Extremes

My overnight stops, parking areas, campsites—61 places in 87 days—have varied considerably in amenities, aesthetics, and cost. Quite a few have been free (thank you for our public lands!), the most expensive was $63 and not worth it, but most have been between $25 and $35. At some point, and don’t tell me I have too much time on my hands, I calculated that anything less than $35/night and I would be coming out ahead of my mortgage. Price aside, the best ones have actually been on public lands, especially city and county parks. Not only are they cheaper, they are usually close to downtown, are not used much in most areas, and are well maintained. Of course there can be drawbacks—

 

or  not

I have spent many nights on the shores of several very large lakes and in Coeur D’Alene saw the answer to a question that had popped up for me only a couple of hours earlier—yes, they do have police patrol boats; with light bars, more of a fog horn than a siren, and they use them!

I’m not sure for what reason, maybe my slowing down changed my approachability, but I have had some very nice visits with people staying in the RV parks. They range from one extreme to another, too. Last night I got to talk a lot about riding the rails with a guy that spent the 70s doing just that, and last week I was talking with a great couple from Calgary, sitting on the shore of Lake Coeur D’Alene, when we were joined—briefly—by a  wealthy, arrogant man from the coast of Oregon. I don’t think that the couple made him feel that he was welcome—could be because of his comments to them about immigration or maybe the offer to give them money to take our president. But he had been on his boat all day–obviously drinking—maybe it was too much sun.

Books. Thank you Joyce for sending some to me! I trade books at every opportunity I get, and my options range in quantity and quality, too; mostly Fern Michaels and Danielle Steel. But the other day I scored! I plan on spending 10 days or so at Death Valley in December and found on the shelf, tucked amongst romance novels, Geology Underfoot in Death Valley and Owens Valley. Just skimming through it makes me eager to get there!

And if you look at my maps you notice I make a lot of loops while going just about anywhere. A few weeks ago I actually backtracked. Passing through Newport, Washington, I saw a poster for the Kalispel tribal powwow a couple of weeks later. When I left Spokane I headed back to Usk and spent the day at the powwow. It was great! I have tried to classify it and can’t; 3 days of competition, lots of families, 400 or so dancers of all ages, very smoothly organized, hundreds of tents and makeshift campsites clustered around the large, open pavilion. And lots of food options, mostly Native American dishes—I passed on the free, roasted bison, mainly because it disappeared before I got hungry. It was the most respectful, self-composed, serene gathering of people I have ever been amongst.

Eagle Staff

Color Guard

Some of the 400 Dancers

On the dirty, messy side of camping—and geology—I spent an afternoon mining for star garnets. After several miles of the worst washboard road I have ever driven on to get to the campground, I decided that I was not going to drive the remaining 2 miles to the Forest Service mining site. Instead I walked, in upper 90-degree temperatures, with little shade, and hoped that others already at the site would give me a ride back to camp. Well, that didn’t happen, but I did go through the whole process of finding rare, star garnets.

Digging Gravel for Garnets

Then You Sift Your Buckets of Dirt/Gravel/Garnets

Finally You Sieve and Wash Looking for Your Gems

My Star Garnets!

Found about ½ ounce of garnets but couldn’t find the Persieds last night because of the smoke. 104F yesterday and supposed to be 107F today. I think I’ll go to the library in Lewiston this afternoon where I know it will be cool and smoke free.