LONG DRIVE HOME

It’s some 660 miles from Sun Valley to Seattle. It can be an easy drive but it can offer some challenges. We left shortly after 7 on Saturday morning, stopped at Starbucks, then launched down 75 and across 20. From Sun Valley to Boise there was fog, with visibility at times getting down to near zero. We stopped at Baker City.


A quick review of Baker City History shows where the priorities were and includes some irony. The first structure built? A saloon, in 1865. Nearly all the early buildings were wood, until Sheriff James Virtue built a stone fireproof structure in the 1870’s. It burned down ten years later. A later Sheriff, Harvey Brown, presided over the only legal hanging in Baker County in 1904. Sheriff Brown was assassinated three years later.

Over time there were several fires that ravaged the downtown area and one by one the wooden buildings gave way to brick replacements and those stand till this day. The architecture is nice, but it appears that there has been little funding for renovation since perhaps 1920.

Baker was named after the only sitting Senator to be killed in battle. Senator Edward Dickinson Baker was killed in the civil war battle of Ball’s Bluff (I am not making this up, really!). Abraham Lincoln, a close friend of Bakers, was said to be moved to tears when he learned of Baker’s death and Mary Todd Lincoln created a bit of scandal by wearing a lilac colored esemble (including hat and gloves), instead of the traditional black, to his funeral.

Once the largest city between Salt Lake City and Portland, the population showed steady growth until about 1940 where it has stabilized (stagnated) for the last 60 years.

Back to present day. We had a real nice lunch at the ‘Corner Brick’, saw some cute houses while walking Rex, then plunged back into the fog which finally parted when we hit the Blue Mountains.

The pass was a bit dicey, but we made it through safely and after a long day dropped down into Issaquah to Zekes for pizza.

LAST DAY IN THE VALLEY

We are wrapping up our time here in the Valley. Today’s adventure was snowshoeing near the Galena Lodge. 5km of snowshoeing. But not just any 5k. I was looking for a trail named ‘Lambs Way’ or perhaps a trip to ‘Gentle Pass’ or ‘Pleasant Meadow’. What did we end up picking?

Never trust a twenty something that says ‘oh, there’s a little bit of elevation gain’. Especially when the trail joins another one.

Actually it wasn’t all that bad. Just enough elevation gain to let your leg muscles know they are needed. Jodi liked the trail and Rex LOVED IT. Rex did get stuck once in the deep snow, but Jodi pulled him out.

We spent a little time in the Galena Lodge. Great little lodge, then back to the condo to get ready for dinner.

The three of us went to the ‘Sawmill Club’ which I liked, but it was a little noisy and the baked brie did not lived up to its much hyped expectation. On a whim, Jodi made reservations at della MANO. They had homemade pasta and each dish was fantastic. Complemented by a bottle of Sleight of Hand, we all had a great time.

The week passed much too quickly. I renewed acquantaince with the valley, Jodi and Rex saw it anew, but we all loved not only the valley, but the lifestyle that went with it. Wonderful time and we all feel a little younger being here a week.

SUN VALLEY PART TWO

Yesterday’s outing involved snowshoeing for Jodi and I and Skate Skiing for Mom. We had fair weather to start and excellent weather to finish.


As we finished our snowshoeing we ran into a gal with a couple of dogs and we learned she was Aaron Mercer’s great, great grand daughter. And brother to Asa and Thomas Mercer. The Mercer brothers were part of the founding group of the University of Washington, the infamous ‘Mercer Girls’ and my hometown, Mercer Island, was named after them.

Jodi and I discussed a way to commemorate mom’s ‘backup dents’. In recent months there have been a rash of small accidents with her new Subaru. All of them happening in reverse and all of them at very low speeds. We think we have a solution….

After coming home we switched gears and headed over to the Sun Valley Inn and Lodge. Mom and Dad spent quite a bit of time over there and while it was beautiful, it sparked conversation of the future of elegance past. The grounds are lit and it was fun walking around.

Then it was off the restaurant for an excellent meal. Duck and Trout highlighted the meal.

SUN VALLEY PART ONE

Fog forced an early Friday. I had planned on flying up on Kenmore air to the island to help mom close down the house for the balance of the winter, but persistent fog had cancelled all float planes Thursday and Friday was supposed to be a carbon copy day. The temperature inversion was crazy. Freezing fog and temperatures in the 20’s, yet high on Mount Rainier it was in the mid 60’s.


Rather than fly, I drove. To accomplish everything we needed to do, I needed to catch the 6:20 ferry, which meant a 4:30am departure from Shilshole. Groan.

The island was beautiful as always even with it’s winter gray coloring, but the chores were dispensed with in short order and we caught the 10:30am ferry back to Anacortes.

More chores awaited on the boat (the fan drawing hot air off the diesel furnace had given out after 30 years of faithful service), but Jodi arrived from Portland with an uncharacteristically plump Rex and we set out to find a new place to grab a bite to eat. We wound up at Burgandian, which was a nice treat. About 20 minutes after we arrived, Sue and Steve Hopkins unexpectedly arrived. What fun. Sue had just been interviewed by CNN regarding Lance Armstrong and her story had been featured on CNN.com.

We had to leave a little early to prepare for the long drive ahead, so back to the boat to pack and make final arrangements to leave for the Valley.

Saturday morning was another early one, albeit not as brutal as Friday. We met mom on Mercer Island then proceeded east on I 90, watching the temperatures rise as we gained altitude to the pass. Emerging from the lowland fog to a sunny mountain pass was uplifting and beautiful.

We split the drive to the valley into 2 days and stopped over in Ontario, Oregon, where the temperatures were hovering around zero. BRRRRR!! The only casualty was Jodi’s wiper wash system which froze thanks to Midas in Portland diluting their mix. A dangerous practice!

Sunday was a relatively short hop to the Valley and after arriving and unpacking the three of us set out on a nice walk on a local trail. It’s quite the dog trail and with tails high, Kuper and Rex sniffed and ran unleashed. Both seemed very happy.

Sunday was Mom’s 80th birthday and she kept up quite the gait for the 2 mile walk. I think she’s in rare form, being as fit and active as she is at that age.

To help celebrate her 80th some neighbors threw a dinner party and while she connected with old friends we met new ones and we all had a good time sharing stories. The clam linguini was wonderful and I could see how Mom and Dad really liked being over here with their friends.

Monday was a little lazy. Jodi was feeling the effects of the altitude, but we wanted a nice long walk, so back to the dog trail. This time we went a little further, and caught a picture that could have been skiing terrorists shooting surface to air missiles at unsuspecting targets. Or it could have been a contrail over Baldy. You decide.

The weather was great and Jodi took off her jackets and enjoyed the warmth of the sun.

Once back we got ready for another dinner party. The Masts were old friends of the folks and years ago the folks were the catalyst to get the Masts to buy in the Valley. Their present home in the valley is stunning and the dinner party was terrific. Another couple, John and Kay were there and the conversation flowed easily. We cooked the food at the table on a hot stone. Magnificent.

One special touches at both dinner parties was the presence of Makers Mark. We made Manhattans at both dinners to toast dad.

Tuesday was the day for cross country skiing. Dad had a pair of skate skies, mom had the complete set, so we rented a full out fit for Jodi and I rented boots. It turned out to be a little like buying a near $100 ticket to be humiliated by your 80 year old mother. In an athletic event.

Jodi did OK on her ‘classic’ cross country skies, but I just couldn’t get the hang of skate skiing. Mom seemed to glide near effortlessly, making it look rather easy. “Push….Glide! Push….Glide!” she’d yell and she was gone. I’d push, stagger, nearly fall, slip and slide. I made it look very difficult.

There were younger folks who zoomed by with impressive style. Jodi and I definitely want to learn to do this, but certainly there’s a technique that one needs to master. For the record, mom has had years of lessons, but at 80, she can hold her own on skate skies.

QUEEN ANNE AND BAINBRIDGE

I am a horrible blogger.   Once you get behind, it snowballs.  We’ve had some good little adventures, but once they accumulate, I didn’t know where to start.  So I thought I’d ‘blog backwards’.  Start with yesterday, try to stay current, then add back past stories as time allows.

Here is Friday's view --

 

This weekend was a rare ‘blank’ weekend.  No obligations, no place we ‘had’ to be.  What to do?   The Seahawks had a playoff game Sunday morning, where to watch it?

We talked about various plans during the week and we wanted to work in a hike or a long walk.  Snowshoeing?  Ideas went back and forth – but we landed on ‘climbing’ up and over Queen Anne Hill.  Rising a whopping 456 feet above sea level, it is a great neighborhood with wonderful views.  My grandfather built a home here in the early 50’s and Mom and Dad came very close to buying a house here in the early 60’s.   My early childhood memories of watching the space needle go up combine with later memories of talking my grandmother, at the ripe old age of 96, to move off the hill and in to an assisted living environment.

Jodi likes elevation and a good cup of soup, so our plan was to start near fisherman’s wharf and go up the Northwest ‘face’ of the hill, traverse it’s western side, get some lunch, make a summit bid and going down the eastern side to Westlake – where the east slopes of the hill slide under the western side of lake union (see our earlier blog post about walking around lake union).

The morning was cold.  Frosty docks.  Jodi captured some pictures of just how cold before we left.

Once we started walking, we heated up pretty fast.  I wish I would have taken more pictures of the architecture.  Some streets have cute, smaller homes, other streets have stately mansions.  Some styles seamlessly mesh, others clash, but it’s interesting.  And the views!!

This is the house my folks agonized over (the tudor style one).  They loved the house and the views, but it wasn’t very kid friendly.  ‘Where would the kids play’ was the question they just couldn’t answer and tilted the equation to the suburbs. 

This is the view from just below the house.

This is from Kinnear park, a few blocks away..

Lunch was great at one of the two nearly side by side French bakeries near the top of the hill and then we hiked down Galer street which has a series of steep steps from the top of the hill all the way down to Lake Union where we had placed a car for the return trip.

Saturday afternoon we unplugged the power cord, fired up Cambria and headed over to Bainbridge where we watched the 49’ers beat up on the Packers.  On the way Mt Rainier was out in full force and Seattle’s sky line shown in the sun.

We were treated to a great sunrise Sunday morning.

Unfortunately the Seahawks lost in a heartbreaker!!