A bit of a pause on the blogging, but back it at now. We finished out our stay at our beautiful little campsite along Fish Creek. We were very glad to have such a nice place as the hordes from Missoula showed up for Labor Day and it definitely turned into a bit of a zoo.
After the first day of fishing where I really started to feel like I knew what I was doing, the fish had the last laugh. I just couldn’t figure out how to catch one anymore. Finally on the last day, I got a bit more action and caught a nice 10″ cutthroat. Whew.
I really have enjoyed the fishing and do I like fly fishing in the creek. It is very consuming and you end up casting over and over again trying to get the fly to float “drag-free.” It is a bit like kayaking because you have to really read the water and try to decided how the currents are going to move your fly and your line and whether it will move naturally over where a fish might want to come try out a tasty meal.
Susanne found one fishing hole near our campsite particularly appealing. She spent a lot of time there figuring out where the fish were, how to cast the fly so it floated by them just right. She ended up catching quite a few there. There was at least one big lunker hiding under the big cottonwood tree that had fallen across the stream and she even got it to come out and give her a strike. I am sure that fish is super smart and wary as it probably gets fished all the time, so I was pretty impressed she was even able to get a rise out of it.
The smoke really moved in which bummed us out as we had had 4 gorgeous smoke-free days prior to that. The good news was that we were moving on the next day (Monday, Labor Day). It seemed like another sign that it was time to move along on the vagabond journey.
We got up in the morning, had coffee and started packing up. The plan was to drive to Viola, Idaho and visit our friends Margaret and Ray who we had not seen for over 20 years. It is just crazy how time just slips by and next thing you know, several decades have passed and your friends’ kids are off being all grown up smarty pants doing amazing things.
It was about a 4 hr drive, so it wasn’t a long day in the saddle. We showed up at their house around 2 pm and the smoke wasn’t too bad. They live on a really nice 47 acre plot of land in the heart of the hilly wheat country in Eastern Washington, not far from Washington State University and where I went to 1st and 2nd grades.
We introduced Sadie to Bear (their dog) and it all went pretty well. Bear is a super nice, young, athletic dog with just the sweetest personality. He just wanted to play with Sadie, but Sadie, being the cranky old bitch, was less enamored with that idea. We walked around the property and had a nice evening catching up after so many years. One really nice thing about this trip is that we have been catching up with some folks that we haven’t seen for way too long. Sadly, I didn’t take one ding dang picture of us. Doh! Anyway, we all look young and healthy. Trust me.
We got up in the morning, sat around and had coffee and then headed out to Wenatchee where we have an Airbnb for a month. It will be nice to just hang out in one place for a while and I know that Sadie will really enjoy that. We drove through Colfax (or near it at least) which is where I went to school for 1st grade, and that was blast from the past. It was a great windy road through the surprisingly beautiful wheat fields.
The Airbnb doesn’t have room for the trailer, but Tom, who is the owner, offered to have us park it at his place during the stay. We drove to his house and met them and started to rejigger all our stuff out of the trailer. Holy crap, we have a lot of stuff, although a lot less wine than when we started. The whole time I kept having this odd feeling that I had met Tom and Lorien somewhere before, but didn’t think too much of it.
We bought some supplies and drove the 20 minutes up the mountain to their house near Mission Ridge ski area. We unloaded and moved in. Susanne googled Tom and Lorien and discovered they ran a company that focused on getting pets back to their owners. Doh! I had met them before at a conference in Canada. What a small world it is indeed.
The place is quite nice and backs to a stream that creates a beautiful symphony while you are sitting out on the deck. Sadie was a bit wound up, so I took her for a little walk to check out whether we could get into the adjacent state park directly from out place. I tried just going across the creek, but this had two problems: (a) it lead into the neighbor’s driveway and (b) it went through a big patch of stinging nettles of which I had forgotten about until my legs started stinging. Susanne would not be amused by this route.
It did eventually lead up to the park and the system of trails there. Yeah! and on my way back I found an easier route. I was happy because now we have a good place to walk in the morning and it is supposed to be great mountain biking.
It should be a very nice and relaxing place to hang out for a month.
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