Day 4, Part 2: The first two photos I took in Oregon

This post (except for these four sentences) was written before the story of the rest of the trip. I'm going to leave it intact. The first part of the day and the last part of the day can be found in parts 1 and 3. I was charmed to be welcomed by a place that was green and floral.

Kate and I had just driven across the border from Idaho, having spent the night at a hotel on the Snake River. I expect I'll put more pix up later that tell the story of my move, but for now these will do. The picture I had taken before the welcome center photo at the top was taken in Idaho. I took more as we drove across Oregon and came to rest in Astoria, still not sure if that was going to be the final destination. And of course I took many, many more after that. My picture files for this period are still pretty limited. As we know, that would change.

I don't remember that much about my first impression of the state. I remember things in the hours after this, but I don't remember a lot about how I felt on first entering the state. I feel sure I was very glad to be there. I'd been through Oregon as a child once or twice, but not as an adult. I was moving here, and I hadn't even come for a prior visit. I think I was glad to leave the flat, brown, mostly boring country of southern Idaho, and was glad to be welcomed. The cheery visitor center made me FEEL welcome. I was a little worried about the heat, because I wasn't tolerating it well at that time, but I knew the coast would be cooler. I remember how pleased I was to see the flowers in bloom - there was some color, finally. It was manicured and clean, and there were bathrooms. It was an anomaly in the midst of the untamed wilderness (or something approximating that) on all sides. We learned a little about Oregon at the center. I wanted to take advantage of it, but I didn't have the capacity that day to learn very much through reading. We wanted to move on. I knew Oregon would be diverse and wild and different, and I wanted to see it. I also wanted the trip to be over, and to know what place I'd be calling "home." I was assuming it would be Astoria, but I'd left the option open to find somewhere else. It had been a long trip, and we still had a very large state to cross to reach the ocean.

Go to Day 4, Part 3

Day 4, Part 3: The greens and browns of Eastern Oregon

We went through a lot of brown country today, encountered the Snake River twice and ended at the Columbia River. We'd started the day at the Snake River in Idaho, and this is the Snake again somewhere near the crossing to Oregon.

Our next destination on the map was Baker City, where we bought gas and food. Baker City seems to have some Old West charm, but we didn't take time to look around. I liked the sign: "Explore the Baker City Historic District."

Here's more of Baker City after we left the gas station.

This was encouraging. The landscape was turning green and there were mountains on the horizon. We were following basically the same Oregon Trail the pioneers had followed. I wonder what they thought of this after all the many days in the desert. Actually, I don't know their route that well. It would be interesting to look at it.

It was wonderful to see the bright purple lupine beside the road, and we got out for a few minutes on the hillside.

Now the countryside kept changing.

An amusing sign? Actually both of them were, considering how warm it was. It seemed like it would never be icy here.

I believe this is the rest stop parking lot that goes with the sign above. The countryside was turning green, which was seriously refreshing. Notice I'm taking a lot more photos. I think the stress had abated some, and I was excited about being in Oregon. Almost "home" now, wherever that was, and enjoying the hills and the green.

I was surprised and delighted when we began passing through pine forests and meadows. This type of environment always energizes and excites me. Oregon seemed quite OK at this point, and the air had cooled down. We'd gone up quite a bit in elevation.

Hmm. I'd been worried about this chain between the truck and trailer, but I hadn't done anything about it. It had been dragging, and you can see where the links had begun to wear thin. One would think it was obvious to tie it up from the beginning, but (I swear) the rather stupid guy where I rented the truck said to let it hang on the ground. Not knowing that much about did or did not make for the best towing, I wanted to do it right. If there was some reason to let it drag, I'd trusted him and not my own brain. Now THAT was stupid! I don't know what the heck he'd been thinking.

There were nice things to look at here, too, and I took more photos.

In fact, I felt so good, I took a memory book photo of the car up on the trailer. There's my tapir bumper sticker and the sticker Sharon Matola had sent me from The Belize Zoo, even though I hadn't been there yet. The box in the car says, "Toiletries." I put stuff in the car that I would want to get to at rest stops and hotels.

Our final goal for the day was the Columbia River. We were cutting across the northeast corner of the state from the Snake to the Columbia. Unfortunately, that brought us down again out of the wonderful mountainous zone into the brown flatland again, and I didn't take any more pictures for the rest of the day. It seemed to take forever, but we finally reached the river at Umatilla a bit before sunset. There was water, yeah, but it was hot, hot, hot. We promptly looked for a place to stay. It was a small motel, our funkiest accommodations yet, and I bought a coffee mug from the gift shop to commemorate the first night in Oregon. I got the least ugly one they had, which was still truly tasteless, I thought. They had some awful souvenirs there, and it made me glad I didn't live in Umatilla. The mug was black with the word "Oregon" in gold script (which was kind of OK) and I don't remember what the picture was, although I think it may have been nondescript scenic. Writing this from the future, I thought I still had it (8 years later), but I think I finally trashed it this year. If I took a picture of it before I let it go, it will turn up on this blog sooner or later :)

Go to Day 5

Day 3: From Utah to Idaho

The stuff pictured above is what got me through the night. Kate had gone out to a nearby eatery/gift shop the night before and brought back the softest, most friendly-looking stuffed animal she could find. I didn't know anything about Beanie Buddies until later when we added some to our gift shop, but I now know that Beanie Buddies are among the softest of stuffed animals. I looked directly into her (the elephant's) eyes and named her "Olympia." I didn't know where I'd end up on this trip, but we were driving toward the Olympic Peninsula, which is actually in Washington, but it sounded like a good name.

In the morning things looked brighter. I felt better. Walking in the cooler morning air was nice. I walked around the edge of the parking lot, enjoying being on dirt, not pavement, and looking at the mountains (below). When the patrons of the Days Inn had said rudely to Kate, "I hope you go today," it seemed to be a mutual sentiment. Things were definitely looking up. We found a nice trucker who offered to help us out of there, and he clearly knew more about turning a rig like this in an inadequate space than we did. He knew exactly how to turn to make a certain thing happen. We watched somewhat in awe, because it made sense afterwards, but it wasn't what one would have expected. He made it look easy.

Springville was actually kind of pretty. For some reason, mountains are always reassuring to me.

The lovely Days Inn. I must have been getting some of my spirit back, because I enjoyed taking these photos, if only for the memory book.

We drove through Salt Lake City uneventfully, only stopping for gas and probably peanuts, trail mix, and water, or something like that. I took this picture in Idaho. I think these are not roads, but potato patches. I'm not sure. I kept thinking about potatoes as we drove, and thinking the countryside was pretty boring. It looks nice in a single photo like this, but we were getting tiring of driving mile after mile with nothing new to look at. Somewhere in the middle of that long stretch of Idaho - actually while we were stopped at a cafe having a baked Idaho potato - Alex called on the cell phone and ordered something from our (now itinerant) gift shop. All of the stuff was in the back of the truck. He said he'd wait till we arrived in Oregon, which was a good thing.

Go to Day 4, Part 1

Day 2: The Days Inn I will never forget

It was desert, but it was also a bit mountainous. I like that about Utah. But it also seemed endless. I took this photo in the morning. I took very few photos on this first part of the trip. In fact, I only took three today. Kate drove all day. I wasn't feeling that good, and I don't remember much about the morning. Later, we had an incident that almost made me believe in angels.

There weren't too many places to eat. Around lunch time we pulled into a McDonald's that had an extremely high curb. In the heat, I think we were after milk shakes almost more than food. We felt the bump but, tired and not thinking, we didn't inspect the truck. It seemed to be riding OK. And then, as we were cruising down what should have been an uneventful stretch of the seemingly endless highway, we noticed a guy waving and flagging us down. At first we were nervous, thinking he'd been drinking or something, but we noticed he looked sane and was in a uniform. We pulled over. Thank god. The guy, who was in the military, pointed out smoke coming from one of the tires on the trailer. Sure enough, the somewhat flimsy fender had bent at McDonald's and our tire was about to catch fire! Our guardian angel was a perfect gentleman and perfectly calm. He had some tools in the back of his car and bent the fender so it wasn't digging into the tire any more and, making sure everything was safe for the moment, and I think he called a nearby repair place or directed us to a phone book. I don't even remember what we did or what happened. I vaguely remember waiting alongside the road for much longer than the repair people said it was going to take. I was stressed, despite everything I was having fun with Kate, and we were finding reasons to laugh, but I was also starting to feel exhausted and nauseous. It was probably from stress and heat. We were so grateful for our uniformed angel, but the day had clearly been too long already.

We stopped early at the Days Inn in Springville, Utah, and they were very sorry we had picked their hotel. I don't know what we did right off the bat to irritate them, but it got worse fast. Normally I'm a good hotel guest, but once we got settled, I threw up all over the bathroom. I had other manifestations, too, which I won't go into. I was at least in the right location when that happened. Poor Kate! She got a bunch of towels and cleaned everything up, then threw them into the hotel laundry. I could barely stand how I felt. I must have simply been way over-stressed. Kate was taking care of everything and being very upbeat, but - and she'll have to remind me about this, because I can only remember part of the story - she passed out from dehydration. She gets a kind of dehydration that can't be fixed by just drinking water. Frogs. If it gets bad enough she has to rebalance her electrolytes, and we somehow did that. Then she went looking for someting to cheer ME up and a way to feed both of us. A little broth, maybe. Food wasn't sounding very good to me at that point. Meanwhile, the staff at Days Inn was getting a clue that something wasn't right with their guests. "You go soon?" they kept asking her hopefully. Just a little more stress. Um, no, we're staying. They didn't like it that we'd parked a truck that was too unmanageable in their parking lot. Who knew. When we'd arrived, we'd driven straight through under that canopy to the back lot thinking that OF COURSE there was a way out, like a circular drive, but no. And the rig with the car on it wouldn't turn in their parking lot. I'd asked politely at the desk if they could suggest the best way to get the truck and trailer out of there, but they were extremely rude about it, so we parked it and left the problem until later. If I'm remembering correctly, the ball on the hitch got damaged, maybe trying to turn the truck in their lot, and we had to call on a mechanic for the second time that day. Again, it took a long time for anyone to come out. Kate got me settled in the room and then went to deal with the truck. In the "can't we do one more stressful thing" department, I called Marco to let him know we were OK. He'd asked me to. It didn't help that he didn't consider the situation OK at all, and he ordered me to turn around and drive back to Grand Junction so "somebody who knew what they were doing" (he) could do the driving. Are. You. Kidding? I refused. We'd gotten this far. We were going to make it. Go back? No, I don't think so. And somehow women's energy at this point seemed a lot less stressful to deal with than men's. I'm sure he was mainly concerned, but he was just showing me the attitude and macho piggishness I was glad I was leaving behind. In all, it worked out OK. Thank god for friends who can stay calm and laugh, even when you're sick and stuck at the Days Inn being told to "go soon." Kate even told them her friend wasn't feeling well and we might want to spend another night or two. They were not happy about that.

Go to Day 3

Day 1: June 5, 2001 - Leaving Palisade, first night

I don't have any photos for this day. I got super lucky, because we were having an unseasonably cool few days just when I had to go get the moving truck and put everything together. It's hard to describe what the heat can do to me, especially combined with the stress of leaving home, so this was just plain fortuitous. We picked up a couple of Marco's friends to help pack the truck. One or two others bailed, so we were lucky to have anyone. It took a lot longer than anyone expected, but eveything fit just about perfectly. The pre-planning paid off. Everyone behaved, and it was a friendly effort all around. I don't remember the goodbyes. I rememer that Kate flew in on time, and I had to keep her waiting longer than I expected, but she'd brought a book and was fine with that. She waited at the airport, which was just off of the route I needed to take out of town anyway.

So, the sendoffs were done. Kate (incredible friend) was a welcome sight. I was even more tense than I thought I'd be and I just wanted to get on the road. I remember seeing her at the airport seemingly pretty relaxed and wearing a colorful (blueish?) scarf. The truck was packed, and it had seemed the lesser of several evils to put my car on a tow rack behind it with all wheels off the ground. I can't say I'd had much experience driving a truck this big myself, but Kate said she had. Once with Kate, I think I began to relax a little. She drove, and we hit the nearby highway never looking back, or not much. We passed through Grand Junction, Fruita, Loma, Mack, and over the Colorado-Utah border on I-70, driving literally into the sunset. I remember how red the sky was, and how pretty it made the desert. It was reassuring and, as Kate and I always did, we laughed in spite of everything.

We'd of course planned to be far enough along to stop for the night before it was actually dark, but that wasn't going to happen. We stopped for dinner somewhere and ate something. The room was big. It was OK, I think. The A/C was cold. And we got into the low desert mountains before we stopped for the night at a small hotel.

Go to Day 2