HikingLog 10139

HikingLog 10139 (ref: On the trail of the Ice Age Floods by Bruce Bjornstad, Sandopoint ID: Keoke Press) 

At 6:30 p.m. I called Tami. "Pack." I thought of the second bedroom in my new abode across the grass and just to the left of the cherry tree behind Tami's condo. A whole room for all our stuff, just off the garage, awaits us there. Now three I had car-loads up and five to go, and our equipment was everywhere. Had I managed to think of everything? Back up stove? oops! We should do that from now on to appease the gentle creature who entwines the fabric of which I lives are woven. It turned out she brought the spare stove.

Before Tami could begin her father called, reminding her to be at his house by 7 for her meds. She went out to his place and took her meds, and by the time I reached her door at 7:30, she was already moving very slowly. Even before she finished slurring the words "I feel heavy," I knew I had a time-line. Get on the road. I had asked her groggy opinion on whether she had packed all her clothes or perhaps not, what do you think, dear. "I got it covered." She said then, "Look at the little kitty, it's so cute..." Her attention span was shorter than ten second.

"Tami," I told her in her bedroom,"it is in your best interest to not accrue any more cats!" Slowly, gently I had assisted her preparations. It would not cross my mind to be rough with her. I no longer have to. The mission to climb came to us to commemorate, in retrospect, our marriage. We have mustered each others offenses and defenses and we are left with unending mutual awe, "And awe leaves no room for adoration."

By eight-thirty we were racing through the cold desert air and of the flat sage desert. The Central Cascades were far to our West and The mountain range of Clearwater Natural Forest to our East. Mt Rainier loomed, if she could be seen at all, a hundred miles in the direction of Phoebes unseen chariot.  This is Hanford's demesne, and we drove straight up her Western Boundary. The national lab's territory bulged far to the East, into the Columbia River, 12 miles to our right carving out a 18-mile lazy s-curve: the Hanford Reach wildlife preserve.

After forty miles we ran into the Columbia ourselves, now gently flowing to our right. For this entire distance we didn't see a house. We crossed the Columbia on the Vantage bridge and turned upstream, following the far bank towards her distant source. We hugged the shore and followed her course for 24 miles. I drove fast, to keep up with my thoughts. I recalled the name of a route depicted in some climbing catalog: Haul ass and your mind will follow...

I had a plan of camping in our favorite spot, but that would entail a hundred yard hike with two packs and a piggy pack (a third pack to be carried or worn). And Tami was still on the passenger seat, deep in the sedation of Geodon, 'a hospital in a pill.' The car's dash illuminated her deeply drowsed state. She came too each time I had swerved into another lane.

Suddenly the Saddle Mountains left and right grew closer and closer and the road swung to the left and then to the right. Traveling fast and low over the water, the road twisted and turned. We had just then entered Sentinal Gap. We arrived at the ruins wrought 65,000 to 89,000 years ago.  The Missoula lake covered an area twice the state of Rhode Island miles of water breached the hills at this point and now the Columbia is the mere runnel of what is left. The slower and weaker processes of erosion leave compressed and distant past.

As quickly as the hair-pin turns come, the are passed, and its straight North from there. The Columbia makes a long slow curve out to our left, like the last stream of water that runs down the drain in the tub. Above us for 600 feet, there would have been floating icebergs, impregnated with boulders destined to reach as far south as Kennewick, in the section of the city where Dr. Manawadu lives: Desert Heights. From here on we are dashing across the basin of the lake, with the residual stream occupying a small rivulet far to our left. We soon catch Interstate 90 as it crossed over the river. It is a  plowed ribbon of traffic, laid straight across the state, from Seattle to Spokane. We rode this magic carpet up the long incline towards Spokane. It rose steadily, with a long entrance ramp for trucks, suddenly putting us 500 feet above the river.

With the cut rock to our right, we found ourselves traveling up, through, and finally on top of a strata of good, respectable basalt columns. That is what we will climb tomorrow. Elsewhere are piles of debris left by the lake; boulders and pebbles that come in two flavors: Talus which is friendly, and Scree, which is horrifying (less, so when frozen). We rode that highway one exit, dropped down and around. I turned hard left and pulled into Feathers parking lot. At this a small rivulet in the tub of the Columbia Valley persisted over the basalt band long enough to carve out the three most beautiful amphitheaters on the Columbia River. A valiant stand of columns juts out of the sand. We were the only ones there.

Why do we drive out into the cold, lonely night and come to rest in a bowl of crumbling basalt columns? To climb! To vault into the next adventure on the very 'un' ribbon-like road of our lives. For all Tami's actions and words are her history and all mine are mine, yet they merge in the pursuit of a common goal. We each get something slightly different from her: the climb gives us what we each need. She tells us directly and instantaneously, and we listen to her through our actions as we bump up against the future. For tomorrow morning, Tami is to lead up Mandatory suicide.

Two bags, one tent, two rolls, twin ropes, harnesses and shoes and rack all around, food and appropriate warm clothing - I had packed everything we needed, I kept reminding myself. Our fates rested in my hands for the night. We could be miserable, or I have seen to everything. I need to see everything if we are to be able to climb higher. If I can orchestrate this parley tonight, we can do it next month. Month after month we will march into the twigs and lay our stakes where we see fit. Pitch our screw right up in the maw of Fuggs Falls, faster and lighter as the seasons pass. And we are one month into fall.

I pulled to a stop and the only light was our headlight. I left the car running. I would keep it running until we either asleep or in the tent. The battery would not tolerate draining at all. Tami was already asleep. I said my good-byes and stepped into the night. It was about 39 degrees, with a mild wind from the West. I hefted my pack and lugged the climbing rig just past where the headlights reached. There I found our prior tent site, recognizing it by the small boulder I used to anchor one side. For the first time I became intensely aware of each of my actions.

First I dropped dropped the two packs about two feed apart. Out of my main pouch I removed the tent bag. From that I got out the foot-print of the tent, a nylon fabric 7 feet long and four feet across at the widest. I got out the stakes and tried one. No way. There was a 'biner on the outside of each pack, and I clipped two corners of the tent and foot-print to the two relatively stable packs, and kicked tension into them. The tent unfurled and fluttered away from me. Next from the tent bag I took out two red poles, and laid down crossing beams on the tent. I passed the ferrule of the poles to the grommets of the tent. I scurried around the the tent and passed the two beams through a centrally located ring, and secured the other ends of the cross beams to the front corners of the tent. There was the U-shaped pole to go. A yellow one. It hoists the front of the door and vestibule, securing it proudly off the arc of the beams. There is tension between the yellow and red poles, tension that makes it strong; its a five-season tent.

I grasped the tense mid-line if the tent, right up in the snout of the door, and clipped it to the apex of the vestibule and for the first time there was tension in the structure. Then I clipped the other side, and then clipped all the poles down, suspending the tent in the sinister grip of the bars. Next I removed the packs from the back, and secured them to the front corners. I took out the mat from my lower, smaller zippered pouch. I inflated it. I pulled the 15 degree bag out of the main pouch, and laid it out. Then I went back to the car.

Tami and I chatted a bit and ate some bit then just rested, appreciating the warmth and security of the heater. Soon enough I asked Tami if she wanted to sleep in the tent and she said, "nnnnnnn." So I dash-ed off to prepare for a tuck in. Soon enough, she climbs out of the truck with only winter house slippers on. I hurry back to assist and she makes it to the tent. I inflate her bag and spread out her bag and help her in, find her pillow and as I am zippering her up she says to me, "If this isn't co-dependency, I don't know what is."

"It's not co-dependency, I coo back, and she is asleep.

The next thing I am aware of, except for the feeling like I turned fifty times in the night and slept only briefly in between, is Tami cooking breakfast. She has been up for three hours, and has let me sleep till now. She makes scrambled eggs, coffee, and a cider-tea combination that we decide we will never make again. She is Jane on the spot and we break camp as fast as we ever have, and head to Feathers. She she carries her pack the 30 yards up the path in her house shoes.

Once at the base of Mandatory Suicide, we fall into our usual regimen: she puts on her harness and climbing shoes and I put on my harness and prepare the rope. The first bolt is twenty feet high. She starts up, but only makes it four moves. "The cold made me focus on the space below me and that attracted my attention to other things and that make the cold come in," she explains later. Kinda circular on it's self, but par for our course, often as not. Tami comes down. Then I lead the route and Tami cleans me and rappels down. I ask her to tie a figure-of-8 in the twin ropes so that they would be ready clip into next time. She twisted her torso and manipulated her arms just so and came up with an eleven and a half. Her knot is triangular [picture, her phone-camera]. Remarkable.