Turns out, this mechanic ... like a large percentage of the citizens in Bend, was a highly educated, smart, mountain bike, snow-skiing, granola eating, nature loving, micro-brew enjoying, camping enthusiast, who knew all the best places to go. Add to that, he was also extremely thrifty and didn't feel like he needed to spend a single penny for camping, when sweeping his arms across the valley he exclaimed, "there's so much federal land we pay our taxes for already, we can camp there entirely free!"
This was just the fuel my already simmering adventurous smolder needed. While camping is great, it's really great to be entirely self-sustained, completely off the grid, and be able to stay somewhere for free. What's not to love about that? With the increasing COVID numbers, our minds were made up, we would boondock wherever and whenever possible henceforth.
Unfortunately, the awesome places our mechanic wanted us to check out, were all south of our current location, and the one thing I could not - would not do - is backtrack. So pointing our trusty Denali north, we hit the road at dusk, and made way for our next destination, Mt. Hood.
Yet again, while we knew the general vicinity of where we were heading, we didn't have an exact destination. And it was a Thursday night. No stress there. (Ha!)
So while Charlie drove, I was in the passenger seat, navigating and researching camp options around Mt. Hood. We found a placed called "Government Camp." It is, and I quote (Wikipedia), "An unincorporated community and census-designated placed located in Clackamas County, Oregon, on the base of Mt. Hood and north of Tom Dick and Harry Mountain. It is the only town within 5 miles of Mt. Hood and is therefore, the de facto "mountain town. The village was named in 1849 when U.S. Cavalry troops were forced to abandon wagons and supplies here."
I'm not entirely sure why the Cavalry was forced to abandon wagons and supplies, but suspect it might have to do with the weather. We were there in late June and nearly froze; I cannot imagine what it must be like in January. The area is situated at just under 4000' above mean sea level, and receives over 2200 inches (I mean, millimeters!) of precipitation a year. It was drizzling when we arrived on Thursday night, and pouring when we left on Sunday.
In the pitch black drizzling rain, with a car full of kids, the rock solid commitment we'd had for boon docking in an unknown area began to crack. As I looked up various established campsites, it was no surprise that at 11:30 on a Thursday night, every one of them was booked.
Unavailable. Unavailable. UNAVAILABLE.
Nothing makes you embrace courage when you realize you've got no other options.
We'd read about an old airstrip that tends to attract a lot of campers, so we crossed our fingers and turned down a road to what would turn out to be approximately 1-mile stretch of open space, flanked by trees. Every kind of camper: trailers, huge RVs, small RVs, pop-up tents, canvas tents, trucks and an actual school bus, had grabbed up spots and were spaced out everywhere; most of them with small (and some large) fires burning in front of their settlements. Charlie quietly gasped, "Oh wow, this looks like Woodstock." It wasn't exactly the picture I had in mind of the pristine solitude, but at nearly midnight, it would have to do.
Waking the kids up with the excited declaration, "We're here!" they looked out the windows and surveying the area said, "Really? Are you sure?" Yes, of course I reassured them. "Don't worry, we'll be totally safe. We're in Quarantinny, with a dog, and can lock all of the doors."
We set up camp, and were in bed, sound asleep within 15 minutes. Because I was working while on the trip, I had to be up early for a call at 6:00 AM. As I stepped out of the camper in to the dark morning, it was peacefully quiet, and I could actually see the silhouette of Mt. Hood just over the trees.
Charlie and the kids woke up, made a wonderful breakfast (which we did nearly every day on the trip), and took off exploring the area on their bikes, while I continued to field phone calls with my team on the east coast. When they came back, Charlie - channeling Studs Terkel - regaled me with stories of our fellow campers. He was intrigued by how many of them had sold all of their worldly possessions and were living their lives on the road.
(I could totally do that, just so you know.)
The kids set up their new hammock city under what would be the few hours of sunshine we enjoyed all weekend....
And constructed a fire pit.
Seeing as it was a Friday, and one of my bestest friends of all time, lives just down the road in Portland, I dropped a call to my friend, Lorie, whom I've written above before. I told her where we were and begged that she and Mark please drop any plans that they'd had for that weekend, and come see us.
Lorie met her husband, Mark, in the geology department at Sonoma State University, the same time I met Charlie, and we've been in touch ever since. Lorie drove cross-country from California to Massachusetts when we were married in 1994 and I'll never forget the disbelief and unbelievable joy I felt seeing her walk in to our rehearsal dinner in a hockey jersey after having just driven thousands of miles, by herself. Mark and Lorie have a daughter, Shayna, that is two weeks younger than our triplets; and a son, William, who is two years younger than Henry. (We never would have guessed when this photo was taken, that in a few years, they'd be twenty more piggy toes!!)
Mark and Lorie used to live in Long Beach, when we were in San Diego, and we'd get together every so often, which was really fun with all the kids. While Lorie did fly out to visit us a few years ago in Texas, this was the first time we'd seen the entire family in more than a decade.
A few hours later, Mark and Lorie pulled in to Government Camp.
They had been extremely faithful to quarantining, as had we, and it had been over a week since we saw Charlie's family. But we still kept our distance, wore masks, and bundled up so we could stay outside.
There's a little bit of awkwardness at first when the kids got together; as there always is when you have no recollection of meeting previously - or you hadn't seen each other since you were five. But within no time, they were palling around and having a great time.
Mark and Lorie had brought inflatable kayaks which they spent the better part of an hour inflating and launching - and all of 20 minutes paddling...
Until the clouds rolled in, the wind kicked up, and they nearly froze.
But it was awesome, nonetheless.
Meanwhile, the two younger boys were able to convince us that since there was only space in the kayak for four people, and they didn't want to stand around and wait .... wouldn't it be a better use of everyone's time if they could do something that THEY wanted to do?
You'll never guess what that might have been...
The chilled paddlers came back, played games ...
Danced around the campfire as the sunset... (our dear niece, Alice, also made the drive up from Portland to come and visit with us - and had planned to stay the night in her own tent. But when she heard that a rainstorm was coming through, she decided to pack up and leave right after dinner, so she wouldn't wake up in a soggy tent. Not a bad call, but we would have loved to spend more time with her!)
And then retreated inside to watch a movie and eat homemade apple crisp.
This is what glamping looks like!
Mount Hood was absolutely spectacular. It was great to be off the grid, and stay in a campsite - free of charge - for four full days. We had sufficient electricity, but the cloudy skies didn't fully recharge the solar panels as much as we would have liked - and kids watching movies took some juice.
We were also constrained by water. Forty gallons may seem like a lot, but it can go pretty fast when you're in the midst of a pandemic and washing your hands every five minutes. Although we were able to collect water from the campsite down the road, hauling it back and forth to the camper in three gallon increments was challenging.
The best part of this stop was reconnecting with some of our oldest and dearest friends.
Mark and Lorie: TAG - YOU'RE IT!!
Can't wait to see where we bump in to you guys, next.
