Travels with The Rayman

I am here to report that we did not slither in yesterday afternoon when we returned home from our summer sojourn.  No siree.  No sneaking up on the neighbors here.

Let me back up.  Our last day of summer travel was done in blistering heat.  The drive consisted of leaving at 9 a.m. from Loomis, CA and driving south on 80 to highway 5.  We stopped at Kettleman City, barged into In ’n Out Burgers but did not stay because the line was way too long and we (read me) were too anxious to escape the heat and get home.  So, Rayman peeled bananas and we washed those down with macrons.  Such was our lunch.  It was thus my turn to drive.

Observation.  CA is parched.  I know this is not new news but highway 5 terrain is sad and brown and cracked.  And traffic was heavy.  Where are these people going?  Doesn’t anyone stay home anymore?  We badly need a high speed rail system.  Getting these people out of their cars and onto a speeding train would help so much.  I’m a huge fan of the project and I hope it gets done while I’m still alive!!!

Second observation.  The interior is hot.  The interior valley, the interior of the coach.  My interior.  On this trip I decided to take myself off my hormone patch.  Think I should have waited until winter.  OMG.  Hot on hot.

But I digress.  As the driver, I announced that I was willing to drive 41 between Atascadero and our house because it was the shortest route.  Rayman was wary.  He didn’t want to drive it.  So, I drove it after we disengaged the Fit.  OMG.  Our favorite avocado orchard was cut down during our long summer trip.  Lack of water.  Folks, this is getting serious.   And my skill as a driver of The Dog House knows no bounds.  I am a female Ralph Cramden.

Anyway, we arrived home and I scraped the bottom of the RV on the road as I made my turn onto Sierra Court.  Sunday is the day to put out the garbage cans and the annual “we’ll pick up all your extra junk” drive was scheduled for today (Monday) so black bags of junk littered the street and I managed to run over June’s junk as I made a u-turn on the street.  Then I managed to scrap the dog house on the tree by our mailbox as I parked it.  Between the heat and the long day and my carelessness, Rayman lost his wits and came darting out into the street saying something to the effect like, “What the hell are you doing?  Why didn’t you back up when you hit the tree?  Now the coach is scratched.  Jesus, Dianna.”  Or something along those lines.  So, by this time, everyone in the neighborhood knew we were home.  And then I confessed that I drove over some of June’s bags and that sent him to orbit.  “What the heck are you doing?”  etc. etc. etc.  The reason why he was so beside himself is that he knew he would be the one to clean it up.  He could only find one big bag and I had decimated three.  OMG.  So, I suggested we put her other two torn up bags in our garbage can which was largely empty.  That worked.  Thankfully, I might add.  While he was dealing with the garbage, I tried to get into the house.  It was locked.  I forgot the code on the garage door.  It took time to find my keys.  By the time I made it into the house, the junk was in the garbage can and things were “cooling off” if you get my meaning.

I, of course, was defenseless.  I had no idea what the answers were to his piercing questions.  I was just as baffled as he.  Only quieter.  You could describe it as sheepishly quiet.  Until I suggested that “well, I didn’t do it on purpose.”.  That was my defense.  And I rested my case.

So, we unpacked the refrigerator, brought in the meds and called it enough for the day.  Then we drove to Taco Temple and had the best meal…fresh king salmon tacos.  And chardonnay.  Then we came back home, took showers, and spent about an hour trying to reinstate our Premier DirecTV service and then trying to remember how to work the TV so that we could watch Breaking Bad, the first episode of season 4 aptly entitled Box Cutter.  Oh, how I have missed Walter White and Jessie.  Did I mention, it was particularly gruesome.  But I loved it.

Observation three.  Life is fine without TV.  We spent the entire summer without it.  The Dog House has two TVs but they are puny and most parks don’t have good channels and so we just forsook (is that a word?) TV and played Scrabble and read in the evenings.  Enchanting.  Unless scrabble involved a squabble, say, around “Is ha really a word?”  On the reading front, I dove into The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.  OMG.  With Kindle, you have no idea many pages a book is so I can’t tell you but I can tell you I started it Oregon and I’m still reading it.  I am now at the part where Japan has attacked Pearl Harbor.  And Hitler has just lost over a million men in Russia, primarily.  He is now regrouping.  And shoring up some help from Mussolini who is completely ineffectual as a leader, really.  And there is a plot afoot to get rid of Hitler by some of the generals but we all know how that ends.  In fact, we all know how it all ends but it is a fabulous book.  I have learned so much.  Hitler just rolled over many countries without firing a bullet.  And he declared war on the U.S. on Dec. 9, 1941.  Big mistake.  As was invading Russia…while he had a pact with them.

But, I digress.

So, here we are in the fog and it is lovely.  The dog has started his scratching again (what is he allergic to here?).  The house looks fabulous and BIG.   I am thrilled to be home and cool.

OH, I forgot to mention that…oh, forgetaboutit.

A trying day.  A day trying to get things done.  A very trying day.  But was it, really?

So, we need to leave our campsite in Camp Champoeg, OR.  A lovely spot.  With full grown trees throwing shade our way.  It didn’t have sewer, but, hey, you can’t have everything.  So, we unhooked and drove out at 7 a.m., undoubtedly disturbing those who slept in adjacent campsites.  And then we drove north to Vancouver, WA to deliver TDH to Power Windows.  These are the people that are replacing our windows-gone-on-bad.  And there we left TDH and drove further north to Mt. St. Helens.

What could go wrong?

A panorama of Mt. St. Helens with my family.

Well.  Rayman input Mt. St. Helens in the phone and it tells him to proceed on a two lane road.  So, that is what he did.  And wandered and wandered and wandered and then came upon a building labeled Mt. St. Helens.  We bounded into the building and I said, “We’re here!”  And a woman who was on her knees said, “Welcome.”.  And that is when we found out that since we had followed our GPS, we had arrived at the wrong entrance for viewing the Mountain.  OMG.  Really.  Now.  Get this.  When we left Vancouver, WA they guy told Rayman it was a 2 hour trip one way.  And so the lady we ended up meeting informed us that Mt. St. Helens was 2 hours away.  We had already been on the road 1 hour.  

No one was happy.

Now, if this wasn’t problem enough, I tried to use Rayman’s iPad.  It didn’t work and we had been having problems with it so I told him that since we were stuck in the car, I would call Verizon and work on the problem.   So, after being on hold the call was dropped.  We were in the mountains.  At this point I waited until we got on the Interstate and called back.  The problem was so complicated that Rush, the Verizon dude I was working with who had me powering off and powering on the iPad, changing settings etc, told me that it was the most unusual problem he had ever worked on.  That pretty much says it all.

Flip to a parking lot off the freeway situated in front of a Mexican restaurant.  There we were.  I was still on the phone with Verizon.  (For an hour. with Rush).  And Rayman decided that his tooth site where his wisdom tooth resided a couple of months ago…yes, that site was really bugging him.  He was agitated by it.  After discussion which ensued as I spent on time on hold with Verizon…it was determined that he should, right at that time, call his dentist.  In SLO.  So, he is standing in the parking lot talking to the dentist’s office and I’m slumped over in the front seat of car on my phone with Verizon.   What a couple.  Really.  Are you kidding me?

But I digress.

We decide to buy peanut M&Ms, hit the head, and fill up the Fit.  Then I take over all the wheel.  We reached another building touting Mt. St. Helens and we ducked in.  This place had a movie about the volcano and it was really good.  And an exhibit.  I went one direction and Rayman the other while viewing the exhibit and then I lost him.  When I found him, there he was on his phone.  Bad news was flowing over the air ways.  Seems there was a problem with the window installation.  The glass was ordered with the wrong tint on 2 of the 4 windows.  So…we would either being sleeping in the parking lot tonight or not.  It was complicated.  Well, hysteria ensued.  By me.  I thought this and I thought that and I huffed and puffed.  Then Rayman got worked up and as he popped a peanut M&M into his mouth he took in a breath and the two didn’t mix.  I pulled over as he gasped and carried on.  I saw him pointing to the water thermos and gave it to him and he took a sip.  Completely fixed the problem.  By this time, I was shaking.  He scared the you know what out of me.  I thought he was going to expire right then and there.

Then we proceed up the road.  

Stopped.  Took pictures.  Enjoyed the view.  Decided we better hurry back as the window place closed at 4.  I was still beside myself about the windows.  But finally, I came to my senses.  And released on the whole thing.  I poohed it.  

Interspersed with all this, the dental problem loomed.  At long last Rayman got a call.  He has an appt. tomorrow.  In Portland.  He was much relieved.  

So, here is what happened to the windows.  The guy at Power Windows in WA ordered the wrong the tint.  So, they cut new windows and took the windows to the tint place in OR and the tint place furnace was down.  So, they waited for it to repaired.  After the furnace was repaired,  the WA windows were put thru the furnace.  That cracked the windows.  The OR people then made new windows.  And they sent those through the furnace.  They cracked(the windows).  So, the place they had taken our windows to tint them,  apparently has the ability to cut their own windows and they are located in Oregon.  So, the guy in WA negotiated that the tint place in OR to cut the glass for the WA people in the right tint.  (So, why didn’t we just go to the people in OR?)  And they proceeded to do that but the thing is…our tint is a light gray.  The guys in OR used the dark gray.  OMG.  Really.  So, the WA place asks the OR tint place to redo it.  The OR tint place is out of light gray.  Really, folks, I am not making this up.  So, the OR tint people order the light gray tint, but it is delivered too late in the day to apply and then get it back to WA .  It must be cured, this tint.  And it has to cured before it is installed, so they need us to bring TDH back tomorrow.  So, the question then becomes, and just why did it take 10 days for the manufacturing of our windows?  Questions abound.

However.  I now sit in the comfort of TDH, a gin and tonic under my belt along with red wine that I washed down my leftover barbecued skirt stead sandwich tonight.  Two of our 4 windows look great.  But I need to cut this short because we have to get up at the crack of dawn to drive TDH back to Vancouver, WA from our current location, Troutdale.  And then Beau has a scheduled grooming at 11.  And so do I.  Different salons, of course.  And Rayman has to face the dental chair at noon.  

And then at 5 we meet our WA bicycle friends for dinner in downtown Portland.   (an aside:  That is when I will confess to them that while riding my bike yesterday, I hit the break and the bike stopped but I didn’t.  I think I was simultaneously trying stop myself with my foot.  Well, this caused my pubic bone to continue it’s forward trajectory at the same time the bike came to a sudden halt and it hit the front of the bike at a speed that caused more than a slight amount of discomfort.  End of aside)  

Oh, but that is after we pick up TDH in WA and return it to Troutdale, hook it up the water, electricity, sewer only to spend the night and then head out on Friday toward home.  Thus ends our summer trip in the northwest.  We will weave out way back home via Redmond, Medford, Lassen, Clio, Loomis and then Morro Bay on Sept 7 or 8.  

Mt. St, Helens was wonderful despite all the travails.  And the Verizon problem is fixed(I was on the phone with them for more than an hour.  Had to turn the car on to the charge the phone so that I didn’t drop the call when rounding a bend).  Two of the windows look great.  And the Rayman isn’t worried about his hole in his head anymore.  That’s because I have taken over the worrying about the hole in his head,,,but in a different way!!  Also, he didn’t choke to death on the side of the road.  That was good.   I think the only guy that had a worse day than Rayman was the guy at Power Windows.  And tomorrow may not be any better for him.  I have some questions…for future reference. 

This is an experiment.  I have downloaded a tune that, if you click on the arrow above, you can listen to as you read today’s tale.  Good luck.

At approximately 6:30 a.m. this morning I catapulted from bed upon hearing a strange noise outside.  “Is that the sound you heard yesterday.”, I asked.  “Yes.”, he replied.  So I dashed to the front of TDH and looked out the window.  OMG.  There it was.  A giant balloon in the sky.  The camera was procured and a few shots were snapped.  Then, when I turned around, I witnessed many hot air balloons floating around.  What a great way to wake up.  Such a surprise.

The next thing I did of any import at all, is I decided to do the laundry.  Laundry figures in our travels, doesn’t it?  And when you do laundry when on the road, you get the experience of never, ever seeing or using the same type of washing machine.  SpeedQueen, Maytag, ABT and other commercial machines are readily available at all the RV campgrounds we have frequented.  Prices differ as well.  As a general rule, the more expensive the RV park, the higher the fees to wash and dry.  And you must have quarters except for one place that had metal plugs we purchased at the lobby.  And the sizes of the loads are all different.  Some barely as big as my home washer and some that can handle three loads.  It is, in a word, inconsistent.  

So, this a.m. I headed to the laundry room to do the laundry and the first thing I did was throw all the light clothes  into the machine, a Tide gel thingee (techie term for a new fangled product that is essentially a liquid gel tab), and $1.75 in quarters.  Then I pressed whites.  And hot water started flowing.  OMG.  I didn’t want hot.  Things could shrink.  I was beside myself.  Pressing the buttons on the front of the machine was not registering with the machine itself.  OMG.  Things will shrink.  So, I turned off the hot water.  Well, sounds started emanating from the machine.  I tried to open it.  It was a front loader.  It would not open.  And the sound continued so I unplugged it figuring it would then reset the machine.  Well, the machine stopped howling.  But it still would not open.  About that time, Rayman came sauntering in.  I explained my dilemma and he went to the front desk of the office.  Returning, he said there was a young woman behind the desk who didn’t have a clue what to do.  After “discussing” the problem, I charged up to the office and told the young lady that we needed the washer to release our clothes and so she volunteered to call the maintenance man.  Okay.  I returned to the laundry room and waited with the Rayman who was “bemoaning” the situation.

The maintenance man entered, stage right.  He said, “Well, once the machine starts, nothing can be reversed and you certainly can’t open it.”  Dejected, I reached down on the pulled the door and it opened!!  OMG.  So, all three of us powwowed about the best plan of attack and it was decided that certainly the machine must have timed out (unbeknownst to the maint. man that this machine could do it) and, therefore, it could restarted and new cycle could be selected.  So, he plugged it in and it continued the old cycle.  OMG.  It could not be dissuaded from it’s program.  No way.  No how.  With speed and gusto, I pulled the plug from the wall.  We conferred.  I decided to call the number on the machine which I did and the woman on the phone stated that once started, the machine could not be stopped and opened.  At this point, it was my obligation to inform her that, yes, they could.  She had no answers or any further information but she suggested that maybe, maybe, it would reset itself in 20 minutes.  So, I decided I would wait 20 minutes.

While waiting the 20 minutes, a lady from the RV resort who cleans the bathrooms, laundry room etc., came in.  She couldn’t believe the machine opened when unplugged.  “But, don’t worry,  Most things shrink in the dryer.”   Then the maintenance man came after she left.  It was a venerable conference we were having there, in that laundry room.   And nobody had ever had this happen before.  Not me.  Not the maintenance man, not the woman.  Who knew?

But I digress.

So, my backup plan was to just let the machine have it’s way with my clothes.  It was holding that laundry hostage and was not going to release it until it “did it’s thing”.   But while I was still waiting, I decided to unplug it one more time (since 20 had elapsed) and give it one more chance.  So.  I waited.  And waited.  While waiting, Rayman vacuumed TDH, when to the dry cleaners to pick up my pants that I had soiled while sitting on pine-pitch ladened tree stumps and benches.  He returned.  And I was still there.

Finally.  I succumbed to the problem of my own making.  I let the washer have it’s way with me.  I turned on the hot water, plugged the machine back in and retreated to TDH to wait and see what damage all that hot water would do to my clothes.

p.s.  the maintenance man managed to point out to me on two occasions that the directions were posted on the top of the machine (insinuating that I had not looked).  Well, I looked.  Just didn’t see it.  A flair for the obvious that man.  And the “I can’t believe I’m that stupid” award for me.  I did suggest that the machine was a terribly designed machine.  It could not be stopped, it could not be changed.  And once stopped, it would not allow for any deviation.  A man must have his imprimatur all over that design.  No woman in her right mind would design or buy, for that matter, a machine so wanting in attributes.  Just sayin’.

OH, well.  Tomorrow morning the maintenance man promised that there would be more hot air balloons floating by.  They do it every year on this particular weekend.  I plan to observe it all in my clean, hanger dried t-shirt that didn’t shrink!!!

Yesterday we decided that we needed to take a hike…literally.  So off we went, parked the car at a trailhead and bounced down the trail which wasn’t anything special.  However, we were using our legs and so we followed our noses which lead us to a big field with giant utility poles that marched across the landscape like aliens.  We then entered a trail that became “treed”…that is we found ourselves amongst trees and were warned to stay on the path because the state was trying to re-tree the area.  Seems there was a dam that had been removed (there is quite a lot of that happening, I’ve heard).  And so the area affected was being “revegetated”.  And that is a great idea, I suppose.

So, as we marched along, the trail became narrow and then narrower still until we finally came upon a “bridge” that took us to a round structure.  On each of the individual boards, there were names of species inscribed in the wood.  With dates.  And when we looked at the data, it was discovered that the species were ones that Lewis described and listed in his journal.  Therefore, Lewis and Clark had actually been at that spot on the edge of the Sandy River.  They named the Sandy River the Quicksand River but that name did not endure because Lewis dragged his feet in securing an editor and Jefferson had many of Lewis’s specimens and papers sent by boat  across the Chesapeake and the darn boat ran aground and all the Lewis treasures were lost.  Ironic that he, Lewis, could get the specimens and journals back to Jefferson from the west coast, but they could not make it across a bay.  Are you kidding me?

The reason I am such a font of knowledge is because I read the book “Undaunted Courage”.  By Stephen Ambrose.  A must-read if you have any interest in the first trip by Americans from the East to the West coast.  It was quite the trip.  In this day and age when we hardly leave the house without a GPS, this group of men and Sacagewea (the only woman, the only Indian on the trip who joined the Voyage of Discovery ((when she was pregnant)) and she was with her husband, a french fellow who was needed for his experience in that neck of the woods and it turns out she was needed because she could speak the language of her tribe and she gave birth on that trip and made it all the way and back with her son) canoed, portaged and walked, rode horses in an effort to find out if there was a transcontinental waterway.  And this was done in the first decade of the 1800s.  It took about 3 1/2 years.  They stood where we stood in 1805.  Yikes.  Sends shivers down the spine.

So that hike was a winner.  We just fell into it.  

And let me tell you about Beau.  He ran headlong into a goldendoodle.  She was lovely.  And her mistress was a young woman who ran like the wind.  So we followed them down to the shore of the Sandy River.  OMG.  Beau and Goldie (just made that name and the sex up), frolicked in the muddy river.  There were sandy stretches between shallow water and they had quite a time.  So, an historic hike.

View from the trail to the top.

Now today, we decided to bike ride.  However, we overslept and so decided perhaps a hike would be better followed by a Voodoo Donut.  So, I found a hike and judging from the picture in the book, it looked to be right on Highway 84.  Only it wasn’t.  Rayman was riding shotgun and he couldn’t find it on his phone or ipad.  So, we finally got off the freeway and I looked it up.  Yep.  We overshot the Horsetail Falls by about 15 miles.  And then on our way back, we stopped at a day use area and the woman told us to go east on 84 and get off at exit 28.  Finally, we found the falls along with about 500,000 other day trippers that were cruising the road looking for a parking spot.  Really, people.  What were we thinking?  It was Saturday and every woman without a tan was spotted walking to the trail we planned to climb.  I have never seen so many white, white legs.  These people do not get out much.  In the sunlight.

Horsetail Falls…the lower one.

But I digress.

The hike was described in the brochure as an easy hike.  My ass.  At least at the beginning.  We rose from the road to the top of the fall on a series to switchbacks that were steeper than a staircase.  We got to the top and reached the Upper Horsetail Fall.  Very pretty.  Except for the part of the trail where someone had just barfed.  

As Yogi Berra said, “If you find a fork in the road, take it.”  So, we could have returned from whence we came but decided to keep hiking.  We went up.  We went down.  We went round and round.  Rayman almost slipped off the side of the mountain twice.  Really.  It is quite remarkable that the state of OR has not installed railings.  There were some places that dropped off…immediately.  We came upon a marker memorializing a 14 year old boy that had died when he fell over the cliff.  The same cliff we were on.  Holy mackerel.  I’m serious about this.  Install some railings.  

Anyway, we kept passing people and it made us nervous when we were on the outside cliff side.  All they had to do was push suddenly and we’d be personas non gratas.  So, at one point when I thought I was about at the end of my rope with all this huffing and puffing, a couple came by and I asked them, “Do you know where we are going?”  They took the time to tell us that we were headed in the right direction.  So, I said, “We’ve been up here for 3 days and haven’t been able to get off the mountain.”  Of course, this was in jest.  The man got a startled look on his face.  I got him!!  So then I had to tell him I as kidding.  He looked annoyingly relieved.  We laughed once out of earshot.

Picture of the Upper Horsetail Fall.  See all those little people?  Quite fun.  A projectile fall.

Once we did get off the mountain, we headed back to TDH because I had to change my pants because I sat on a stump and got more pine pitch on my pants.  Second pair.  First pair ruined.  This pair probably ruined.  We then headed out to downtown Portland for a donut from Voodoo Doughnuts.  World famous.  Their donuts are fabulous and names even better.  Balls and Cock was the name of one donut.  No, I am not making this up.  I report.  You decide.  I ordered a bacon maple bar.  Yes.  A maple bar with two strips of bacon on top.  Come on.  I earned it.  Rayman whoosied out and got some mamby pamby lemon concoction.  It was good but not as decedent as mine!!  Then we went to Chicos and I bought two items to replace my pine pitched items.  Then we got lost looking for Whole Foods downtown and almost ended up at the Portland Zoo.  And then we retraced our steps and found the Whole Foods, purchased stuff for dinner and returned to TDH.

One tier of the donut display.

The bacon maple bar!!

Quite a day, overall.  Glad to be alive.  Really.  We could have died up there!!  Perhaps our hike was taken by Lewis and Clark too.  Except there were no paths except for what the Nez Perce Indians would have established.  I don’t know.  Stranger things have happened.  One thing is for certain.  Lewis and Clark would not have encountered people on the trail and asked them if they, the people, knew where they were going.

People, this is a rough life.  The Rayman and I sit under four lumbering juniper trees which are providing glorious shade.  Besides the beautiful flowers and the other RVs, we can see one of the Sisters mountains, adored with snow and crowned with a huge thunderhead.  What’s not to like?  It is fabulous.

Yesterday was NOT  like today at all.  Today we are preparing to embark on the northernmost location  of our trip …to Portland.  When one gets ready to leave there are a myriad of tasks to be performed.  Washing.  This time moi did the duty.  And I did not use the dryer.  Clothes were hung in the RV for drying.  Then I needed to clean the kitchen so I could make brine for the bone-in pork chops that we plan to barbecue tonight.  Oh, and then I needed to blanch the string  beans.  Why is it one thing always leads to another?   Then I cleaned out the refrigerator.  A few things past their prime needed to be discarded.  No need to truck the tired cilantro to Portland just to throw it away there, is there?  Then clothes needed to be folded and put away as they dry very quickly here.   Ah, where was the Rayman you are asking.  He went to Sisters to wash the car and then to the ice cream store where he bought huckleberry ice cream to go with the recently purchased marionberry pie.  And a shallot, a lemon, a head of garlic.  The ice cream was not on my list but sure am glad he took the initiative.

Well.  Yesterday was quite removed from these types of domestic chores.  Yesterday we broke all the age records of the day.  We were, without a doubt, the oldest living things floating down the Deschutes River which intersects the city of Bend.  What a hoot.  No pictures to post because we were afraid of getting the camera/iPhone wet.  Perhaps your imaginations will prove better for us than the real thing!  This feat was performed when we rented two inner tubes in which we inserted our derrieres into the middle of and got our fannies nice and cold.  Everything else stuck out unless we voluntarily put our hands and feet into the swirling cold water.  We of course did that too.  That is because once you put the tube in the water and then you insert yourself into the tube, it became incumbant on you to guide yourself to the place where you took the tube and yourself out of the river.  And that had to be done twice.  Let me back up.

Click on the link below for a picture.

http://tumalocreek.com/river-tubes/

We rented the tubes from a young woman with no sense of humor whatsoever.  Tall, lean, rye.  We then signed away all our rights and plunked down $30 for the two of us to float down that river.  A young man then gave us two tubes and instructed us to carry the tubes across a nearby bridge, turn right, find the beach on the other side by “those trees over there”.  From there you float under two bridges and then exit the river on the other side from whence you entered.  Then you schlepp (my verb) the tubes up to the street where a city bus picks you up and transports you to another part of the river.  The city bus collects $1.50 each for the pleasure of the ride and we had to have correct change.  Yes, they will take wet money.  Then the bus takes you to another spot to put in, as it were.  Then you slither onto the tube and float again down the river.  But, don’t, don’t go over the dam.  WHAT?  Dam?  OMG.

Well, you know that bridge we had to cross on foot while lugging our tubes?  That is directly over the dam.  So, before you get to the dam, you must disembark your tube on the opposite side of the river…again…and bring the tube back to the tube rental business.  Well, that sounded easy.

What fun we had.  We verified that we were, indeed, the oldest people on the river and on the bus.  Except the bus driver.  He gave us a run for our money in the age department.  But we didn’t care.  We were thrilled to be there.  That is when I got the bright idea to spring the ambulatory people from the local rest homes/assisted living centers and bring them on down to the river.  I think they would enjoy the ride.  Assistance would definitely be required.  Heck, we could you have used some assistance!!

It was gentle.  Slow.  The only excitement was wrestling the tube at the start and end of the ride.   Rayman was a bit concerned (read really, really nervous) about missing the place to exit the river so he splashed feverishly when we approached the exits.  If you missed the exit, I’m not sure what would happen.  Perhaps if you could extricate yourself from the hole in the tube, you would find the river to be about 2 feet deep.  I don’t know.  All I know is that extricating yourself from the tube was a hoot.  Legs splayed.   Weight “rearranged”.  Crawling.  And many other methods of extrication were engaged.  The kids sprang forth from the tubes.  We lumbered.    Just like the rest of life at this point.

So glad we did it.  It was a blast.  And then we celebrated with  ice cream cones.

I’m missing my writing so I’m writing to satisfy myself.  It’s not that I have a lot to say.  Just saying.

The great northwest continues it’s rush to break all heat records, I’m pretty sure.  Oh, I know.  We said we didn’t want to suffer through a foggy summer.  By that I think we meant, let’s mosey north where it is a bit warmer and a lot sunnier.  Not, let’s mosey north and roast our assess off.  That was not part of the thinking of either the Rayman, me or Beau (whom I speak for).  But, alas, here we are and what are we doing here?

The other morning the Rayman woke me up because he wanted to strip the sheets off the bed because he wanted to wash them.  I’m blessed.  However, I was asleep.  And he reminded me of my grandmother who used to wake me up every Saturday morning.  She declared Saturday to be laundry day.  But her laundry day was much different for her.  She did not own a washing machine.  Actually, we don’t have a washing machine in TDH, but everywhere we stay has washing machines and dryers for a price.  And the price swings are radical.  $1.00 to $2.00 a load for washing.  And .75 cents to $1.50 for dryers.

But I digress.

My grandmother would load the dirty clothes into the car and my grandfather or mother or, later, I would drive her down to Mr. Alexander’s.  He owned a laundromat on Pine St. in Paso.  It was a big high ceilinged place filled with Maytag wringer washer machines.  There were a few cement “canals” that ran through the building that were used for dumping the dirty water from the machines and the tubs.  She would have the washer filled and a big wash tub (like the kind we put in garages) filled with rinse water.  And after the clothes got churned up real good, the process of wringing and rinsing commenced.  And I was forced to participate.  OMG.  It was hot (read no air conditioning) and humid (read from all the hot water steaming) in the summer.  Winter was much kinder on the washer women of Paso.  It took hours.  And then we would gather up the clothes, pack them into wicker baskets and return home to hang them out on the clothes line in back that had not a bit of shade.   It was hard on me…I cannot even imagine how hard it was for my grandmother.  She was a tough ole bird…and her name was Birdie!!  And the kicker is, she did this until I graduated from high school in 1963.  She didn’t need to make it so hard on herself.  The neighbors had a washer and dryer in their HOUSE.  Not grandma.  In reality, it probably felt like luxury to go to Mr. Alexander’s laundromat.  We have to remember that when my grandmother married, my grandfather took her out to “the ranch” where she had a wood stove and an outhouse.  How did she do the laundry then?  Probably by hand.  There was no running water in a stream with rocks that she could beat the clothes with (dangling participle).   She had to prime the pump.  Laundry was much harder.

But I digress.

Well, so, Rayman didn’t have to do the laundry that way.  Except that on this trip we have used a clothes rack for drying things.  It takes about 20 minutes in this heat.  And hangers for shirts/blouses that, if hung, dry equally as fast and with few wrinkles.     Still, what woman wouldn’t want the problem that I have?  A husband or significant other that is willing to do laundry without asking.  I am counting my blessings.

When the Rayman returned from the “laundry room”, he opened the door to the next door neighbor’s RV.  Espying the man on the couch, he said, “Oh, I am so sorry.”  The man on the coach retorted, “Wrong coach.”  Luckily he did not have a gun at his side for he might have “stood his ground”.  “An innocent mistake takes life of local man” would be the headline in The Tribune.  We were lucky we weren’t in Floridah.   

So.  Where was I?

The other day we went to a play in Ashland called “The Great Society” and it was a play about LBJ.  At intermission, Rayman walked into the ladies restroom.  When he scurried out, he was red as a beet.  These type of incidents are new to his repertoire.  And twice in one week.  Should I be worried?  I wonder.  Should he be worried?  Most definitely.

This just in.  I beat Rayman at golf the other day.  Gross.  To be fair, it was a par 58 course and most of my yardages were 100 yards to 140 yards with an occasional 250 thrown in for good measure.  It was the most fun I have ever had playing golf because the course was a full 18 holes that only took 2 1/2 hours to play and I had 11 pars.  I have never had 11 pars anywhere, anytime.  My thinking leads me to the conclusion that golf courses of the future should be like this one.  Short and sweet with ample trouble that punishes an errant shot but rewards a person for accuracy and good putting.  And it didn’t take all day.  Really, people.  Pros can have the long courses.  For just plain old fun, shorter is better.

Today we took a ride to see the sights nearby.  We visited a fishery, the headwaters of a river, and a high hill.  Here are some pictures.

Beau regarding the trout

The Metolius River

La Familia y rio Metolius

La femme et Bend, OR et montagne Sisters.

A fisherperson’s dream. Trout at the fishery.

So…our new friends, the Chambers, whom live in Redmond just north of Bend, invited to dinner last evening.  And they watched Beau for us when we played golf.  These guys are great.  We met them in Graeagle/Plumas Pines.  So glad we did.  He barbecued beef blade cut ribs.  OMG.  They were so flavorful.  And she made a zucchini baked affair and scalloped potatoes.  Yummy.  When discussing food we ventured onto Mexican food and they told us about a place in Redmond where, when you order guacamole, the waiter makes it at your table.  Sort of like they used to do in fine restaurants for Caesar salad.  Well.  One the lead to the next…and now we plan to go with them to Diego’s tomorrow night.  Brice reports that they don’t do regular Mexican food.  Perfect.  Since I tried beef cheek tacos the other night at La Tapatia (see previous blog), I am hoping for tongue this outing.  Or goat.  I’m ready to broaden my horizons in the eating department.  Ole.

And here’s the latest epiphany.  Rayman loves this life of RVing.  He is more relaxed than I have ever seen him.  Perhaps it is because we don’t watch TV.  And we visit places that we would not visit if we were staying in a motel.  And there is a lot less work than at home.  Just saying.  This whole thing is a revelation.  Now we both understand the lure of the RV phenom.  We are surprised and delighted.  And we’ll see you in September!!