T+44: Underserved and Overutilized

Mile 1006: LAKE KOOCANUSA RESORT, MT:  For reasons necessary and self-indulgent, Wes and I have been sampling accommodations from the high and low price points for the past few days.  Most of our experience has been unsettling, but for quite different reasons. 

After camping in the community park in Kettle Falls, we made an early morning run to the town of Colville.  Up before dawn, it was almost all downhill, and downright chilly, as we cycled as fast as we could to this supposedly bigger and better served town.  When we got there, two sights greeted our eyes. 

First was a Sprawlmart on the edge of town, almost right across the street from a massive lumber mill.  We stopped and stared at a giant machine, standing at least 100 feet high tall, on which 30 foot long pinchers moved back and forth.   The huge, claw-like pinchers, manipulated by a single operator in a cab high above the track, would reach down and lift the entire load of a lumber truck and convey it in one motion to the de-barking machine.  Logs came out, stripped of their outer skins about every second, fed by a fast moving conveyer belt.    A sign proudly proclaimed that this machine was the only one of its kind in the interior of the country.  

We have seen these types of machine on the waterfront, lifting shipping containers, but this was a much more dangerous and skilled use.  The logs were all different sizes and weights, and the operator had to determine where was the best place to grab to keep the logs together and balanced.   We could see the operator manipulate the giant claw, tenderly moving it up and down the load, testing it, then suddenly lifting the many thousands of pounds like so many pick-up sticks.  We were mesmerized and appalled by this process…thousands and thousands of trees per hour were being processed this way.

Going into town, it was just what we feared after seeing the Sprawlmart--another downtown full of empty buildings and/or second hand stores.  Clearly Colville once had a cute and productive downtown, but those days were gone.  We asked a few people for a breakfast café and received blank stares or suggestions for cafes five miles away.  We did spot a fairly unlikely looking restaurant in a disheveled former hotel.  The cook was outside, smoking a cigarette, and she called us over, when we asked if Wild Bill’s served breakfast.  “Come on in, store your bike in the front room, I’ll fix you some breakfast.”

Inside, there was a capacious dining room with plastic seats and tables.  Beyond a tattered curtain, one could see a stage and bar.  The cook/owner said it used to be night club, but it didn’t make it.  She had been the cook and then bought the dining room part of the business last year.  From the lack of customers and the lack of knowledge about café, it was clear that she was having a hard time of it.   Nevertheless, she made us an outstanding breakfast and delivered it to us herself.  She told us about her first grandchild and her hopes for the restaurant, which was her first effort at running a business.  We could see that she had known hardship in her life, but she was still in there swinging.

The ride out of Colville was tough and hot as we left the Columbia River Valley.   About 10 miles out of town, after cycling (and pushing) in the hot sun, I started to get overheated.  We had to stop and pour some of our limited water supply on my head and on my clothes to lower my body temperature.  We wound through various valleys and hills, ever climbing.  The country was populated, but there were no services of any kind along the way.  

Miles stretched on, with houses every few hundred yards, but not a small store, or local café or tavern or anything.  We stop for lunch at a Forest Service campground on the Little Pend Orielle River.  We look and look around the campground, thinking we might stay, but are put off by three factors.  The place has been over used and most of the campsites are pure dust.  When we go to use the water pump, there is a big sign: “This water is subject to contamination and must be boiled before use.”  Finally, the nicest campsites by the river are absolutely over-run with yellow jackets.  In fact, the sound of yellow jackets is the only sound we hear in this forest.   We know that these wasps are not particularly aggressive, but certainly will sting if provoked.  It is hard not to swat at them when they swirl around our eyes and ears and in and out of our food.   We boil some water for tea and to refill our rapidly decreasing stores, and decide to move on. 

Miles later, after continuing to gradually climb, we are extremely relieved to see a resort called Beaver Lodge which has camping, cabins, and a café/bar.  It is a beautiful setting, right on a small lake, with series of small cabins, and a deck overlooking the water teeming with all sort of watercraft.  We decide to stay and inquire about cabins.  As it turns out, all of the cabins are full, but we are invited to look at the campsites.   The RV portion is a mess, with lots of trailers packed in a small space, and every site containing not only a trailer and truck, but also ATV’s.  Many have several.  At one site, I count 4 ATV’s, two motorcycles, and a few bicycles.  At the far end of the tent site, we find an acceptable location.  Wes goes to get water from the standpipe.  From across the campground, a fellow yells, “I wouldn’t trust that water!”  He offers to give us some water, and engages Wes in a long conversation about the poor state of education for today’s engineers.

Down at the café, we sit on the deck, drink a beer, and have a long conversation with a couple out celebrating his 71^st birthday.  He had worked for years for Boise Cascade in Kettle Falls.  His longterm girlfriend, originally from California and wanting to return there to be with her grandchildren, has been trying to sell her house for three years.  “I just keeping lowerin’ and lowerin’ the price, hoping someone will take it.”  He says, “Ain’t nothing sellin’ up here, now that the logging business is gone.”   Service is quite slow, and we gradually realize that there is one woman doing all the public work at the resort.  She is managing the front desk and store, as well as being the waitress and bartender.   There a cook in the back, and that is it.   As we look around, and especially when I use the disgusting and nearly dysfunctional bathroom, it is clear that no one is doing much maintenance on this place.  There are piles of buckets and cardboard boxes outside the kitchen door.  No one is limiting the use of the ATV’s: there are trails everywhere, beating the poor forest floor to dust.  I cringe when I see one young father taking his four year old son on a harum-scarum ride through the camp, neither in helmets.  Wes and I crawl into our tent are about to fall asleep, when we are startled to hear the sound of high powered rifle firing multiple rounds in quick succession, very nearby.  

When we leave early the next morning, we speculate how this resort came to have such an unhealthy and anarchic vibe.  At one point, it had been a nice, beautiful place.   The woman doing her best to keep the place going was not the owner.  No one was taking care of the place or putting limits on how the land could be used and it was slowly but surely being destroyed. 

A few miles later, we reach the top of the Little Pend Orielle, and bloop over a lip to see a sign that says, “Steep Grade, Dangerous Curves next 7 miles”.  They weren’t kidding.  Down we go through hairpin turn after hairpin turn to the spot called Tiger.  There used to be a store; it’s gone.  We read the signs around the store which says there are two resorts between Tiger and the little town on Cusick, 40 miles away. 

Off we go.  It is a beautiful, flat run with the Pend Orielle River on our left.  There are lots of houses and ranches in the narrow valley, bounded by steep sided mountains.   After about 10 miles, we come to first resort.  No restaurant and the store will not open for three hours.  They let us fill our water bottles and we are back on the road.  The next resort is another 10 miles.  It is closed.  We are starting to get concerned because we only had food for one day and it is gone.  

When we finally get to the store in the tiny town of Cusick, we have gone more than 70 miles in constant habitation and seen 1 store/restaurant.  This little store does a rocking business, as can be imagined, but it seems strange that it so far between services.  The salesclerk directs us to the other side of the river for a more quiet ride into the town of Newport.  Foolishly, we did not take her advice to stay at the Pioneer Park campground outside town, but went in, only to find that accommodations were limited, to say the least.

We stay at a small motel that was state of the art in 1964, and had barely been upgraded since then.  We are unnerved by one set of tenants, busily and grimly pulling pile after pile of bedding, clothing and equipment out of their truck and putting it in their room.  Another hyped up, super skinny woman comes seeking a room.  She was aggressively berating the Polish or Russian immigrant desk clerk and demanding to see room after room.  She yells, “Why are you showing me one room, then giving me another…you’re trying to cheat me, aren’t you.”  Wes and I pull all of our equipment, bikes, BOBs and all into our room.  It makes the room very crowded, but at least it felt like they were more secure.  I don’t trust the bed and pull our own comforter out to sleep.  Wes conks out, but I am anxious and have trouble sleeping.  When we leave the next morning, we pass a former motel that has become a tweakerville.  I think our motel was on its way to that status. 

The ride to Sandpoint is beautiful and fun.  When we enter outskirts, it is clear we have left the land of poor folks.  Sandpoint has amenities: big wide streets with designated and separate bike lanes.  There are enormous estates surrounding Pend Orielle Lake.  There are quaint shops, and cute little eateries.  We are thrilled to find a wonderful natural foods shop with handmade bread.  A patron directs to the county fairgrounds where there is camping.  When we get there, it is nice and clean and new.  All the lights are timers; there is recycling, the showers and rest rooms are clean and spacious.  The camp hosts warns us of upcoming rain and lightening, and tells us to camp on the group picnic pad, which has lights and power.  

We have a nice night, a good meal from the natural food store (so much better than the pre-fab food we have been finding at these little towns).  It rains all night, but we are snug and dry under the shelter.  The next morning, one of neighbors brings us coffee from Starbucks (she thought we looked cold).  It dawns on us we have not seen Starbucks in hundreds of miles.  The camp-host invites us to stay another night, warning us of more rain. 

Once again, we didn’t listen to the local, and followed our instincts, to bad effect.  When we leave, it is barely drizzling.  About eight miles out of town, it starts pouring, then pelting.  Soon we are soaked to the bone.  We find out our rain coats work well, but our shoes, pants, and side panniers are wet.  We pause for while under the elaborate gate of the Idaho Club.  There is a gatehouse, and it is open, but we are much too nervous to go in out of the rain.  We try calling the numbers on the board, but neither my or Wes’ phone work, and neither does their keypad.  We are now standing, wet and getting increasingly cold.  It is better to be moving.  The next town is called Hope.  There is a hotel there.  We will try for it.

TO BE CONTINUED…

T+39: A Tale of Towns and Passes, Part 1

Mile 865: NEWPORT, WA:  This is our last night in Washington.  After an L-shaped journey up the west side, then across the northern reaches of the state, we have learned a lot about it, but we will be glad to explore other terrains.

First of all, we had no idea that this was such a rugged state.  The incredible pass over the Cascades was a foretaste of travel to come.   We entered the Methow (Met-how) valley, where the three small towns each had a distinct personality.  We climbed a tough pass out of that valley to enter the Okanogon valley, which was rather surreal and unnerving.  Another big pass took us to a mining town perched on the side of the mountain.   A big hard pass that took all day dropped us into east Montana and the Columbia River Valley, where lumber is king.  One more climb dropped us into the Pend Orielle valley, which is remote, beautiful, and remarkably underserved.

Tonight we are in a town that is part Washington and part Idaho.  Our first impression was terrible, but has improved as we explored further.  This has been by far our longest day on the bikes.  We have cycled 63 miles, which is a testament to our increasing fitness, but mostly to the flat landscape of the Pend Orielle valley.  

As we wandered the town, had a nice dinner at a crowded Mexican restaurant, and observed the people, we saw signs of a town in transition.   This was obviously a former logging town.  One of the town monuments is an enormous 19^th century steam engine made Allis Chalmers which fueled a lumber mills that “cut more than 1 billion feet of timber.”  It is in the process of becoming a tourist town, but not there yet.  There is obvious poverty, some signs of drug addiction, but still a functioning downtown.

This is a pattern throughout the state.  There are towns that have given over completely to the hospitality/tourism industry, towns that struggling to hold to their industries and identity, towns that seem unsure about what is next for them.  

In the first valley after crossing the Cascades, “the Northern Cross,” as it is called, we first visited a very high end district, catering to the crowd that might visit Aspen.  There was heli-skiing; catered mountain bike rides with van, guided elk hunts.  The Freestone Inn, where we stayed, was a former pioneer dude ranch where guests stayed in cabins without electricity and running water.  Now there are photos throughout the facility harkening back to that time and claiming that heritage, but neither host nor guests would welcome that kind of ruggedness.  We stop at the pricey, beautiful store in Mazama and buy 10 blueberry newtons for $5, and forgo Wes’ latte because we can’t bring ourselves to pay $5.50 for it.

It is beautiful cruise in the early morning to the town of Winthrop.   The valley is filled with the smell of new cut hay.  As we curve in and out of Ponderosa pine forests, we see a mix of older, working ranches, and great big trophy second homes.   We are looking forward to breakfast at Winthrop, but when we turn the corner into the town, our hearts immediately falls.  The whole town has been turned into a fake Disney-fied version of Western mining town.  There are false fronts, goofy names like Black Bart’s; the only businesses in town are eateries, bars, and expensive kitchery, and one good bookstore.   The guy at the sport shop where we purchases a canister of cooking gas explained, “The town was starting to die, and there was a rich lady who told the town she would pay for it to become Western so it could bring in the tourists.”     Just down the street, we find out that she was the wife of the local lumber baron.   So now this town, deep in the heart of the Pacific Northwest, looks like a Nevada mining town, and draws the tourists by the busload.   At one point we look through a rough wood façade to see a miniature golf course, complete with Astro turf and plastic western décor.

The valley continues southward, with a more emphasis on working ranches and fewer trophy houses.  The heat is starting to pump and we are on a busy highway 20, with no shoulder and plenty of trucks.   It is well over 90 degrees when we land in the little town of Twisp.   A homegrown bakery called Cinnamon Twisp attracts us, where we go in, drink coffee, and work on the last blog post.  As I blog, and Wes reads the paper (exactly what is happening right now), an older man with a white beard approaches us and asks us about our trip.  This happens quite often.  These conversations usually last a few minutes; we answer the standard questions:  Where you going?  Where you coming from?  How many miles a day you travel?    However, this man is a veteran bicycle tourist.

When we tell him we are waiting out the day before tackling Loup Loup pass in the cool of the morning, he confirms our judgment.   He asks us if we would like to set up our tent in his back yard.  His mate, sitting a few tables down from us, says, “The basement would be much cooler.”   They offer us the use of the bedroom and we accept.  We haven’t even exchanged names yet.    A few minutes later, they give us their address, we exchange names and make arrangements to see them after we take care of some errands.

After errands, and returning to the bikes, I notice that the Adventure Cycling map we have been following is missing.  Not only do the maps guide you onto the best bike routes, they also provide critical information about camping, shopping, lodging, and bike shops.   After going o Wilson Hicks and Susie Gallaghers’ house, and discovering that both are artists and quite interesting people, I retrace my steps in search of the map.  No luck.  Perhaps I left it in Winthrop.   Wilson and Susie, understanding that I am distressed about the map, offer to drive us back to Winthrop to look.  Wilson, takes us the back way, through beautiful mountain scenery and lots of stories.  He has had a varied life and truly loved the bike trip he took with his son from Seattle to Colorado.  Susie is fairly recently retired from administrative work with San Francisco’s BART system.   At the tender age of 75, Wilson now works on call taking out cooking and shower trucks for fires, disasters, and big fundraising events.  Susie paints beautiful watercolors and volunteers at the library.

We talk and talk.  They are just a bit older than us, and we have a lot in common, artistically, philosophically, and politically.  They have been the soul of hospitality and helped us with our fruitless search for the map.  We take them to dinner at a delicious Mexican restaurant.  (The Latino community is big and obvious throughout northern Washington.)  We sleep like rocks in their cool comfortable basement, and leave before dawn to tackle Loup Loup pass.

In its own way, Loup Loup is just as hard as the Cascades.  It is dry and quite steep.  There is no shade for the first five miles.  We are glad we are pushing our bikes in the pre-dawn hours because it would be terrible during the heat of the day.  We push and ride, push and ride.  There are places where it so steep, we are reduced to the “25 steps, then breathe, 25 steps, then breathe” strategy to get over the hill.   It is about 35 miles to the next town, with the summit at about 15 miles.   It is slow, hot going, and we are going through our water rapidly.  Near the top, we stop for lunch at a national forest campground, assuming we can refill our water bottles.   We are thoroughly disgusted to find out that water and garbage service have been stopped in this, and most forest service campgrounds, a victim of budget cuts.   The fees, for a parking spot with a picnic table, remain however.  In my search for the water tap, I meet a young couple from Texas, traveling with two hounds who ceaselessly “arooh” at my presence.  They tell me there is no water and they were surprised that the campground was so primitive.  They offer us two bottles of water, which prove to be essential as we continue our journey.

We finally clear the top and begin the huge descent to the town of Okanogan, known as the hottest location in the state.  We pop out of the mountains into the sage desert, and see an unimaginably strange site.  There are thousands and thousands of fruit trees, perched high on the desert walls.  Some are swathed in netting, and there is the constant swoop, swoop, swooping of irrigating systems.  Right next to huge sagebrush are cherry, peach, apricot, apple and pear trees.   Just beyond the trees, there are signs of a very recent wildfire, which swept through the sagebrush, leaving a charred and blackened landscape.  It is growing hotter and hotter as we drop from the pine forests of the 4000 foot summit to the town center at 800 feet. 

There temperature is over 100 degrees during a hot ride through the nearly abandoned downtown.  We practically run into the air conditioned coffee shop.  It is too hot to cycle.  We have to wait.  As per usual, we read the local paper and are surprised to see story after story about methamphetamine arrests, deaths, and car-wrecks.  Wes engages the young woman working behind the counter, who tells us that most of her friends use meth and that she left the town for a while because she couldn’t stand what is was doing to them.  The coffee shop, however, is lovely and cool, and obviously, a well-loved community center.  We are there for hours.  We have a long conversation with a couple about our age, who own one of the last functioning retail businesses in town.  They were both former (short-lived) teachers who had been happily running a clothing and sporting goods business in this little town until two great calamities: the crash of 2008 and the opening of the Walmart (Sprawlmart in our parlance) in the next town.  Now they are watching their receipts go down every month.  They wonder how much longer they can hold on if the downtown continues to deteriorate.  

TO BE CONTINUED....

T+20: Happy Birthday to Me

Mile 245: SHELTON, WA: Today is my 57^th birthday and we have been on the bikes 9 days.  We are definitely getting stronger.  Yesterday, we came over Cloquallam Creek from Elma, to Shelton, Washington.  This was definitely an out-back route, with almost no services for 26 miles. 

We left our hostel stay after a meager breakfast of oatmeal and one container of yogurt between us.   According to the Adventure Cycling map, there was a grocery stop about half way along the route.  We figured we would stop there for a break.   When we got to spot where to store was supposed to be, the building looked boarded up, and there was an older woman with scraggledy blonde hair in intense negotiations with a fellow in a beat up old pick-up truck.  She would reach into the bed of the truck, pick up something, and exchange a few words.  Wes heard her say “Who would want a moldy old board?”  We saw afterwards that the wreck of a building had an “OPEN” sign on it and we wondered if that was the grocery stop in question.

Neither of us wanted to stop, but this had consequences down the line.  By mile 15, our breakfast was long gone and we still had more than 10 miles to go.    This was definitely going to be a fat burning moment.  If only that stored energy were easier to access.  It just sits there on our guts and butts, as our energy drains away.

There is a growing mismatch between Wes and my cycling.  My months of training and the fact that my bike is much more of a road bike means that I am going much faster than Wes.  I have to stop every couple of miles and wait for him.  He comes plodding along on his heavy mountain bike with balloon tires.    We have an on-going discussion about the best approach to pedaling.  I say more spin, less push.  Wes says that means he goes too slowly, but I think he is coming around because pushing the pedals over and over is exhausting.

Speaking of Wes, he has been wanting to “guest-blog”, so I will turn it over to him:


Howdy. Some of you know, and some don’t, that I am addicted to speed. No, not the chemical kind, the kind that is generated by self-propelled movement such as skiing and, of course, biking. As it turns out, there are some ‘killer’ hills on this north-bound route from Portland to northern Washington. So, Shaun and I are having a hell of a lot of pain and a hell of a lot of fun pushing up and ripping down hills. One was two and a half miles at 6% grade with the added bonus of a coffee shop at the bottom. Whoo-Hoo!

My observations on the economy: In the Oregon/Washington corridor we’ve noticed the middle class is struggling to stay even and there is an unusual number of very poor people. Our conclusion; the poor are getting poorer in this area. I’ll make periodic updates as we move across the country.

Shaun again:

One of the ironies of this part of country-- We are in a huge forest and yet many, many people live in mobile homes.   One day a couple days back captured the yin and yang of this experience. 

We camped at the Lewis and Clark State Park, after a glorious day on the Jackson Highway, one of the original roads of the Oregon Trail.  It was clear and cool, and up on this high prairie, we could see for miles.  Mount St. Helens was on our right, snowy and misshapen, with its massive chunk removed from its conical shape.  We have seen this mountain from three sides now, and it figures very much in peoples’ consciousness. 

One sweet fellow named Fred, whom we met at the Columbia River camp, told us “You kids shouldn’t oughta drink that stinkin' camp water, you jist hep yurselvs to my 5 gallon tank.”  He also tells us that he and his crew had been watching the bulge grow on St Helens for days, and were about 10 miles away when it blew.  He shook his head sadly, “I tole my crew we had to go on inside, so we missed seeing the explosion by thirty minutes.  It lost a thousand feet in one minute and I didn’t get to see it.”



More stunning by half is seeing Mount Rainier, which is twice the size of St Helen’s.  I have never seen such big massif.  It looms in the north like some white headed mountain god.  I can see why the native people revered it.  Unlike the Rockies, which are a serrated chain of mountains, these are single, gigantic volcanoes.  Rainier must be at least 100 miles across the base, rising several thousand feet above that.  It has a sheer northern face that must be at least 1500 feet.  Most days are cloudy here.  The appearance of that massif must feel like the unexpected appearance of planetary diety.

We camp in the shadow of Rainier at a very little used state park called Lewis and Clark State Park.   The camp host comes to tell us that, once again, we have been unintentional scoff-laws, by camping in a spot intended for RVs and not in the hiker-biker site.  He recognized that this was ridiculous, as there was only 1 hiker biker site, it was filled and the rest of the camp was empty.  But rules were rules, and he had to get special permission from the ranger to let us stay there.  

Wes measures a giant Douglas fir
 

We asked why it is so little used.  His answer, “All there is is trees and hiking, and that ain’t interesting enough for the kids.”  It is interesting enough for us as this is an old growth forest.  We take a hike and see Douglas firs that are at least 120 feet tall, with trunks of at least  20 foot circumference.   We are agog at the western red cedar.  The bases of their trunks are as big as a small car.   The buildings of the park were made by the CCC’s in the 1930’s; they are well done Western heroic craftsman style.

We set our tent on a bed of moss and listen to the ancient trees whisper in the night.  The next morning we tarry and tarry, not wanting to leave this magical place of primeval energy.    But the road calls and we make our way to the fairly big town of Centralia.  

This is yet another lumber town, pretty much down on its luck.  Camping choices are limited, so we end up staying in the tent section of a fairly low end RV park.  We are right next to an industrial lumber yard with a rail spur, so there are regular train, equipment, and diesel truck sounds. 

I notice that the washing machines are reasonably priced, so instead of sitting at the picnic table in the shadow of the lumber yard, I decide to wash clothes.  We are digging through all of our pockets trying to find money for the machines, when an older man pushing a walker opens the door and shoves a plastic sack of books at me.  He pants, “Would you put that in ‘ere fer me?”

On the spur of the moment, I ask if he has any change. He looks stunned, but answers, “Yeah, but it’s back at m'trailer.”  I walk with him back to his home.  He apologizes, “My legs don’t work so good.”  At one point, his knee almost gives out and he grabs the wall of the wash house.  He apologizes again.  I offer my arm; he refuses.  We putter along, talking about his dog, Shadow, a snow white toy poodle.  He says, “It’s good for a guy to have some companionship—keeps him up and movin’.”  He says, “I spend too much time readin’, a guy’s got to have sumpin’ to keep him goin’.” 

When we get back to his home, I see that is a small motor home, hardly bigger than a van.  He apologizes again.  “Jis'  big enough for one.”  He rummages about, then gives me five dollars in quarters.  I ask him about his reading.  “Oh, I like mysteries, and westerns, and suspense. I don’t like the same thing over n' over.  I get bored.”  I look at his big luminous, rheumy blue eyes behind big metal glasses.  I ask, “Do you have any family around here?” “I got a sister over n' Chehalis…I got a kid in Portland…”, he answers vaguely.  It is obvious he hasn’t seen either in quite a while.  I leave Walt to his dog, books, and tiny trailer, and wonder what will happen when his legs completely give out.

A little while later, when we are leaving the laundry room, we see an elderly couple with a small spaniel taking a walk.  They give us a little wave as we go by.  Back at our table, we are fixing a cup of tea, when all of a sudden we hear a little dog barking and barking.   Wes looks up and says, “Did that guy just fall?”  Across the way, the little spaniel is barking, and the old man is laying on the ground. 

We hurry over there and find a frail old man lying on his back.  Wes asks if we can help him.  He says his wife has gone to get the car, He was "just plumb done in.”   We stay with him until his wife comes.  He asks if Wes was ever in the service.  Upon hearing that he was not, the thin, neat, white haired man tells us that he served in Iwo Jima in ‘42, Okinawa in ‘44, and Nanking in '46.  “I 'spect you two were not even born then,”  he guesses.  When the wife arrives, Wes gently puts his arms around the tiny frail man and picks up him in one smooth motion.  They thank us for our concern and we watch them drive away slowly.

We return to our camp abashed.  How can this camp be full of so many old, frail, and rather impoverished seniors?  I spend the rest of night wondering about our country’s values.  I am still wondering.