Rescuing a Vacation

The four of us traveled to California this past summer. We decided that the girls would enjoy a visit to San Francisco. We knew it would be cool, even in July, but we hadn't counted on the unseasonable cold that greeted us. We did enjoy some of our prior favorites, as well as some new destinations, such as the MOMA, Haight-Ashbury and The Golden Gate Park, but we found ourselves yearning for warmth. After all, we were SOUTH! We Minnesotans didn't really want to spend summer days wearing coats and knit hats.

After a few days, we were tooling further south in our rental car headed for the beaches of Santa Cruz. Driving along the Pacific Coast had its highlights, but we were dismayed by the fact that the temperature did not increase. After spending a few hours of bundling up at the beach and trying to keep our pizza plates from blowing off the table, we bought a highway map of the state and used our iPods to get current weather reports. The next morning, we took off, headed inland for Yosemite National Park. We cheered with every increase on the car's thermometer as we climbed the coastal mountains. leaving the ocean breezes behind us. We were giddy when we could actually open the windows and feel the warmth.

We discovered a roadside berry stand and loaded up on strawberries, cherries and free garlands of fresh garlic. By the time we hit a town with a fast-food restaurant to get some lunch, the temperature had risen about forty degrees and we had to restrain ourselves from dancing around the parking lot.



Our luck held as a woman at the Welcome Center in Mariposa helped us find the last motel room "within 80 miles." The next few days were positively hot! We hiked, swam and relaxed in the over 100° heat, relishing every degree of it.

While we have fond memories of the walruses at Fisherman's Wharf, Chinatown, Muir Woods and The Stinking Rose, our favorite memories of the trip were of our glorious days at Yosemite - the destination that rescued our vacation!

The Reunion Phenomenon

I attended my 30th year class reunion in Minot, North Dakota last weekend. There were plenty of people there to visit with - my class was 550 students - but more interesting to me was how many were not in attendance. I know plenty of friends who refuse to attend their reunions.

The reasons given are valid. "If I wanted to stay in contact with classmates, I would keep in touch all the time and not just show up with a bunch of people I don't care about." "I don't need to relive high school." "Reunions are for people who need to be in a popularity contest." "I've moved on!"



What I am more interested in are the reasons people DO drive 500 miles to attend an event with a few hundred people they don't really know. We in attendance obviously don't go around explaining why we are there. As I was driving across North Dakota and Minnesota, I was asking myself why I had gone. Why do I feel a connection with hundreds of people who just happened to live in the same town I did during my teenage years? Am I trying to relive my past? How much time and effort is reasonable to try to maintain friendships though Facebook and get-togethers?

Maybe there are just too many miles from there to here to ponder life's why's and what-if's!

The misadventures are much more interesting

My daughter Devin and I arrived home from our week-long camping trip four days ago and have had many opportunities to relate our adventures to family and friends. I find myself saying, "We had a great trip...until the end..." at which point I get to tell the stories that are the most fun: being lost in The Black Hills National Forest for hours during the evening of my birthday (luckily it was the Summer Solstice, so we had more daylight!), watching our tent whip away into the darkness and the Missouri River (with our gear inside) during a wickedly stormy night, and finally traveling home with my daughter experiencing acute appendicitis.

This phenomena of relating our misadventures seems to be quite common - it's part of what is exciting about traveling - the challenges! I certainly don't want to hear about all the pleasant and wonderful events of my friends' trips...I want to hear about the language hassles, lost luggage woes and having to seek medical treatment on a cruise ship. My favorite story from all my trips into the Boundary Waters Canoe Wilderness Area is the trip that got cut short because a bear ate all our food, not the one where the weather was perfect and we had no mosquitos. My only memory of a camping trip around Lake Superior when I was a kid is that it rained the whole time. My husband and I often brag about our honeymoon in the middle of August. We camped in the BWCA. It rained almost continuously, never got above 60° and we only survived by inventing "fire in a box" Now THAT was a honeymoon!

Heading West

I'm headed to South Dakota and Wyoming tomorrow for backpacking and camping. I hope to avoid grizzlies (as well as black bears) and rattlesnakes. We plan to hike the Badlands National Park and The Wind River Mountains. I learned from last year's trip to Isle Royale National Park to pack LIGHT! I was reading Rod and Sharon Johnson's "Comfortable Ultralight Backpacking." Rod claims that we overpack due to fear. We're afraid of cold, hunger, getting lost, bugs, etc. so we gear up to protect ourselves; makes sense to me! Unlike Rod, I will be bringing toilet paper along-not sure what fear prompts this...