Sherman Pass Sunday

I had heard that early May is a good time to go fossil hunting at the Stone Rose Interpretive Centre in Republic. Apparently the shale is still wet and comes apart easily to reveal magic and treasure. Republic is about an hour west on Highway 20 over the Sherman Pass from Skunk House

I set off under blue skies after stopping to admire the (priceless) kitty in the window at Chewelah Iron Works. Just outside of Kettle Falls I met the Tin Man in a field of purple flowers. After that things started getting a little wild.First raindrops as big as dinner plates (I only exaggerate a smidgen) washed the maple pollen and other debris off the truck. By the time I was climbing Sherman Pass the rain turned to snow. Luckily it wasn't sticking because I have removed the sandbags from the back of the truck and thus am somewhat light in the tail.I did find some fluffy wintercoated deer feasting on roadside salt and a beautiful vista of an old burn scene in a break in the rain/snow squalls. Once I reached Republic the rain was pouring down again though so I cancelled fossil hunting for the day.Instead I decided to explore some more by heading on along highway 20 in the Tonasket direction.I found a rock pile, some of which I could persuade to come along for ballast and then home for the Skunk House Garden Project, an exquisite butterfly, hillslopes of pink phlox, fresh mountain sage, a moonshine still against a hill ("...oh she give me moonshine whiskey/oh she give me southern love...") and finally a field of blue camas. There were some other almost-ghost towns and beautiful landscapes in there too as i wandered west a little then headed up north to cross the river as close to Canada as I could.
Not bad for a day of wandering.

Paddling history

At the Lake Roosevelt Forum held at Kettle Falls Interpretive Centre recently, I got to paddle in a genuine birch bark canoe, learn a lot about the natural history of the area and meet interesting people with an interest in the history and geography of the area. The day was perfect blue skies with just enough painterly puffy clouds to break the monotony, and the venue had an untrampled, fresh, waking from winter slumbers feel, with blooming wild flowers on all sides under the Pinyon Pines I am coming to love.Even though my left arm is seriously crippled having been mysteriously torn at the shoulder, I still joined a group of 12 or so to paddle in a genuine birch bark canoe over the now flooded Kettle Falls and St Paul's Mission. What a thing of fragile beauty and integrity that vessel is! The Chinook Expeditions folks were also there with their fibreglass canoe but I was fortunate enough to stay with the all natural materials Spirit of the Lake (well the name is actually in a native language but I didn't write it down) canoe for both paddles. We returned to the Interpretive Centre hungry, where we were entertained by fiddle jigs and reels over lunch.After lunch we heard from the Native Plant Society, Jack Nisbet, (prizewinning) author, historian and naturalist and Dwight Morgan, a local Society for Creative Anachronism member, who shot off a black power gun, showed us handmade knives and blankets spun and woven in his classes.

Dwight also showed us some of the wild foods the Hudson Bay fur trappers and first European explorers would have carried. Thus I got to taste the blue (white is deadly poisonous) camas root, important staple of the indigenous peoples of this area, hazelnuts (and discover that they are indigenous to this area) and some little dried black berries whose name and origins I have now forgotten.
During the day I also took the time to pay respects to the whetstone - a huge piece of rock overlooking what was once the Kettle Falls, where knives and blades have been sharpened for hundreds of years.
What a great learning day hugely increasing my knowledge of the history and geography of this area where human habitation has been traced back 9000 years. Knowing history and geography connects us profoundly.

The ground beneath her feet

"Whenever someone who knows you disappears, you lose one version of yourself. Yourself as you were seen, as you were judged to be. Lover or enemy, mother or friend, those who know us construct us, and their several knowings slant the different facets of our characters like diamond-cutter's tools. Each such loss is a step leading to the grave, where all versions blend and end." Salman Rushdie - The Ground Beneath her Feet

Whistling up the wind: gardening by storm.

There's a tree in my strawberry patch.

It's complicated. Or simple, depending on how you look at it.

In an attempt to heal my broken left wing, after work last night, I went across the vacant lot and down an alley to the place at the back of the old bank building, next to the incredibly beautiful garden, to the good doctor Shelly, who has a reputation for doing a mean line in hot rock massage.

It didn't take Shelley long to see through this old body's act. "Your chakras have shut down. You've basically blown a fuse. We have to open these up" she says as she turns lights down low, cranks up the heat and gets to elemental work.

Hmmmmm....seems she healed up a storm. While Shelley worked, a huge wild wind came up from the South, direction of all positive growth. Apart from celebrating unruliness to the highest degree, wrecking absolute mayhem with garbage cans and anything else remotely loose around the neighbourhood, this strong south wind messenger blew one of the maples from the backyard lockup at Skunk House clean out of the ground.

Luckily the only casualty seems to be the rickety picket fence which I was considering for gooseberry bushes or sweet peas. I did want a bit more sunlight in that area. Of course the birds and I will have to find some other place for the bird feeders now.
The left shoulder still feels like it has been on the receiving end of serious recoil from shooting high and wild.

I think it is time to examine the whole balance of giving and receiving and the fundamental feeding a spirit requires. There's a garden in my heart needs tending now that the south wind intervention has blown a gap in the sky to let the light in.

When lovely woman stoops to folly: this broken poetry

For Robert the Incomparable because no other lives and dies in poetry, knowing the curse of a pair of ragged claws scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

Deer evening

Now that the evenings are lengthening and warming I can take my wandering Stingy Lane walks after work. This particular evening was full of beautiful light, fresh spring growth and deer.

Rez Roadtripping

In mid-April, on opening day of turkey hunting season, I go exploring in the Spokane and Colville Indian Reservations where I find beautiful wildflowers are just coming into bloom.
I also discover Midnite Mine, a uranium mine and many beautiful vistas, ride the Gifford-Inchelium ferry again (separate post) and have an adventure of the chickenskin kind in Inchelium.
Half way through photographing the murals on the community centre walls, my camera suddenly gives me a red screen of death. Battery out. Huh? But I just recharged it before setting out on this little road trip.

I switch the camera off. Switch on again. It seems quite calm and contented. I take a several more shots. When I get home and upload the pictures, I discover that the frame of Chief Joseph which I had just shot when the battery claimed to be kaput is missing.Makes me think of that line from the "Older than America" movie. "What's with you white people? The minute you come onto an Indian reservation, you begin acting like you've taken peyote."

A Saturday well spent in spite of the momentary heebie jeebies in Inchelium. And yeah, this was just an excuse for a picture post. As always more on flickr.

Swing low, sweet chariot

In Kitsap County, on the west side of the Cascades, riding on the big Washington State ferries is a way of life. Huge multi-decked vessels pour the daily commuter crowd in tunnel-visioned, monochromatic, dark rivers across the Salish Sea (aka Puget Sound) to Seattle from Bainbridge, Bremerton, Kingston. In summer tourists and leisurely locals enjoy the views from the open decks. In winter we huddled against chill winds and watched our lives recede from us.

In contrast, the San Juan Islands routes are pure adventurer delight, with progressively smaller and smaller boats and incredible island scenery. Yup. Just about every journey where I was living required a water crossing to get anywhere off the peninsula. So much so that the big ferries have become an icon for the Pacific Northwest.

Turns out, however, that ferries existed first in Washington State in the Inland Northwest, on the dry eastern side of the Cascade mountain range.The story of the nearest ferry to my current base camp goes something like this. In 1896 a Congressional decision was made to open the Colville Indian Reservation up to non-Indian mining interests. This development led to more people wanting to cross the Columbia River. In 1898 a ferry began operating between Gifford in Stevens County on the east side of the Columbia River to Inchelium on the Colville Indian reservation.In 1939/40 the area was flooded by the construction of Grand Coulee dam. Both settlements of Gifford and Inchelium were moved to higher ground. Of course this meant that the Gifford-Inchelium ferry had to find new landings as well.Today the Columbian Princess is the single boat in the Gifford Inchelium fleet. This boat was built in 1981 by the Fisherman's Boat Shop in Everett at a cost of 1.7 million, paid for by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. It seems that this water princess had quite a journey to get to her home waters. First she was towed through the Straits of Juan de Fuca to the mouth of the Columbia. From there she travelled upriver through a series of 5 locks to Pasco. After that she was trucked 108 miles overland at a speed of 4-6 miles, through the soft rolling seas of the wheat lands. Imagine that!

Since 1994 the Gifford Inchelium ferry has been operated by the Federated Tribes of the Colville Indians on contract from the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The Columbian Princess crosses daily starting at 6:30 am. In winter the ferry shuts down for the night around 8:30 pm and in summer 9:45 pm

There is no charge for the ferry ride, and no schedule beyond the first and last ferry. The crossing takes six minutes and the ferry staff are relaxed and gentle about loading and unloading, knowing their routines and taking the time to greet a cousin or nephew doing the crossing. None of the impatient, incomprehensable but clearly irritated gestures of the officials on the other side of the mountains.

It seems to me that the ferry boat captain waits until enough vehicles have collected. Or sometimes maybe he just crosses when he gets tired of waiting. On the first crossing the amber liquid sunshine Ford Ranger and I did, there were only two vehicles on this 120 foot long vessel.There is something beautifully African about the Columbian Princess. Old office chairs provide comfort for the rudimentary crew to lounge on while waiting for loading or on their breaks. Lunch pails, bicycles and much loved motorcycles lean against the sides of the boat. Exhaust from the engines pours out from smoke stacks on either side of the deck. There is no passenger cabin beyond the cab of your vehicle. The captain is perched in a little compartment on a bridge above the single deck.The views can be beautiful - especially early in the morning or evening when the light is sweet and low and the sense all about is that the chariot is coming for to carry you home.
More about the eastern Washington ferries here:

http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=8035

http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/Regions/Eastern/KellerFerry/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gifford%E2%80%93Inchelium_Ferry

Ancestral voices: the dark heart of the matter

A few weeks ago, on my first exploration on Colville Indian reservation, down the west side of Lake Roosevelt, I paid respects to the ancestors at a cemetery near Inchelium.

The construction of Grand Coulee dam in 1939/40 caused the flooding of a huge area, stretching hundreds of miles upriver. This created Lake Roosevelt with its 660 miles of shoreline, some of which you have been seeing in photographs on this blog already. Environmentalists today condemn the damn building and subsequent flooding. A huge swathe of unique river bank eco-system and a myriad plant species were destroyed by this act, not to mention how it interfered with the salmon life cycle journey.

It is difficult to comprehend the hubris of those times only 70 years ago, to think it was okay to block the path of the salmon, but there we have it: Grand Coulee Dam and Lake Roosevelt. Don't worry, we will give you electricity and a huge playground of a National Recreation Area. You can swim, boat, fish (for reintroduced farmed species), camp. Play. And, wait there's more: for no extra charge, free bonus extra in summer: we will give you a coloured light show on the wall of the dam. Celebrate electricity!

One begins to understand the passion in Edward Abbey's environmental activism writings which were deeply rooted in protesting the horror of "progress" of the nature of Grand Coulee dam. Apocalypse now, here, in the heart of this country. It was happening. But who pays attention to poets, dreamers and novelists?On a human level the building of the dam flooded not only villages and sacred sites such as Kettle Falls, but also cemeteries. For those who believe it is important to be near the burial grounds of their ancestors, this must have been a profoundly disturbing event.Before the waters rose, the Bureau of Reclamation, of the US Dept of the Interior, was responsible for relocating the burials. It seems that many of them were moved to New Inchelium Cemetery which I think is also Hall Creek Cemetery and the one I visited. Or maybe Hall Creek Cemetery is now under water. I am a bit vague on the detailsWhat I do know is that the cemetery I visited is on the 1.4 million acre Colville Indian reservation, on the west side of Lake Roosevelt, just north of Inchelium. It is owned and maintained by Saint Michael's Mission in Inchelium, a Roman Catholic parish which was founded in 1926 on the banks of the Columbia river. In 1942 Saint Michael's Church was moved to higher ground above the rising waters of the newly formed Lake Roosevelt and today has a mission to serve the people on the eastern side of the reservation.
It seems that only Indians and their immediate families are buried at Hall Creek Cemetery and the grave monuments reflect this. As with the cemetery in Suquamish, there are stones here commemorating the unknowns as well as the reinterred buried without proper records - possibly these were relocations from flooded burial grounds?

All the places in the world

Another Carlos Casteneda marries Leonard Cohen crack-that-lets-the-light-in day on a recent Saturday kayaking expedition.

Started a little slow loading a kayak in the frosty morning with ice still on the bird bath. Then to Spoko fuel for petrol and a little pre-kayaking treat of wedges of fried potatoes aka jo jos.
Decided on French Rock, west side of the river down a little ways from the Kettle Falls crossing. It had looked protected and interesting on a scouting party. En route there I discovered Sherman Creek apple orchid in full fresh bloom reminding me of the winelands of the Western Cape of South Africa. Okay none of the inimitable scenic whitewashed Cape Dutch gabled architecture against purple fold mountains..... but there was a similarity. orchards against a backdrop of mountains. Out of the corner of my eyes I could see other places I have been.
The colours, especially the blue of sky and fresh early spring green of bud at that point of the adventure were out of a child's crayon box in their intensity.Just after the orchard, a coyote bounded joyfully across my path. He looked over his shoulder, laughing directly at me. I swear he met my eyes. What is it about coyotes that whenever I see them they turn and look at me. Setting me up, huh?I took a little side diversion to explore a deserted campsite where peahens with iridescent blue necks foraged amongst the pinecones. It was the harsh cry coming from the woods more that the sight which had me feeling I had stepped through a crack in the worlds and was back in India. Or why did coyote take me down this road? To mock me for how tarnished India has become in this ordered oh so secular land of plenty?At French Rock the water was calm at the launch. I found blue triteleia flowering on the little bluff overlooking the cove whilst a yellow bellied marmot (thanks to Morticia for the id) watched me from another.The south wind was strongish when I left the shelter of the launching cove but I had already decided to paddle up river, then return with the flow. Not that it was as strong or noticeable as the tides in the Salish Sea.
I found islands of tumbled volcanic structure poking out of the sea. Some had poetic pines, clinging in a Japanese woodblock way, and Canadian Geese.I played around a little bit in the interesting flows of water, calms and cross currents around the coves and bluffs of those islands. Though the light on water was, at times, reminiscent of some of my best prayer paddles on the clear salt water on the west side of the Cascades, this Lake Roosevelt water has a brooding deepness to it somehow. There's a visceral vertigo grabs at me at times. I feel wobbled from the deep with chickenskin and sense of mysterious depths beneath me.I realise how small and alone I am in this vast landscape of water, mountains and sky. Not a human being knows where I am most of the time and only the local critters see me: eagles, ravens, coyotes, marmots, geese, brilliant washes of yellow from the arrow leaf balsamroot. There's a stillness. Such a deep stillness surrounds.

The kayak sometimes feels irrationally wobbled and tipsy in a way that it never felt on the salt water. There I felt rocked, cradled, bobbed about but always buoyant. On this fresh water, I feel a dark sinking precariousness.

People once walked paths of the drowned canyons I paddle over now. Built campfires on the banks of the river which flowed with salmon and life.

It takes a while for trust and communion to build up.

I am spending so much time alone, in the interior world these days. It takes all the covering off nerves and senses.

I found a sandy beach to have my lunch on. With half closed eyes and ignoring the cold wind off the snow still on the mountains around, I could almost imagine myself on a Hawaiian beach: white sand, water.

I lay and watched cloud shapes form and dissolve. A hand in the vee of a peace sign formed. I lazily reached for my camera. When I looked again it had turned to the single fingered salute. Flipping the bird at me are you coyote? A shark swam across a different section of the sky, jagged jaws elongating.

Coming back the storm blew in with rain and a chill wind.