McCall, Idaho USA …
When we left Kailani dockside a year ago for the winter in a marina in Virginia, our 2020 cruising plans were still being debated. Our then major news was that our dearly beloved Kailani was for sale, one step of many to prepare for Sophia to start high school in mainstream USA. We still had two years to go for her to begin high school though, so our back-up plan if Kailani did not sell was to take yet one more tour off to the South Pacific.
Like most, plans for those wanderings were curtailed due to world events, but that certainly did not stop us from traveling and living our adventurous life in 2020.
A major advantage to being cruising sailors is that we are totally accustomed to uncertainty of plans: after all, our favorite expression is that “our plans are drawn in the sand at low tide “... But 2020 was a zinger for all of the world. Little did we know one year ago when we left Kailani and headed off for a few months of winter fun in Idaho, how very much world events would skew our plans.
Last year’s winter was “normal”, no more than 5 feet of snow to shovel and plow, and lots to play in. Sophia continued with her love for skiing and absolutely fell in love with jiu-jitsu. Something of an anomaly for us, Sophia found herself with an activity-packed schedule of skiing, sledding, snow-shoeing, swimming, martial arts, and community classes for kids in software coding and pottery. She thrived! Meanwhile, Jen was on the sidelines at home recovering from a much-needed neck surgery, and Harley worked on expanding his work clientele. He attended the Seattle Boat Show at the end of January and within the week was patient zero in the house. Jen and Sophia fell ill within days with high fevers, dry coughs, total malaise, incredible body aches. Our first thought was we had one heck of a flu bug, especially since we all had received flu shots … Wonder what it was? We believe we had Covid before it was a “thing”, and certainly before we could have been tested for confirmation.
Always the trend setters, the family found itself on the front end of the pandemic which came to dominate everyone’s daily life. For us, however, not much changed, for after all we have spent the past eight years in the close company of each other but otherwise socially distanced albeit at distances on the order of fathoms rather than feet. We already worked from “home”, or as we call it on the boat, “anywhere we are that has internet”. The whole hoarding frenzy was a bit of a head scratcher for us as well. As sailors we are typically provisioned up and can go for months without laying in the staples of life. Jen has developed spreadsheets that insure we are never without and if prompted she can tell you how many days, weeks and months of toilet tissue we have on hand based, of course on normal usage rates.
When all the craziness hit, we were in fact in Durango, Colorado to celebrate Harley’s father’s 92nd birthday, after having traveled from, of all places, Las Vegas! Las Vegas shut down literally on the day we departed. Then, while in Durango, Jen returned to the ranch from a grocery shopping excursion in town and sounded the alarm: people were going crazy clearing off shelves! Talk of shutdowns and restrictions loomed, so we headed back to Idaho. We decided it would be best to check on our Oregon rental home, so after only two days back in Idaho we loaded up the car again, planning to spend a week in Oregon. Our one week turned into three months as state lockdowns and local restrictions made it illegal to rent our vacation rental property. It was not terrible by any means. For one thing, for the first time since she was four, Sophia was able to do some gardening. She devoured gardening books, planned and executed expansions of flowerbeds, and we even planted a tree. Sophia also cultivated her love for all nature by expanding her passions to birdwatching. The property sits atop an estuary that leads to the open ocean. Daily we saw eagles, herons, crows, swallows, and all manner of ducks and waterfowl. We had elk walk through our property and even were fortunate to see whale spouts as they came near shore. As a family, we are definitely nomadic and nautical – traveling and being on the water has been such an important part of our “life balance”. Without this option we endeavored to keep our spirits up and count our blessings. And so it was that we spent our three-month lockdown doing home repairs, school and work, all with the fortunate ability to at least gaze out and be inspired by the sea. Walks along the beach, down time watching the ever-changing wildlife, and chill time in the hot tub at sunset … Oft-repeated on our part : “well, this doesn’t suck!”
Finally summer rolled around and we were back in Idaho by mid June. We were excited to learn that the biannual Idaho with Kids camping trip on the Lochsa River had not been canceled. This gathering has been going on for decades for some of our friends here and they were kind enough to invite us a few years back. The focus is on whitewater rafting and kayaking, and it is a two week roving camping outing for these expert parents and their growing kids to experience Idaho’s notoriously fun and challenging white water. Harl was persuaded to paddle a duckie (a.k.a. inflatable kayak or IK) on the last day through a few miles of easy whitewater. Maybe not so easy as he got tossed out at one point and had to swim a couple hundred yards of rapids before he could get to shore. You would think the experience would have put him back safely in a raft with a fly rod in his hand but in fact by early July all three of us had our own IKs, and we were spending four or five days a week running some of the local whitewater for which this part of Idaho is world renown.
With our skills improving we decided to use our newly found locomotion to do some multi-day camping trips along some classic whitewater. We did three days on an easy stretch of the Salmon, another four days along 28 miles of the famed Blackfoot River in Montana and the summer culminated with an invitation to join some highly experienced friends who picked up a last minute permit on the main Salmon, a six day, 86 mile run through the ominous sounding Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness Area. Our friends were kind enough to rescue us when we overset in the bigger Class III and Class IV rapids but by the end of the trip we were more confident as well as more competent than just days before. Harley even managed to go one whole day without getting tossed out and “window-shading” in what he would claim was a hidden hole that the other sixteen kayakers managed to avoid.
With summer fading and the rivers getting too low and scrapy to run we packed up the truck camper and set out on a 25 day 4,300 mile trip to some of the iconic National Parks and Monuments in the west. What better way to get outside, fulfill our nomadic spirits’ craving for travel and show Sophia some of the beauty and history of the Western US? We traveled through Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, Colorado and Utah, and along the way visited 10 National Parks and Monuments. Crowds were somewhat diminished, it being mid September, but we were still surprised by the number of families out and about. Having our own camper for accommodation allowed us to easily stop and visit with friends scattered along the way, and we were even able to stay at the geology field camp in Montana that Harley had been to in his youth, and has so often described to Jen & Sophia.
The highlights from the National Parks were many: geysers, hungry bears, howling wolves, curious foxes, bugling elk, soaring eagles, lovely hikes through fall foliage, vistas of mountains and canyon lands rich in geologic history, and man-made wonders both ancient and modern. Sadly, some of those vistas and the air quality were hampered by the west coast forest fires, with westerly winds bringing smoke as far east as South Dakota. But through it all we still were amazed every day, Harley and Sophia got to do some fabulous fly-fishing, and we all were reminded of the rich beauty these wilderness areas gift to us as visitors. Thank you Theodore Roosevelt (and of course all those NP workers since …!).
Of all of our times on this trip, probably the absolute highlight was sitting atop a hillside in the Lamar Valley in Yellowstone Park during the cold hours just after dawn, watching through a spotting scope for the 34 wolves of the Junction Butte pack. Sophia had read some books about the history of the re-introduction of wolves into the park, an interest which has become quite a passion leading to devouring all books wolf-related. She passed her knowledge and some of her enthusiasm on to us, and so it was that we found ourselves spending eight nights camping in the northeast section of Yellowstone, rising before dawn each day to get ourselves mobilized and relocated by sunrise to a hillside overlooking the Lamar Valley. Some mornings a predawn “howlfest” alerted us to the wolves before we could see them – what a magnificent experience! Then, as dark turned to light, there they were: sometimes a few, but most days up to twenty wolves and their pups all playing and intermingling as they greeted the day. All in all, it was a truly remarkable experience, punctuated by two particularly special moments. The first was the day we were able to watch as a grizzly bear amble near the pack’s location. It was fascinating to watch the ensuing wolf pack protection behavior kick in, with the strongest members of the pack effectively herding the grizzly away from their wolf pups by nipping at its hind quarters and generally harassing it with their numbers. The other highlight was of the human interaction kind. We decided to track down the local author of one of the wolf books Sophia had read, the book that sort of “started it all” for her avid passion: The Rise of Wolf 8. And so it was that we spent our final wolf-watching morning alongside the author, Rick McIntyre, who was gracious enough to let us share his passion, his scope and time with him among his fellow wolf experts / colleagues, all while being atop his special spotting hill overlooking the Lamar Valley. Incredible.
Among many other things, the onset of Covid restrictions has meant that selling our boat is next to impossible: buyers cannot travel to see her, marinas won’t allow haul-outs necessary for a buyers’ inspection, and finally the general sense of economic uncertainty contributed to a difficult place for us: no sale. Instead we have been left trying to manage Kailani from afar, Harley traveling back three times to juggle her location as seasonal demands on the limited dock space on the east coast meant she kept getting squeezed out by “regular” customers. We repeatedly considered just getting back aboard and setting sail – how better to self-isolate? – but an ever-changing set of local and foreign restrictions and quarantines made it all just too logistically impractical and uncertain.
We are now back in Idaho. All signs that winter has arrived have happened: We have already had our first foot of snow; the elk that move down from higher altitudes have already graced our “front yard” with early-morning wanders; and most mornings are in the single digits. We are hoping for lots more snow so the skiing can ensue and we can use some of these short cold days to sit fireside and plan our next adventures.
So here we sit on the precipice of another year of cruising together as a family. On the positive side, we still own our beloved Kailani, and therefore blue water sailing adventures are definitely on the horizon for 2021. Where to? How long? Who knows! Most certainly our first step to figuring that out is to wander down from our high altitude mountains, get to the coast, find some sand, wait for low tide, and start scribbling!! We promise to keep you posted.
Anchor Ranch
McCall, Idaho USA
