Long But Worth It…Kinda Like This Trip

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A duo drove into Seattle, but a trio left. Evie Barnes of Boulder Colorado, a friend of friends from Southern, has joined us for the drive up to Alaska. Evie has dreadlocks and a long list of food allergies. One way she gets protein is by drinking chia seeds with her water (you remember “cha cha cha chia…the seeds that so easily sprout into thick green grass). I’ve petitioned Evie several times to plant the seeds in her dreads, thus achieving a truly unique style. Evie is closed minded when it comes to my ideas.

It takes only three hours to drive from Seattle to Vancouver, B.C., so we made it to Vancouver in time to spend the evening in Gastown. Gastown is the historic and touristy part of Vancouver. Gas lights illuminate the narrow cobblestone streets. At the heart of Gastown a giant steam powered clock billows and ticks the hours away.

I’ve always felt indebted to the people of Vancouver. Once I snuck into a spinning restaurant atop a skyscraper a few blocks from Gastown. I wanted to see the panoramic view without paying $15 dollars to visit the tower’s observation deck. A dapper young man introduced himself in the elevator. Jason was a dump truck driver by day, and philanthropist of his family’s fortune by night. He had three underprivileged Chinese boys with him (Big Brother program) and he invited me to join their dinner party. The boys had trouble pronouncing and understanding the fancy names on the menu (so did I to be honest). Questions arose about many dishes, and Jason would graciously describe each dish, but he also ordered ever single dish in question (at $30-50 a plate) so that we wouldn’t have to take his word for it. He treated us like kings, and as I revisited Vancouver I was eager to return the favor. I found Mike, a hungry heroin addict. We went grocery shopping. Maybe Mike will blog about it someday.

From Vancouver we went up to Squamish to spend a couple of days climbing B.C.’s world class granite. In Squamish the Taco Bell is expensive, but the rock is incredible! We saw one of the hardest routes in the world, Chris Sharma’s “Dream Catcher” (5.14d, it’s only been climbed twice). The rain held off long enough for us to soundly abuse our underused climbing muscles. On the afternoon of our second climbing day we headed North and East to Kamloops.

It’s a bit of a thrill to call people you’ve never met and ask if you can stay at their house. There is potential for awkwardness, but there’s also the potential to encounter greatness. I’m so happy we didn’t pass Kamloops without calling Andy and Inge Anderson. We went to church with them, feasted on all manner of goodness from their garden, and listened to yarns of a couple who, as we do too, live life as a great adventure. It must be the garden food that gives Andy, at 70, a fire in his eye and indefatigable story telling energy.
The Andersons took us for a hike along the Adams river where we watched the Sockeye Salmon spawn. At the confluence of the Adams and a brisk mountain tributary Andy stopped us and pointed to a Sockeye in the midst of making a decision. The fish sampled the two currents, deliberated for a spell, then took off decidedly in the direction from which he had come four years ago and from which his ancestors have come for millenia.

Andy, the old story teller, marched with a large cedar walking stick straight up hills, over logs, and through thick undergrowth. His stride never faltered, nor did his stories. He told of a time he’d gone to the Ukraine to build a facility for the Adventist church. He drove across the border in a “peppy little Volkswagen” and told customs officials the truth: that he was carrying $100,000 in cash.

Not surprisingly, Andy wasn’t far from the border when he noticed a dark car was tailing him. After stopping for gas and groceries the dark car reappeared and confirmed the intent of its occupants to corner Andy and steal his payload. Andy had some church ladies in the car with him, and didn’t want to alarm them, so he mentioned he’d like to see what the little car could do and took the thrilled ladies on a joy ride through the mountains. Once he’d gained a sufficient lead over his pursuers (out of their line of sight) it occurred to him that the women might enjoy stopping to watch the sunset. He dipped off down a little dirt road, and led the Dorcas crew on an evening stroll. Once night had fallen they regained the road miles away from their befuddled pursuers. The ladies never knew.

Andy and Inge’s stories were better than ours, I suppose that comes with maturity. No doubt we bored them with our pitiable attempts at orating. Andy’s ears did perk up though when Jeremy mentioned the mountains we saw in South America. Andy wants to visit those mountains since they’re his.

We salied forth from Kamloops two days ago, our northward drive serving to expedite autumn’s onslaught. Although the spruce maintain their color all year, the aspen leaves are already bright yellow. It’s chilly at night and the taller peaks are already receiving their fist dustings of snow. Yesterday we saw three bears. I accidentally hit and killed a ptarmigan with the car. I’m carrying it along in case I get fired up to gut and cook it, but to be honest my motivation for that has waned markedly post rigormortis.

Yesterday we stopped by the Alger river to munch on the primitive contents of our grub box. The scene was picturesque so I got out my camera bag (an old leather fanny pack that I wear like a shoulder holster) to take some pictures. A few miles down the road, after eating, I again saw a landscape worth photographing. The problem was my camera bag (in which I also keep my wallet and ipod) was nowhere to be found. I realized right away that I had left it on the roof of the car. A quick glance at the roof confirmed the sickening truth that my bag, my luggage’s analogue for the Sanctuary’s Most Holy Place (thieves don’t read this do they?), was no longer with us. We went back. The bag was laying in the middle of the oncoming lane at the first major turn North of our lunch spot, it had slid from the roof of the car at roughly 60mph. Luckily there’s very little traffic here (no cars had passed) so the bag hadn’t been run over, but my heart was in my throat knowing that a crash to the asphalt at 60mph had probably left me with a useless bag full of Canon and Apple shards. I was praying pretty hard and God really blessed. Everything works fine, and now that I have my I.D. back I’ll be able to leave Canada and enter Alaska (remember our passports are still in Seattle at the Russian consulate).

We’re about 30 minutes from Whitehorse, Yukon. Evie is driving and Jeremy and I are typing in anticipation of a good upload session in Whitehorse. Tonight we will camp on the marge of Lake LaBarge. Last night the northern lights were flickering and I hope they do it again tonight. We’re going to build a fire and read “The Cremation of Sam McGee” a poem set on the marge of Lake LaBarge. We just passed another bear! This is fun.

-bjorn2bwild

Live Love Loiter

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I’m staying at my buddy Matt’s house right now. Of my good friends, he’s the one I’ve known longest. Matt, an opportunist if ever there was one, couldn’t help himself one day in our seventh grade Social Studies class. He had been laboriously extracting an enormous booger from deep within his sinuses. Finally it broke free, but before propelling it across the room with a mighty flick (Matt was renowned for mighty flicks), he elbowed me and held his finger out so I could admire his treasure in all of its splendor. My jaw dropped wide open at the sight of such a monumental specimen. I find it difficult to say what happened next but If you recall that Matt is an opportunist, and renowned for mighty flicks, and that my mouth was hanging wide open, you’ll figure it out. Our relationship was a bit rocky there for a bit, but I finally found it in my heart to forgive him. Now I’m at his house in Seattle. If he were here I’d make him breakfast in bed as a sign of the everlasting covenant of peace between us. He’d love my toe-jam omelets; I season them with the perfect amount of dandruff. Anyway that punk ran off to Florida to visit family. Something about prior plans. Hogwash.

Jeremy flew home for the weekend for his family’s reunion and the celebration of his grandparents’ 60th wedding anniversary. So I’m loitering in Seattle, a bit lonely but far from sleepless. I’ve been trying to use my time wisely: gearing up for cold weather in Alaska, beginning work on what I hope will one day develop into a book, and researching ways to get across the giant pond you’ve seen in the upper left hand corner of your map.

Last time I wrote from the rugged coastline of Southern Oregon. Lots has happened since then, let me fill you in. A week ago Friday we continued our drive up the coast. We passed the sea lion caves (you may confidently use your powers of deduction to figure out what we saw there), and a handful of quaint harbor towns before reaching Lincoln City. I took the wheel in Lincoln City and soon thereafter applied sufficient clockwise torque to alter our course inland towards Portland.

Between the coast and Portland we stopped only twice: once for a $3.99 lunch special at a Chinese place, and a second time to buy some tires from some friendly Turkish guys who convinced us we were getting a bargain. They did sweeten the deal by putting us in touch with their cousin who sails the Mediterranean. I left them half a quart of black berries I had picked the previous evening, partly out of good will, and partly hoping they’d go ahead and put in a good word for us with the Mediterranean cousin.

Portland required our attention for three reasons: One reason was male, but the other two were female (I hope my use of the past tense hasn’t confused anyone, the three “reasons” intend to maintain their respective genders indefinitely). Bryan and I worked together at Camp Wawona in Yosemite. We arrived at his house a bit late for the 13 mile hike he had planned, but we grabbed lights and decided to do it anyway. Hiking fast we could theoretically finish before midnight, but it’s impossible to hike fast when three different species of wild berries team up to distract you. We managed to summit Silver Star mountain just in time to watch the sun set. The glowing panorama included views of four of the Northwest’s most famous peaks: Hood, Adams, St. Helens, and Rainier (I named the last batch of pictures prior to learning how to spell “Rainier”). Normally it would be impossible to see that many peaks, and often none would be seen, but we were blessed with especially clear weather.

On the return hike Jeremy walked fast and got ahead, but retreated briskly and explained he thought we should walk together since he had just seen a bear cub. I was impressed with his calm demeanor since he had likely been very close to the cubs protective mother. Bryan and I still awarded Jeremy partial bravery points when his bear turned out to be a porcupine.

The two other reasons for going to Portland go by Lauren and Bonnie. Friday night had been an adventure in the mountains, but Saturday night was a social adventure. Several months had passed since friends at college had mentioned there was a cute girl named Lauren living in Portland. They had given me her number so I decided to call and ask for a date. It’s rough to get your courage up to call someone, and then get their voicemail instead of them. I wanted to talk to her in person. It was something like committing to bungee jumping, but at a surprise moment. “Ready Bjorn?”… ” Yeah, I think so.”… “Nevermind not yet.”… “dang it.” After several rounds of this my nerves were fully bewildered. Just about the time I started expecting to get her voicemail, she answered.

Lauren seemed pretty sceptical, but said if she could bring a friend (of course this was fine with Jeremy) we could go to the John Mayer concert. The concert was near George, Washington (they would name their town that) at an outdoor venue called the Gorge Amphitheater. Matt brought a group of friends from Seattle so we met them there. Our seats were a very long way from the stage, but my date was quite resourceful. She brought along a pair of binoculars. John Mayer himself was still kinda hard to make out with the binoculars, but if you used them to look at the jumbo-tron screen you could get a pretty good idea of what was going on. It can be hard to chat at a concert, but it was easy for us, we were far enough away it was almost like not even being at a concert. All the fun none of the hassle! I can’t speak for everyone, but I had a great time.

After the concert we said goodbye to the girls. They had driven their own car in order to avoid aligning their fates with people like us. They headed for a hotel and we followed Matt a few miles to a climbing area where we laid down to sleep in the dirt. As I gazed up at the night sky one of the brightest shooting stars I’ve ever seen burst into view. Matt didn’t see it but I told him about it and he suggested, since he’s been looking for employment, that I use my wish to get him a job. I’m not superstitious so this seemed silly, but just in case there was something to it I went ahead and wished aloud, “I wish there to be a Subway at the exit where we get back on the main road tomorrow.”

In the morning we climbed some picturesque volcanic rock before loading up to head for Seattle. We were starving by the time we got out to the main road. There was only one restaurant at that exit: a Subway. I had a footlong…. It was soooooo good.

-Bjorn2BWild

A Sunbeam

This is my blog archive. Read my latest blog at www.thewholeworldround.com
If we see a swimming hole, we swim. A taco stand, we eat. And if we pass a Saab with 97 surfboards on its roof, we go back to get a picture. These are the luxuries of traveling by car.
After logging over 300 hours on buses, incarcerated in rolling prisons, the freedom of the car is positively glorious. So far the Sunbeam has carried us the vertical length of California. She’s gotten as low as 28mpg in the mountains, but during the most recent stretch she carried us 32 miles for every gallon she sipped. She takes her time accelerating, but hums like a top at 80mph. Her elegant lines are constantly catching eyes, the eyes of State Troopers notwithstanding. The cop told me he stopped me for doing 15 over in the city limits, but I’ve had a pretty girl on my arm before, I know what he wanted.
The Northern Californian coastline is wild and beautiful. Sheer cliffs and jagged outcroppings rise from pounding breakers into lush pine forest. A narrow strip of asphalt a few miles inland is aptly named Avenue of the Giants. Colossal trees, Sequoia Sempervirens, dwarf even the preconceived trees I’ve been harboring in my imagination.
The Avenue meanders alongside the gravel-bottomed Eel river through a series of Redwood groves. For a West Tennessee boy, who is used to being up to his needs in Hatchey Bottom mud, swimming in the Eel river with the Giants for lifeguards, was pretty Narni-esque. The water was clear like crystal and surprisingly warm. My imagination took me to a house built into a hollow Redwood like a giant staircase. A river gently caressed the gravel bar . In that place I could swim to work. That’s my kind of commute! Exercise and bath to boot!
Things continue to go well, and unless the misfortune besets, we should be up to Alaska in a couple of weeks. Looming ominously, like the clouds I see billowing in from the Pacific, is our trips biggest hurdle…the crossing of that same ocean. We are pouring over forums, maps, and websites and calling all manner of people who might have a valuable bit of info. Next week we will be in Seattle, and I think that’s a place where we can learn a lot about shipping in the north seas.
It’s tricky to get papers for Russia. Their thinking doesn’t very well accommodate our spontaneity. Besides the fact that we don’t know if there are ships from Alaska to Russia, we will need invitation letters, and a specific detailed itinerary if we hope to meet welcoming arms. We would much prefer to meet this type of arms than the alternative, side arms.
I’m still hopeful that, with a bit of wit and persistence, we can find a way to cross directly from Alaska to Russia. I’ll be disappointed if we have to compromise. I recently compromised and cut off my mullet for my medical school interview. Although I recognize the value of compromise, I’d rather compromise on haircuts and restaurant choices than the Alaska/Russia jaunt.