The Long Way to Squamish

I’ve journaled on-and-off for various periods of my life, but I was never a “regular contributor” until this past year. Switching from a form of writing meant for public consumption (this website) to something solely for me was at first awkward and revealing. Isn’t so much of what we do meant for someone else?

What follows is a selection of modified journal entries from the first phase of our recent trip to Squamish. These posts capture affectionate, curious, and questionable observations from the long road between Utah and British Columbia.

July 11, 2022: Wells, Nevada

I’m seated on a ragged picnic table outside our camper in Wells, NV at the Welcome Station RV Park. It’s 7:23 pm and I’m enjoying a hot (87 degrees currently), but otherwise enjoyable evening.

We were in no particular hurry knowing we’d secured a rare reservation for the night. The tireless desert sun beat down on the hood of the truck as we traveled northward across eastern Nevada, guzzling gas the price of cashmere sweaters. Desolate highways and forlorn outposts lay in broad, windy basins. Towering ranges rise abruptly from the plains on either side, with wide gravel aprons at their base. Crisp shapes and landforms fade to a blur on the distant horizon. All day I’ve wondered, who the hell lives here and damnit, why is gas so expensive in Nevada?

With the sound of gravel on tires marking our arrival hours earlier, we’d begun our first RV park experience. This immediately felt unfamiliar.

The Reluctant Camper

My wife is a reluctant camper in much the same way that I’m reluctant to stay at interstate hotels. When I look at that bed framed by all that red carpet, I can’t help but to imagine the hundreds (thousands?) of people who have shared this space. Inevitably I imagine what they’ve done there. Say what you will about a camper and where you park it, but at least that space is mine.

Thankfully, we both share the simple joy of saving money. As such, a $35 dollar night with electric and water hook-ups, which enables use of our neglected air conditioner, beats a backwater $100 Nevada hotel any day. Plus, I get a real shower. Well, real if you count the fact that I wouldn’t dare get in that shower without flip flops or stand flat-footed. Tip-toeing in poorly draining water, it’s easy to once again imagine all who have come before me.

Americana

The park is nice enough, with a well-manicured lawn, a quintessential babbling brook, and plentiful shade from tall and towering oaks. The motto for the place is, “an oasis in the desert,” and that feels, well, sort of accurate. The interstate noise is white noise of the psyche, like an oasis.

The scene here is one of giant RVs, small dogs, American flags, and the aura of social security accounts. We have a small camper, a large dog, no flag, and I’m doing yoga in the grass. Needless to say, we stand out.

One RV has a large decal on the door that reads:

“Jesus is my lord, savior, strength, brother.”

Lord, savior, and strength is something I can understand. But brother? Where do we draw the line? What about colleague, or roommate? Or comrade?

When I inquire about access to the locked shower rooms, the kind host provides the code: 1776.

Our neighbors are seated on the rear of their house-sized RV, on an outdoor platform the type Teddy Roosevelt might have used to deliver a stump speech from the back of a train in 1903. I half expect them to say:

“…[the] highest form of success which comes, not to the man who desires mere easy peace, but to the man who does not shrink from danger, from hardship, or from bitter toil, and who out of these wins the splendid ultimate triumph.”

Instead, they say, “You guys parked a little close to the hook-ups, don’t you think?”

---

July 13, 2022: Ketchum, Idaho

It’s 7:52 am and I’m sitting on my camper table on Trail Creek Road, above Ketchum/Sun Valley, Idaho. The beauty of this place makes the road trip feel worth the hassle.

We arrived around 12:30 yesterday after an uneventful departure from the RV park. Highway 93 north of Wells, NV stretches across a vast landscape of forlorn and largely treeless buttes and low hills, a landscape more reminiscent of the Columbia Plateau regions of the northwest than the Basin and Range landscapes of Nevada. I often wondered what life would be like on the scattered and remote ranches we passed.

We were surprised by the increasingly notable, shall we say, mountain chic of these Idaho towns as we pressed northward on highway 75. After passing through the midwestern farmland vibes of Twin Falls and southern Idaho, “Let’s Go Brandon” signs gave way to cursive engravings in wood, with phrases like Adventure Awaits or Life is Better at the Cabin. Powder coating warehouses and farm machinery yielded to yoga studios, designer clothing, and chalk boards.

An Afternoon Hike

After settling in, we busted up an exposed and rocky road on the flanks of Trail Creek Valley. Our intended target was the aptly-named Summit Creek Trail—notable for both summits and creeks—where we hoped to hike at least five miles. It was hot and exposed in the late afternoon sun, even at an elevation of 7000-8000 feet. As temperatures began to fall and the breeze kicked up over the next two hours, we found ourselves simply enjoying our time. Our hydrophilic dog darted in and out of the stream along the trail. Jagged, treeless peaks framed beautiful mountain meadows. Lacking sufficient daylight to hit the pass, we turned around.

Back at the trailhead, we made small talk with an older woman just beginning her hike. Eager to take a discreet poor-man’s “shower” in the creek, I waited patiently for her to shimmy across the stream crossing—a downed log—feet-first on her ass. Any sense of enjoyment came only once I was done dipping my posterior chain (etc) in the liquid that was recently snow. Standing there drying off in the searing afternoon sun, with a rush of blood to my extremities, I remembered why I love this kind of life so much.

July 14, 2022: Ketchum, Idaho

Yesterday was one of those dream road trip days. We ventured to Redfish Lake; an incredible feature nestled in a glacial valley of the Sawtooth Mountains. The drive north from Ketchum is already noteworthy: Highway 75 winds over subalpine forest before dropping into a jaw-dropping valley of muted green sage. Broad river terraces trace the curves of the Salmon River, all bordered to the west by the elongated hinterlands of the Sawtooth Mountains.

The Redfish Lake Lodge was bustling with swimmers, kayakers, and paddle boarders. The open-air grill was pumping out beers and burgers, all despite the threatening dark skies, wind, and only mild temperatures. We walked along the shore to “Dog Beach,” where dog was able to beach, leash-free. It felt too good to be true.

Wait…there’s more

From the lodge we walked back to the main trailhead for the Fishhook Creek Trail. We enjoyed 4.5 miles of pure bliss: a flat and pleasant creekside trail leading to astonishing alpine views. I stripped down (again) and dipped into an eddy pool in the creek, which was Cold with a capital “c” but incredibly refreshing. And despite the area’s popularity, we enjoyed the trail terminus alone.

Back at the lodge we splurged on beers and enjoyed live music and late afternoon sun on the lawn. We talked about what it would be like to live here, or at least spend a summer here.

Heading back toward camp, we pulled off on a forest road to the west of Highway 75 to reheat our pre-cooked stew on the tailgate of the truck. This was reminiscent of the early days of our 2020 road trip, where we often cooked “at large” due to my wife’s acute fear of bears.

Oh yeah, I was pulled over in front of the Sun Valley Gun Club for going 49 in a 35. I was given a warning ticket!

July 15, 2022: Ketchum, Idaho

Yesterday was an uneventful day. After a slow start, we drove the short distance to Ketchum to explore the downtown area. While cute and all, it’s a little too ritzy for us, reflected in the aneurism-inducing real estate prices. We popped into a couple of quaint bakeries and coffee shops in search of a regular-ass cookie, but all we could find were vegan cookies or those kinds with too many grains.

Dejected and cookie-less, we retreated to a shady picnic table on the lawn of a forest service building. We hung there for a while, unsure of how to proceed in the searing heat of the day.

These moments are the unspoken truths of road trips. There is often some part of the day that is hard to fill. Without a home, we are occasionally relegated to sweaty (or cold) sessions of reading, stretching, or computer work, often uncomfortably adjacent to busy playgrounds and the concerned side-eyes of parents. You know, the kind with leashes for children.

The Chase

I read online about Frenchman’s Hot Springs up Warm Springs Rd. On the way there I passed a police officer heading in the opposite direction. As a knee-jerk reaction, I looked in the rear-view mirror to see brake lights and what appeared to be the vehicle beginning to turn around.

I hit the gas in search of a pull-off to hide; if I were to be pulled over again, I’d certainly get a ticket. I turned on a private driveway, slowly making our way down to the end and turning around. Never the rebel, my wife only grew more frustrated at my inability to drive the speed limit and not evade law enforcement. In my defense, your honor, the speed limits here are painfully slow, by at least 10mph. Either way, I nervously drove the final miles to the hot spring and never saw the cop. I can’t say for sure that he was in pursuit.

The hot springs were already brimming with a well-fed and pasty family with ATVs. Disappointedly, we drove another ¼ mile up the road and just let the dog swim in the river before we returned to the car and reversed the process.

The Bite

Back in town we were hot, a little frustrated, and slightly bored. We decided to go back to camp, but on the way, I got the idea to stop at one of the riverside pull-offs about a mile downstream of our campsite. There I did my third consecutive river bath, and our dog might have been bitten by a non-poisonous snake. She was wandering along the river when we heard her suddenly yelp. After calling her over, I went to investigate.

There amongst some tall grasses and thick roots on the bank of the river I saw what looked like a Garter snake, about a foot in length, slithering with great evil between the recesses of the exposed roots. I didn’t get a full view before it disappeared into some portal to hell, but I took some comfort after a quick Google search to learn that rattlesnakes aren’t expected in Ketchum. And most importantly, she never showed any signs of being bit, physical or otherwise.

July 16, 2022: Wallowa Whitman National Forest, Oregon

It’s 6:24 am local time (Pacific time) and I’m writing this from our new temporary home in the Wallowa Whitman National Forest, just east of I-84 between La Grande and Pendleton, Oregon. After three mornings straight of waking to temperatures of 50 degrees inside the camper, today was 54. I slept great nonetheless, and this was the first night I didn’t get up to piss. I think that might have something to do with our more vulnerable feeling of being alone deep in the woods. Additionally, we paired our solitude with an episode of the survival series “Alone,” which included one of the contestants getting stalked by a mountain lion.

I was nervous about moving camp on a Friday, but this place is anything but busy. My wife misses our last campsite on Trail Creek Road, where we camped on broad and open river terraces with other campers in view. While spacious and comfortable, there was no sense of isolation.

This campsite is a small clearing in an otherwise dense forest of Douglas fir and thick underbrush. It’s beautiful—and the shade is a very welcome respite—but there is a sense of claustrophobia and vulnerability in a thick forest. The green moss and filtered sunlight turns sinister after sunset. There’s too much you can’t see, and the closest camper is an RV about ½ mile back on a quiet gravel road.

The Feeding

We arrived here yesterday at around 2:15 pm local time. After setting up camp we took a stroll down the forest road, turning around after about 1.5 miles due to sun exposure. Back at camp I did a truly half-assed and lethargic hangboard session, my energy diverted instead to digesting too much burrito in the sun.

When we left Ketchum yesterday, we secured two truly enormous burritos from Lucy’s Breakfast in Bellevue. After passing the Oregon/Idaho border just west of Boise, through the rolling burnt-yellow grassy hills of eastern Oregon, it was time to indulge. And indulge I did, cramming down a burrito the size of a premature newborn child.

Anyway, hours later, neither of us were hungry and I was devoid of energy in the afternoon. After my sorry excuse for a hangboard session, I had four dates and a protein shake, calling that dinner.

Time Slows

These last two days are slower compared to the awe and wonder of the Sawtooth Mountains. The muted landscape, with rolling, high plateaus of thick forest, has no particularly notable topographic relief.

My wife is fairly spooked by this campsite, and I appreciate her telling me so. In general, she’s not a huge fan of dispersed camping, and I understand that. She is, however, willing to tolerate it when she doesn’t feel isolated. We’ll stay here tonight and then move on to our reserved campsite near the Canadian border at Birch Bay, Washington.

The Pressure

Other than writing this journal, I’ve felt less pressure to work on anything this week. That said, I’d be lying if I said that putting it all aside is anxiety-free. I’m reading 4000 Weeks by Oliver Burkeman, which is a timely partner in the battle against productivity, drawing purpose only from my achievements. I’m trying to lean into nothingness like Danny Zuko, to find joy and wonder in the mundane. The problem is, I’m not yet convinced that there is either joy or wonder in the mundane. So far in life, I’ve only found mundane in the mundane.

I catch myself getting frustrated digging around in the truck, resisting the urge to roundhouse the tailgate when my coffee is out of reach and buried under a bunch of bullshit we shouldn’t have brought.

Hey, hey, hey! I think, unfurling my clenched fist and tense jaw, imagining myself forcing a smile in the mirror like Stuart Smalley.

I catch myself rushing through, well, everything. I’ve lived my life in a hurry to get from one moment to the next, caring little about the present. This week has been a unique opportunity to engage in a difficult mode for me: relaxation.

July 17, 2022: Wallowa Whitman National Forest, Oregon

6:40 am, the camper is 55 degrees, up from a low of 52. Man, I slept fantastic last night; my first night of truly uninterrupted sleep.

Yesterday was a good test of embracing nothingness, or almost nothingness, in Pendleton, Oregon. If I had to use two words to describe the town, I’d say Harley’s and leather. Granted, it was apparently bike week, a gathering known to amplify the occurrence of both Harley’s and leather, and probably brass knuckles too. The historic downtown is small, with a focus on cowboy culture. As a non-cowboy, I’m oddly pleased to see these throwback vibes still exist after all these years. In stark contrast to the tent cities and wire-rim glasses of Portland, Pendleton feels like another world in no particular hurry to change with the times, for better or worse.   

Back at camp as the sun set, we read and then watched two more episodes of “Alone.” I love how peaceful it is here. And perhaps because neither of our show episodes featured apex predictors, this campsite felt far less imposing or vulnerable last night.

It’s time to boogie: we have a long drive to western Washington.

July 18, 2022: Birch Bay, Washington

The drive north and west across Oregon and Washington was a lesson in coastal mountain geography. The parched grasslands and rolling hills gave way to lush farmland of the Yakima Valley wine country. The snow-capped Cascade Mountains loomed beyond, shrouded in low clouds building over the divide. Pressing westward on I-90 on a Sunday afternoon, traffic built in tandem with elevation and lushness. After days of scorching heat and sun, we were relieved to encounter cool and humid air amongst ferns and towering Douglas fir pines. Everything was green.

After the harsh reintroduction to society that is Sunday afternoon traffic in Seattle, we stopped for gas north of the metro area along I-5. There a couple of middle-aged women gave me unrelenting Carrie eyes at a gas pump. I guess it was some combination of Utah plates and a camper that must have signaled that I was an insurrectionist.

Birch Bay was a perfect end to this phase of the trip. We’d reserved a campsite at this waterfront state park to ensure an early arrival the next day at the Canadian border. I had no expectations, so this place easily exceeded them. Our site was nestled in a deep and dark enchanted forest. Steps away from the forest was an arced beach of gray rounded cobbles, driftwood, and wonderfully pungent heaps of seaweed and shellfish. The water on the protected sound was still and punctuated with sailboats and other small watercraft. In the low evening fog I could make out the Gulf Islands and the mountainous Vancouver Island in the distance.

There it was: Canada.

---

Take me to Part 2 in this series: From Squamish, With Love

---

Remember, the best laid plans mean nothing if you can’t take action today. Have questions? Need some feedback? Hit us up on the contact page.

If you enjoyed this post, please subscribe here for much, much more. And please, send this to someone who might enjoy or benefit from this content.

Support this free project:

Thanks guys, see you next week.

Affiliate links are used on this page. If you choose to purchase a linked product, you will incur no extra charges, but we will receive a tiny-baby portion of the sale. Those very small proceeds help us keep the digital lights on around here. We wouldn’t link to a product we wouldn’t buy ourselves. Tis all!