Shutdown Adventures - Day 3 - Chapter 2

My first stop after escaping the Alamar Palace is the Forks Timber Museum.  It is a pleasant trip through the history of Forks and the challenge of logging the big timber.  I contemplate the old photos and admire some verrry long crosscut saws and chainsaw bars.

Across the highway, about 50 elk are grazing around the runway of the Forks airport.  Rumor has it the  police have to come out and clear them off the runway when small planes want to land.

I head for La Push and stop enroute to eat lunch at the Three Rivers Restaurant and store.  I treat myself to a decent Monte Cristo (dipped in strawberry jam) and chat with staff and fellow tourists. A couple from New Jersey is distraught that Kalaloch Lodge was closed due to the government shutdown and they will be unable to stay there.  

We speculate about whether the trails to the Olympic National Park beaches will be closed.  The staff recommends going down to First Beach at La Push since it is on tribal land.   I declare my intentions to hike into Third Beach if it is not posted.  I'm off to the trailhead and since there are no officious signs prohibiting access, I defiantly head down the trail. (take that, congress!)

In spite of a dozen cars lining the parking lot, I have the trail to myself.   A well maintained trail leads through spruce forest.   The day is sunny and bright, but the light reaching the forest floor is ethereal and muted by filtering through the canopy overhead.  

About ten minutes down the trail, I stop to quiet my noisy footsteps and look around without fear of tripping over something.  I'm impressed by the silence.  No road noise, no ocean noise, one distant bird call.

A slight movement catches my eye off to the left of the trail above a small pool of water.  As I watch, a drop of moisture collects at the tip of a sword fern and drops into the pool.  A ray of sunlight interacts with the resulting ripples, causing many points of filtered light to dance up a moss covered stump.

Another ten minutes down the trail, a brief pause to listen, but no ocean sound yet.  I also can't smell the ocean yet, but that could be due to the havoc the smoked out carpet of the Alamar Palace has played on my sinuses.  Onward and downward!  The trail is descending steeply now.

A few minutes later, I stop once again to listen.  Now I can hear the sound of the surf hitting the beach.  I put my hand on the rough bark of a sitka spruce and inhale the pungent aroma of the sap that comes away on my fingers.  (take that, Alamar Palace!)

A large pile of driftwood heralds my destination.  A couple of older hikers are sitting on the first log, unwilling to clamber over the jackstrawed pile to reach the sand.  I clamber over and under the obstacle to reach the beach.   Even at high tide, there is a walkable ribbon of sand. To the right is an open expanse.  To the left lies a large creek that is spanned by the tangle of driftwood.  I envision myself adroitly skipping across the large log that spans the entire distance. However, knowing my balance and coordination, I crawl unceremoniously across on my hands and knees, providing high amusement to a couple of twenty somethings reclining on a nearby stretch of sand.

After hiking up the beach to view a waterfall, I retrace my steps, inspect a purple starfish and caress a tiny piece of driftwood that feels warm and smooth in my palm. I do my four-appendage clamber back across the log, walk a bit in the other direction and then make my way back to the trail.  

I climb back up the steep part of the trail at a faster pace than my fitness level can support.  When the trail levels out, I pause to catch my breath and wait for my heart to stop pounding.  Just as I start forward again, the couple from New Jersey appear on the trail.  

"Please tell me we are almost there," the woman pleads.   Since she said please, and since they started on the east coast, it isn't too much of a stretch to provide them some assurance.  I tell them that the trail is steeper from this point forward, but  yes, they are almost there.  

Back to the trailhead with "It's too late to turn back now" running through my head.

Shutdown adventures - Day 3 - Counting my blessings

For anyone who is wondering about why Pat and I are spending so much time in Forks these days, I will start with a brief backstory....

In late June, Pat parted ways with his employer of 11 years, Longview Timber (now Weyerhaueser).  Just when he was getting settled into an early retirement lifestyle of golf, hiking, gardening and goofing around, he was recruited to come to work for a forestry consulting firm.  The work and the people were a perfect fit, the location, Forks, Washington, was a bit of a stretch.  

After making a trip up to check out the area, the job still felt like the right thing to do, so we are in the process of establishing a family outpost near the most northwesterly point in the continental United States.

So much for the backstory.  When I shuttered my government cubicle on Tuesday morning, it only took me about two hours to pack up Sippy the Prius and the dog named Boo and head for Forks.

It is going to be another month before we will be in a permanent housing situation.  The bachelor pad that we found for Pat in the interim is the equivalent of indoor camping except it smells much much worse than a pine scented campground.  Even though the walls are freshly painted and the curtains are new, the carpet is saturated with nicotine and pet urine and no amount of shampooing will ever fix it.

There is no five-second rule if you drop food on the floor.  If I pick it up, it goes immediately into the trash.  I'm afraid that if I don't pick it up immediately, some Little Shop of Horrors plant will emerge from said carpet and gobble it up.

Pat's interim furniture consists of an air bed in the bedroom, a folding table and chairs for the kitchen and two camp chairs and a lamp for the living area.  One of the other tenants gave Pat a couch as he was moving in, but .... well after one look and sniff on my first visit, I gave Pat an ultimatum that either the couch or I had to go.  Wise choice husband.

This morning, before leaving the "Alamar Palace"  I found myself counting my blessings.  Most of the other residents live there because it is the only thing they can afford.  We are there because there was nothing else available to rent on the week Pat needed to start work and it left more money in our pocket to set up a second household.

The government shutdown will have a short term impact on our budget.  But unless something dire happens it won't seriously impact our ability to pay our bills and meet our obligations. It did prompt us to  cancel a planned outing over to Victoria, BC.  We normally don't think twice about a getaway like this.  Two nights in a Victoria motel and the ferry ride from Port Angeles cost more than the monthly rent at the Alamar Palace.  

Yup, counting my blessings.

Epic Commute Chronicle #1

The light changed before I could cross the street. I sadly wave at the south end of the last northbound express bus of the day. That means I have 15 minutes to people watch until the local bus meanders to this stop and ample time to goof off on the "milk route" home. Such is the plight of the commuter. Well, such is the plight of the commuter who isn't very good at watching the clock!

The bus driver just informed us that there are not one, but two wrecks on the I-5 bridge ahead which means no getting home by the usual route. Time for a scenic tour of north Portland side streets. This has the makings of an epic commute for the record books.

This will be totally boring, but I must chronicle the first epic commute of my fledgling blog....

6:20 I leave my desk
6:31 I missed the express bus
6:45 I am picked up by the local bus
7:02 The bus driver tells us about the wreck. My handy KGW traffic app verifies the problem. It usually shows green, yellow or red. It is showing black.

7:07 The bus driver bails on to the side streets, backtracks to Portland and then heads east on I-84. Yay for freeway speed. The commute has abated on this side of town.

7:17 We make it to I-205. I pause to enjoy a somewhat hazy view of Mt. Hood.

7:20 I hum Roll on Columbia as we cross the river and enter Washington.

7:22 Now heading back west towards Vancouver on Hwy 14. I'm actually glad now that I missed the regular bus, because that driver sounds like he is hopelessly bogged down in the I-5 tangle. It is a nice compensating error.

7:28 We pass historic Fort Vancouver and begin the meander through the local stops in downtown Vancouver.

7:32 On to I-5 for the home stretch to the park and ride. I should have tweeted this instead. I am sure all three of you who are going to read this would be waiting anxiously for the next update.

7:44 We arrive at the bus stop only 24 minutes late. Good job driver.

Thank goodness tomorrow is work at home Wednesday.

On The Late Bus

There was an extremely heavy gravity field surrounding my pillow this morning. I was unable to pull myself away until an hour after my alarm had buzzed. I am fortunate that I can flex my start time at work and their is a commuter bus that runs every 15 minutes from 5:30 to 8:00.

There are consequences to being a sluggard.

The early bus sails from Vancouver to Portland in less than 25 minutes. I usually still have coffee in my travel cup when I'm unceremoniously dumped on the curb along the transit mall. With every subsequent bus, there are more commuters clogging the freeway and the bus time is longer. With my extra morning bus time, I finish my coffee, look at the scenery, play Words with friends and begin a blog entry.

Off the bus, work, work, work.

Waiting now for the late bus home. Because of the stellar weather today, I pulled a light summer skirt out of the back of my closet. A strong breeze allows me to provide a minute of entertainment to other commuters by doing my best Marilyn Monroe blowing skirt imitation. A poor imitation at best, since Marilyn was not fat and brunette, nor did she wear sensible sandals.

A slow roll home, but no bus ride tomorrow. I will be hiking in the Columbia Gorge on my first federal furlough day.

and, so I begin.....

During the last couple of weeks, I've had the true pleasure of live, face to face interaction with quite a few people who I usually only see on Facebook - a college buddy from the east coast, my son-in-law's family, West Point Parents Club alumni and pipe band parents. How cool is that?

A surprising number of people said they enjoyed reading my Facebook posts from the bus and at least one person suggested starting a blog. I was pleased, since I sometimes worry that my commuter angst is a bit too whiny and self serving.

Without further encouragement, I begin my adventures in bus blogging.

Of course, on the day when I could use about 30 idle minutes to achieve beginner blogging perfection, traffic is light and I hurtle towards the 99th St. Transit Center at warp speed.

and, so I begin.....