I thought it was clever, the title, because we saw humpback
whales last week from our amazing campsite on the beach in Olympic National
Park. We got the campsite by accident, possibly because it was the very last
one and I had inadvertently reserved our actual
campsite on a random date in August.
Later, we meandered our way through the Hoh Rainforest;
Braeden was shocked at the Hoh river, which he says is amazing because “it
dries up so much faster [from my hands] than other rivers, like in a minute
instead of an hour!” I decided that self-correction on the physics of this
fallacy is something that he can address someday as a young adult, and just
went with it.
The next day, we saw no such luck as the beach campsite.
Instead, we drove into the middle of nowhere trying to find an off-the-beaten
track campground that the locals use. We found it, along with two bear
sightings within skin-crawling distance of our site. I was a good Boy Scout and
snobbishly expounded my wisdom to my family while hanging up our garbage in a
nearby tree (on the trunk, hooked to a piece of bark, within my reach….I’m not
perfect).
Then we drove 9,000 miles through Washington state until we
got back to the good part of the country, where we then drove another 9,000 miles
through traffic crawling at 25mph because every festival for the last 10 years
happened to be scheduled on THAT DAY in every coastal town in Oregon. But we
went swimming at the beach, which was fun except my feet hurt so gosh-awful
after about three seconds in the water, which is only in liquid form because
the freezing point has been lowered by the salt content. But I caught a bunch
of sand crabs during those 3-second intervals.
We got home and went to work the next day (okay, it was
actually church) and then tried to create diabetic comas for ourselves by lying
around and eating junk food until it was time to pack again for our sojourn to
The East. I decided that camping was again in order, so I crammed everything we
needed into our car and then attached a large bin to the hitch carrier.
Fast-forward to our trail to Reno, Nevada where the
landscape gradually transformed from beautiful to tolerable to the Pits of
Despair. You guys, even the lakes looked
like sand! Our campsite was located in
the craggy cliffs of a rock formation right in the center of said Pits of
Despair, where every single jackrabbit alive has relatives and mountain goats
think that they are so gentrified they pay taxes. The nearest town was 10 miles
away, strategically located within easy sniffing distance of the largest
landfill imaginable (I feel like, out of literally thousands of acres of empty
land, this was poor planning of population placement). Once inside our 1-minute popup tent, Emerson proceeded to tell us
several stories about 5 people who bore remarkable resemblance to us, which stories all ended with the
characters getting eaten by bears or attacked by a scary man with a hook who
was “right outside the tent!” Stephanie and I were officially scared out of our
wits by the end of it, even though he’s only 5 years old and his tales are
nothing if not predictable.
The next day, we didn’t die from dehydration because (being
the Boy Scout that I am, once again) I had brought a gallon of water; Stephanie
said I was smart because of it, so I rode that high for as long as possible
while we drove through Death Valley. We arrived to Last Vegas, the crispiest
section of terrain in the United States. We discovered the Hoover Dam, next to
the first national park ever founded (#whyhere)
and found our hotel. It was 116 degrees outside and I was questioning
Humanity’s reasoning of attempting to survive somewhere that looked like it had
been inside of a giant broiler, but my questions were answered once I realized
that Humanity needed a place where strippers could walk around mostly naked all
of the time and not get cold.
I learned a few things: in Vegas, if she looks like an
exotic princess, she’s probably an escort. Also, if she looks like an escort
she’s probably an escort. Also, Stephanie does not like escorts, nor does she
like people who forget to wear pants and shirts out in public (I’m still on the
fence about that one). Stephanie, I’m kidding! Also, M&M’s can be sold
by the pound at more than the price of fancy fudge in Bandon. Also, it’s too
hot and Humanity is a moron for setting up a giant city here.
Regardless, we finally found an economically priced buffet,
which was delicious until two hours later when three of us started having
diarrhea and nausea and vomiting. I’ll tell you, nothing beats the excitement
of having your kids and wife throwing up all night right before you are
supposed to board a plane to cross the country; Emerson threw up twice while we
were standing in line to check our baggage (with me loudly proclaiming to Stephanie
“I wonder when he’ll get over that bad chicken he had last night!” for the
benefit of understandably-apprehensive bystanders) and then had diarrhea in his
pants before we got to our gate, 1 hour and 45 minutes after arriving. Also, I
accidentally attempted to get a tiny keychain pocketknife through security, but
their damn machines caught it and it got confiscated. At least I didn’t get confiscated, though, so in
the end we won out.
Now, I’m on a plane and nobody is throwing up and Eliana is
asleep and Stephanie keeps going back to the restrooms but she looks like she’s
still a few hours out from kicking the bucket. Let’s wax poetic:
Some trips are doomed
to be sickly and sorry,
Others are built off
of somebody’s folly.
But all of the
memories, the ones that don’t fade,
Are usually ‘cause of
adventures we made.
Emerson’s looking a
little bit green,
Eliana is yelling and
causing a scene.
Braeden is glued to the window so far,
And Stephanie’s been
feeling the plague from the start.
I’m on my laptop,
typing this rhyme
So that someday we’ll
remember this time.
Actually, this trip reminds me of the last time we all had the stomach bug. It happened to be four of the
five of us, feverishly throwing up our immortal souls during a 9-hour drive
through blizzarding conditions last Christmas. I’m beginning to think we have a
spot of bad luck with these things….
