic Peninsula, and the Oregon coast. Maybe.

2,400 miles so far.....11 months to go.

Saturday, September 17

We're back from a week almost entirely off the grid. Probably nobody cares much about our grid status, but it's on my mind.

After our KOA respite we returned to West Glacier and hiked another "easy" hike -- along Avalanche Creek to Avalanche Lake. The "easy" designation is a little demoralizing to such as me, but once again after we (I) huffed and puffed to the top of the 2.5 mile trail, rewards were had. 

Avalanche Creek is another surreal sight -- pure turquoise.

Avalanche Lake inhabits another glacier-created cirque, and has an almost prehistoric aspect.

Fresh from our hike, we set out for one of the more remote spots at Glacier, Bowman Lake campsite. The road to Bowman Lake is much like the original Oregon Trail.

Wide enough for one and a half vehicles, the road was rutted and featured potholes every inch of the way, some seemingly a foot deep. It took two hours to negotiate the 20 miles of road. There was a lot of silence during this trip. Kate was thinking "I wonder what he's thinking?" I was thinking "What could she have been thinking?"

Part way to Bowman Lake we came to the town of Polebridge.

We asked someone what was the population there, and after a pause he said "Let's see, with the new family that moved in this year it must be 8."

Polebridge Mercantile and Bakery is pretty much all there is in Polebridge, but it's enough. The bakery is incredible, famous for its huckleberry bear claws. People come from far, far away, braving the rough road. During the hour or so we spent there, probably 20 or thirty people stood in line to buy pastries and bread.

Finally arriving at Bowman Lake, we secured our own tidy little campsite.

It being very late in the season, only 12 of the 46 sites were occupied. It was very quiet, and beautiful.

We've encountered much scenic beauty on our travels so far, but I think we both agree that the highlight has been the people. There's something about camping (I grudgingly admit) that inclines people to come together as a kind of instant community. 

The moment we arrived, while the engine was still running Curt from the adjoining campsite came to greet us. Curt and his wife Denise hailed from Wisconsin, were consummate campers, and were eager to help us get settled. Immediately we noticed that everyone seemed to have raging campfires going, and we had forgotten to bring any fire wood. No problem. Curt introduced us to Dave, the camper across the road. Dave in turn offered to walk with me to the distant part of the woods where the ranger said it was OK to harvest fallen trees for fire wood. He said, "Just bring your camp saw." After overcoming his incredulity that someone existed in the world who would come to a primitive campsite with no wood and who didn't own a camp saw, he offered to loan me his.

So I proceeded to saw off some logs, 

and to carry them, two at a time, the hundred yards or so back to our fire ring.

After I had sawed several smaller logs from the large ones, Dave taught me how to split the wood properly -- making sure not to commit common errors that can cause one to lose fingers, a hand, or a leg. After more or less successfully splitting one piece, I retired from the log splitting game. Dave did the rest of the splitting for me. I just felt I was too good a candidate to lose at least a digit while I learned the trade.

My logs.

My labors were rewarded. Kate built a terrific blaze using her "sqaw fire" technique,

she wrapped some chicken, brussels sprouts, and yams in foil, threw them in the fire, and made the best dinner ever.

Bowman Lake, of course is beautiful. What else is new?

During our time there, the weather finally transformed to the previously advertised warm, sunny, September we had been hoping for. That provided a chance for me to take my birthday present, a very classy inflated raft, for its maiden voyage. After pumping it up (almost as exhausting as hiking), I took it to the shore and launched it.  As I boarded the craft in full view of some canoers, I somehow vaulted backward into the water while the raft shot six feet in the air and landed upside down on top of me.  After finding my way out from under with some difficulty, I re-boarded with complete nonchalance. Luckily no video or still evidence of the event survives.

To say it again, the people were the highlight. 

Curt and Denise (with Dave, right) are Wisconsin through and through -- wearing Wisconsin hats andWisconsin shirts, and sitting in Green Bay Packers camp chairs. They were friendly and helpful and fun to talk with -- although a little smug about the Aaron Rodgers/Alex Smith thing (for those who care).

Dave is an engineer from Rochester, NY who was definitely the mayor of our little community. Dave allowed that he used to be a guy who did everything by the numbers and planned to the enth degree. But now he listens to his inner mind, which tells him what his heart wants to do. Still, he spent a lot of time designing the perfect way to build a blazing campfire without having to saw much wood, and finally came up with his "oven." When I asked to take his photo, he insisted on posing with his invention.

Dave and his invention.


The latest arrivals in our group were Sebastian and Jessica, a German couple from Hamburg. 

They're school teachers who are taking their year sabbatical to travel in the U.S. and Central America. In Germany teachers can take every fifth year off with full pay -- how do those Europeans do it? Anyway, these two bought an old Land Rover a few years ago and spent a long time repairing and customizing it -- and they brought it with them.

They plan to travel to California (northern and southern), Arizona, and possibly Colorado in October and November and would love to meet any of you who might like to meet them. If you're interested let us know and we'll put you in touch.

Our camp hosts, Bill and Sally, were terrific. They have visited 43 national parks. They spent hours with us giving us tips on the best places to go, the best things to see, and also lots of practical advice.

We loved our time at Bowman Lake and we may go back again sometime. Now we're off to Missoula.