Dry Creek Fire

I am at fire camp. My brother owns several hand washing trailers that he rents to the forest service during wildland fires. This time I am operating a station at White Salmon, Washington, for a fire called the Dry Creek Fire. Fires are almost always named for a geographical feature near where the fire starts.

It took me six hours to drive down to the Columbia River Gorge. I crossed into Oregon on I205 and headed east. Traveling back into Washington at Bridge of the Gods I continued east on Hwy 14 until turning to drive up to White Salmon, a sleepy little town on a bluff overlooking the Columbia River that boasts an Ace Hardware, Hi School Pharmacy and a surprising good Natural Foods Market. The placard upon entering states 'White Salmon, where the sun meets the rain.'

Donald already had the trailer set up when I arrived. This fire camp is at the high school and we are camped on the baseball field on grass. GRASS! Usually we camp on dirt so the luxury of grass is amazing. This is the nicest fire camp I have ever been stationed at. In addition to the grass we are right next to the track and each morning after the fire crews leave for the day I walk two miles around the track to get my exercise. I share the track with the cross country team and the cheerleaders. I have developed a deep respect for the cheerleaders. They are out on the track at 9 am, and they spend 6 to 7 hours every day practicing their cheers and dances in 90 degree heat in front of the empty stands. Sometimes in the afternoon the football team scrimmages as well.

This fire camp uses inmate labor. The inmates cook and serve the food for everyone, and there are several inmate squadrons who are actually fighting the fire, as well. Apparently the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) uses a lot of inmate labor. There are guards supervising but I imagine that being allowed to participate in something like this would be considered a privilege for the inmates and I have not observed any problems.

Fire camp reminds me of summer camp, just for adults. Friends are quickly made and when a crew is demobilized there is a sad farewell. Now that I have been doing this for awhile I occasionally see a familiar face. At this fire one of the camp admins is a teacher from school!

My day starts at 4:30 am when the kitchen crew washes their hands before starting work. When I feel the trailer start rocking as they push the soap dispensers I stumble out of bed and start the generator so they have lights. By 5 am there is a steady line of firefighters washing before going through the breakfast line. I hurry around wiping and cleaning sinks and refilling the paper towel dispensers and by 7 am most of the crews have left and then the potable water tanker comes and refills my 400 gallon water tank and the gray water truck comes and empties my 500 gallon gray water bladder.

I typically do another deep cleaning and then the afternoon is mine to nap and read. At 5pm I do another cleaning and dinner starts. The admin and camp crew eat. The firefighters start rolling back in around 7 or 8 pm. They are dirty and grimy after their hard work and once again I am busy, cleaning and bleaching and replacing paper towels. After dinner I am refilled with fresh water for the morning and lights go out at 10pm.

I turn off the generator and shut myself in for the night and the drone of the kitchen reefer truck lulls me to sleep. 

Baker Lake Adventure

Once again I find myself as a chaperone for the Oak Harbor High School backpacking class. We have a small group this year and as we huddle from the rain in front of the stadium one student never appears and we finally leave without him. We are headed to Baker Lake to Anderson Point. It is a pretty easy 2 mile hike down to a campground by the lake that has bear boxes, fire rings and very rustic toilets. It is a great spot for a first backpacking trip.

When we stop to buy our Northwest Pass we are warned that the creeks are running high due to the thunderstorms yesterday. Brian and I look at each other, thinking about the log bridge over Anderson Creek. It is a slanty single pole log with a rickety cable to hang on to and a tree fell  and cracked it this winter making it even sketchier. Brian and his wife Shelley hiked it last weekend and it was still possible even with the damage.

We head down the trail in a light rain and I am, as always, bringing up the rear. Brian hikes with me, warning the kids to stop at Anderson Creek for us. Before we know it we round the corner and Anderson Creek is roaring before us. The water is running completely over the log bridge, the pole supports with the cables barely above the flow. Shelley and the kids have been looking at a couple logs that might be possible upstream but they are wet, mossy and extremely slippery. A slip would mean a pretty nasty drowning death in the snags downstream and Brian, Shelley and I confer and Brian makes the decision to turn us around. We pause for a snack and a drink of water and we begin the plod back up to the vehicles.

Once again in the back, Brian and I discuss our options and Brian decides we will drive up Baker Lake Road and look for a place to car camp. The kids have already experienced a 4 mile hike with full packs so now we start the hunt for a place to camp. As every campground is closed our hope fades the further up we get. I know that there is an outhouse and a bear proof garbage can at the end of the road but we don't know if we can camp. We are almost there when we see  Brian start to turn the van around. We talk him in to continuing to the end since we are almost there and once we get there he is glad we did. There is spacious room for all our tents and even a picnic table!

We quickly set up our tents in the drizzle and all the kids write down their phone numbers. Shelley and I drive back down to Hwy 20 where we have cell phone coverage and Shelley contacts the parents to let them know our new location. Part of our dilemma is that we only have my little snow peak stove for our group to cook with and we also need more tarps. Brian's tarps and cookstove were stashed at Anderson Point the previous weekend to save space and weight. I call my husband John and ask him to bring up our car camping cook stove, more tarps and some dry firewood, but his truck isn't running well and he isn't sure if he will be able to borrow a car, so Shelley and I decide to go into Concrete to see what we can buy. We see a large fluorescent sign advertising a yard sale and swing by. We score a huge 20x20 tarp for ten bucks and the lady also agrees we can fill up out trunk with her uncovered wet firewood for five more dollars. She also gives us three large dry pieces of cedar for kindling!

Next stop is the hardware store on Main Street where we buy a bundle of dry firewood and the clerk generously gives us a large cardboard box of dry wood pieces and some paper for starting the fire.

Shelley eats gluten free but has never heard of 5B Bakery so of course I have to stop to introduce her. After scoring a strawberry rhubarb hand pie and a blueberry muffin we continue to Outdoor Ventures and purchase two large fuel canisters for my camp stove. 

We head back up to the camp where German exchange student Greta organizes all of us to hang up the tarps. While we were gone they managed to start a smokey fire but the addition of our dry wood helps kick things up. As we are huddled around the fire a car drives up and my husband jumps out. He and our friend Mike have brought us more firewood, camp kettles for heating water, tarps and camp chairs. But when they go to set up the camp stove for cooking they realize it doesn't have all the parts and when they head back out an hour later they take it with them. We will be using my little snow peak stove and the fire to heat water and cook for the weekend.

It is starting to get dark and I crawl in my tent and snuggle into my sleeping bag. I wake up cold around 2:00 am and realize I need more air in my sleeping pad so I roll off and blow more air until it is quite firm, but that helps and I fall back to sleep, finally warm as long as I keep my stocking hat on. I roll out of bed around 7 and teach the young man who is up, Dylan, how to get the fire going. He's been up since 5:30 and will start the fire tomorrow. We start heating up water and eventually more kids get up and join us and start cooking their breakfasts. Some had been cold during the night but all had stayed dry with the tarps over their tents.

After breakfast we head up the river to the foot bridge over Baker River where we take pictures just as it starts to sprinkle. We head up the Baker River Trail and once again I am bring up the rear. We cross several little streams and the kids always wait to help me across and I manage to keep my feet dry. Eventually we get to a large stream where there was a log bridge that is now washed out. Once we get to the end of the bridge we clamor down and scout out another log to cross the rest of the way. It is dry and we carefully walk across although Brian elects to crawl. Once we are safe on the other side we continue hiking until we reach Sulphide Creek and the end of the trail where we stop on the banks and eat our lunches. It starts to sprinkle again as we turn around to go back and by the time we reach the washout the log is wet and slippery and this time I crawl across it, too.

When we get back to camp we stoke up the fire and play a game of Apples and Oranges before cooking up our dinners and making smores. It is supposed to be even colder tonight, down to about 35 degrees and I take all the hand warmers out of my car and give them to the kids to help them stay warm during the night. I snuggle into my tent again. It is another cold night and I sleep a bit cold but Dylan has the fire going when I wake up and a hot cup of coffee helps. After breakfast we pack up and then scour the area, picking up all trash and broken glass from previous campers before walking down to the river to take a picture. The sun is out and it is warm.

We have a little extra time and so we stop at Baker Hot Springs on the way out so the kids can see a natural hot spring. A final stop at Five Guy's Burgers for lunch and we are back to the school by 2:00. It was a great weekend!

PNT Alternates on Whidbey Island

As hikers of the Pacific Northwest Trail traverse Whidbey Island on their way to the Coupeville Ferry, the official route from Joseph Whidbey State Park is a beach walk down the west side of the island. This is a lovely walk, but should be done on a tide of 4 or lower since there are several areas where the tide can push you up against the cliffs or even cause you to have to be in the water. The best walk is on an outgoing tide so any sandy sections are on wet firm sand. The beaches on Whidbey change with every tide. Sometimes there are sandy parts but often it is mostly pebbly rocky sections.

Fortunately there are several places where you can jump off the beach and take an alternate route if the tide is not accommodating. Hastie Lake Road, Libbey Road, Fort Ebey State Park, Ebey's Landing and Fort Casey are the five places where this can be done.

From Hastie Lake Road take West Beach Road south to Libbey Road. Turn west on Libbey and you can either rejoin the beach walk if the tide permits, or take the alternate through Fort Ebey State Park.  To take the alternate turn south on Fort Ebey Road. You will go up through a residential neighborhood to the old entrance to the fort which looks like a private driveway. 

Take that and look for the trail on the left which leads you into the park. Stay on the trail/old road until you reach an actual asphalt road. Follow it to the right (west)  and go about a hundred yards and take the first trail on the left which goes to the Bluff Trail. You can also catch the Bluff Trail if you've been on the beach. From the beach you can see the trail go up into Fort Ebey State Park. If you are at all concerned about tide, this would be where you want to get off the beach because Partridge Point is coming up and is one of the places that is impassible on a higher tide. Follow the Bluff Trail south past the old fort battery and campground. From the campground take Kettles Trail which eventually pops you out next to Highway 20 and becomes a paved bike path.

Continue south until you reach the Kettles Spur to Pratt Loop Trail. Take that to Ebey Prairie Trail to Ebey Bluff Trail and back down to the beach at Ebey's Landing.

From here, decide if you will take the beach or an alternate route. To take the alternate head south up Hill Road. To your left you will see a ravine with a weathered gray house at the top. This is the old Ferry House (now owned by the National Parks) which was run by the sons of Isaac Ebey after he was murdered and beheaded by Indians in a retaliation killing in 1862. After his murder his home was abandoned and eventually torn down and the lumber was used to build the Ferry House which lodged travelers coming onto the island from Port Townsend and enabled his orphaned boys to make a living.

Continue up Hill Road past a 75 year old red barn with curious cows until you reach Engle Road. Turn right on Engle and follow that until you see the signs for the Admiralty Inlet Preserve trails.

Admiralty Inlet Preserve is a cool hiking area and preserve of one of the few remaining wild prairie on Whidbey Island. You have a couple choices here. If you are in a hurry to catch the ferry take the path that parallels Engle Road. But the better choice is the bluff trail which is a mere 1/10 mile longer but has great views of the water and Olympics and takes you down grassy paths through corridors of wild roses. When you get to the place where it looks like a driveway goes to the left, take that back down towards Engle Road. But before you do that, take a look at the views along the bluff to your right. There is a placard which identifies the mountain peaks of the Olympics across the Sound and anoth which tells some of the military history on Whidbey.

Once the pathway rejoins Engle Road near Fort Casey, follow the road to the Coupeville Ferry. If you have the time and like old military forts, wander up to Fort Casey. Several parts of this fort have been repainted recently and a couple big guns are still installed. There is also the old Admiralty Head Lighthouse that you can climb up into during visiting hours.

If you want a snack while waiting for the ferry be sure to visit the Keystone Cafe. Friendly staff, good sandwiches, cold ice cream and a cozy outside deck make this a great little stop.