Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Bliss on the Lake

 I would like to live on or in water.

Water around me, supporting me, comforting me, rocking me to sleep.

I wonder why that is.

I went up to the lake this afternoon.  Summer is on the wane and I feel it like a desperation in my bones.

Don't go, summer.  Please.

So I ran up, with my raft, and the sun in and out of the clouds, rolling clouds like distant threats, off towards the mountains, billowing out from the horizon white and thick.

I blew up my raft and launched out onto the water. Immediately, I was in my comfort zone, my home, the water.  A big smile rippled through me.

I rowed and played with my rowing and got out on the rocks at my favorite spot and swam even though I could see the algae hanging into the depths like green tapioca pudding not quite mixed, freckling the water.  This gave me pause.

There are some cliffs around the second arm, higher on one side than the other, in the 5 mph zone.  The young people line up to garner the courage to jump from the rock cliff on the higher side, in early and mid summer especially.  I once jumped from those rocks.

I was up swimming on a break from trapping, sun a searing hot ball in the sky.  The water felt good.  But up above me, on the cliff, some young people taunted me.  Them being young and me being older with marginal swim wear and not such a good figure.

I was in a mood that day and this was not a day to be mocked.  I immediately swam to the rocks beneath the cliff jump off site, climbed the tenuous steep trail to the line of young people and pushed to the front of the line.  Most of them would wait twenty or thirty minutes trying to come with the courage to jump or walk off, never jumping.

"You're not going to jump, are you?" one young man implored.

"Well, I didn't come up here to admire the scenery," I said, and moved to the edge, looked down, and jumped.

It was a long way down.  The force knocked my sandals from my feet.  I LOVED the thrill of it.

I briefly then became addicted to cliff jumping and bridge jumping into water, the higher the better.  This horrified the young people, who think daredevilism is their domain alone.  Sorry kids.  Taint so.

On the opposite side of that arm are the low rocks.  The advantage of jumping off low rocks is that you can do it over and over again.  The low rocks have two jump off points, one lower than the other by about six feet.  The higher jump off rock is 14 to 16 feet from the water, height greatly dependent on water levels.  It is great fun.  The jagged rocks along that shore stretch out bench like just under the surface in places, making for a perfect spot to sit, slightly submerged against the cliff.  I love this place.

After rowing around two arms and down that one, this is where I sat, slightly submerged, feet propped up on my raft, and ate a late lunch.  I pushed the raft out then and jumped in after it.  I towed it across the arm, swimming, a rope around my wrist that was tied to the front of the raft.  I got back in on the other side and saw a boat with its motor smoking out a hundred feet.  I yelled at them "Do you need help?"

"Our motor went out," the woman said.  They were a couple who had traded one boat for this one with a promise from the old man they traded with, that the boat and motor worked just fine.  But the motor doesn't work.  I said "I'll try towing you!"

Since they'd gotten nobody else so far to help, they agreed and tied on to the end of my raft.  Now that was a hard pull.  The rope should have been tied to the bow just above the water, so my towing force would not be lost in that downward slope of the rope, from the top of their bow, down to my little raft.

I would have made it though, I just know it.  But they hailed a speed boat who agreed to tow them back around to the boat ramp.  So they cut me loose and off I went.

I saw some young men trying to snag a rope swing on a steep wooded bank.  I have long called that the rope tree.  But for them to reach the end with the wood handle, isn't so easy.  I offered up a short piece of rope I had along, to tie on the end, so once they go up the bank with the rope handle, make their swing and drop into the water, they could get ahold of it again, with a short piece of rope hanging down from it, when they're down low, to take it back up high for the next swing.  They were happy for that piece of rope and yelled out, as I rowed off, "Thank you.  We love you."  That made me grin!

I ran into two Inflatable stand up paddle boarders.  I asked if it was hard to keep balance standing up to paddle and they said it wasn't that hard.  I've seen a few up there.  It doesn't look comfortable or like much fun after awhile.  Maybe for short jaunts or for riding waves.

I like my raft.  I LOVE my raft.  I paddled around some more and went very close to one shore, overhung in tree branches, to pick big fat ripe blackberries.  My hands and mouth are still stained, the telltale signs.

I did spins in the middle of the lake, with the paddles, and then laughed and laughed.  I joked with the young vultures circling.  "Not yet," I'd say.  "Go away.  Soon enough you'll be back for me.  But not yet."

Now I'm home and still wait and still happy.

I love my raft and summer, don't you dare leave before I get out a few more times on the water.






Sunday, August 25, 2013

Best Friend Files: Slurpy and Deaf Miss Daisy



On a rainy Oregon day, and yes, today Oregon is getting rain, finally, what  better way to spend time than with friends.  

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Albany Arts and Air. What Goes Up Must Come Down



Balloon lands in Albany front yard.


I drove out to the Albany Arts and Air balloon launch this morning.  I was late and it was crowded but I saw the balloons struggling to get into the air, watched one come down almost immediately behind everyone, on an airport runway.  Others hovered just over and behind Walmart, as I went in, to scrounge for marked down meat, for cat food.

But on the way home, I drove down Kennel Drive to Grand Prairie, trying to avoid traffic.  Many of the balloons were already landing in bare fields off Grand Prairie.

Field landings off Grand Prairie
Uh oh, monster balloon dead ahead!

Albany backyard balloon decor!
Colorful Balloon hides unsuccessfully behind trees.
Another one bites the dust
Coming down, like it or not!


Awkward landings this year by far beat out the take offs!
Today, in Albany, I bought a hunk of marked down meat at Walmart which I am now cooking and later will make into cat food.  I also chased hot air balloons as they came down all over town, some in still snoozing residents front yards.

 I watched a pitbull  race around a fenced yard in a frenzy wanting to get at a balloon coming down behind his house. He didn't know what that was, but he was ready, more than ready, to defend what was his against this blob from the sky.  He was born for this day and he knew it.  Today he would do more than poop against the fence and bark at bicyclists.  TODAY, finally!  Today he would slay the dragon blob and be knighted!

Sadly, his owner came out and clipped a leash to his collar and led him, drooping now, inside.

 It was a good morning in Albany.

Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Camping Part Three: Blue River

Last weekend, I went camping up the McKenzie River highway out of Springfield.  I camped at Delta campground, just off the road that continues on up to Cougar Reservoir.  A couple miles west of the turn off to Cougar Reservoir off highway 126, is the one to Blue Lake Reservoir, which then is just a few miles up the road.

Blue Lake Reservoir was warm, the water levels normal and there was no toxic green algae in the lake yet.

We drove past the boat ramp at the dam, on to Mona campground, but it was clogged with people, and my friends didn't want to get out there.  So we went back to the boat ramp.  I got my raft out and blew it up, then went rowing.  They went fishing and immediately began catching trout, before I even got my boat pumped up.

Blue Lake Reservoir.  Photo taken from the boat ramp near the dam itself.
I don't take my camera out in the boat. It isn't water proof and even I get wet rowing my raft.  So I don't have many pictures from the reservoir trip.

My beloved raft!
I rowed down the reservoir for a while, then crossed it and went around an arm and down that.  Speed boats pulling skiers zoomed by.  But they were not on traditional water skis or wake boards I've seen before.  One guy or girl was on what looked like a single water ski, but it had a post on the bottom of the ski, that looked to be two or three feet long, and a smaller "ski" attached to that.  The skier would rise above the water two or three feet, riding that smaller board, that was under the water, or come down from a wake jump and the smaller board would disappear beneath the water and the skier would then ride the water on the board his or her feet were attached upon.  It was amazing.  One skier was doing flips as he jumped the wakes.

Another boat was slow pulling teens on what looked like small surfboards or wake boards, but right behind the boat, in the large waves created at slow speeds.  They would step right off a swimmers platform at water level at the back of the boat backwards onto their boards, holding a very short ski rope with one hand.

These boats created huge waves and I enjoyed riding them with my raft.

I kept rowing and rowing down that one arm.  I wanted to see where it ended.  Jet skiis passed me and disappeared for quite some time before returning.

I finally rowed across the arm and hugged the steep rocky and tree lined shore until I found a shale bank, where I could step out of the raft into the water, on loose shale, keeping my balance by holding onto the side of my raft until I found firm footing with my sandaled feet.

I sat half submerged in the water, watching the last boat disappear from view, then tied up my raft by securing the rope around a larger loose piece of rock and piling a couple more rocks on that.  I grabbed my own Goodwill wakeboard from the raft and set out for a swim.  It was spectacular!

I was alone, along a rocky shoreline up from which extended trees as far as I could see.  The sky was pure blue against the blue green water, dark green evergreens, and pale gray shale.  I could have stayed there swimming forever.  I was overwhelmed by the beauty and the pure joy of being immersed in water.

After a time, boats again appeared from around the corner that led to the main body of the reservoir.  After another lapse of time, I knew my friends would have caught their limit and be ready to leave.

I rowed back around the arm, catching waves from boats to propel me faster.  I rounded the final point and looked across to see the boat ramp.  One of my friends raised an arm in greeting.

Once back, I swam there, then took out my raft.  They had indeed quickly caught their limit of trout and were overjoyed that they had a couple of kids come over, there with their parents.  They let each kid reel in a fish then gave them the fish.


Their dogs were enjoying themselves also!  This is Patches, a semi psychotic dog, who likes to lick the floor, the frig, and even furniture, and chases spots of light.  I just adore Patches.

The White Viking with Yellow Glasses!
 This character was there with his friends for a fun day and agreed to me taking his photo.

I've described the great camping trip of 2013 in three posts.  It lasted three days and I'm still tired, mostly because of missing most of the first night's sleep over the stolen campsite fiasco, but I will recover.

Oregon is beautiful, that is for sure and I intend to get out again very soon.

Camping, Part Two. Delta Campground Nature Trail

Becky Turns Tree Hugger

I went camping this last weekend up on the McKenzie River, near Blue River.  My friends stayed in Delta Campground space 9, in their trailer while I tent camped it on the other side of the campground.

The campground is in an old growth forest.  The second day, while Becky and I were returning from a walk around a nature trail, a sudden boom and loud pops and cracks startled every camper.  Most went running towards the sound, to see if anyone had been hurt.  A tree branch had cracked, split and fallen from the top of a giant tree.  Fortunately no one was hit by the large branch.

It was this tree, in the middle of the campground, whose top suddenly split and crashed to the ground.
The Delta Campground short nature trail, maybe a half mile long, is a trail through a cathedral of giant trees.  I felt I was walking sacred ground.

Beautiful Forest!

One of three bridges on the trail.

Fallen giant.

Dwarfed!

Enchanted woods
Logs in the Stream
To Infinity and Beyond!
Use of Space

Interesting trunk










I became aware as I walked at the feet of these giants, of a feeling building inside me, that these trees were alive, like we are alive, another species, communicating and living slowly, in another way.  
I wanted to tiptoe then and whisper.   

Monday, August 19, 2013

Camping with Karma

I went camping.

I had fun!

Happy Camper Me!
I headed out Friday, down to Springfield then up the McKenzie River.  My friends had reservations at Delta Campground, just off the highway and 3/4 mile down a road off the road that heads out to Cougar Reservoir....and beyond.

Once there, long before the arrival of my friends, I checked out their campsite, and was not overly impressed.  They had to get a pull through site, for their long trailer.  Beyond the pull through was a picnic table, a fire pit and above that, a grassy mole hill area, that extended east and west.  It was about 8 feet wide, then descended through brush steeply to the creek and beyond to the north fork of the McKenzie River.

All along that narrow "promenade" of 8 foot wide grass were tents.  No privacy at all was to be had there. It was like concert camping, in a way.  So, off I went to find a site for myself and my tent.

I drove on up to Cougar Reservoir.  I'd never been there before.  I hoped it was beautiful.  It might have been, but the water level was very low.  After you get to the dam, which is about four miles from the turn off for Delta campground, it's another 8 miles to go along the west side of the reservoir, turn the corner, at the far end to cross a bridge and the south fork of the McKenzie River that feeds Cougar Reservoir.
Road along Cougar Reservoir.

Rocks near the hot springs


A little more than halfway along that south side, you come to the very popular clothing optional Terwilliger Hot Springs.  I didn't go up to the hot springs.  They post a ranger at the entrance now and ask a $6 day use fee.  I guess that's because of trouble that's gone on up there, and trashing of the area by freeloader litter bugs and campers.  There are five hot spring tubs up there, the hottest being 110 degrees and they go down in temp from that.

Cars crammed the parking lot on the other side of an overpass from the hot springs trail head.  Many had out of state license plates.

Down from the bridge, that spans an outcropping arm of the reservoir, was a water fall, and a few high and dry swimmers, laid out on the steep barren bank above what remained of the water in that arm.  The reservoir is very low right now, drawn down by water usage downstream and no rain.


The reservoir, not far from Slide Creek campground.

Looking south at Cougar from the hot springs pull out.
I continued on from the hot springs south to the end of the Reservoir, crossed the river and took a look at the first of three campgrounds on the south and southeast side of the Reservoir.  Cougar Crossing is the first, on the right just beyond the bridge.  It lays out flat with spacious campsites, along the east bank of the river.  There are only a dozen or so sites and at this time of year, no camp hosts.  I liked this campground.  It is the cheapest of the three, at $12 per night.

Across the road from the campground, is the campground sign, and in that pullout, a trail starts, along the river, and runs all the way to Slide Creek Campground.

I drove on to Sunnyside Campground, by taking the left fork between the Cougar campground sign and the campground.  If you go right, you can connect with highway 58, but it's a long way.

It's gravel road from Cougar Crossing on to the other two campgrounds.  You climb up above the river, and Sunnyside isn't far.  Once you turn off, when you see the sign, you drop down into the campground, which is also small and shares a camp host with Slide Creek, but he stays at Slide Creek.  Remember that.

Road into Sunnyside campground.

Sunnyside Campsite Four!  My Site!

I loved this campground.  The trail from Cougar Crossing was just below the campsite I chose, then paid for--Site Number Four.  I set up my tent, facing the river, then headed out to explore the trail that ran all the way to Slide Creek campground.

This is part of the trail.
That's the bridge way down there, just across which is Cougar Crossing campground.
There's the road way above the river, that I drove in on.


You can scramble down to this river pool and beach, from the trail.


Slide creek campground is the largest of the three and includes a boat ramp.  However, the reservoir is so low right now, most boats could not launch.


I finally went back to Delta Campground about 6:00 p.m. to wait on my friends' arrival and let them know where I was camping.  I spotted two hitchhikers just off highway 126 and rolled down my window to ask where they were going.  "The hot springs," the girl said, but nobody will give us a ride.  How far up there is it?"

"Um, close to 8 miles from here," I said.  "Good luck."

My car was still crammed in the back with stuff, like my raft, and I wasn't driving them back up to the hot springs.  I told them I would be going back to my camp later, after my friends arrived, and if I saw them on the road, I'd give them a lift, but hopefully they would be long gone by then, since I didn't plan on returning that way for over two hours.

My friends pulled in about 8:00 p.m.  I was happy to see them, but I had to get back to my camp.  They've restricted the area, from a couple miles in front of the hot springs, officially closing it to traffic, although there is no gate I saw, at 9:30 p.m., trying to prevent trouble at the hot springs I think.  Off I went.

Whom should I run into about four miles up the hill?  You guessed it, the hitchhikers. By now, they were worn out and crabby and he was being bitchy to her.  I pulled over, moved some stuff, and they crammed inside.  I told him it's day use only, but they were intent on breaking the rules.  He's just hitchhiked around for 8 years he says, and she for four or six, can't remember which.  They'd come up from Eugene and were going back to Eugene the next day.  They live mainly at homeless shelters, when not hitching, and have a son that was taken from them by the state.

I dropped them off at the hot springs and once again, wished them luck.

On I went to my campsite.  But I get there, and.....someone has stolen my site.

Stolen it!!!  My tent is still set up in there, but there is a black car in my site parking space and three tents.  I am MAD!!!

I get out, blocking the black car, and start yelling "Who stole my site?"

I go ask the twenty somethings in the campsite next to my site, because I'd talked to them at length before, when they were setting up.  They said they were from Portland.  They said "We didn't do it."  But this time, were otherwise unfriendly and very obviously had been drinking.  Three guys run up all upset.  "We paid for it," they claimed.  "We didn't think anyone was really here," they claim.

You can tell if a site is taken or not by whether there is a ticket payment stub on the site number post.  The ticket stub states the date of departure.  I had 8/18 as my departure date on the ticket stub.  I'd paid up for Friday and Saturday nights.  You pay at a self registration box at the campsite entrance.  You tear off the front of the payment envelope before dropping that in their metal payment box, and put one stub on the site post and hang the other from your mirror.

It's an Oregon honor system but bullies and entitled shitheads often abuse it.

I said, "Did you not see my tent or the ticket stub on the site number post?"

They claimed they thought the tent must be with another site and as for the stub, they had removed mine and set it on a rock at the base of the site number post, and replaced mine with theirs.  I WAS MAD!

I fumbled for words.  I wanted to punch them.  It was dark. There's no camp host there.  There's no cell service out there.  There were a lot of them and one of me and you don't know what people will do anymore.  These guys had stolen a campsite.  Their excuses were just that, excuses.  They knew what they were doing unless they were just really really stupid people.

They claimed to be from Eugene.  I wanted to say, "You know this is behavior I'd expect more from someone from some white trash Springfield trailer park."

I was so worn out and now this.  My mind raced over what I should do.

Finally I asked they pay me for nights I'd paid for the site.  So they shelled out and I packed out my tent.

Under my breath as I'm taking down my tent, I whispered, "Maybe it's meant to be."  But I didn't know then, when I said that,  I had karma camping beside me.

I got back to Delta and my friends were already in bed.  They cheerfully however laid out their trailer kitchen couch seat for me to sleep on for the night, however.  I didn't sleep much.

Next morning I set up my tent on that ugly "promenade" area.  I wasn't happy and the bad nights sleep had put me in a particularly uncharitable mood.  I was mad I hadn't kicked that group of twenty something campsite thieves to the ground, or died trying.

I went to the Delta camp host and told him what had happened and that I thought somebody should know.  He said the outer campgrounds like that, are a draw to the drinking and thieving types sometimes, so they can try to elude consequence for undesirable actions like what had happened to me.

He said he wouldn't charge me the extra car fee for camping with my friends the night before.  But later, he came into our camp asking "for the girl who got run out of her campsite".  "That's me," I said, jumping forward, from the camp chair.  I liked the Delta camp hosts.

"I got a campsite for you," he said, excited, eager to show it to me.  I got on his golf cart run around and he took me down to the opposite side of the campground and proudly led me into a site, right by the river.

So this is where I camped, ten feet from the river, with the river singing me to sleep.  It was a beyond awesome campsite, better than my site at Sunnyside.  I was ecstatic!

That's the view I had out the front of my tent.  I wanted to live there!  Karma had struck!
But karma did even more for me.  Part of the deal from the Delta camp host, with me getting that site, was for me to drive back up and tell the camp host at Sunnyside what had happened.

So...later that day, Becky and I did make that drive back up.  We stopped first at the hot springs because the camp hosts sometimes work the entrance.  It wasn't Roger, the Slide Creek camp host, but he was a super nice guy and told us to stop on the way back out to tell him if we found Roger.

I liked Roger.  I met him the first day.  We found him cleaning bathrooms at Slide Creek and I briefly told him about my campsite being stolen by those young men from Eugene.  I was a little embarrassed now, since I had a great campsite replacement, courtesy of Delta, and the young men had at least paid me that night what I paid out for that campsite.

Well, Roger had more to say.  Seems the guys who would have been my neighbors, on the other side of me, had my campsite not been stolen, had kept everyone awake until after 2:30, blasting music, being loud and obnoxious drunks.  Then one or more of them had destroyed the only bathroom there at Sunnyside by vomiting all over it.

I was rolling in laughter by that time.  So was Roger, even though he'd had to clean it up.  So was Becky.  Becky piped up "Karma got them!"   Karma got the campsite thieves!

Roger asked if I wanted to make an official complaint and I said, "Nah, it all worked out."  He said, "It sure did."

I've always wondered why drunks go camping.  They simply move their drunken haze from home to a public campground.  They tell the same stories over and over, monopolize the conversation and think they're very funny, when everyone near them is groaning inside.

Same thing with groups of people who fully intend to get wasted and destroy the camping experience of anyone nearby with their noise, obnoxious behavior and blaring music.  How in the world do people justify in their minds behaving like that?  It's selfishness taken to an extreme.  If people want to get together and drink and play loud music half the night out camping, then they should go way way off in the woods to do it, way out, up some logging road, where nobody has to be affected by their choices or clean up after them.

Breakfast cooking

Campfires!

Clothes dry after swimming at Blue Lake reservoir.

Fern forest across the river from my campsite

Trees across from my campsite.
I had great fun, great food, and my friends and I played some rowdy cribbage nights with the campfire beside us and their two dogs under the picnic table napping.  We went to the reservoir across from Cougar, Blue Lake Reservoir, and had a blast.  They fished while I rafted and swam.  Becky and I walked the nature trail in Delta campground.

Am I tired?  Yes.  But I had a great time.  I'll post some photos later of Blue Lake and the nature trail.

I going to take a nap!

Tent Morning!

Round Up

Today is cat round up for tomorrow's five spots.  Two more came up from the vet student in Harrisburg late this morning.  Over 60 fixed ...