Words are inadequate

back to nature, back to home

2024-08-18T16:51:26Z

Erin and I went camping last weekend with a couple dozen other folks. Camping remains a Good Thing for me generally. This spot in particular is just fantastic. It's on a sandy bank of the Stillaguamish river in the Washington Cascade Mountains. The river's, I dunno, fifty feet? a hundred? across, and the bed's filled with large rocks. Out in the middle it's deep enough that I can't touch bottom, but if you choose your path carefully you (I) can walk from one side to the other without fully submerging.

It's exactly what I needed. Sunlight and warmth and more sand than muck underfoot. I was barefoot outdoors for two straight days. I went swimming repeatedly, in water that was cold enough to be chilly but not so cold as to keep me from going in. I sat on rocks in the sun and watched tadpoles and water-striders and dragonfly larvae. I walked a small laybrinth, I found a bit of spiritual reconnection.

The ritual itself was a wash, mostly because my ability to social has been malfunctioning for at least the last month and a half. But it was good to be out in the woods and water, and out with other folks.

We drove up to her place on Monday, and I drove back on my own yesterday. It's a long drive but it remains absolutely gorgeous. Over twelve hours conifer forest gives way to scrub desert which turns into deep rocky canyon, then foothills straight up against river delta farmland. Majestic. Coming from the Appalachians, I didn't really believe mountains could be that big or that close.

I like driving the Fraser Canyon (roughly, Highway 1 between Cache Creek and Hope). I especially like driving down it: up is nice but for whatever reason one gets the best views going back down. Or maybe it's just that I'm more often driving down alone so I have more mental space to take in the scenery. Whatever the reason: when I can take a day to do that (two days, really, one up and one back down) and the weather's decent, I'm happy to do so.

And now I'm home and catching up on a great many things, including sitting with / petting / brushing Mr Tuppert. It is Good.

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greenery

2023-08-22T00:30:19Z

So, camping. First time in six years, second time since moving to Vancouver in 2011.

I've missed this, is my main takeaway. I've missed trees and water and cool morning air, tea and oatmeal outdoors for breakfast and sitting by a fire late into the night. I've missed being surrounded by green, I think. Pac-NW green is quite a bit different from Appalachia but the sense is the same.

My thirty-year-old backpacking stove has sadly given up the ghost: the plastic pump assembly has sheared in a way that's non-trivial to repair. Doesn't look like anyone is selling pump assemblies for stoves that were finicky and outdated thirty years ago, either. I'll need to get a replacement stove before the next time.

And in the chaos of packing the car and departing we managed to leave the sleeping bag behind. Thankfully a campground full of car-camping pagans is well equipped with cloaks and things, and Erin was able to scrounge up enough bedding to keep us from freezing. Honestly, as things to forget go the sleeping bag was likely the least problematic. The tent and air mattress worked great (the shock-cords in the tentpoles are no longer elastic, which is annoying but not terminal), and we had a sufficiency of food and flashlights.

Spent a bit more time talking with a range of people I'd met once or twice in passing, which was lovely. It wasn't the auto-click I get on rare occasions (most recently Fourth Street) but it was still quite good. Saturday was basically a perfect temperature for camping under trees, which meant it wasn't quite as warm as I would have liked for going into the river. Not that that stopped me.

I had Experiences and Conversations and much of those defy easy description. I brought a lovely spiced mead to share. Everyone who tasted it got wide-eyed and said "This is GREAT!" which was rather gratifying.

The fires are certainly still A Thing; on Sunday morning the sun was a dull angry red from the smoke.

One of the things I love about camping is the way it rewards minimalism and having the right tools. (Where "right" is of course highly subjective.) For instance, I'd forgotten that ages ago I'd bought a silicone bowl and cup, which are the perfect camping dishes: lightweight-ish, multipurpose, easy to pack and easy to clean. Or my "chair" which is two pads held together by straps and reinforced with metal struts: cushioning and back support, in a flat package. No legs, so one has to be comfortable with sitting on the ground, but that's never been a problem for me. It's just so great to have everything I need in a small package right there. Makes me feel secure and comfortable.

There's not really enough room in the apartment to properly dry out the tent etc, but it didn't rain so just hanging it loosely seems to have done the trick.

Erin's staying a couple of days with Sherry who does pottery. She's then coming back up on Wednesday to hang out here for a couple of days before we drive north. I'm looking forward to that as well.

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habemus condominium, et cetera

2014-07-18T22:04:22Z

Important news first: we have a place to live. We're moving out to New Westminster, two towns over. The new place is thirty-one floors up and directly on top of the Skytrain station. It's a little less nice than the current apartment but only a little: electric stove & fireplace instead of gas, no awesome superfast internet, office space will be awkward to figure out. It's got a decent-sized balcony, which is nice, and a view of the Fraser river (and, on clear days, Mt Baker) instead of Stanley Park / North Shore, which is a slight negative. Most importantly it's saving us a grand a month in rent.

In retrospect I'm a little bit sad to be living *directly* on top of the Skytrain; I would have enjoyed a short walk home after events. More importantly, I don't know what living in New West as opposed to downtown will feel like. Most of the people I want to see are out there, but most of the stuff I want to do (shows, the independent/artsy movie theatres, Stanley Park) are towards downtown. Will try it for a year or so, see how it goes. I expect we'll be fine out there.

Lease starts in August so we have a full month of paying double rent (boo) and getting the move sorted out (yay).

Over the weekend my aunt Susan came up from Atlanta to visit. Rather, she came up from Seattle since she was already visiting out there, but close enough. She got roped into games on Satyrday, which she seemed to like pretty well, and then dragged out to Chinatown and Granville Island on Sunday.

I like Susan pretty well. She's... I was going to say 'prickly' but that's not exactly right. I don't know how to describe her. I think it's to do with having lived with a bit of loneliness for so long that you get almost but not completely used to it. Or I might be projecting.

Regardless, we had a really good time. We (well, she) found a store in Chinatown that I've walked past dozens of times and never stopped in, that's full of fascinating stuff. I'd call it a junk shop except that they know what they've got and want real money for it. Example: an old laboratory glass bottle of HCl, where the label is made of raised glass letters on the bottle itself (awesome!), for $35 (yow!). And we poked in shops and galleries and wandered all over the place, and talked about all manner of things, and avoided roasting in the heat.

We'd made plans to go camping this weekend, but the combination of "fire ban" due to weeks of heat and drought, plus "rain saturday through monday" made that look like a less good idea. Stupid weather. Instead, tomorrow we're going off to what appears to be a live-action version of Myst. Will report back.

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assateague

2010-09-20T17:02:22Z

And then uilos and I spent the weekend before last camping at Assateague, because the correct time of year to do that is just after Labor Day. I mean, assuming you don't get hurricaned out, which is what happened last year.

( Camping! )

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labor day, seattle

2010-09-15T14:58:14Z

So a week or two ago I spent an extended weekend in Seattle.

( It was fun. )

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