The Great American Road Trip - Driving to Missoula via Walla Walla

Continued from The Great American Road Trip - Exploring Hood River.

Interstate 84 winds along the Columbia River, wedged between the water's edge and some dry, sometimes rocky, sometimes rolling, hills. 

Interstate 84 heading east from Hood River, along the Columbia River.

After grabbing some coffee downtown, we hit the interstate and left the green, fertile valley of Hood River behind. It was about three miles outside of town, with the dead, brown/gold grasses blowing in the wind, barely clinging to the soil, when the true dryness of the area really hit me. Was the lush Hood River Valley, just a manufactured reality of smart irrigation? If so, why does this bother me?

The dry countryside outside of Hood River.

The road continued and the climate seemed to become drier and drier. We discussed our impression of Hood River. The same picture kept creeping into my mind, one where I am at some social gathering and I meet a new person that I think is really cool. I'd like to become friends with this person, but I am starting to get the impression that the only reason the person is talking to me is to be "nice" and that they have no interest whatsoever in becoming friends. I'm not sure why this keeps running through my mind, everyone I met in Hood River was really nice, although nearly everyone was a transplant (mostly from Portland). As I ponder this, we turn off the interstate on Highway 730, through farmland taking us straight into Washington.

A farm along Highway 730.

We make our way onto Highway 12, deeper within the dry, dry countryside, on our way to Walla Walla. From my days of working in a fine wine store, I've often tried to imagine this Washington wine country. So far, it wasn't exactly living up to the picture in my head. First, it was kind of hazy. Second it was really, really dry and there were no vineyards in sight. I reminded myself that Napa got really dry this time of year as well and eventually I did start to see some vineyards, spreading some green across the golden hills.

The countryside outside of Walla Walla.

We stopped in the small city of Walla Walla, Washington for some lunch and as we walked around downtown, the country, local charm began to grow on me. We ate a local place, called Stone Soup and had simple sandwiches. There were normal, everyday people, going about their business, eating lunch on their lunch break, making a living. Then there were tourists eating at nice looking restaurants, enjoying their time off and probably getting ready for the evening wine tasting. Here, in Walla Walla, it seems that most wine tasting starts after 5 p.m. In fact, I had a hard time finding a place that was open where I could buy a bottle of local wine.

Downtown Walla Walla

Walla Walla

Walla Walla

I walked into a place called Coffee Connection for an post-lunch cup of coffee. As soon as I walked in, I felt out-of-place. It looked more like a sit down place, where you order a meal, not a coffee to go. A middle-aged man with nearly mullet hair, walked up to me and said, "Hi Sweetie, table for one?" Yuck. Creepy. I generally hate being addressed this way except by a very, very, select few people. I inquired about coffee to go. "Sure honey, you can get a coffee to go. We have a special on chai today, wouldn't you like to try a Vanilla Chai instead sweetie?" he said. No, I would not like a freaking vanilla chai, I thought. Instead I told him I would just take two coffees to go. Somehow he managed to work in honey or sweetie into every single sentence.
"Room for cream, sweetie?"
"Do you want a straw, honey?"
"Is that going to be all, sweetie?"
"Here's your change, honey."
"Bye sweetie, have a good day!"
The guy was creepy. He was not just the older gentlemen polite guy, he was creeping me out and I couldn't get out of there fast enough. On top of that, the coffee was a small step better than most gas station coffee water.

Charles Smith Tasting Room in Walla Walla.

Fortunately, we found another coffee shop, dumped our nasty coffee for replacements, just before I sauntered into the Charles Smith tasting room. I bought a bottle of inexpensive Cabernet Sauvignon just as Poppy burst into the tasting room, hot on the trail of another small dog. Apparently dogs are not only welcome, but encouraged. After a lively play session, all throughout the tasting room and back offices, we left and hit the road again.

Leaving Walla Walla we drove through amazing, huge, rolling hills of golden wheat like I have never seen. We drove through tiny little Washington towns with quaint downtowns and well-kept historic districts. It was inspiring to see the pride in the small town life.

Outside of Walla Walla

Eventually, we crossed the Snake River (I think) into Idaho, which led us into the Clearwater National Forest, along the Lochsa River (I think) and over the Bitterroot Mountains. It is a beautiful, wild place and the river was so intriguing that we had to stop in order to try to lure Poppy into the shallow waters. She was hesitant, but tip-toed cautiously into the water to gingerly pull her ball from the river.

Highway 12 in Idaho.

Poppy in the car.

We reached the summit at Lolo Pass where we crossed into Montana as the daylight began to disappear. Eventually the mountains fell away and we were left in the wide, rolling Montana countryside south of Missoula. After a bit of a fiasco about the room we rented (more about this next time), involving a wrong address, a station wagon with missing windows and a Beware of Dog sign, we settled into our rented room (via Air B&B) and then went straight to downtown Missoula for a very late dinner.

Beers and later, dinner, at Tamarack Brewing Co. in Missoula.

Summer Road Trip - Drving to Salt Lake City

Last view of Redfish Lake

Rose had set the alarm for 8am, so we awoke at a more reasonable hour than the other mornings. It was another beautiful Idaho morning. We packed up our camp, I had to go through some of my stuff and make sure I was packed properly for my flight for New York that night. We left the camp at 9:20am and drove the short distance to the lake beach park where we took some departing photos. Then we drove down the street to the tiny gas station/convenience store/laundromat/showers. After fishing out $2 in quarters, I picked a shower stall and showered in the somewhat miserable spray of water. The water was hot, the shower clean and I hadn't showered in three days so it was wonderful. Unfortunately, 5 minutes for a shower is not long enough when you have long, thick hair that smells strongly of campfire, so when my time ran out, the hot water stopped and the flow of water slowed to a heavy trickle, which was still good enough to finish rinsing. I felt confident that whoever was sitting next to my on my red-eye out of Salt Lake City would not be offended by strong camping odors.

We both drove into Stanley and parked on the dirt road downtown for breakfast at Stanley Banking Company. We sat on the porch where the Idaho sun was beginning to warm up the day. We had the last of our chats for this trip as we ate sourdough pankcakes and drank good coffee.

Rose. At the beginning of May, this year, Paul and I were in Bend, Oregon for a workshop. It was there that I first met Rose. There was a continuation of this workshop, with a small group of eleven people in Bend, Oregon. It included myself and Rose. Our workshop group has met a couple of times this summer, so we have gotten to know each other although, not the details. After the last meeting, we were talking by our cars at night and I mentioned this trip and it was then that the idea of Rose going with me was born. Rose is a chef, raised on Maui and living in Bend, Oregon with her boyfriend Stephen. Rose and I are the same age. Rose is nice. I don't mean that in the polite way, I mean it in the real way, she is a nice person. Rose is fun and funny. She is interesting and smart and honest and real. She is thoughtful and efficient. Rose has traveled and adventured widely. I could not have asked for a better traveling companion. I am grateful for her company. Now, she is going back to Bend and I am driving to Salt Lake City. We are parting ways.

Rose has been listening to the audiobook, The Swan Thieves, while driving in her Eurovan. On our stops she would hand me a CD she had finished in the 18 CD series. She gives me CDs 4 through 9 to listen to on the rest of my road trip. We say goodbye and hug. I get in my purple Honda and drive down the dirt road of downtown. I turn right on Highway 21. A minute later I see Rose in her Eurovan in my rear view mirror, she makes a left onto Highway 21 and then disappears out of view. I am sad to be leaving Stanley, such an amazingly beautiful place, but I feel fortunate at the same time.
START: 1016 miles.
At Highway 75 I turn right to go south. As I go, I stop a few places to take some photographs. The moutnains and trees start to thin a little. After about 30 minutes an antelope crosses the street in front of me. I stop the car. I back the car up into a gravel area off the road. I get out and attempt to get some pictures of the herd of antelope but by this time they had kind of run off. The road heads up and up and near the top I can see the valley I had just driven through, below me.

Antelope

The Valley Below

Downtown Ketchum

After all the uphill driving, the road begins to wind and turn downhill and I pass many bicyclists. I notice there are many game crossing signs, which worry me a bit after my near run-in with the antelope. After many miles I reach the town of Ketchum. This ski town seems lively, charming, drier and much bigger than Stanley, in fact, it has at least three stop lights, but it is hard to compete with Stanley. After Ketchum, the road descends into Sun Valley, which is dry and expansive and becomes more and more remote. There are farms the extend towards the brown mountains which move further and further away. The trees change from pine to some other kind of silvery green tree. I pass through the town of Belleview which has a Western feel, quaint and empty. The Main Street is wide, four lanes wide, and is also empty. I think maybe Main Streets should be narrower, encouraging people to walk, creating a community.
I continue on Highway 75 further and further from human occupation. I start to get a little worried that maybe I somehow missed Interstate 84, which I am supposed to get onto eventually. I pull off and consult my road map and all still seems to be well, so I continue on the road, which travels through a lava field. The road stretches on and on and seems to be going nowhere. I still have 1/3 tank of gas, but now I am getting a little nervous. There is very little traffic, no services and it is very, very hot and dusty. The road flattens further and becomes more desolate and desert-like. Eventually, the desert ends and farmland spreads out before me, golden and green fields.

Dry Open Road

Lava Field

I am excited to see signs for Interstate 84 and once I get on the highway, I get off to fill up on gas. This is Magic Valley. I pull into a covered gas station and enjoy the shade relief from the intense sun. Despite the dryness, the air smells fresh, probably from the golden hay/straw field next to the gas station. There is even a mild breeze which feels nice after being so sweaty in the car.  I feel a little silly bent over in my car making a sandwich from what's left in my cooler, but I will have to throw all perishable foods out once I get to Salt Lake City and I don't want to eat any gas station food. The stop from driving, in a way, stops the thought stream in my mind, watching the passing landscape. Instead, I feel like a kid on an adventure, even scrubbing my windshield and making a sandwich, aiding my adventure is kind of exciting. 

Dust Storm

I get back on Interstate 84, which travels through a few farm areas and then flattens out long and wide in front of me. The hills spread out and become less brown, more golden, less dusty. Along the highway are signs for deer migration and game crossing, which seems odd to have these along an interstate but it is getting very, remote. The sky field of brilliant blue and puffy clouds is huge and sweeps down to the earth pastel with yellow, orange, light green and brown. The light is different here, brighter. The wind picks up and I see a dust storm alongside the road.

This land reminds me, that there is something bigger than myself that is flowing and I am not watching it, I am in it, we are all in it, but now I see that I am in it, flowing with it. Instead it throws me out of  this dingy corner that claims to be it and feels untrue. A road trip washes my windshield and I get clear again and when I get home it gets dirty. Often, when I am home, I am not always flowing with it, I am fighting it, this is why I like road trips, they can help you see.

At 1,254 miles into my road trip, I cross into Utah in the middle of nowhere, a sign and a change in the pavement tell me this. After quite some time, the vastness closes up as the mountains crop up larger and closer and I see rocky mountains ahead and I hope I am close to Salt Lake City. Below me, a valley flattens out amongst the rocky mountains with houses, farm fields and streets neatly lined, nothing is dirty or messy or cluttered. The air smells perfumey like wildflowers, but I don't see any, only the farm crops in their neat rows. A large body of water appears to my right, the beginning of the Salt Lake. At a rest stop, I call my friend Mandy to let her know I am running a little late. She is going to feed her kids dinner before I arrive. I hope I won't hit too much rush hour traffic. I continue on.

Nearing Salt Lake City

Salt Lake City

Driving into Salt Lake City, the rocky mountains have turned more into green, but not all they way to the top. At the top of the mountains is an electric blue with a long fluffy layer of puffy clouds and between them they reach toward each other, the clouds melting into electric blue, every few minutes I see lightning. The sky becomes dark and in the distance is the dark silhouette of the mountains that surround Salt Lake City.

I get to Mandy's house and meet her husband and four kids. She has some dinner for me, tacos, and we sit and talk while she keeps an eye on her one-year old, Elinor. The other kids are older and are good at entertaining themselves. Mandy and I went to high school together and were good friends, our lives are very different from each other's now. It is good to see her, she seems the same and that is nice. I organize things in my car, throwing away some food and getting my bags together. Mandy's mother comes over and it is nice to see her too. I always liked her. We talk in the garage as it begins to rain while the sun is going down and a rainbow appears in the pink sky.
Mandy drives me to the airport. We say goodbye. I check in and get to my gate and find a power outlet. There is much grumbling around me, I guess the thunderstorms had caused the cancellation or delay of many flights. A skinny, older man with a funny, pointed moustache complains to me about his canceled flight to Boise. He must go there to help his 90 year-old mother with her ranch. A woman with her teenage daughter, returning from a trip to Alaska, is trying to strike up a conversation with anyone around. She is alert and listening, eavesdropping, ready to comment or question at any opportunity that she can. She is nice and maybe, she is lonely. She lives in Albuquerque. The boy next to me is in eleventh grade and his father is a commercial pilot for Delta so he gets to fly all the time. He is returning from a trip to Portland where he was there for one day, to pick blackberries. He helps me connect my Mac to the internet, since I haven't yet figured out how to work it properly. They all swap stories about how they are stranded in the airport and soon realize that I may be the only one amongst them getting out of town on time.
There seems to be something lost between thought and speaking. Things that sound eloquent in your mind, in your thoughts, sound less so when spoken or written. Maybe this is why I like photography, it is so much easier for me to catch a glimpse as I saw it, for a moment or how I imagined it. 
END: 1384 miles.

Stanley, ID to Salt Lake City, UT:

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Summer Road Trip - Stanley, Idaho

I am still lying in my bed in the Eurovan when I hear Rose say softly, from the top bunk, "I don't think I am going to hike today. I think I am going to relax by the lake, maybe swim and read. But if you want to go on your hike, I hope you still go."  I am relieved. Not relieved that Rose is not going or that I want some time to myself, but I am relieved she is doing and saying what she wants and does not feel obligated to accompany me on the hike.
After some cereal and tea I set about prepping for my day hike in the mountains and Rose starts her detailed pasta sauce clean up in the van. I feel a little bad that I am not doing more to help her, but it is hard to have two people in that small space. Since we have been staying up late, we have also been getting up late. Its after noon before I leave the campground. I drive back down highway 75 north toward the small town of Stanley. I have not yet seen this countryside directly outside Stanley in the daylight.
Stanely. Stanley, Idaho. Oh, I am... speechless.
There is no way to adequately, accurately describe Stanley. Words, photographs, even film, could never explain this place or give you a sense of it. It is not just a place, it is an experience. To know it, you must be part of it, to be in Stanley, to absorb all of it, occupying all the senses, even those senses beyond the five we know. I can not know how someone can come here and not be awestruck. But since you are not in Stanley and maybe have never been, I will attempt to describe my time there with some photographs and with words I might manage to find.

The river along Highway 75

Stanley. Stanley, Idaho. Where was I? Oh yes, I was driving north on highway 75, four miles south of town...
About one mile south of Stanley, on highway 75, the rolling green mountains dotted with pine trees are on my right. The Sawtooth Mountains, tucked behind pine forests are on my left. I stop at a pullout to gaze in awe at a wide, shallow river flowing between the road and a green pasture along the hills.

Downtown Stanley

I turn left onto Highway 21, right on the edge of Stanley. Stanley's population is about 100 people, that is, permanent population. I guess quite a few people only live in Stanley in the summer. Stanley has no traffic lights and a few stop signs. Highway 21 goes right through Stanley with a few buildings on either side. Turning left onto a very wide, dirt road and then a quick right at the stop sign will bring you to downtown Stanley, another wide dirt road with a scattering of shops and restaurants on either side. Stanley is two blocks deep and behind it, green pastures stretch out flat to the Sawtooth mountains to the south. To the north, the river and a few houses reach toward the rolling mountains.

View just outside of Stanley, looking south

View just outside of Stanley, looking north

I drive downtown and pull into a parking spot in front of the Stanley Baking Co. to get some coffee. The end of the road ends at a gate with a road extending beyond it into a field. I order my coffee and chat with the cashier, she is a young woman who is cheerful and lives in Stanley in the summer. I find that people here are nice, they wave to every car they pass on the road and say hello if you happen to pass them while walking. My coffee is really good and I get back in my car to drive towards the trailhead of my planned day hike.
My planned hike is the Iron Creek trail to Sawtooth Lake, a very ambitious day hike, especially for someone getting such a late start, but I am here to do this hike. I drive the three miles outside of Stanley on Highway 21 until I reach the Iron Creek road, a rocky, pot-hold filled gravel and dirt road. It heads up at a slight incline and I drive slow so I don't get a flat tire. As I round a bend a large animal is in the road and it moves into the field and behind a very broken fence. It is an Elk, I think. It almost looks slender and graceful enough to be a deer, not stocky like I would expect for an elk. I stop my car and watch the herd graze and slowly make there way across the pasture. The seem mildly interested in me and look up occasionally from their grazing to check out what I am doing.

The road to the trailhead

After a bit, I continue up the road passing another dirt road turn and then a tiny campground full of trailers and tents. I enter a forest and round the bend only to find several utility trucks and a huge backhoe digging and working on the dirt road. The have a small, feeble, wooden barrier up with a sign saying "Men Working". The left side of the road seems to be completely blocked. Some of the men glance up at me and then continue their work. I immediately do a many-pointed turn to turn around and head back down the road I came up.

Field of cows and the Sawtooth Mountains

My feeling is panicked, bitter disappointment. Disappointment, because I had driven two days to do this hike. Bitter, because it looked like they had just started working today, so if I had gotten there earlier in the day I might have gotten through. Panicked, because my bitterness and especially my disappointment were so overwhelming that I could barely handle it. By panicking, I put a lid on the other two feelings, clamping them down, containing them, hiding them away by not feeling or dealing with them. This has been my pattern in life. In bitterness, I always blame myself. I could have been smarter, stronger, harder working, more prepared. In disappointment, maybe my greatest fear, then I have to admit that I do have feelings, even though they may be packed and hidden away, because if you don't care you won't be disappointed. In admitting disappointment, not only do I have a feeling but also a expectation, a need, a desire that went unfulfilled. It is so hard for me to allow myself to want something, that I often only allow myself to want something guaranteed, not take risks. Maybe this is not what I seem like to some people, maybe it is, but this feels like truth, internally, for me.

My car alongside Highway 21

I proceed to yell at myself, for having such high expectations, for not being more flexible, for not being able to let go of my negativity and change my course. I yell at myself for being so negative where, just ten minutes before, I was awestruck by the beauty of this place. It is still beautiful, that has not changed. I yell at myself for fleeing from the scene so quickly, for not inquiring whether I could somehow pass through, since there had been no "Road Closed" sign. I drive back to the scene and I notice, this time, that there now is a sign indicating the road is closed and, from the looks of it, it does not look like a car could pass through at all. I feel better. There is nothing I can do. The road is closed, I will not get to the trailhead. I accept this and my disappointment starts to fade, although not right away and not quickly, but it does fade.

A view of Stanley, looking east from Highway 21

I head back to town to go to the tourist office to inquire about another hike. At the tourist office an older man with a thick southern accent is talking to another guy. When they are done I express my awe and speechlessness of the beauty of the place and ask him about a four hour hike. We chat a bit about how he came to be in Stanley. He lives outside Birmingham and discovered, with a friend, whitewater rafting later in life. Then his friend somehow heard about the Middle Fork of the Salmon River, supposedly the best whitewater rafting in the country. They came to Stanley to do the week long rafting trip and feel in love with the area. Now, he comes up to Stanley every other summer. I can tell he appreciates my appreciation of the place, as maybe being the same as he felt, when he first came here, years ago. He sizes me up. Youngish woman, in relatively good shape, experienced hiker, but she is alone. He suggests the Bridalveil Falls trail and assures me that there will be other people on the trail, although this had not been a requirement of mine. But I take his suggestion, the maps and his help with gratitude and head back out of Stanley.

The marshy area alongside the trail

I drive to Stanley Lake, about five miles out of town. It is a beautiful lake with lots of campers. I park and walk down the dirt road toward the trailhead. I pass a marshy area and then come to the lake, another beautiful mountain lake. I gaze at the lake for a few minutes, then continue on the trail for Bridalveil Falls. The trail leads me through a meadow alongside a creek and then into a lodgepole forest. It alternates like this, back and forth throughout the trail. Sometimes it heads up and gets a bit rocky. The open areas are scattered with wildflowers. I cross the shallow creek by walking across the thin trunks of fallen and washed away trees. The bank along the creek gets steeper and steeper. I come across a threesome with overnight backpacks, a father and his two young sons, who both look under twelve. We chat a bit about how much further the falls are and he offers me some mosquito spray, since they are getting quite bad. He was born in the San Francisco Bay Area, Hayward, but did not say where he was raised. He lives in Boise now, where his wife is from. This is his first time coming to this area, to Stanley. After our chat I continue ahead of them and see a small wooden sign, nailed to a tree, with an arrow pointing toward the right for Bridalveil Falls.

Overall, the trail had been pleasant, although not spectacular. While I hiked I went back and forth between admiring my surroundings and concentrating on my posture while walking. Sometimes, my mind wandered. I love hiking because you are moving outdoors. I like movement, I think it soothes my mind, it pulls everything together and focus becomes easier. I like the outdoors because it is refreshing and rejuvenating and nourishing. I like the smells in the air and the earth under my feet. I like to be amongst other living things, plants and trees, but also a habitat, an environment, it has a life of its own, maybe like decorating a living room, interior design, it is nature's "exterior" design and it is wonderful.
The trail seems to end at the creek again, which is wide and shallow and salmon colored. I wonder if this is how it got its name, not from the fish, since it seems impossible that they could exist here, but from the color of the rocks. I am hungry, so I sit right at the water's edge and eat some dried fruit and buffalo jerky that I brought with me. The father and his boys appear and ask me if I found a good place to cross. No I hadn't, maybe I would turn around here and go back, I tell them. Then two men, maybe in their late thirties, appear and also look for a place to cross. There are six of us, a temporary community of hikers, trying to solve the problem on how to cross the creek.

I take my shoes and socks off and carefully cross. I head uphill toward the sound of the falls, but the trail gets vague. I see the two men coming back down the trail and I ask them if they saw the falls. They said no, the trail got thick and hairy, and looked like there was a lot of poison oak, so they turned around. We chat for a while. One of them is from Minneapolis and one is from Chicago. The guy from Chicago is quieter and seems nice. The one from Minneapolis does more talking, asks questions and then interrupts my answers, he must be too busy listening to himself. I had already decided I did not need to see the falls, I wanted just to hike and I was satisfied. It was getting late in the day and the sun looked close to dipping behind the tall, jagged peak of the Sawtooths, so I decide to turn around. The two men get ahead of me as I stop to photograph a patch of wildflowers. I do this several times on my way back, since the light is getting slanted in the sky and is catching nicely on the wildflowers.

While crouched quietly in the forest, changing the settings and focus on my camera, I become nearly silent. I am no longer moving through the forest, but the forest moves around me. I hear the animals, the insects, the breeze. The air becomes more fragrant and the surroundings more focused. You are no longer an intruder, a visitor, you are part of it and it is part of you.

A mountain meadow along the trail, late in the day

I am getting a bit anxious since I told Rose I would be back around the same time that we got back yesterday. The sun is dipping quickly and I don't want her to worry, although I don't know if she is the worrying type. I start to job along the flat straightaways and downhill, holding my camera against my body so it doesn't bounce. I think about how completely dorky I must look, jogging with a camelback and a camera in the woods, but there is no one around, but I still feel dorky anyway. Again, the elevation causes me to be out of breath quickly so I take breaks. I am sweating and out of breath, this is how I like to know a place. If the sun of a place can make you sweat, if you take big gulps of the surrounding air while out in the open nature, then maybe you can know a place like you can't from a car or from sitting still. It becomes part of you. It is calming. It is like discovering new things about yourself, or old things, that you had forgotten.
Stillness and brisk movement. This is how I feel most alive. I like to be still and I like to move quickly and all the places in between are like drinking coffee that is no longer hot, it just resembles what it was supposed to taste like. It drains me, the in-between.

Stanley Lake

I arrive back at my car and head back toward the main road. I stop along Stanley Lake and take a few pictures. Back in Stanley, I pull off on the side of the road to call Paul, where I know I will have cell phone reception. I miss him. I am grateful for our talks, reconnecting, even if just for a short time. Back at camp Rose has started making dinner. I start a fire and we eat stir fry and roast some hot dogs over the campfire. We talk again and share what we each did that day. It sounds like she had a nice day and I am glad. It was nice to go off by myself for a several hours and what makes it nicer is, at the end of it, to have some good company. Later, we make S'mores with dark chocolate and then go to bed early, early for us, that is. Tomorrow we leave. I drive to Salt Lake City and Rose drives back to Bend, Oregon. It was really nice to hang out with Rose, to get to know her better, to have someone else get to know me. I fall asleep feeling thankful.

A view from Stanley, looking north.

Summer Road Trip - Sawtooth Mountains

Lake view from site 11

The sun was in my eyes. I was lying in the van and the sun had risen in the sky to that angle where it was shining light directly into my eyes. I slept a little longer, until I started hearing a number of people moving about outside. Finally, I get up and Rose gets up. She makes some Coconut Chai tea and we go for a walk. We walk to campsite 11, the site that we were supposed to have the night before, it was now empty.  It is a lakefront site and we walk down to the water's edge with our steaming tea. It is my first daylight glimpse of the Idaho scenery.
The lake is large and very blue. It is peaceful and calm and, of course, amazingly beautiful. Across the lake, pine trees come up right to the lake beach and behind them are hills, or, smooth mountains dotted with trees. The Idaho morning sun is strong, warming the lingering chill in the air. It is an expansive scene, almost overwhelming with its serenity. Funny, how that is, but maybe, the feeling of serenity reaches so far that it reaches places beyond the boundaries that is your contained self, it makes you more than just yourself, just for a moment, and you are part of a bigger thing and because we so rarely feel so connected to something bigger than ourselves, it overwhelms us.

The Sawtooth Mountains

An older couple, who turned out to be the campground hosts, spot us and asked Rose and me if we had camped in that site the night before. I said, no, but we had reserved that site only to find it occupied when we arrived with a youngish man insisting, apologetically, that it had not been tagged as reserved. They seemed very irritated at this man since he not only took our site but he left the site messy with litter. They insisted that the site was tagged and he must have removed our name tag. I think I believe them. They are very apologetic and feel terrible about the situation and insist we stay as long as we like.

Mountain Lake Beach

Rose and I walk along the lake side path and around the bend to a view of the Sawtooth Mountains. Along the lake is a larger beach and empty dock. Canoes, power boats and jet skies are all out and people are swimming and having a wonderful time.
The Sawtooth Mountains are amazing with their craggy, jagged peaks and edges that abruptly point toward the sky and flanked by an abundance of pine trees. The lake in this scenery is Redfish Lake which is very popular for swimming, boating and fishing. It is a deep, beautiful blue and spreads out in an oblong shape.

Mountain Creek

The Trail

Rose and I move our vehicles down the street to the Glacier View campground, site 46. It is early for check in but we park in our campsite anyway. The campground host is gone so we take off on a hike and walk down past the beach park to the Redfish Trail trailhead. After some discussion on which direction to go, we begin our hike. The trail goes uphill a bit and we are out of breath quickly because of the high elevation. There is a small side trail leading toward the sound of running water and we venture in that direction and discover a mountain creek. Rose wets her hair and hat in the mountain creek to keep cool.

Wildflowers

Mock Orchid

The air is hot and dry and the sun feels strong. We head back out to the main trail as it meanders uphill through patches of wildflowers and tufts of brush and eventually through an occasional grove of trees that are not pine trees. Rose and I talk the whole way, trading thoughts and swapping stories. The talking makes the high elevation hiking harder and I am grateful for the chance to listen and catch my breath.

View of Redfish Lake

View of Sawtooth Mountains

After some time hiking higher, we can see Redfish lake below us. It is even more beautiful from above and you can appreciate the bigness of everything here. The big lake, the big range of rolling mountains, the big forests of trees and ahead of us, the big Sawtooth Mountains.
We continue hiking, talking the whole way, and come to a series of switchbacks. A hiker, coming back down, informs us it is only half an hour more. We start up the switchbacks and enter a lodge pole forest. At the edge of the forest there is a mountain lake, Beach Lake.

Beach Lake

We find a grassy spot along the lake, shed the outer layers of clothes and jump in the lake. Ok, so really, Rose did a shallow dive and I awkwardly walked and slipped my way in. The water was cool and refreshing and rejuvenating after the hot, dry hike. We swam for a while, treading water too, but the elevation is so high that we were out of breath just treading water. We swim back ashore and sit on a log while letting the sun dry us off.
A group a teenage boys, backpacking into the mountains, come along the trail a few feet from our spot. They are silent. Another group comes, probably part of the same larger group, they are talking a bit and become silent as they pass us. When out of earshot, Rose and I have a laugh at the surprise it must be for teenage boy backpackers to come across two women drying off in their bathing suit/underwear along a mountain lake in the middle of nowhere.

Idaho evening along Redfish Lake

The sun is getting lower in the sky when we return to our campsite. We buy a bundle of firewood from the campground host and then grab some wine, snacks and our camp chairs and walk down to the lakeside beach. The sun is throwing slanted light across the lake as we sip our wine and munch our snacks. As the sun disappears, the temperature quickly drops and the mosquitoes begin to trickle in, so we head back to our campsite.
I start a fire while Rose makes some salad and ravioli. As I make the fire, I start thinking. Rose and I have been talking to each other all day, getting to know things about each other from our the thoughts and stories we've shared. Am I being a motor mouth? Am I talking about myself too much? Am I being too polite? I don't feel these things, just the fear of these things. It is stressful, this fear. This fear of being a dork, of being unlikeable. But I don't know how to be anything else and I don't really want to be anything else, I am as I am, but the stress of being judged is a heavy burden. Certainly, this is no reflection on Rose at all, just myself. I like Rose and when you like someone, would like to be their friend, you can only hope it is mutual. In my life, generally, making friends has been stressful. It feels like being back in elementary school, picking friends on the playground during Recess, or rather, hoping they pick you. When I was in elementary school, sometimes I was picked and played with the other kids and sometimes, I spent many Recess hours jumping rope by myself.  I like Rose and I am glad she was able to come on this trip.
The campfire is burning brightly and dinner is done so I pick up my plate of salad with a bowl of raviolis and pasta sauce. I carefully carry my plate from the Eurovan to the picnic table when I hear a yell from Rose. When I get to the Eurovan I discover that her bowl of ravioli and sauce had slid off her plate throwing red pasta sauce all over the van! I grab some paper towels and eventually we laugh as we attempt to clean up the pasta sauce. We sit by the fire eating dinner and talking late into the night. When you look straight above our campsite the clearing in the trees shows an amazing number of stars. I have not seen this many stars in a long, long time and it makes me wonder. Wonder what, I don't know, maybe it was just wonderment.