kayaking – Page 5 – The MoHo and Other Traveling Tales

01-31-2014 Day 6 Costa Maya

Currently we are camped at NAS/JRB, Belle Chasse, LA Temperature: 47 F, and foggy

This is sixth in a series of posts about our NCL cruise on the Norwegian Jewel to the Western Mediterranean. Read about our first day at sea here, about an evening onboard here, Cozumel here, Belize here, and Roatan here. Also, keep in mind that the link to the left for my photos on google will take you to many more images of our cruise and the ports we visited

It’s always nice when a ship docks at a pier and no tenders are required to go on shore. The pier at Costa Maya is big and new, much like the cruiser’s village built in 2007 after Hurricane Dean decimated both the cruise port village built in 2001, and the older bucolic fishing village of Mahahual.

We had no expectations for the last port on this cruise. Reading in advance, I knew there were a few ruins to explore on excursions, that there was the Disneyesque cruise village, geared to bars and shopping, dolphin encounters, and swimming pools. I did know the town was a short taxi ride away, but wasn’t at all sure the town was worth seeking out.

However, once we walked the very long pier to the village, I was dismayed to discover that the entire village was walled off on either side by private land, and the beach was non-existent. For the second time on the cruise, I felt incredibly claustrophobic, and very frustrated that I seemed to be trapped in a bright, fake world of color and people. Ack! Mo was rolling her eyes at me as I struggled with my frustration, desperately seeking a way out.

If I had read just a little more, I would have realized that there was a rear exit from the ‘village’ that didn’t require an excursion or golf cart rental. We simply walked outside and found the old road leading south to Mahahual. The extensive damage from Hurricane Dean was clearly evident as we walked. Old electric boxes marked what once must have been small homes, but other than the paved road and stone street signs populated by iguanas, there was no sign of habitation.

I did know that the town was only a mile and a half from the pier, so we walked in the general direction and within half an hour turned toward the lighthouse and the beach. The skies were clearing from the morning overcast and the temperatures were quite warm. As the day wore on, the water turned brighter and brighter shades of turquoise. A cold local beer from the Blue Bay Beach Club and a couple of beach chairs gave us a chance to enjoy the view of the distant ship and watch people snorkeling. Of course, we hadn’t lugged our gear, unsure when we left the ship if there was any possibility of a snorkel beach nearby.

I had heard that, like most beaches in Mexico, there were entirely too many locals hawing wares on the beach. Instead, we had only one woman approach us the entire time we were there, and after a couple of no’s, she left us in peace. We walked the beach a bit, I went in the warm, clear water, and the kayaks sure did look tempting.

Mo liked the look of those kayaks as well, thinking we would get the best price for a tandem. Instead, the Blue Bay kiosk only had singles, but a delightful young woman gave us two individual kayaks for 5 bucks for an hour instead of the posted $5. per half hour, or $10 for two hours. So we walked for free, kayaked an hour for ten bucks, and spent 4 bucks having a good beer and comfy chairs under a nice palapa. I would say that was a good price and beat just about any excursion we might have found.

It seems that snorkeling trips on a cruise are something that should only be purchased on site and on the day you want to snorkel. Weather is completely unpredictable, as are water conditions. Purchasing a snorkeling trip in advance could have been a real bummer. However, finding good snorkeling beaches is also a bit of a crap shoot. We hauled our snorkeling gear all the way from Oregon for this cruise. I have hopes that we will get to use the gear in Florida, even though the weather didn’t cooperate much on the cruise.

After a few delightful hours at the beach, we walked back to the ship, managing to get in a three mile walk and an hour kayak for our day’s exercise. I think we got an additional mile just walking the length of the pier back and forth from the ship as well.

Deciding on an early afternoon lunch/dinner, we headed for the Garden Café buffet for some fresh salad and a table on the aft patio deck where I tried to get photos of the distant town and lighthouse that marked our kayak location. The weather was perfect for dining outside.

After lunch we walked up to the sports deck and watched part of a rousing game of basketball played by opposing crew teams, and then found an available ping pong table for a funny game of ping pong with wind, crooked table tops, and moving seas to add to our fun.

With our late lunch, we had no need to have dinner and instead relaxed in the stateroom until time for the last big show of the cruise, “Cirque de Bijou”. Something else we noticed on the Jewel was the available seating in the theater for the shows, both early and late. In the past, especially on Princess, it can sometimes be difficult to get into your chosen time for the evening show. Not a problem here, although last night we did choose to go a bit early for a good seat and ended up down in the lower area toward the front of the theater.

It was a great choice. I can say, unequivocally, that the show last night was the best we have ever seen on any cruise ship, ever, on any cruise line. Cirque d Bijou was a Las Vegas quality cirque show with breathtaking performances by all the regular artists from the evening shows. If I had been a bit less than thrilled by their singing, I was completely taken by their ability to both sing and hang from the sky on cloth draperies as they spun and flew around the auditorium. And for some reason, the singing was fabulous as well.

Just breathtaking!! As usual in the theater, no photos are allowed, however at the end of the main show, the crew put on a tribute show that I could have photographed if I had lugged the camera along. Jaime, the cruise director, introduced at least 200 members of the crew who marched down the aisles and to the stage, from room stewards to Executive Chef, to the Captain. The crowd, all hyped up from the standing ovation for the Cirque show thundered their applause.

Service on the Jewel is interesting. Individual crew members are attentive and cheerful, however the service isn’t exactly “in your face” perfect. We are not constantly plied with invitations to purchase alcohol, and used plates are not picked up the minute you finish eating. Our steward is adequate, keeping our cabin reasonably well kept, and creating great little animals for us every night, something that has gone by the wayside on Princess.

However, we didn’t get our ice bucket constantly filled, and the mirrors often were streaked after the room was freshened. There are so few things we disliked about this cruise, it seems only fair to mention the few that were not what I might consider “cruise quality”. A detail we especially liked was the tabletop baskets filled with napkin wrapped flatware. We never had to hunt for flatware and if needed could use two napkins.

I have been trying to come up with a way to describe the ship décor, and this morning it hit me. Without any glitz and sparkle, no fancy shined brass, interesting art, flowers in the bathrooms, crystal chandeliers…the ship seems a bit like funky Key West conch house. Lots of bright wood, bright Key West colors, and not much that seems to be “cruise fancy”. It is more like a good working class vacation resort, with everything you need in a pleasant environment.

Unlike my expectations for a possibly mediocre experience, I wouldn’t hesitate to cruise Norwegian again if the price, departure port, and destinations fit where I wanted to go.

Tomorrow is the last day of this cruise, with a full day at sea. Rumor has it that the unseasonably cold weather in the south has moderated a bit and the forecast is for a cloudy day in the low 70’s in New Orleans on Sunday. Tomorrow at sea we can expect mostly sunny skies with temps in the mid 70’s. Lucky lucky US!!

1-17 and 1-19 2014 Padre Island National Seashore and kayaks in the water

We only gave ourselves a single day to explore Padre Island National Seashore. I am sure folks who love this place dearly are appalled that we didn’t take the time to settle in to the rhythm of the waves, and to really enjoy the longest stretch of undeveloped barrier island in the world.

Padre Island is truly a national treasure, one I had heard very little of until recently when I found bloggers talking about their time volunteering on the island. North Padre Island is a bit different. Technically it is a neighborhood of Corpus Christi, with many upscale seasonal homes on the intracoastal waterway, surf shops, and all that go with that beach resort kind of atmosphere.

Unlike what I read about South Padre Island, North Padre Island seems to be a bit more laid back, not quite so crowded, maybe not quite as popular with the spring break crowd. Very few high rises were to be seen. Just a few miles south, however, is the entrance to the national seashore. The entrance is still a few miles from the visitor center at Malaquite Beach, and the broad expanse of the barrier island seems a bit featureless until time is taken to look at it a bit more closely. Camping is allowed both in two main campgrounds that are accessible by road, and along the entire 65 mile length of the shore with a park permit. There is an additional campground at Yarborough Pass at milepost 15 ( through the dunes) that is on Laguna Madre, inland from the beach, and is accessible by 4 wheel drive or by boat.

We decided to drive to Bird Island and discovered one of the campgrounds, with several rigs settled in along the silty beach bordering Laguna Madre. It was here that I first saw this very weird bird that I later discovered was the national bird of Mexico, a crested caracara. There were white pelicans settling in on an exposed bar in the lagoon, and the wind was blowing hard. Perfect for windsailing, which seems to be a popular pastime at this site.

Continuing down the road toward the visitor center, we found a short interpretive trail with a nice path that led through the grasslands. The ecology of a barrier island is complex: simplified it consists of the beach, the dunes, the grasslands, the wetlands, and the lagoon separating the island from the mainland. The grasslands are full of all sorts of plants and wildlife, and we saw the lovely vermillion butterfly.The weather was cool and windy for our walk, and the sun was brilliant.

Dog friendly beaches and trails were another great surprise about the seashore. We were happy to have Abby with us all day on the trails and on the beach, although even with pavement, there were many stickers on the trail that Mo had to pull from Abby’s paws. Again, the national seashore is almost 70 miles of coastal frontage with no roads providing access. The only access is in your vehicle, right on the beach.

The first 5 miles don’t require a 4 wheel drive, but it is recommended after that distance, due to drifting dunes that build up along the route. The warning sign at the 5 mile marker regarding illegal activity and smugglers was a bit sobering.

We drove about 10 miles, most of the time we were the only ones on the beach, and it was very windy and cool enough that we were grateful for the protection of the car. This landscape is a place where immersion would take commitment. It would be wonderful to take the MoHo as far as we could manage and just sit there and watch the water and the view change with the shifting light. Instead, it was an exploratory trip and we decided that we will definitely return to explore it in depth.

Shoreline trash is a big enough subject that it is directly addressed in the park brochure. Seems as though most of the trash is blown in from the Gulf and there are both public and private programs to try to clean it up. It would be a never ending project. An entire day could be devoted to picking up all sorts of flotsam and jetsam that must be dumped from ships or who knows where. It was a shocking, actually. More trash than I have ever seen on a beach anywhere. In an nearly pristine wilderness. Trash bags are provided at the access roads to help with the garbage pickup. Made me really sad, and yet overwhelmed enough that I didn’t fill a garbage bag and try to take it back. Sorry Erin. I did manage to pick up a lot of trash at the NAS beach.

Unlike the complex, ever changing coastline of the Pacific, this gulf shore feels infinite…going on and on what seems like forever, with very little change. The subtle differences would have to be experienced at a slower pace. As nesting grounds for the endangered Kemp’s-ridley turtles, there would be nests to watch for as early as April, but with the chill winds, we saw no sign of turtles.

The story of the Kemp’s-ridley turtle is fascinating. Nearly extinct, they were losing their nesting sites to development, so biologists put Padre Island sand in their incubators to help them imprint, released them after tagging them from the shore, and recently tagged turtles have been returning and nesting in what was not an original nesting site for them. Although five different species of sea turtles nest on the island, we saw no nests and no turtles. Still too early in the season, I am sure.

In spite of the chill wind, seeing that expansive shoreline was fascinating, especially for me as a westerner with a Pacific ocean mindset. I loved it. Loved that I could just walk and walk and walk if I had the opportunity. I would imagine we will return to this place again and continue our explorations.

We waited for several days for the winds to lessen enough to launch our kayaks, and on our last day in Corpus Christi were rewarded with a calm not so chilly morning. There was a bit of fog to accompany us as we drove once again across the bay toward Mustang Island and turned north toward Aransas Pass.

We read about the Mustang Island Paddling Trail, where there are several launch sites, and official markers for the trail. Being inexperienced in this area, it seemed like a good idea to try a marked route.

The trails are on the bay side of Mustang Island, in brackish water that has a very silty, muddy bottom, dotted with islands and inlets. If you have ever tried to navigate in a completely flat landscape filled with water, you can imagine how challenging it was to figure out where we were. I didn’t have the official GPS with me, just a good printed map of the trails, and the google earth imagery.

Sure am glad I also had the phone GPS. In spite of my reasonably good navigation skills, I had no clue where we were on the map without turning on the phone and trying to figure out where that blue dot was! It was fun, not too windy, and there were enough birds around to keep things interesting. I was quite delighted to finally find the route marker number 11, and then number 10. We had completely missed the rest of them.

It isn’t a difficult place to keep track of where you need to go, it just is a bit tricky avoiding lagoons that might dead end into mud without an outlet. We probably paddled a short five miles or so, in water that wasn’t the least bit exciting and very very shallow in many places. Still, it was good to get out in the kayaks for a morning at least and experience a bit of Texas water.

As mentioned in the previous post, we topped off our morning kayak with our fabulous afternoon with Erin and Mui. It was a great way to spend our last day in this area that was brand new to us until now. I especially enjoyed trying to photograph all the birds. As they say, the best equipment in the world still needs the photographer. In spite of Deanna’s great lens, I have a long way to go before I get those shots of their eyes in perfect focus. I’ll keep trying.

Next: Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge and a visit with Judy

September 10 to 12 Baker City to Wallowa Lake State Park

Currently in Rocky Point, Oregon, partly cloudy at 55 degrees F, predicted high of 64F

Don’t forget to click on the photos if you want a bigger version

Sometimes when we are traveling, our tendency is to go fairly long distances between locations. This time, however, we took our own sweet time getting from place to place, and then settled in to really enjoy the countryside. After the morning in Baker City, we thought it might be fun to wander off on some back roads instead of sticking to the Interstate. We could see the curvy road ambling northeast rising on the southern foothills of the Wallowa Mountains.

How bad could it be anyway?! Sure, the road was narrow, there were curves, but no real spooky drop-offs like the ones back in John Day Country, and we were rewarded with beautiful vistas of the Wallowas and the Eagle Cap Wilderness shining in the late summer sunlight.

It is amazing to me how many tiny little towns are scattered across this part of Oregon. Of course I knew of Baker City, La Grande, Pendleton, Joseph, and Enterprise. I do actually live in this state. But I had never heard of Cove, or Union, or Medical Springs, and as we continued our travels for the rest of the trip, many little towns appeared that were just blips on the map, and a blink of the eye.

People lived in these little towns, there were city halls, and fire departments, police stations, antique stores advertising “used antiques”. Hmmm. There were old barns, and beautiful ranches, and miles and miles of open space. It was lovely to wander through the countryside and imagine what it must be like to be born and raised in places like these, or to live there now. Did these people grow up here or did they somehow choose to come to a tiny town in the far reaches of Northeastern Oregon. Lots of fodder for the imagination as I rode along, for sure.

As you can see from the map, there is really no way to get to Joseph without skirting the amazing Wallowa Mountains. Home to the Eagle Cap Wilderness, these mountains are sometimes called the “Little Alps of Oregon” with good reason. Formed dominantly from granite from the Wallowa Batholith, the peaks are glaciated and dotted more than 50 apline glacial lakes. They reminded me a bit of the Sierras, only a bit more open like the Big Horns. The Wallowas are one of the premier backpacking destinations in Oregon, not nearly so well known as the Cascades with their volcanoes, but much more enticing to me.

The meandering route gave us just a taste of what was to come in the far corner of our home state. Somehow I was reminded a lot more of the Idaho I lived in for more than 30 years than the Oregon that is now my home. Everything felt so familiar, the forests even smelled different, familiar somehow. I recognized the plants, the geology, all of it was like coming home somehow.

Just like a lot of other folks, I thought, “I could easily live in this place”. The winters are long, the population of Wallowa County is a mere 7,500 or so, and shopping is far away in La Grande or Pendleton. But the towns are lovely, well cared for, the vistas are magnificent, the land open and spacious. Beautiful.

When we arrived at the Wallowa lake State Park in early afternoon, we were a day early for our reservation, but in spite of the crowded park, there was a site open for us until our space was ready the next day. We originally planned to stay longer in Baker City, but continuing to the lake and taking our chances for a spot was a good plan. When we first planned this trip, I didn’t think we would need reservations, but checking the State Park website was a good hunch, since we just barely snagged a spot for the four nights we wanted to stay.

Wallowa Lake is home to one of the best examples of glacial topography in the West, and images of the huge lateral moraines are used often in textbooks on geology and geomorphology. The lake is deep and blue and incredibly clear. Often the mountains still have a bit of snow in late summer, but none was left this year, a low snow year for the entire area. The lake was really quite low as well, surprising since it is a natural lake and not a reservoir, but I guess drought is drought, and lake levels will go down.

After settling into our one night spot, we took the Tracker for a visit to the Forest Service Information Center on the edge of the little town of Joseph. The woman at the desk was incredibly helpful, and there were a ton of brochures about the area. She suggested we try the Lostine Creek Scenic Route, maybe hike up Hurricane Creek, or go check out the Zumwalt Prairie to look for wildlife. All good ideas, but we settled on Lostine Creek, a deep glacially cut valley that climbed back into the Eagle Cap Wilderness.

We hoped for some close-up views of the mountains, but the creek is so deep in the canyon that it is hard to see much without actually doing some of the 12 mile hikes into the back country that boast elevation rises of 3 to 5 thousand feet. Maybe not today. Let’s go back to the campground and check out the local nature trail and let Abby swim in the lake.

It was good to be settled in and to know that we had at least one day of doing not much of anything. Mo had surprised me with the idea of a special birthday treat, and in a couple of days we were going to drive the Hells Canyon Scenic Byway to Hells Canyon Dam and a big adventure on the Snake River in the wild and scenic part of Hells Canyon.

After a great sleep, we took our time enjoying the campground, went to town to do some laundry and actually check in on the internet for a bit, and were back in camp in time to move to our more permanent site for the next few days. This is a very popular park, even in late September, and on this Wednesday morning as we tucked into a rather short space, I was again really glad I had made reservations the previous month before everything was completely gone.

As I picked up the new tag for the new site number, I overheard a very sad RV driver complaining to the park ranger in the kiosk, “I NEVER make reservations this time of year! What do you mean there is NOTHING?!” Blue lake, big mountains, cute town….a very popular place.

Finally in late afternoon we wet out on the lake in the kayaks to enjoy that gorgeous clear water. The mountains are so high that the sun disappears fairly quickly on the tucked away part of the lake, but it was still beautiful. There are lakeside homes all along the western shore, most of them very big and spendy looking, and only a few of them with folks hanging around on the decks and porches. Even so, the lake was reasonably quiet, and the kayak time was nice.

We never did see a lot of birds around. I suppose the shoreline is too rocky, the lake is too low, and the water too clear for bird food in any quantity. As lovely as the lake was, and even with that gorgeous clear water, I think I would rather meander around in an estuary somewhere that has a bit more complexity. Don’t get me wrong, it was a beautiful kayak and it felt great to finally get our boats out on the water. We originally planned to try doing some kayaking on the John Day River, but the drought wasn’t about to let that happen. I hate it when we haul the boats for miles and miles and never get them on the water!

Mo had packed up a good amount of wood for the trip, so we had another huge campfire after supper and enjoyed all the activity of a very busy campground with kids on bikes, lots of dogs (well behave and leashed) and giving Jeremy a chance to play around outside unhindered. We even put up the chili pepper lights on the MoHo awning, something we haven’t done in a very long time. There are some more photos of the state park linked here

Who said planning is the fun part?

Clear warm evening in Rocky Point at 83 Degrees F

When I first imagined what RVing would be like many years ago, I pictured an idyllic ramble around the country, taking my time, staying wherever I felt like staying for as long as I wanted, and just picking up and leaving when I felt like it. That might work in the desert southwest now and then, but not so much for a three month sojourn through Texas and Florida and back, during prime season.

In the midst of all the other doings around here, I have been trying to get a handle on those plans. Usually I like this part, and open up the various apps that Nina discussed so well in a recent post, start up my old copy of “Streets and Trips 2011”, open up Google Maps and my Google Calendar, and start planning a route. Even for our trip to Alaska, this was a fairly straightforward process. We didn’t even make reservations for that entire summer on the road.

Florida in February is a completely different story, and as Sherry warned me, I should have started six months ago! I not only have to plan a route, I have to know EXACTLY when I plan to be in any particular place and make real honest to goodness reservations. Ack! How in the world can I be sure that I’ll be in Chiefland, Florida on a specific date when there are many months and thousands of miles between me and that date?

I have dreamed of a winter in Florida with my kayak in tow ever since I started visiting Bel in Ocala back in 2000. Mo and I got our boats to Florida on our cross country trip in 2007 for one magical float on the Silver River before we trundled on back west to buy the new motorhome in Texas and continue toward home. I have read the blogs avidly, ‘pinned’ campgrounds and rivers and events, and they created the beginning of my google map. The problems only begin when I try to link them all up, figure out the route and the miles and the DATES…and then make reservations. Only by now, I have been working on this for a few months, and I am too late for some of the places I wanted to go! Yup. Sherry was right. I should have started this six months ago, but somehow I was too busy TRAVELING then to be thinking about what I was going to be doing in 2014.

Before I go into the ‘plans’, I want to remember the fun things I have been doing NOW.

Would you eat dinner in this place? We did, and it was a fantastic experience. The Cowboy Dinner Tree used to be just that. It was a big old juniper tree out in the Oregon Outback near Silver Lake where they parked the chuck wagon for the cowboys. It has evolved a bit, and now people come from who knows where to fill this place up every weekend. Reservations required, two choices: chicken or sirloin. Dinner comes with salad, rolls, bean soup, potatoes, iced tea or lemonade (oops another choice) and dessert.

It isn’t cheap, and it takes two hours to get there. We rode with some local Rocky Point friends so the distance was irrelevant, and the experience was priceless. It is a “thing” and I am glad we took the time to do it. Although I brought the completely ridiculous steak home and made fajitas two nights in a row and then two more dinners from the chicken. Sheesh!

This week was bittersweet in a good way. I worked the very last time for soil survey. Sequestration and budget cuts and no federal budget all combined to end my contract career, so I retired for the second time. So I am really really retired now. Completely. It makes for some nice travel time, and is the reason I can manage to be off work long enough to take off next winter for three months instead of just a few weeks at a time. I’ll be poorer, but richer in time. I am pretty sure it is a good thing.

Another delight this week was a visit from Vermont friend Jeanne, (yes the famous adventure woman, Jeanne, that I have written about before). Only this time she brought along her sweetie, Alan, and he won Jeremy over in about two seconds and won me over about two seconds after that. Jeanne, you done good!! As did you, Alan. A pair made in heaven, or as all Jeanne’s friends say, a Danielle Steele novel. It is just romantic beyond imagination. He is a forester, she is a botanist, they both had basically given up on finding a soul mate, and they met in the woods at work! Isn’t that just incredibly perfect?!

We were on the water by 7 with beautiful partly overcast skies, perfect water, and lots of birds. Jeanne and Alan planned to see Crater Lake later in the day, but weren’t in too much of a hurry to miss out on pancakes and bacon for breakfast before they left.

After all the smoke that has been here, I was so glad to see perfectly clear skies by the time they got to Crater Lake, blue and smoke free and gorgeous. At least on the web cam. I had to keep checking to be sure that Alan’s first view of the lake would be wonderful. Jeanne wanted to show him all the cliffs she used to ski down when she lived here. Crazy woman.

Now back to the planning thing. Which is pretty much how that planning thing has been going. I work on it awhile, then something comes up and I get back to it later. Which is why I missed out on Myakka Springs and a couple of other places I wanted to see in Florida. Completely Booked!! We did manage to have a conversation with John and Carol from Our Trip Around the Sun who are going to be at Ding Darling Refuge on Sanibel Island and yes, I arranged a day, at 7 in the morning, when we will meet for a refuge trip that will hopefully turn up some spoonbills. Big on my bucket list. And yes, I have planned that specific day and specific hour from 3500 miles and six months away.

I know, I know. I have no right to complain. If you haven’t read Erin’s post about her plans for the next three months go check it out. That is planning on an Olympic scale! I think they have so many vacations nested in their vacation that it reminds me of those little Russian dolls. Ours will be just a bit simpler. We only have a simple vacation with a cruise vacation buried in the middle there somewhere.

We will amble through California, Arizona, New Mexico, and into Big Bend country in Texas, wander off to the coast at Port Aransas where I will get to walk the beach with Erin and watch her with that famous camera! We will continue east toward New Orleans, where we will take a 9 day break for a little cruise to the Western Caribbean, and after returning we will amble off to Florida for a month of kayaking and beaches. There is a saying about Florida, “I came for the beaches, but I stayed for the rivers”. Ahhhh. We will go as far as Key West, then amble back up the coast.

I have mostly reserved everything along the way. I think we will be in Blue Springs on Monday morning, March 3, at 10:02 AM. Or something like that. I know, the best laid plans can be severely disrupted, and I am trying to accept that with equanimity. Still. Those reservations are all prepaid, for Pete’s Sake! When we leave Blue Springs a few days later, I have no plans except for going north and west. I have no reservations. I have lots of blog posts about COE campgrounds and great places to see along the way, but we are going to actually stay loose during this part of the trip. For the month of March, we will just move gradually west and north toward home, following whatever route the weather and our mood dictates. I’ll let you know how that goes as well.

It is so great to have Deborah here to house sit for us while we are gone. She wants to keep the home fires burning and I’ll leave my truck with her so she can get back and forth in the snow. We will be bringing Abby, but I have decided to let Jeremy stay with Deborah for the trip. At least for now that is what I have decided. I’ll let you know how THAT goes as well. Sigh.

Lots coming up. More to tell, but this post is entirely too long so I’ll save it for later.

Next: MoHo interior renovations and we are soon off to the far northeastern part of Oregon!

Six Days off the Grid

Waking early Wednesday morning, I looked out over Medicine Lake, smooth as silk, without a ripple anywhere.

The skies were clear and only a faint bit of smoke remained on the eastern horizon. Our days of doing nothing were about to begin with a meandering 3.5 mile loop around the perimeter of the lake.

Our campground site is at the upper mid right of the map above, the swimming beach is the far right marker, the best fishing hole is on the lower left on the lake and the Brownell Cabin in on the lower bottom left on the shore. The good bike trail goes to Little Medicine Lake on the upper left shore. Somehow slipping into a kayak in the early morning feels like nothing at all, no effort, just a silky glide across water so clear I can count fish and silence only broken by the cry of ospreys.

I don’t know how long we were out there that first morning, maybe a couple of hours, but by the time we returned to camp the wind had picked up a bit and the smoke was disappearing completely. The day began with french press coffee and tiny donuts before we went out on the water and waiting for a mid morning hearty brunch seems to work best for us on this kind of trip.

The day would have continued without much fanfare, but as we settled onto the beach for a bit of sunny doing more nothing, our neighbor approached us all full of conversation and questions. She wanted to know where we were from, where we got our kayaks, and if we wanted to join up with their kayaking group from the Medford area. Martha was a very gregarious, talkative, and friendly woman and by the time she left, we had exchanged emails and had plans to contact each other for a day on Recreation Creek.

Not long after that conversation, she and her friend pulled out of the site just next to us, number 43. Earlier, when we found out they were moving, I asked Mo if maybe we should relocate, and she said, “No Way!!” But after they left, and we walked over to the site, the very easy, not steep, and not rocky path directly to the beach from the camp spot changed her mind. Ok, let’s do it!

Within minutes we pulled in the slide and backed the MoHo down the 50 yards or so to the much bigger, much more level, much more private site even closer to the lake. The funniest part of all was later when I was reviewing my photos, I realized that we had camped in this site back in 2005. How could I forget?!? Rather than hooking up the trailer, we just rolled it down the hill by hand to the new site, and floated the kayaks over to their new beach..

So much for doing nothing! After getting all settled in again, I had to run around in a flurry trying to take photos of the new site to remember why we made the move. It was a great plan and for the next several days we said over and over how happy we were that we didn’t have to get up and down that rocky trail to the beach from 45. Funny, I think I remember saying yesterday that 45 was such a great site. Well, it is, but only if you can’t get into 43.

A bit later we were down on the beach again when another woman came up to us asking questions about the boats and our rig. Seems as though she and her husband were camping and were hoping to eventually retire and buy a small motorhome of some kind. Before long we discovered that her husband was the base commander at Kingsley Field back in Klamath Falls and she was some kind of retired air force officer who now had three kids. I swear this woman didn’t look a day over 35. I guess some people make all the right choices at the right moment. She talked about her travels in the world, her husband, being active duty parents, and all about how much they loved living in Klamath Falls. People in campgrounds are just so incredibly friendly.

It wasn’t long afterward that another couple moved into our vacated site 45, only they at least were camping with a tent. Next thing you know, they are coming down the trail asking about the kayaks. They were from San Francisco, at least that is what they said at first. When we responded with “Oh, where in San Francisco?” she said, “Pacifica”. Then when Mo said she had taught in Pacifica for 25 years, they started talking about driving Devils Slide and the new tunnel, and then it came out that they actually live in Montera, just a few blocks away from Mo’s ranch in Montera where she lived for that 25 years while teaching. We all laughed about how you just say “San Francisco” to folks you assume won’t have a clue where Montera actually is located. How does that happen anyway?

It turned out that Barbara and Ansel were a highly entertaining couple, with some crazy quirks and a LOT of stories that they liked to tell with gusto. They also had a brand new inflatable kayak and were fairly new kayakers and wanted some advice about where to go on the lake. By this time it was very windy and there was no way anyone was going out on that lake in a kayak. We knew there was a small window of quiet usually in the morning for silky boating and told them to be up and on the water by 7 if they wanted to take advantage of it.

We spent the rest of the day doing our usual nothing, which includes some reading, some sitting and watching the sky, throwing balls for Abby in the water, watching the lake, and eating. We used the Weber Q for our suppers and the days just seemed to run all together. I had taken the computer with me, thinking that I could at least write for the blog with the inverter or when the generator was on, but sure enough, I had forgotten the plug! I am having to remember all this several days later since writing with a pencil is something I just can’t seem to do any more at all. I didn’t even take photos for two entire days and the only way to remember what we did is to go back over the photos.

We kayaked every morning and some evenings, had a big campfire every night where I roasted marshmallows and filled them with little pieces of chocolate that would melt perfectly. We had great dinners, and wonderful big breakfasts that were closer to lunch and never bothered with lunches the entire time.

We went for short hikes up to the Glass Flow, rode our bikes up to Little Medicine Lake on the lovely bike trail. We tried to ride to Arnica Sink on the not so lovely bike trail that was deep sandy pumice mined with fat lava rocks. We turned around on that one and decided that riding on the road was much more fun.

The birds are always a highlight, and after a few mornings I actually recognized the two blue herons that flew from shore to shore. It is always a decision as to how close to get, with the rule being if the bird is uncomfortable and starts to look nervous, you are too close. I think I got too close to these herons. I felt guilty, and then would think, well maybe if I am really slow and still it would be ok, but it wasn’t, they flew away, and dang! I need a longer lens.

The lake is populated with at least a dozen ospreys, perched on snags on the east and west shorelines and always entertaining with the diving and fishing. We also saw one bald eagle on the west side one morning, and a couple of red tailed hawks and another hawk that I couldn’t identify.

I was surprised to see several vultures as well, as I don’t remember seeing them at this kind of high altitude before. There was one Great Egret in the meadow on the first morning, too far for a photo, and he wasn’t there again. Ducks were surprisingly few, with just a little group of young ones without a mother paddling along on the east side of the lake.

Mo and I don’t fish, but we had a great time searching for fish in the clear water, with some great success along the southwest shoreline where one of the springs comes up. Sometimes we could see six to ten trout, maybe 14 inches or so, swimming around beneath us. We also love paddling into the knotweed with the happy pink flowers standing up above the water and making for some great photos with my pink kayak.

On one of our days the winds blew so incredibly hard I decided to spend a large part of the day inside the rig knitting a luscious wrap that I have been working on for much too long. The sound of that wind was fabulous, and the clarity it brought to the sky was breathtaking. I loved it, even though it made it too wild on the lake to take out the kayaks or try to take a swim.

I completely finished reading a great book about cheese, and Spain, and slow food, and betrayal. It was written so well that I had to highlight phrase after phrase of beautiful words to remember. I highly recommend “The Telling Room”, by Michael Paternini. Reading that makes me feel like I have read something worthwhile is great. We even had time for watching a couple of movies in the evenings, with the inverter handling it just fine without having to run the generator. I laugh to remember that we had this rig for several years before we knew it would do that.

Finally on our second to the last day, the wind died down completely, and I managed to slip into that crystalline water for a great swim. Cold, but great. Barbara and Ansel came down the hill to join me, but neither one of them could manage to get all the way in. I probably wouldn’t have stayed in as long as I did if I hadn’t been trying to convince them to swim with me. The day heated up beautifully, but with the warmer temperatures and no winds, before long there was a bit of smoke in the air again. Nothing like Grants Pass a couple of weeks ago, but smoke nonetheless.

On our last morning kayak, we took our slow time meandering around the lake. While admiring the old historic cabin on the southwest shore, the owner came down to the shore to visit with us. I must say I haven’t had such a busy social life in a very long time! He regaled us with stories about the cabin, built in 1928 by his wife’s father who saved the life of the original owner of the property. When asked what he would like in return for saving his life, the man said, “If you ever sell the property, sell it to me”. Sure enough that is how he got it. Now there are three sisters who share the space with extended family who have memories of staying there as girls in the 1940’s. They live there 3 months out of the year and then return to Morro Bay in California.

He told us that the first trout were brought to the lake on mules in 1880 and by the 40’s there were huge browns in that lake that the girls remember catching. In the 60’s however, chubs were winning, and the Fish and Game decided to kill the lake and start over. Now the fish that are planted each spring are fairly well fished out of the lake with no big old boys left. The deepest hole in the lake is about 150 feet, but the rest of the lake is quite shallow. It was great to get local stories from the local folks. He even said we were welcome to hike up behind his place to Brownell Meadows but we will have to wait for the next trip to take him up on the offer. Besides, this was the camping trip for doing nothing and we were getting a bit carried away with all the somethings that we were doing.

When it was time to leave, once more the campground was very nearly empty, with only a few occupied sites even over in the busy Medicine Campground. Our Hogue camp was almost completely empty. How often can you find an empty campground on a lovely lake in the middle of August!?! We read on the campground sign that there was an RV dump nearby but turned the wrong direction and ended up going south on 49 instead of where we were supposed to go. As many times as we have been to Medicine Lake, I still needed to get out the map to be sure we were on the right road heading home.

Down from the Highlands, summer set in again, with temperatures rising ten degrees in as many miles and smoke thickening the air as we approached Klamath Falls. bummer. At least we got a nice break from it, and Rocky Point has enough thick forest to help oxygenate the air a bit. I just read that Janna and Mike tried to see Crater Lake this week. Such a bummer and bad timing. I an only imagine how disappointing it must be for folks who travel from all over the world to see the beautiful lake and its gorgeous blue. Ah well, Medicine Lake isn’t quite as blue, or as big, or as dramatic, but it was lovely and perfect and I am so glad that after five years we finally took our Medicine.