The end of the road

At the place where the Quinault River empties into the sea, there is a town named Taholah. It is the Tribal HQ for the Quinault Nation and, in any practical sense of the words, "the end of the road." According to http://www.city-data.com/, the population of 470 men and 405 women are overwhelmingly Native American (94.2%), and make less money than the Washington average (Taholah - $30,645 / Washington - $55,591). There are other statistics, but they don't really tell the whole story.

It has been many years since I've been to Taholah. I went there on Labor Day once to go kayak surfing. I remember the waves at Point Grenville wrapping around the top of the bay and gliding toward shore, miles it seemed, before they started to break in regular-interval, perfectly formed barrels. I remember catching a paltry half-dozen waves that day, but they were so good, and the rides so long, that it remains one of my favorite Northwest kayak surfing experiences. I am not sure why I haven't gone back.

At some point during the day, I went the extra couple of miles into town. It's a small place, and it felt just like you might expect a rez town at the end of the road to feel. La Push and Neah Bay have similar vibes (although Hollywood has been making some inroads in La Push of late). Rusted cars and double-wide trailers, a general sense of unemployment and dogs. Lots of dogs. This was before the Indians figured out that in gambling, it is best to be the House. I am sure there have been changes.

All is not, however, rust and rot. There is great beauty there as well. The black river flowing quickly past and mixing with the nearby ocean waves. The deep, corrugated green of the northern hills and the simmering yellows of the riverside grasses. Natural beauty and wild spaces are hard to find, but when you are in Taholah, you are there. And that is worth something that would be difficult to quantify using internet stats... but by my calculations, the 875 residents of Taholah are millionaires.

Early?

All joyful and happy noises this week from the Hood Canal Bridge project. With the favorable weather we've been enjoying lately, work on the span has gone more quickly than expected, and the opening date is now expected the first week in June. The conditions weren't as good when the project began, but have impoved mightily since then.

“Our crews really hit the ground running after those weather delays,” said Dave Ziegler, Hood Canal Bridge Principal Engineer. “We’re making the right kind of revisions to the schedule – the kind that has us opening sooner, rather than later. And that’s great news for everyone.”

Indeed. Good news for me too. I'm planning to head out to the coast that first weekend in June...

Meet the Queets

"Out of the dirt of the skin." That's what the word Queets means, translated directly from the Quinault original. The story, as I've heard it told, is that the Great Spirit Kwate was out walking on the beach one day and came to the banks of the river. He had been walking a while and decided to take a break here, rest his legs and meditate a bit. (Which begs the question, "What could a god possibly have to meditate about?")

He crossed the mouth of the river, swimming through the deeper sections, and reached the other side, where he sat down on the sandy bank. As he rubbed his chilled legs to restore circulation, little balls of dirt formed on his palms. He pressed them together to form two larger balls of dirt, then tossed them into the river. The lumps of clay were transformed, and thus was created the first people of the Quinault, the first man and woman in the valley and the ancestors of the present native population. "From this time you shall remain on this river," Kwate told the couple, "and your name shall be 'K' witz qu, because from the dirt of the skin you were made."

The Queets River runs about 50 miles from its source at the Humes Glacier on the slopes of Mount Olympus. The majority of those miles run through National Park land, with the final 4 miles or so at the mouth being on reservation land. The Queets is a big river, draining one of the peninsulas largest watersheds - its main tributary, the Clearwater, is a significant Olympic river in its own right.

Water can be swift here during the runoff. Volumes approaching 100,000 cfs are not uncommon. Logs, carried from the high country in the torrent, are piled together in places, changing the course of the river from year to year. Salmon and steelhead have healthy runs here, and the water is among the cleanest on the peninsula.

Slice of Moclips

The town of Moclips - if "town" is the right word - started out as a Quinault village along the banks of the Moclips River. It was a place where young women were taken when they reached puberty, a place where menstruating females were set apart from the rest of the tribe, so as not to bring misfortune and bad luck to tribal fishing and hunting efforts. It is located very near the place where seven Spanish sailors were killed by natives, back in the days where white guys with ships used to plant crosses on wilderness beaches and claim the land for one King or another. Hardly seems possible now.

Moclips was established as a bonafide town in 1905 and for a brief run, it was quite a bustling burg. A man named Dr. Edward Lycan built a couple of grand hotels - his second one boasted 270 rooms just a dozen feet from the high tide line. Which was too close, as it turned out. Three stories tall and a block long, the huge structure dominated the beach dunes until 1911, when a series of storms battered the Washington coast. All sign of the hotel was gone by 1913.

Other disasters have periodically threatened the town over the years. Fire, mostly. A house or a store burned down here and there, with the last major blaze coming in 1948 on the bluffs above the beach, when an accident involving a welding torch and a bottle of whiskey took out most of the homes and businesses on the east side.

Moclips is pretty quiet today. Most of the buildings are vacation cottages, often shuttered and empty. Pacific Beach, a couple of miles to the south, has a little more going on, with a State Park and a Navy hostel, hotels and shops, but Moclips itself is on its own side track, apart.

The beginning of another crazy plan

The Olympic Peninsula is an island. I wrote a post last year about the Black River and about how that particular little stream connects Puget Sound with the Chehalis River, effectively surrounding the "peninsula" with water. Making it an island, really.

Not that it matters. Other than being a semi-interesting factoid that can be brought out at a party every now and then, it's fairly useless information. The world is full of trivia these days and the quasi-fact that the Olys are an island is crying out to be put in that category.

I do wonder though, what a trip along the periphery of the peninsula would be like. It's been done (O.A.R. Northwest did it last summer in a two-man rowboat), but I bet it hasn't been done very often. A quick look at a map shows me that I've already paddled most of the route at one time or another, either in a kayak or a canoe. There are a couple places I haven't been- the swamp between Black Lake and the Black River, the Gray's Harbor bar - but a trip around for me would, for the most part, be a return to familiar waters.

I should research the possibility of an Olympic circumnavigation. How many miles is it and when is the best time to go? Would it be worth trying to use a variety of watercraft: kayak, canoe and SUP? Would it be a solo trip or a group effort? Would anyone else even find the idea interesting? Hmm.

A Complex kid (part 2)

Although avoiding the public was the secret to Big John's success at eluding capture, there were times when he needed things that he couldn't get anywhere else. He broke into Jackson’s Country Grocery Store that winter, something he was wont to do from time to time, as he needed supplies. On this particular raid, however, he took off with the store's safe, along with the flour and the salt. Inside was $15,000 in cash, a hefty sum back then - as it is today. With a price on his head - a $1000 reward for the return of the money - the number of searchers increased dramatically. The end of the saga was now set in stone; it was now simply a question of when and how.

Sheriff McKenzie heard from a traveling prospector that Tornow had been seen in Oxbow, a camp farther up the Wynoochie. Those two recruited the Deputy Game Warden to come along and they went to the camp, but the wild man was gone. He had left some things behind him - a couple gold coins and various lesser items - but the strongbox was nowhere to be found. The Sheriff and Warden Elmer continued the search until, a few days later, they went missing as well.

The reward was increased to $2000, the hills and valleys flooded with searchers out looking for the loot, while the operation to catch Tornow was now the responsibility of the Deputy, A. L. Fitzgerald. Another posse was put together to track down the fugitive, and before much time had passed, they succeeded in locating what was left of the Sheriff and the Game Warden. Each of the men had been shot through the head with a single bullet, then gutted like an animal. Tornow was nowhere near the scene.

It was not until the middle of April before any headway would be made on bringing Tornow to justice. Three men who were out looking for him, Deputy Giles Quimby and two others, discovered a small shack constructed of wood scraps and bits of bark. It was fairly clear that this had to be the mountain man's cabin. The men talked about returning to get the rest of the posse on the scene, but the idea of having to share the reward convinced them that they should attempt to take him in on their own. There were three of them, after all, and only one of John Tornow.

As they advanced on the shack, a shot from an unseen barrel hit one of the men, and sent him immediately to the ground. The other man next to him returned the fire but was quickly shot through the neck, and he died there next to his companion. The Deputy was the only one left, huddled behind a log, just out of sight. Seeing the treatment that the other men had received, Deputy Quimby figured his best chance for survival was to negotiate.

"All we want is the money," Quimby shouted. "If you tell me what you've done with the strongbox, I won't stand in your way." This promise of freedom was a false one, of course, and Tornow instinctively distrusted him. It took a long time for Quimby to wear him down - the Deputy must have been quite a salesman - but eventually Big John relented, and told Quimby that he had buried the safe back in Oxbow, "by the boulder that look’s like a fish’s fin. Take it and leave me alone!”

Once that nugget of information had been prized out of the fugitive, Quimby immediately broke his promise and began a barrage of the underbrush where Tornow was hiding. When it was quiet once more and having received no return fire, the Deputy wasn't sure that he'd hit his mark. He was concerned, however, that Big John might be playing possum, so rather than investigating the target area, he returned to Montesano to gather the rest of the posse together. When the group returned to the scene, they soon found Tornow's body leaning against a tree, riddled with bullet holes. He had $6.65 on him, some of it in coins identified as taken from Jackson's store, but no sign of the strongbox.

The body of John Tornow was put on display at the morgue and the place was overrun with gawkers come to see this wild man. Postcards featuring the corpse were sold, referring to the late killer as “The Great Outlaw of Western Washington .” Fred Tornow, John's brother, told the press, “I am glad John is dead. It was the best way now that it is over, and I would rather see him killed outright than linger in a prison cell.”

After the events had passed and the area had begun to quiet down once more, Quimby went looking for the treasure. He quickly found the boulder that looked like a fish's fin but despite extensive excavations, he never found the box with the money. After he gave up, others joined the search, but all had the same results. The cash was never found and it is still there today. Somewhere. The Wynoochie has been dammed since then and the river's course has gone through some changes, so it's hard to know where to start looking now.

John Tornow was buried in Matlock Cemetery in Grays Harbor, Washington, where his bones remain today.

A Complex kid (Part 1)

It is a fine line between feral and domesticated, between wild and tame. The difference between tearing raw meat from the bone and quietly noshing on a cucumber sandwich is not as great as you might believe and, once that line has been crossed, it is difficult, maybe impossible, to return.

On September 4, 1880, a child was born on the Tornow homestead near the Satsop River on the south slope of the Olympics. His parents named him John. As long as his family could recall, he preferred to be out in the woods, among the wild animals, rather than in the company of people. He would spend days in the wilderness with his dog as his only companion, coming home only when he grew too hungry to stay. By the time he was ten years old, he was a dead-eye shot and an excellent woodsman, able to remain beyond human contact for weeks at a time.

It was at about this time that one of John's brothers, for reasons that are unclear, shot his dog. In retaliation and without any hesitation, he found his brother's dog lying near the creek and calmly returned the cruelty with a single bullet. From this point on, he was rarely at home, although he would bring game back to his parent's homestead from time to time on his brief visits. By the time he had reached his teens, animals would approach him without fear and his skills in the woods had become legend. He was a gifted woodsman, an iconoclast, and nuttier than squirrel shit.

His brothers, like many peninsula lads, began their logging careers early, eventually starting their own business. John worked with them off and on, mostly off. He wore animal skins for clothing and his shoes were constructed of cedar bark. He was a large man, 6'4" tall and tipping the scales at about 250 pounds, a substantial man, physically speaking, but something else on the inside.

By the early 1900's, he was in the forest full-time, hardly ever leaving the protection that the tangled, green underbrush had to offer. Somehow his brothers, who were convinced that he was dangerously soft in the melon, captured John and had him committed to a hospital for the insane in Oregon. A year after his arrival, he escaped.

After more time passed, he began to turn up at his sister's house occasionally, coming out of the forest to visit with her and her husband, as well as their twin sons, John and Will. Other than these scattered visits, he was spotted from time to time by other local settlers, and described as having "tangled hair, a long beard and ragged clothes... a giant gorilla-like man." Loggers told stories of this hairy beast-like creature that would appear and disappear from nowhere, way back in the deep forest.

In September of 1911, Tornow shot and killed a cow. His sister's cabin was nearby, and the slain bovine most likely belonged to her. As he dressed the kill in the dewy morning meadow, a bullet flew past his ear and irrevocably shattered the scene. He quickly dropped his gutting knife and crouched behind the carcass, rising to blindly fire three shots in quick succession from his rifle. When he was sure that the danger had passed, he approached the place where the shots had originated, and found his nephews dead on the ground, killed by his return fire.

No one will ever know for sure why the twins, John and Will Bauer, shot at Tornow. Kinder souls liked to think that they were shooting at what they thought was a bear or some other wild animal feeding on one of their cattle, but not many bought into it. Whether the boys were intentionally aiming at Big John or not, he obviously thought that someone was trying to get him. Once he saw what he had done, he hightailed it back into deep cover once again, way up the rills and vales of the Wynoochie Valley.

When the twins did not return, their family contacted Chehalis County Deputy Sheriff John McKenzie who put together a search party of more than 50 men, no small feat in an area so lightly populated. It wasn't long before the bodies were located. Each of the boys had been shot through the head and their weapons had been taken. The bodies were taken back to the homestead and the Sheriff began his next task, organizing a posse to bring the killer to justice.

That the shooting had been done by John Tornow was never an item of any serious discussion. The efficiency of the kill, the accuracy of the shot, and the half-cleaned carcass of the nearby cow painted as accurate a picture as the Sheriff needed to see. His posse, a collection of loggers and settlers, nervously fanned out in the backcountry, wary of a wild man they knew to have the forest skills of an Indian and the black heart of a beast. Every crack of a branch, every flutter of shadow, was attributed to Tornow, although they never actually saw him in the course of their search. They did, however, manage to mistakenly kill an unfortunate cow at one point, in their trigger-happy excitement.

As the search went on and on, the tales about Tornow got more extravagant. Exaggerated stories about “the Wild Man of the Wynoochee,” featured a "cold-eyed giant constantly traversing the forest in search of prey." With winter coming on, Tornow was able to avoid crossing paths with any of the searchers by staying to the high country, using the deep snows and dangerous slopes as cover.

Even here, at this late point in the game, after blood had already been spilled, Tornow might have been able to escape. Head north over the Skokomish, get to salt water somehow. An anonymous night passage on a coastal packet boat, it would have been easy to be in Victoria within the week. But there was no way that would ever happen. Big John was well past any chance of pulling that off. Besides, if ever there were a man so tied to his country, I have not heard of him. His fate, whatever it would be, would take place in his corner, and nowhere else.

"A Good time in the mountains"

In Chinook jargon, the word Klahhane can mean a variety of things: "out of doors," "without," "outside." There is an implication within the word that describes not only a place, but the pleasure of being there. My favorite translation of Klahhane is "a good time in the mountains."

Klahhane Ridge, not far from Port Angeles, was given its name by settlers in the late 19th century and was officially entered on area maps in 1961. There is a hiking club based in Port Angeles that goes by the name as well, a group of local folks who have been having a good time in the Olympic backcountry since 1915. Their club house is situated on the shores of Lake Dawn, near Heart O' the Hills, on the way to Hurricane Ridge. On August 5, 1885, Lt. O'Neil climbed Peak 6101, located on the ridge, and named the lower western portion of the area Victor Pass, after the founder of Port Angeles, Victor Smith.

The snow is melting.

Growing older but not up

There was once a reasonable man by the name of Ashley Montagu. A social scientist, back when the term conveyed an understanding of both science and society. Montagu was a pioneer in the realm of popularizing scientific topics, bringing the edges of science into the mainstream of society. (Think Margaret Mead or even Rachel Carson.) He died in 1999, at the age of 94. He had an excellent outlook, in my opinion, on life and the living of it: "The idea," he said, " is to die young as late as possible."

I only bring this up because I'm feeling old today. The weekend at the symposium wiped me out. The plan was to be a day on the lower Satsop, outside Montesano, floating in a red canoe under green trees and a blue, blue sky. This morning, however, I changed my mind. A pity, I'm sure, but there it is.

With that said, I enjoyed the symposium immensely. It was one of the best organized and well executed events I've been a part of and the current staff of Metro Parks deserves a hearty thanks and a round of ale. The people who attended seemed very interested and I know that quite a few of them left with new kayaks on their cars. That's just good for everybody.

I spent most of my on-water time on a SUP, paddling a mix of favorites and new arrivals. I tried the Hobie boards for the first time, and was pleased with the way they handled and the way they felt underfoot. Solid, fast and manuverable, with an abundance of floatation for their size. I also goggled at the beautiful boats from P&H and Impex, and came away especially lustful of the P&H Cetus that was there for the demo. I'm pretty sure I need one.

The East Fork of the Lower Satsop will be there some other time. It's just that I'm too old to go today. I will be younger tomorrow.

If you haven't already made plans for today...

My father used to tell me, "Son, it isn't often that you're right, but you're wrong again."

I was sure that this year's Puget Sound Sea Kayak Symposium would be a bust: other recent symposiums in Port Angeles and Port Townsend had poor attendence, the person at Tacoma Parks responsible for this event left a couple of weeks ago for a different job, and the economy is tight, especially in a blue collar burg like T-town. I was pretty sure this symposium would be a boring and painful auto-de-fe for a few tired diehards, and nothing else. I was wrong again.

Yesterday was perfect. Ideal weather, just the right number of people at any given time, and although the total number of vendors seemed smaller, everyone was busy, on-water classes were filled and there were scores of kayaks and SUPs on the go throughout the day.

It's Sunday morning now and I'm getting ready to go back for day #2. It promises to be another gem. I guess what I'm saying is, if you have the chance, maybe you should come down to the beach yourself. The event goes until 3pm. See you there.

5th Annual Sea Kayak Symposium

Owen Beach, Point Defiance Park

Tacoma (City of Destiny)

What was that name again?

The Duckabush River, on the eastern slope of the Olympics, takes its name from the Indian word "do-hi-a-boos," which comes out as "reddish face." Whether the name refers to the ochre hue of the mountain bluffs in the region or is a Twana Indian reference to the chief of the mythical salmon people is a matter still under discussion. What everyone can agree on, however, is that, since the Wilkes Expedition of 1841, the name of the river has never been in doubt.

If you're talking about the mountain though, that's a different story. Essentially, Mount Duckabush gets its name simply because of its location near the headwaters of the river. At 6250 feet, it's a significant peak, large enough that you would figure, once it's named, it'll stay that way. Not so, in this case.

For a while in the late 1800's, it went by the name Mount Arline, in reference to the eldest daughter of Army Colonel Thomas M. Anderson, Commander of the 14th Infantry. In August of 1890, Tacoma Judge, James Wickersham hung the name Susan on the mountain, presumably in an effort to suck up to his wife, Deborah Susan Wickersham. It could not have helped his cause that the O'Neil Expedition of that same year gave the mountain the name of Skookum, an Indian word meaning strong or powerful.

It all came out in the wash eventually. The other names fell by the way and Duckabush stuck. It's actually pretty common, this throwing of names at a natural feature like a mountain or a river. In the end, there's one that survives.

Huck, Jimmy and me

I remember being about 10 or 11 years old and feeling quite excited at the idea of being Huck Finn. Floating all day on the mighty Mississippi, doing petty crimes with his best pal Tom: his life seemed to me to be a fine one, one that I would like to have as well.

As I look back, I realize that through all the years, for me, it's been between Huck Finn and Jimmy Buffett...

I went so far as to cut the legs off of one of my older pair of jeans, left them all raggedy at the ends, like some 3/4 length capri pants for literature-addled grade school boys. I would sometimes coast down the slight incline of our street on my skateboard, imagining that I was on the river too, and that the neighborhood houses were mansions on the bank (or in the case of the Pulver's and the Keenan's places, the hard-luck, waterfront dives of a river town.) Avenida Gorrion, in Goleta, California, was my muddy river, at least for a short time in 1972.

I have next Monday off. No obligations, as far as I can see, either with work or family, that would trump my desire... to go find me a river.

Staircase memories

Before there was an Olympic National Park, there were a number of private lodges and resorts that operated in various spots around the peninsula. Enchanted Valley and Olympic Hot Springs come to mind. Also Staircase.

I don't think about Staircase as wilderness exactly, there is too much activity for that. Still, not nearly as much activity as there once was. The resort that once stood on the banks of the North Fork of the Skokomish River numbered approximately twenty cabins, along with offices, a store, and an assortment of other buildings. In the mid 1930's, a couple named Lester and Anna Dickinson ran the place, and frequently guided groups of visitors in the nearby mountains. City folks would come here for the weekend. Families and fishermen, hunters and hikers.

The Staircase Resort is long gone now. It went through a few different owners, grew during the 1940's, then fell into some disrepair. Eventually, the Park Service claimed the land, and most traces of the resort were erased. There is still one cabin that remains, a single building that was upgraded and repaired in 1956. It's the only structure still standing from the old days, perched at the edge of a small greensward near several newer park buildings. It's nondescript, a 16' x 22' rectangle with a gable roof and cedar shakes all round and on top. You wouldn't think, to look at it, that it has such a history.

There is more to any place than meets the eye.

Road work

At the moment, there are several significant ghost roads that lead into Olympic National Park. When I say "ghost roads," what I'm talking about are the many miles of roadway that were once open to vehicles, that have since been closed as a result of slides, washouts and other rain-related injuries. Two of the most critical access roads on the west side of the park are scheduled to have work begin in mid-July, and although it will not affect vehicle access much this season, it surely will once the work is completed in October.

The Graves Creek Road, along with the South Shore Road nearby, was damaged in a storm in 2007. At eight different places along its 6-mile length, portions of the road have been washed away by the raging floodwaters of the Quinault, making it impassable for vehicles, but still open to pedestrian, bicycle and stock use. A large campground and a ranger station were stranded in what is now the backcountry of the Graves Creek area, and it now takes an additional six miles of hiking to get to the Enchanted Valley trailhead. The South Shore Road was closed by similar damage, resulting in the Quinault lakeshore loop being out of commission for the past two years.

Once they're open again, however, everything changes. Winter traffic will be light, but come next spring, when the snow is melting and the days are getting longer, the people will arrive. The 36-foot road warriors with names like Mountain Aire and Allegro, Bounder and Southwind, these will return once more to their assigned places along the river. Large bonfires will again be built and much alcohol will be consumed. Groups of surly teens, hauled into the woods by their misguided parents, will hang out near the restrooms once more, snarling softly and avoiding eye contact. The sound of idling diesel engines will mix delightfully with the river noises, creating a form of mountain music that hasn't been heard around these parts for years. Ah, wilderness.

On the other side of the Olympic range, the Dosewallips road is still closed to cars. Similar circumstances to those at Graves Creek shut this one down back in January of 2002, and it has lesser washouts and rockfall damage at several points along the way. What really closed the road, however, was a shift in the river that carved out the side of a hill, scouring away a section of roadway the length of a football field. These days, you drive to where the road ends in a dirt berm, climb up and over the washout via a bypass trail, and come out the other side of the washout on the same road once again. A mile or so along, the Elkhorn Campground, where the internal engine once roamed in packs, is empty and piled with river debris. At the original end of the road, the Dosewallips Campground is the same, a beautiful flat section of riverfront with meadows and shade trees growing tall along the banks, quiet except for the voices of the few campers who have made the trip under their own power.

I am in favor of access, but here's how I see it: If the roads were to stay closed, it would just make the wilderness that much closer. Instead of having to drive ten or fifteen miles into the heart of the mountains to find the wild areas that we all say we cherish, those wild places would effectively move farther out from where they now sit, move closer to us. And the really great part of it is that we don't have to do anything, just let nature take its course.

There are those who see it differently though, and their point of view carries more weight than mine. The road to the Dosewallips trailhead is also slated to be reopened, just like Graves Creek. The ghost roads will become regular roads again, normal, everyday, ordinary roads. The line of thought, as far as I can tell, is that the notion of access implies access for all your stuff too, and that even automobiles need wilderness.

A Warming trend

The road to Staircase, Forest Service Road 24, was reopened last week after its winter closure. It's been shut down just past the Mount Rose subdivision since last October, but according to the Park Service, there is now full access to the Staircase area. The road closes in the winter now because of what is often extensive rock fall that represents a real hazard to cars. And drivers, too.

It's another indication that summer really is on the way. At least, that's how I'm going to take it.

How young is too old?

I have been thinking a lot lately about trees. More specifically, I've been thinking of climbing them. Not all of them, just one big one, on the right day, climb it to the top, or as close as I can get. Is it juvenile of me to be running this daydream? Is climbing trees an activity best suited to the younger set? (And by that I mean, younger than me.) I have a long list of things I want to do before I die - I've been keeping it since I was in high school - and #257 is "Spend the night in a tree."

I don't recall exactly when I added that item to the list, but it's interesting to look at it now, to consider the doing of the thing, and wonder about whether it's still an age-appropriate activity. It may not be seemly for me to admit a desire to climb a big tree. That, after all, is a child's game. You don't see adults out there in the park, perched in the cedars above the point, swinging from limb to limb. I have to confess that sometimes, sometimes I wonder, "Why not?" How is something that is so plainly fun, so unabashedly filled with joy, that overloads the senses and literally heightens the mind, how is this a thing that we are to grow tired of, and consign to the young, and them alone?

I read something the other day that I hadn't thought about before. I was following sea kayaking threads on the internet and came across one that was comparing North American paddlers with their European counterparts. According to the author of the piece, the perceived difference in the expertise and skill of the average kayaker favors the Europeans. In other words, they are better technical kayakers than we are, more skilled and better prepared overall. (Blah, blah, blah. You would think, by now, after all we've been through, we would be finished with such prejudice, such aquafascist eugenics.) This part of the article was not new, however; there will always be Us and Them.

What was new, at least to me, was the writer's assertion that people in this country tend to "try out" a variety of sports and outdoor pursuits, more so than in Europe. A person will take up mountain biking, for example, and get seriously involved with the sport over the course of a few years. He'll be out every weekend, bombing down singletrack courses and obstacle runs in all kinds of weather. A dedicated bike afficionado. At some point though, his eye will drift to the sails on the bay, those billowing triangles of white against the deep blue of the sea, and the next thing you know, Jack's a sailor. Then, after a few seasons on the water, his eye will be a'rovering once again, only this time, it's skiing, or hang-gliding, or canoeing, or rock climbing. When it comes to recreation anyway, we, as a society, hop from one thing to another entirely too much.

Which, the argument goes, is why the Euros are better paddlers than us colonials. The mother country - makes no nevermind which one - is still superior and peopled by our betters; that is ultimately the point of the discussion. I'm not buying it, at least not as it relates to kayaking. But the rest of it? I can't help but wonder where the urge to always find the new, to put away the old... where does that come from?

It may be that it all starts the day you stop climbing trees. When you come to believe somehow that there are things that little kids do and things that big kids do. A pattern begins, and continues into adulthood, a regular cycle of abandoning one thing and picking up another until, presumably, we will all meet on the golf course.

You'll be able to spot me. I'll be the musty old duffer looking at the trees.

Wind

Here in the Pacific Northwest we call them "wind storms," which seems a little redundant to me. And completely inadequate. I mean, all storms come with a little wind. Up here, the wind is what our storms are made of, what they are. Our wind, when it really gets to flying around, has substance, heft, mass.

On January 29, 1921, a massive storm struck the Northwest coast. Hurricane force winds bombarded the shoreline from Central Oregon to the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Back in this faraway time, when everything about peninsula life revolved around logging, about getting out the cut, the Forest Service estimated that total loss of standing timber was several billion board feet. Roads were closed by countless fallen trees. Storm damage in some places, like Hoquiam and Forks, was significant and costly. An article that appeared in the following day's papers came out of hard-hit Aberdeen: "Telephone and telegraph wires out of here were all prostrated by the gale, one of the most violent in years. Communication with the outside world was not restored until today."

Winds in North Head, near the mouth of the Columbia River, were clocked at 92-106 mph before the anemometer was destroyed. Estimates for gusts during that time were 120 mph, at least. At the weather station out on Tatoosh Island, winds hovered in the mid 80's, with peak gusts around 108 mph. Those are legitimate hurricane numbers there, Cat 2 and Cat 3 storms.

It's windy out there today too. Nothing like it was on January 29, 1921, or during so many other Northwest storms, but the forecast is calling for sustained winds of 60 mph on the Washington coast. It's supposed to blow about 25 mph here in the south Sound; I can hear the trees outside gnashing already.

Slouching toward summer

I remember one summer, the summer of 1993, that was cancelled completely. At least here in western Washington. I remember it so well because it was the summer when I was supposed to be renting kayaks on Ruston Way. Down by the water all day, peddling kayak rides in the sun to throngs of happy customers...

It didn't work out that way. It rained almost every day and it was cold enough that I remember seeing my breath on July 24th. And it wasn't the kind of dew-point, see-your-breath phenomenon that we get every now and then on the colder humid days; it was really that bitterly cold, at the end of July. Needless to say, customers were few. I read a pile of books that summer, did a crossword puzzle or two, under the worn blue tarp at the top of the beach.

Summer is not a given, here in the Pacific Northwest. The snow is still deep in the Olympic mountains, the high country still slumbering under a thick, white blanket. When it will melt enough for extended backcountry travel is anyone's guess. I am hoping for a heat wave soon, a rare week or two of high temps and blue skies. There are some intriguing spots I want to see this summer, and they are all currently buried: the Tubal Cain mine, Mount Angeles loop, Wonder Mountain, Mount Barnes and the headwaters of the Elwah. There's more, of course, but these would be a good start.

While I'm waiting for the high country to open up, I'm thinking maybe I'd like to go canoeing.

Aftermath

It's hard to put a trip into a nutshell, to compress all the exertion, the stress, the joy and the freedom of an expedition into words and paragraphs. Even the most evocative turns of phrase can't blow salt spray in your eyes, or put the chill your toes like the real thing. When the trip is split up into segments, it gets even more difficult.

It was a wonderful experience. To travel from the head of Hood Canal all the way around the top of the Kitsap Peninsula, then back down through southern Puget Sound to the little town of Allyn, a mere 4 land-miles from the start. I am a better paddleboarder now than I was at the beginning, though it's still apparent that I have more to learn. I am happy with the way that the board performed (a Laird 12'1" Tuflite fiberglass), and considering the extra weight that I carried, it did very well indeed. I would like to tour on a longer board next time - there are a couple of 14-footers that I have my eye on.

Because the cargo is so exposed to wind and wave, it's critical that the drybags are dependable. The one word I have to say about drybags is Ortlieb. I tried bags made by other manufacturers, Seattle Sports and WX Tex, but nothing worked as well at keeping the water out as the bags from Ortlieb. They cost more, but that's because they're worth more.

Werner paddles are still the best thing since pants pockets. I used the Spanker and the Advantage... love them both.

Pieces of prized Arc'teryx shell clothing were essential items during this wet, winter trip. I used the Alpha LT jacket and the Theta LT pants, and I never worried about whether they would keep me dry.

Rite-in-the-Rain notebooks are the way to go for keeping notes in the outdoors. A "must-carry" item on every trip, and a local Tacoma company. The Hot Shot stove was once again the best cooking option for size, weight and trouble-free operation. I've used it almost every trip since Newfoundland in 2000 and it's never let me down.

There's more to say, I'm sure, but I think the most interesting and exciting thing I learned during the course of the Puget Sound Challenge has to do with the environment itself, the sea, and how it is possible to literally immerse yourself in your surroundings. It's interesting to me, because in all my years of kayaking I've never been as relaxed in big water as I was on the SUP. I was a cork, sometimes standing and riding the swells, other times seated, gripping the rails to stay aboard. Never worrying about falling in because I was already in, I was already as much a part of the water as of the air. And it's exciting because, if I already know this much, think of how much more there is to come. I will be back out there soon.

Puget Sound Challenge - Day 12

The rain kept up all night. Heavy at times, loud on the roof of the picnic shelter. When the morning arrived, the rain had lessened to a drizzle but the air seemed cold. Packing was easy, being out of the elements, and I enjoyed the morning cup of coffee even more than usual as I got all of my gear loaded into the drybags and ready to go.

The water was calm as I set out, across Whiteman Bay and points farther on. It wasn't long before Herron Island came into sight and I paddled toward it. Studded with vacation homes, cottages and a few full-time residents, Herron Island still manages to be mostly green. There is tall fir and hemlock all over the island, and the understory is thick and lush in many places, so the houses tend to blend well, for the most part. There is one McMansion, however, up near the ferry dock, that is grossly outsized, an architectural obscenity of the highest order. (I have seen trophy homes in many places around Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands and I have encountered some truly gaudy specimens. But for sheer size, and as an artless monument to blind excess, without any saving grace or sense of imagination, this one here is among the most egregious examples of shoreline blight I've come across.)

I stopped for a snack at the top of the island and checked my photocopied chart with what I could see ahead of me. Stretch Island was my next landfall, about 3 miles away over open water. There was a slight current running against me, but I figured that most of that would vanish after I'd paddled past the entrance to Pickering Passage. The sky had cleared and it was getting warmer.

The paddle to Stretch Island took the better part of an hour. I got a boost from the breeze, which was building at my back. I stopped at Stretch Point, on a public beach at the top of the island. (This used to be Stretch Island State Park... I wonder if it's been sold.) There are no facilities and camping is not permitted, but it's a great spot to rest for a while, soak up the sun. The pea gravel beach is ideal for a midday snooze. I had dispensed with the drysuit by this time, and when I left the beach, headed for Allyn, I was down to a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. Felt like summer.

I got to Allyn in the mid-afternoon. There was a significant amount of mud to cross to get to solid ground, but it didn't take too long before I was done. (I could have avoided the mud if I'd gone to the dock at the park, but I didn't.) I had a couple of hours to wait before Mary and Micah came, so I walked around for a while, watched the chainsaw carver at work, bought a milk shake at Big Bubba's, had a burger at the Boathouse Bar and Grill. It didn't take long for me to get back into the groove of modern living once again.

This trip is done.