Epic Beginning

Moving out of our 6 years-lived-in, 1400 square foot apartment was an episode I will hopefully soon forget, though not so much that I also forget its lessons: Too much accumulation of stuff will not end well; It's far too easy to accumulate too much stuff - it takes work and discipline to avoid; Two weeks is not enough time to end a 3-year job at an organization I care about and pack up the house in an unstressed state while your mate has work to do during those last couple weeks and has been overwhelmed with the arduous logistics of trip planning for a couple months already; Each new element of stress compounds the total weight and affects every aspect of life; Help from friends is necessary at some point and will ease the stress significantly.

After a relaxing, fun-filled, and sometimes hectic (madly sewing black felt on the few remaining curtains on Sunday morning, hours at the beach on Saturday finally getting this satellite dish connected - thanks to Adam and Neal for your remarkable stamina!) weekend at the Russian River with 12 of our friends, we headed out with our good friend Emily on Sunday afternoon for a brief stop in Sacramento to drop some stuff off with our good friend Hans (there was no way we were taking the vacuum cleaner!), do some errands and get our stuff in moveable condition.

Hoping to move two stones with one trogdor, we stopped a couple places on the way to Hans's house. First stop was successful: return stuff to REI and buy the right outdoor stove 1 minute before the end of their sale, just before closing. The next stop: pick up our laptop case shipped to a FedExKinkos downtown (no, Kinko's employees are not anymore knowledgeable since the merger, but we'll report back on this later - perhaps it's too soon to see an effect). This stone was stubborn and would not budge. Having heard from an employee at this particular branch of the famed bad service copy shop-turned shipping center that they are open till 11 pm, we arrived a few minutes past 6 to discover: a locked door and an oblivious employee on the other side. Adam called them from his cell phone. They (for the third time) said they don't even accept packages. Growl. YES, you do accept packages and there's one waiting for me there; lemme talk to Tim. Tim, the only one who knew about the package in the whole joint, refused to let us in cause yada, yada, yada. Dude. Bummed. Reluctantly, we admitted defeat and trudged back to the van it took us a while to park since we're not used to parking with the trailer.

We had a lovely Indian dinner with Hans. The family who owned the place was very gracious and loving. We were the only ones in the restaurant. Nice and quiet.

From the strip mall heaven that is Sacramento, but more importantly from our friend Hans's very comfortable and welcome home, the three of us headed Southeast on Monday, May 17th. We had spent the entire day unloading and re-loading the van, getting rid of some extraneous stuff, cleaning out camelbacks that still had playa dust on them, searching in vain for the fabric store I swore I saw at an nearby intersection, working on the van curtains, cooking food, and shopping for our week-long venture to the desert. We ate our delicious BBQ chicken sandwiches in the Whole Foods parking lot at about 8 pm. Our ultimate destination
(to stay for 5 days): Saline Valley, in Death Valley National Park.

We had delusions of making it 4 hours from Sacramento to Bridgeport, and camping that night next to Travertine hotsprings. But we got tired and camped at Sand Flat on the American River in the Sierras, two hours away. It was COLD. I thought to myself as I hurried between pod and van with various toiletry and clothing and bedding items: Cold camping is not so happening. We need to get somewhere warmer. We crashed out and woke up the next morning one of about 4 vehicles in camp. The river was so loud we could barely hear each other inside the van. I got up and spent some time staring at the river in many directions. Rivers are not very familiar to me. The San Lorenzo in Santa Cruz doesn't really count to me as a river. It trickles rather than flows. As I gazed at the rapids, I noticed the dull brown water turned sparkly topaz for brief moments as it collided with granite boulders beneath. Em and Adam woke up and we snapped some photos of each other on the bridge over the river. We waved goodbye to the elderly couple who manage the camp, winking at the lap dog inside the man's coat, and headed off toward Tahoe.

South Lake Tahoe turned out to be a bit of a time warp. We ate a yummy breakfast at Bert's Cafe (at first, I thought it said Berf's Cafe, as did Emily, which was not so appetizing, but luckily we re-read it and noticed all the cars parked outside). They had real maple syrup and small-grid waffles (this earns quite a few points in my book). We did errands, Adam worked a bit at Starbucks (where they were doing interviews that Em and Adam can tell you more about - apparently they were quite funny).

At last on the road again, we arrived in Bridgeport and made our way to Travertine, highly recommended by Hans. It was early evening when we arrived. A few cars were parked near the upper pool, but there was only one man in sight, soaking in the spring, his wolf-dog prowling nearby. We eagerly disrobed and joined him. The air was cool and the tub was about 105 - perfect. The travertine, through which the steaming water bubbled up and coursed toward the pool, reminded me of Yellowstone's mineral-crusted geyser chimneys and terraces. Not 5 feet away from our spots in the 2-foot deep warmth, bright rust-colored stone and a tiny stream of water camouflaged rags that someone had placed to divert the stream a bit and cool down the pool. Turns out the guy, I'll call him Ridge, lives in Bridgeport (a very small town between the White and Inyo Mountains) and is a writer. His day job is construction. He has just finished building his house. He did not envy our traveling ways, saying he loves being home. He even expressed measured doubt about Trogdor getting us into Saline Valley.

We drove down hill a ways, out of the restricted area near the springs, to set up camp. A few other spring-goers were camped in the small hills around us. Emily and I set out to use our tiny grill (it fits in a briefcase) to make fresh hamburgers and sweet potato wedges for dinner. We quickly discovered that 3 lighters do not a fire make. All were malfunctioning. We had no matches. Adam, or should I say - McGuyver - jumped at the chance to perform pyrotechnic feats with gasoline, jumper cables, and a car battery. We realized shortly that we were unwittingly part of Strong Bad's science project: the effects of gasoline on fire! Much to our surprise the effect of gasoline on fire is not much. Sparks, sparks, more sparks. No flames. Apparently, the charcoal soaked it all up and there was no vapor left to catch. So we tried paper. Finally, a flame! A little more coaxing and we finally had a coal lit, and began to cook. About an hour later we enjoyed quite scrumptious teriyaki hamburgers, occasionally undercooked but still yummy sweet potatoes, and a deliciously dressed salad.

Morning came early. We packed up and trounced back to the springs for one more soak. This time, we hiked down the hill a hundred feet or so to the silt-bottomed pool. This time we had total privacy. The snowy mountains loomed to the west and the travertine shown bright under the trickle of its geothermal spring. We discovered why the upper pool was lined with cement: gushy silt. It was nice and soft, though. Relaxed, we piled into the van and continued Southeast toward Saline Valley.