Travelogue- Portland, OR to Pinewood Springs, CO

Friday, July 22nd, 2011

Trying to learn calm, attaining it, recovering it after a shock.

Last two days have been busy but not exhausting– due in large part to this inner regimen. Calm no matter what happens.

Just before a trip like this, even the most routine demands are vexing and petty annoyances are grinding; but I try to keep Rudyard Kipling's advice and keep my head.

Today I walk through the gardens on Francis in the high 30s to Les Schwab to pick up the truck, then stay to listen to an army of oil change mechanics shout at each other.

I have to accept the fact that I will never be ready for these trips, not in the way that I envision, and simply act on what I know to be true. Once I leave all of this yelling, loud engines and blaring signs behind it will be better.

Saturday, July 23rd

Powell–I-84–Hilgard Jct.–Granite–Olive Lake.

Pacing around while I convert the 78s that have been sitting in their wrappers since the last trip to the cabin. Ten passes. Eleven. Finally we leave around noon. But I'm determined to take things as they come and it all works out. We stop in Hood River to have a sandwich and decide how to get to Olive Lake. There's a steady stream of cars down 2nd and turning off Cascade to cross the railroad tracks and turn onto I-84. Some of these loom behind me while I try to parallel park near the Hood River Hotel. Of course, the ranger office is closed, so we miss our opportunity to buy a Umatilla Forest map. So we walk up the hill to the Sage Café and find a seat near a window. We decide to take Google's route as the one with the least turns. In the carpeted and air-conditioned café these questions are academic. Later, aching and squinting into a rapidly disappearing sun, we resent every extra mile.

But even now there is cause for quiet admiration– the black wedges of road, the yellow-green meadows and red palisadoes of trunks rearrange themselves as we crackle along and I catch myself wanting to pull to the side and watch the sun shoot through the shoulders of the hills. About eight miles from the lake we see a gray gable and romanesque arch through a gap in the pines. The gap opens on a long, stately stone building with all kinds of mysterious arches and ports– a deserted power plant now maintained as a kind of museum of industry. A large group of solid rural types– perhaps ranchers and their families– stand by their new full-sized trucks and stare at it. I take this as a sign of things to come and prepare myself for the worst: that Olive Lake will be full of such stocky men with their full-sized pickups and over-powered North River fishing boats. We will be forced to turn around and drive 40 miles of gouged, washboard and gravel roads to the nearest campsite– one we had flagged in the salad days of a higher sun and smoother roads.

But all this turns out to be a bad dream: a few miles from the campsite we see a clearing off the road, with space enough for a tent– ours no matter what happens. After a glimpse of a red pickup and trailer through the trees and others peeping out like easter eggs in the grass, I see an isolated spot at a bend in the road. We occupy it and walk down to the lake. There are several others but they're too close to their neighbors– so we pay the fee, use the dank, buzzing vault toilet and walk back up the hill to our site. Before long the tent is standing in a clearing behind the table, Celeste is chopping sausage, peppers and onions and wrapping corn in foil, and I am foraging for firewood and tending a modest but hot fire. We eat our dinner by the fire and have Ransom whiskey and half-melted trail mix for dessert. Above us the sky is a glittering agate beach of stars.

In the early morning Celeste makes a strange, anxiety-filled noise, and I put my hand on her forehead. She stops.

I open my eyes on the leaf-shaped tent door. The shadow there looks like a ragged thief or witch crouched by the tent. A moment later the shadow has spread over the door. I turn over, shut my eyes again.