Bree hangs out with her friend Sadie on the camp’s boat dock.
(Our camp stories this year start on August 26, but we didn’t post them until September. The August stories are available at http://family.cozi.com/miksovsky#201708.)
Anya stuns Jan by asking if he’ll take her on a hike up Mt. Tallac. This is completely surprising because Anya doesn’t generally go in for hiking at all, and the hike up Tallac is considered the hardest hike commonly made from camp. Jan points out that we may not have time to make the hike. Susi, a camp counselor, happens to be sitting nearby during the discussion, and mentions that she hiked Tallac at night in order to see the sunrise from the summit. Anya thinks this is a fantastic idea: it not only manages to make this difficult hike even more difficult, it will also allow us to squeeze the hike in on our very last morning at camp.
Jan and Anya leave our cabin at 2:55 am. The moon has set, but there are a million stars out. They climb up the mountain via the “Mid Tallac” trail, which a number of camp counselors say is the best route up. The trail climbs some 3500’ in something like 3.8 miles, which is really steep. And in the dark, the trail isn’t all that easy to follow — the trail alternately crosses dirt, rock slabs, loose rock, and crushed rock, and any one patch of ground looks just as trail-like as any other. They lose the trail several times; Jan consults his phone’s topographical map app to get back on the trail.
They finally reach the summit around 6:00 am, just about 3 hours after starting, and about half an hour before sunrise. The light is already bright enough to see by, and getting brighter by the minute. A group of four other hikers — a couple from Sacramento, and two students they’re hosting from Spain and Afghanistan — join them at the summit. Around 6:30 am, the sun finally peeks over the mountains east of Tahoe.
Anya really wants to be back at camp as soon as possible so she can say goodbye to her camp friends before everyone heads home. She walks/jogs down the trail. When they’re about a mile from camp, she takes a spill into some spiky manzanita bushes, and her legs get scraped up. Anya jogs the last mile into camp ahead of Jan, who arrives around 8:45 am. Angela’s waiting for both of them in the dining hall with breakfast.
We get ready for the imminent school year with some Back to School shopping — shopping for snacks, that is — at Uwajimaya, Seattle’s Asian supermarket. We have dinner at the food court first, then buy food. The girls are thrilled to shop for their favorite snacks and drinks.
Bree has learned to cook her very favorite food on Earth: macaroni and cheese. She takes advantage of this new ability when she can, including when her friend Annabelle comes over for a playdate. Bree later confides: “Annabelle tried to help, but she wasn’t really very much help.”
Bree starts 4th grade!
She comes home shouting, “Science is awesome!” We’re so glad her school’s venerable and venerated science teacher has decided to stay for at least another year.
Bree’s now the only child in the car as Jan drives her to school. She misses having her sisters in the car with her. Jan has 5 more years of this daily drive ahead of him.
Liya starts high school: she’s now in 9th grade! She’s attending the same high school as Anya, who’s now in 10th grade. They can now both walk to school.
Both girls start the year with three days without actual classes. Liya leaves for a 3-day 9th grade retreat, where she’ll get to know her new classmates a little better. Anya begins a 3-day series of day trips.
Jan and Anya fly to the East Coast so that Anya can visit the boarding schools of Phillips Exeter Academy and Choate Rosemary Hall. The first stop will be Exeter, NH, where their plan is to spend the night with Jan’s cousin Bondi and his fiancee Jane.
The flight to Boston connects through Philadelphia, but the connecting flight is greatly delayed due to fog in Boston. Bondi suggests trying to switch to a flight to Manchester, NH, which is clear and much closer to Exeter. Jan and Anya manage to get on the flight, but it’s still 10:45 pm when they get to Bondi’s house. Bondi brings out the dinner portions he’d set aside for them, and everyone catches up over the late meal.
Jan and Anya tour Phillips Exeter Academy in the morning. They start with a meeting with a member of the math faculty to hear more about the math program at Exeter, then go on a tour led by a boy named Sam. Anya’s impressed by the school’s campus. The library’s huge atrium is particularly stunning. Afterwards, Anya has an interview with an admissions officer.
Afterwards, Jan and Anya drive to visit the home of Ute and Roy Tellini, good family friends from Maplewood, NJ. Ute serves a nice lunch, and everyone gets a chance to catch up. Ute is very happy when Anya mentions the large number of art history books on the shelves — Ute taught art history for many years. She pulls out a volume to give to Anya.
Jan and Anya say their goodbyes, then drive a few hours down to Wallingford, CT, for a visit to Choate tomorrow. They check in at the Wallingford Victorian B&B just before dinner, then make a short walk through the Choate campus before walking into Wallingford for dinner at an Italian restaurant.
Anya and Jan make the very short drive from the B&B to the Choate campus in the morning after breakfast. Their first meeting of the day is with the head of the math department in the new Lamphier Building, followed by a head of the arts department at the large Paul Mellon Arts Center. Jan shows Anya the balcony gallery where he once had an art class, and the strangely tall outdoor hallway that produces sharp echoes when you walk through it.
They head over to the admissions office in Archbold. Two very friendly girls, Nina and Loni, lead a tour around the campus. Choate’s campus is comparatively more spread out than Exeter’s, and includes a number of recently added buildings. The new student activity center is busy, as is a small cafe in the math building. Loni takes them into her dorm, and shows off a nice single room. Following the tour, Anya has an interview, while a member of the development office comes over to talk and pass the time with Jan.
Jan and Anya have lunch at a Subway near the Bradley Airport, and get to the gate in plenty of time. However, their flight to Philadelphia has been delayed, and will miss their connecting flight to Seattle. They manage to get switched to a flight through Chicago, which gives them a chance to have dinner at Tortas Frontera. The flight to Seattle does get in pretty late though, and it’s 11:30 pm before they’re back at home.
Bree creates a sketchbook in art class.
Glico makes a “Men’s Pocky” variety in dark chocolate. Jan had a box in the pantry, but discovers Bree has modified the box to read “Women’s Pocky” — and then helped herself to some of the contents.
Jan and Chris fly up to the Powell River area of British Columbia to hike 90 km (56 miles) of the Sunshine Coast Trail. A seaplane takes them from Seattle’s Lake Union to the dock at tiny Bliss Landing, BC. From there, they walk up to the trail’s northern terminus at Sarah Point, then begin hiking south through BC’s Malaspina Provincial Park.
The trail is harder and slower than they expected, so they arrive at the destination for the evening at 7:00 pm, just before sundown. They’re staying at Manzanita Hut, one of the trail’s numerous snug huts for hikers. They quickly make dinner so they can enjoy a bit of the view of the Strait of Georgia, Texada Island, Savory Island, and Vancouver Island before it’s completely dark.
Sunshine Coast Trail, Day 2. Jan and Chris hear rain on the roof of the hut during the night, and after they set out on the trail for the second day of hiking, it begins to drizzle on and off. They manage to stay fairly dry for most of the day, but in the mid-afternoon, the clouds open and it pours down for 20 minutes, soaking everything. Worse, this is the one evening where there’s no hiker hut, so when they reach the campsite at Sliammon Lake, they have to set up their tents in the rain.
One bit of good news: they find a pile of firewood someone has left covered with a plastic sheet. Chris manages to start a fire, which helps warm them up.
Sunshine Coast Trail, Day 3. It’s still dripping when Jan and Chris break camp and get back on the trail. Shortly before noon, they walk through the northern tip of the town of Powell River. They purchase a bit of gasoline for a camping stove Chris has brought, and enjoy a huge lunch at the Shingle Mill Restaurant on Lake Powell. From there, the trail heads back into the wilderness, following the eastern shore of Lake Powell, and eventually up to pretty Inland Lake. The sun comes out for the first time in two days, and they eventually reach their third stop on the trail, the rustic Anthony Island Hut. Jan manages to put together a fairly decent dinner of Indian food, including some steamed and toasted naan bread.