Summer days at the beach in Seattle. Life is good.
Our international student has never had ice cream from an ice cream truck before, so when one passed by Angela, Anya and Evrim had to chase it down and get some!
Bree’s school indicates that they’re going to start with remote classes next month. Bree’s disappointed. But given that the virus is nowhere near under control in the U.S., and given the poor examples of schools that opened early with in-person classes, it seems like the only sensible decision.
Liya’s school indicates that, for now, they also plan to start with remote classes next month.
Evrim has been with us for about 6 weeks. She doesn’t know how to swim, so today Anya, Liya and Angela took her out and gave her a swim lesson: trust your PFD and inflatables. She even learned to kick and blow bubbles under water!
For the past few years, a strip of low-voltage track lighting in our dining room hasn’t worked. One day it stopped working, and when we tried replacing the bulbs, they still didn’t work. We couldn’t fix the problem ourselves, and at one point asked an electrician for help, but they said it’d be hard to fix without knowing where the transformer for the light strip was.
Today we happened to have Dennis, the general contractor who has overseen several of our house projects, stop by. He took a look at the lights, then said, “Oh, the transformer for those is in that utility closet.”
When the closet was opened, we discovered that the transformer had been unplugged. A few years ago, we’d thought that the transformer was a leftover piece of an old alarm system, and so we’d pulled the plug. At some point after that, we noticed the light strip in the dining room wasn’t working, but we never connected the two events.
So, after several years of slightly dim mood lighting in our dining room, all the lights work again!
The girls have continued taking Evrim down the block to one of the pocket beaches for time in the lake. With a borrowed lifejacket and a floatie, she has fun bobbing, kicking, splashing, and spinning around in the water.
After picking up a canoe from the floating Ross Lake Resort, Jan and Bree begin paddling north to Rainbow Point. It’s 6 miles — a fairly long distance to paddle. Luckily, there’s a stiff breeze from the south. On a previous trip with his brother Chris, Jan had rigged up a sort of spinnaker sail from a garbage bag and two paddles. Chris dubbed it the “Janniker”.
This time, Jan doesn’t have a garbage bag, but happily does have a small tarp that happens to be made of ultralight sailcloth. Jan ties it to Bree’s extensible hiking poles and hands the contraption to Bree. She puts it up, and the “Sabriyaker” sail instantly fills and begins pushing our boat downwind. When the breeze gets going, our canoe even leaves behind a little wake.
In short order, the two arrive at Rainbow Point.
Bree and Jan set up the tent, then go for a quick dip in the cold lake before attending to dinner. Jan’s brought some of the items they like from the Japanese camping anime, “Laid-Back Camp”: curry udon noodles and small pork dumplings. The dumplings they steam in a little pot to make them fluffy, then fry in a skillet to make the outside crisp. Everything comes out nicely.
Afterwards, they light a campfire, toast marshmallows, and read.
Bree discovers that the dry air is causing chapped lips — but she’s forgotten to bring lip balm. Jan had meant to bring some, but didn’t. Jan suggests they try using drops of olive oil instead. This works fairly well. Jan: “This way, we’ll smell like salad to the bears.”
Jan and Bree head out for their annual father-daughter camping trip. This year they’re headed to Ross Lake for four days of canoe camping.
Due to the pandemic, interest in camping has skyrocketed this year, and Ross Lake is a particularly popular destination. Jan’s been tracking the availability of the first-come/first-served campsites at the southern end of the long lake, and as the day of the trip has approached, the list of available sites has dwindled to almost nothing. So when they arrive at the ranger station in Marblemount to request campsite permits, it’s not clear whether they’ll be able to get sites at all.
Getting campsites turns out to be a very near thing. The ranger initially says that there’s nothing available the first night, but eventually finds a discrepancy in their system that suggests one site at Rainbow Point. The ranger then says there’s nothing available the second night, but then decides to give Jan and Bree permission to camp at a huge 12-person group site at Big Beaver Campground. For the third night, there really is nothing available. Since Jan and Bree have backpacks, Jan asks whether there are any hike-in spots available. The ranger says, yes, there’s one hiker site available at Devil’s Creek, just a short hike away from the boat dock at Devil’s Junction. So, by a small miracle, Jan and Bree do get sites for all three nights, although they’ll have a bit of paddling up and down the lake.
The two have lunch at Mondo’s, a small restaurant in Marblemount. One of the owners is Korean, so the restaurant has a surprisingly large number of Japanese and Korean meals on offer. Bree opts for teriyaki chicken, which turns out to be really good (and far too large).
They head up to the trailhead at the south end of Ross Lake. Naturally, the parking lot is completely full. Jan ends up wedging in his car in a dubious spot. Luckily, just as they’re about to hike down to the lake, a pair of hikers comes up the trail and leaves a real parking spot available.
The trail down to Ross Lake is fairly short, and provides some early views of the lake. Bree stops to take some pictures of the dam that created the lake.
Ross Lake, Day 2. Bree and Jan paddle a short distance across the lake from Rainbow Point to reach Big Beaver Campground. The two of them have a reservation for the huge group campsite, so have their pick of places to set up. They select a site right at the point with a good 180° view of the lake.
A short while later, a group of National Park Service employees arrive to settle into the rest of the group site. They’re there to clear out reed canary grass, an invasive plant that’s begun growing in the area.
Since the afternoon forecast calls for some rain, Jan and Bree set up the tarp over a picnic table to create a nice dry space. Bree thinks the use of sticks reminds her of the camps set up by the “Bokoblin” monsters in the game “Zelda: Breath of the Wild”, so the two refer to their campsite as “Bokoblin Camp”.
Bree poses on a bridge over Big Beaver Creek, during a short walk away from the campsite.
In the mid-afternoon, Bree and Jan go for another swim in Ross Lake. For some reason, the lake feels much colder today. They also take advantage of clear weather to do some laundry.
Bree finishes reading the one book she thought to bring, and begins pestering Jan to do something. Since chipmunks keep visiting the campsite, Bree proposes a “Chipmunk Drawing Contest”. Jan asks, “Are we determining which chipmunk can make the best drawing, or are we competing to draw chipmunks?” “The latter”, she says.
Using the burnt end of a stick, Jan gamely draws a cartoony chipmunk face on a rock. After a couple of false starts, Bree draws a perfect chipmunk that would look at home on the cave walls in Lascaux.
Bree’s other camp crafting activity is using her penknife to carve wands like the ones seen in Harry Potter.
Dinner is Bree’s favorite backpacking dinner: gemelli pasta with a marinara meat sauce. As a side dish, Jan cooks a batch of quick-rise skillet bread.
Ross Lake, Day 3. Jan and Bree pack up and paddle north. The weather in the morning is beautiful, but rain is forecast for the afternoon.
As they paddle up the lake, Jan and Bree stop to explore Devil’s Creek, a ravine with steep sides that gets narrower and narrower. It’s beautiful, but also very quiet and a little eerie.
Jan and Bree reach the dock at Devil’s Junction and tie up their canoe. They shoulder their packs and head about half a mile up the trail to reach the Devil’s Creek hikers’ campground. Jan had actually camped in this same campground last year for the last night of his Pacific Northwest Trail section hike, and is happy to be able to snag the spot in the campground with the best view. Rain is threatening, so they get the tarp up first. Just as they finish pitching the tent, it begins to rain.
The rain continues for a few hours, so they pass the time by playing cards and reading (or, in Bree’s case, listening to an audio book). Another couple comes in looking for a spot to camp. Jan and Bree invite them to set up nearby so they can have a nice view too.
When the rain stops, Jan and Bree go for a short hike down the Pacific Northwest Trail to the bridge at Devil’s Creek and back.
Ross Lake, Day 4. It rains overnight, but by morning the weather has completely cleared. Jan and Bree get a very early 6:00 am start and do their best to get on the lake as quickly as possible. They have to make a long 9+ mile paddle back to the south end of the lake today. The headwinds will start in the middle of the morning and only get stronger as the day progresses — so every mile they can paddle before the wind starts is an easier mile.
The first couple of hours of the day are, in fact, glorious, and the two make quick progress to about Roland Point before the wind really starts. From that point on, the trip becomes a bit of a slog against the wind. They stop for an early lunch at Cougar Island, then resume their slow upwind progress. They’re extremely happy when the lodge and its docks finally come into view.
After returning the canoe, they get a motorboat ferry back across the lake to the trail. (The ferry operator gets paid by trips, not by time, so he goes much, much too fast.) Then they make the short but steep climb up the Ross Dam Trail to the waiting car.
As they drive through the town of Marblemount, they stop at Cascadian Farms for their justifiably famous blueberry ice cream.
We — all six of us — drive to Leavenworth for a final bit of summer away from home.
Jan had asked everyone if they wanted to go car camping, and the vote was to stay in a cabin somewhere instead. We end up opting for two nights at Sleeping Lady Resort: a cluster of small cabins in a pine wood near Icicle Creek. We’ve stayed there before and have always enjoyed it. It’s a little different with COVID — the famous buffet has been replaced with table service, and the pool is closed — but it’s still fun.
The weather’s a bit hot for the big hikes around Leavenworth, but the Tumwater Pipeline Trail along the Wenatchee River is flat, short, easy, and includes the option to swim in the river.
We hike to a nice sandy beach along a slow section of river, and Jan runs back to the car to grab the bag of swimsuits. The water’s cold but nice. Most of us swim out to the huge boulder just beneath the surface in the middle of the river.
We have lunch at München Haus on Leavenworth’s faux-Bavarian main street. They’re only serving a limited menu, but the food’s still fine.
In the mornings, Liya goes for runs, and Jan goes for walks. He walks to the Icicle Ridge Trailhead the first morning, and on the second morning from the Snow Lake Trailhead back to the resort. This lets him connect his trail of footsteps in Washington from our house to the PCT to Icicle Ridge to the resort to the Enchantment Lakes basin.
Angela and Jan also go on a walk past the fish hatchery near the resort. A team of workers are taking huge female salmon out of tanks, removing their eggs, then moving the eggs to an incubation building.
We check out of the resort, then go into the town of Leavenworth. We park the car, then walk across a bridge to Blackbird Island, a park with some beaches for swimming. We spend a leisurely hour or so wading in the river.
This is the summer of social distancing circles. At Madison Park Beach with Liya and Jan.
Angela heads out of town for a retreat. She’s begun an 18 month program to get a certificate as a spiritual director, a role something like a coach or counselor that helps individuals grow spiritually. The instructors and the dozen students would normally gather for group retreats, but this year the retreats are remote. Some of the students, like Angela, have opted to at least go somewhere away from home. Angela heads to a cute, tiny cabin rental she found on Whidbey Island, and will be there for the next few days.
Liya turns 17! We celebrate with Lyn and Evrim. Angela’s away on her retreat, but she participates by video call to help sing “Happy Birthday”.
In a normal year, this is the day when we would have headed down to Fallen Leaf Lake in California for a week at Stanford Sierra Camp. The camp is closed this year. Bree and two of her local Sierra Camp friends organize their own get-together to hang out for the afternoon at University Village.
We have our own family Sierra Camp get-together in Madison Park with two other camp families that live nearby, the Rosenbergs and the Wolson-Blacks.
Photo of the camp teens: Anya, Liya, (Evrim), Bennett, and Samantha
Liya reaches her cross-country training goal of running 500 miles this summer!
She’s going to be the captain of the girls’ team this year. Sadly, the season has been postponed from the fall to the spring. Training during the rainy, cold winter months won’t be as pleasant as summer training.