A spring trip

by Jeff · July 5, 2020

We have been slow here in the Pacific Northwest what with the Covid-19 lockdowns and phased re-openings mandated by the Governor here. E and I are lucky to be in the “Essential Employee” lists and so not a lot has changed with our daily routine except that we don’t get to go play poker in live poker rooms and interact with the people there. We have been having “happy hour” outdoor meetings with our favorite neighbors and enjoying their company while swilling cocktails, noshing on food and maintaining social distancing. Their oasis of a backyard is filled with a lovingly maintained garden and is a haven for all types of birds who accompany our conversations with their lovely songs.

Disconnecting for the Weekend

So, a planned quick early summer trip to shake down The Beast, Piper and knock the rust off our checklists and procedures. Gotta get ready for the BIG TRIP in August don’t ya know?

We planned on going to Eastern Washington (the dry side) for a two-night stay at the Squaw Rock RV Resort along the Naches River. Well, we got to talking about it to friends and family and This Thing of Ours has grown out of proportion. Now we have two couples in the spots next to us and my sister and a friend staying down the road at another place!

We had talked on and off about E taking a day off early and going over by ourselves to get set up and scope out the area, but she wouldn’t commit to it. I spent Wednesday getting my chores completed for the trip and then Thursday morning doing the last-minute chores of putting water in the tank and started carrying stuff out to the refrigerator. I sent E a text around noon and she surprised me with an “I’m on the way home” reply. She arrived and commenced to “putter about” and asked what our drop-dead time should be to leave for Naches. To my great surprise, we got all of the last-minute things done and left the house at my estimated 2:30 pm!

After a last light and break check, it was out of the driveway, onto Interstate 5 and south to U.S. Highway 12 where we head eastbound. A quick stop at the AM/PM/Arco for an overdue nosh (great green chile burrito and sweets to follow) and East to the town of Packwood. This little mountain town is a crossroads for sportsmen and adventurers but is little known to anyone else. The businesses here struggle and barely eek out a living most of the year and are often shuttered in the winter. I travel though here regularly through the year for work and have found a great coffee place named for the locally famous Goat Rocks where there are, you guessed it, Mountain Goats. We head into the coffee shop and both E and I ask the semi Steam-Punk dressed girl behind the counter if she can do a CUBANO coffee. We try to explain it to her and the older lady who owns the place happened to be sitting in the dining area and searched for it on the internet and between the two of them, a fine replica of the sweet jolt of caffeine was produced! We chatted for a few minutes and then were back off on our trip. This town does cater to the traveler as well as the logging industry which started the community and barely exists anymore. Almost all of the businesses have nice wide aprons of pavement out front where a big rig can pull safely off the main highway and easily re-enter the highway. There are a couple of hotels in town and some specialty lodges as well as a decent RV park right in town. The local market is easily accessed and there is a craft brewery in town now that I hear is worth the visit. Locals tip: Watch out for the Elk herd that lives here and is often in town in the city park, they do not care about humans and consider us interlopers in their lives.

Back on our way, we climb up out of the Cowlitz river valley and get a good view of the Goat Rocks on our way to crossing the Cascade Range at White Pass. The weather, temperature and scenery immediately change as you head down the “dry side” of the mountains and instead of the ever present Fir trees and moss, you get their dry country cousins the Black and Yellow pines. The smell in the air is different as well…instead of the constant odor of decay (which is ever present, even in the summer months in western WA.), you get a drier, crisper, nose bouquet of dirt and dry country plants. This time of year (mid-June) you get an immediate temperature change and suddenly you are experiencing 10-degree warmer weather just by changing sides of the mountain range. Washington is two different states in many ways, divided at the top of the Cascades, and climate is definitely one of them.

Anyway, we reach the bottom of the drive along the Tieton River and turn left on Highway 410 where we follow the Naches River upstream, through the Nile valley, back toward Mt. Rainier. The Naches river is flowing briskly and we can’t wait to find ourselves camped nearby.

About 15 minutes’ drive brings us to the store and restaurant combination that is the office for the Squaw Rock RV resort. The store/office is closed but we had the foresight to call ahead before we left home and secured the early night. We see a note in the front window of the store with our name and space number and we proceed into the park. We back Piper into a very level compacted dirt/rock site and find ourselves with a fire ring within steps of the riverbank. We get out of the Beast and soak in the sounds of the rushing river and have visions of sleeping soundly to the background noise.

We had left-over food from the night before and decided against breaking out the grill, just heating dinner in the microwave (isn’t having “glamping” great?) and dragging our chairs out to enjoy the scenery around us. Around 9 pm, we head off to bed after reading a bit and starting some offline blog entry. Did I mention that we are totally disconnected here? Yep, NO ELECTRONIC SIGNAL AT ALL, the park does not have WiFi, there is no cell signal or data. No annoying dings or buzzes from the phone, computer or tablets. We actually have to enjoy each other’s company, LOL. And that brings me to our visitor; Just before bed I hear a car pull up and feet on the gravel then a knock on the door. I open our door, after looking out the window, and a young woman asks if I am the manager or host as they had an emergency and need a phone. I say no and that we have no phone service either and she looks puzzled and says she saw our name and space number on the note in the window of the office and thought that meant we were the hosts. Laughing, we respond that we are not and why our name was in the window and she apologizes and goes off to get cell signal…15 minutes’ drive away. We are hopeful she found a resolution to her emergency and that this is not a recurring theme.

Waking refreshed from a cold night under warm blankets (our preferred sleep scenario), I get the coffee going and our morning routine gets under way. I should mention here that we have a very long history of my always making the coffee…E says only I can make coffee the way we like it and that she always messes up the ratio, I dunno about that, I think she just likes my coffee. In return, she always cooks breakfast. I think the turn about is a good division of labors. (Ha Ha – “equal” says E, “let’s trade.”)

Anyway; up, fed and out the door after loading camera, fishing and some hiking gear and off to Naches where there is the all coveted cell and data signal… E watches her phone and announces when we get cell signal but no ‘G’ and then finally we get close enough to get the vaunted 4Glte and we are in Naches with her texting friends and family while I find us a drive up coffee stand. Btw>>>Naches is pronounced “Nacheese”. The locals all pronounce it this way and I remember growing up with that. They say it is to differentiate it from that other Natchez “back east”.

This is the Yakima valley fruit growing area and the sweet Rainier Cherries are being harvested…time to get our fresh fruit (picked here) on. We pick up some local cherries to share around the campfire and head off to our days adventures. We got local info on a little pond on forest service land and hiked around it accompanied by a family of Canada Geese and a beaver. Fishing was a bust for us there but we did get some fun exploring in around this beautiful Nile valley.

Our other folks start showing up with Lin and husband arriving in their Airstream “Silver” with their dogs Trigger and Colt. Sister Janet and her friend Jan show up in just their car as they are staying in a cabin down the road. Tambo, her husband Brando, 7 year old son A and Thor the Lab arrive in a bumper pull trailer behind a Jeep Gladiator.

Everyone got introduced and dinner and drinks were had while a fire was built…more on the fire:

E and I have just finished the first season of the show “Alone”. E was fascinated by making fire so one of our fun goals this trip was to teach her to start a fire with a Ferro rod and knife. I know, some of you folks out there that follow me probably are saying “gee that’s easy” or “use a primitive method and prove you can really start a fire”. I hear both factions and say that this was a single task for E to have fun and succeed at. So, I had made some prepper tinder (cotton ball soaked in petroleum Jelly) and bought a new UST fire rod. E gathered up her natural tinder/kindling and her friends and new acquaintances gathered around the fire pit with the show even being video recorded. We scraped the new off the rod, spread the cotton on a piece of dry kindling and after just a couple of strikes…A fire was born! Quick application to her prepared kindling and that fire then burned late into the night, providing heat and entertainment for all in the combined camps. E learned a new skill and wowed her friends and even inspired them to try their hands at doing it the next night.

Saturday broke with our usual routine and then everyone left for their own adventures. Lin took the dogs and husband antler hunting/mostly hiking in the surrounding hills while the rest of us headed to a little place along the Tieton River call Tim’s pond where we spent most of the day fishing for trout for dinner. Some fish were caught with E catching the first one and young A catching the biggest.

Back to camp early evening and dinner prep is more of a communal affair tonight. Young A cleaned his own fish (with dad supervision) with his own pocketknife! He then made sure he showed every newcomer to camp where the guts had been thrown in the river. Everyone sharing space on my portable charcoal grille with so much food on the grate that the lid couldn’t get hot! Lin wowed us with great snack plates of home-grown beef jerky, pepperoni, summer sausage and some rather good cheese choices. Lin’s husband claimed to have never tasted trout before and stated that he liked it. Eventually all of the food was cooked and everyone got some of the fresh fish and there were some fun stories…

It is a good thing that Janet knits, because there were a lot of yarns around the fire that night!

It’s so remarkably interesting to get a group together that includes veterans, police, civilians, dispatchers and other first line professionals and see where the conversations go. Reminiscences of other days and times and experiences that hearken back to times even before any of us old folks were born and current familial affairs and family histories. Two things are usually forbidden topics in our groups…Politics and Religion (unless you have a fun anecdote about the topic). We are neither apolitical nor anti-religion, we just don’t invite the potential for heated tempers that flare around those items and E and I enjoy being neutral for those topics.

Saturday night actually wrapped up early. I think everyone was a little worn out from the day of adventuring.

I believe our trip was definitely a success. We got our system checked out, identified items to be checked, repaired and replaced for the season and added items to our checklists.

There will be a follow up to this about the RV resorts along the Naches River for those of you interested in such things.