Deschutes Trip Redux, or Most Expensive Vacation EVER

tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick

This is the sound coming from the engine compartment of the van. Quiet, unobtrusive. Might be a little low on oil. We'll check it once we get over to Maupin, before we head down the 17 miles of Hell known as the Deschutes River access road.

It's about 2:30 in the afternoon on Friday. The van is fully loaded, as is the boat that the van is towing. Sammy and I are in charge of the bulk of the food for the trip. Remember the entry about the concrete ice cooler? Yep, it's in the boat, full of block ice. We are just outside Sandy. Usual father/son banter has been going on, as well as a little bitching about traffic and plans for the upcoming week.

Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick

The sound coming from the engine is definitely a bit louder. Probably due to the load and the fact that we are now going uphill. Haven't quite reached Government Camp yet. Radio still coming in ok so we haven't switched over to the CD's yet.

TICK TICK TICK CLACK TICK CLACK TICK CLACK CLACK CLANK

Okay...now that's fucked up, right there.. Past Government Camp now, heading up towards the summit. The van will not go faster than 25 mph. Tim is worried, starts a diagnosis as to what might be the problem with the engine. Tim thinks the engine is toast but hesitates to vocalize this to Sam. Sam is utterly silent.

Tim: "It sounds pretty bad, Dad.. But I think if it were really bad, like a thrown rod or something, it wouldn't even be running.."

Sam: "Yeah."

Sam: "We'll stop at that Pine Grove/Pine Hollow/Oak Hollow/Whatever the Hell that town is called where the road flattens out. See if there's a mechanic there."

Tim: "Okay."

Sam: "Shit."

We stop in Pine Grove at the store (the only one) and ask if there is a mechanic in town. The van is still running because we are afraid to shut it off. There are no mechanics in Pine Grove.

Sam: "Maybe we should head back to Government Camp and call somebody."

Tim: "Yeah...But that means we have to drive back up that mountain we just came over, and I don't think that's gonna happen."

Sam: "Shit. GawdDAMMIT! Ok, Maupin or bust it is!"

CLANK CLANK CLANK CLUNK CLANK CLANK CLANK

The sounds coming from the engine aren't just loud anymore, they are hammer-on-anvil-in-empty-warehouse loud. The inside of the van is completely quiet. No radio, no CD's, no talking of any kind. Tim thinks we may be spending the night in the van. Tim knows that Sam snores loud enough to wake himself up. Tim does not think he will be sleeping tonight.

Miraculously, we make it to Maupin. At 5:00 p.m. on a Friday. We stop at the first garage we come to, which is closed. Thankfully, the owner is still there and agrees to take a listen. Sam starts the van for him.

Old Garage Guy: "Jesus-Fuckin'-CHRIST SHUT THAT THING DOWN!!!"

Old Garage guy: " You came from Portland?"

Tim: "Well, Canby..Yeah. We stopped at Hollow Pine Oak but there weren't any mechanics there."

Old Garage Guy: "Un-Fuckin'-believable. Thrown a rod for sure. You fellas are damn lucky to have made it here. I can take you over to the Oasis, but that thing is gonna have to go to The Dalles. I can't fix it here."



Next, Redux Part II, The Oasis...

Everywhere there's signs

Note to Canbyites-

"They" have extended the 45 mph zone north of town from just past Fred Meyer to the top of the hill.. The signs went up last Thursday or Friday I think.

Expect speed traps in the near future!

I am sooo gonna get a ticket...

Playing Dress-Up

Well now... It would appear that I'll be attending my first bona-fide, costume required Halloween party in quite some time! My normal routine for this particular day is to shut the porch light off and pretend I'm not home, so this will be quite a change..

Now I won't give away what I'll be, but I only had to get a couple of accessories to complete the look. Most of this ensemble is stuff I wear fairly regularly anyway.

Scary, huh?

And yes, it is a real costume! I'm not going as "Tim", or "Biker Dude", or some lame assed not-really-dressing-up costume..

That wrinkle wasn't there yesterday...

Okay. So last night I had to take some movies back to the movie place. They have this deal going right now where you pay like $10.00 a month and you can get all the movies you want. My dad thought this was a decent deal so he signed up. Since we are sharing living space at the moment I opted not to.

Now before I get to the rest of this little story I have to share this. My dad is without a doubt the worst movie picker-outer in the world. He has no clue as to what got good reviews in the theater, or if the movie he's picked was ever even IN a theater. He picks rentals by the cover. If he likes the cover, he rents it. That is always his excuse, "It had a good cover". He also is prone to renting the same movie twice (or more) because he looks at the cover, not the title. This is why I found my self in the following situation...

Since he has unlimited rental privileges, I have been using his account to rent the movies lately. Usually I just have to give them the phone number and say my name is Sam. Last night, the kid at the counter wanted either the rental card or a phone number and picture ID. I gave him the number and then fell silent.

Movie Store Kid: "Do you have a picture ID I can see?"

Me: "No."

Movie Store Kid: "Uhhhhh.... can I have your date of birth then?"

Me: "6/1/1943"

Movie Store Kid: "Okay! These will be due back on Sunday by midnight."

He didn't even blink.

Now I know I've had a year or two of hard livin', but I'm pretty sure I don't look 61...Why I bet I don't look a day over 53!

One for the Road

Saturday I joined some friends at the White Eagle and saw The Rascos play. It was a good band, playing pretty much all 50's and 60' Rock-N-Roll. Gotta love a piano player that reminds you of Jerry Lee Lewis!

The only thing that stunk was riding home at 1:30 in the morning in the rain.

I discovered another cool side effect of sobriety: I don't know if this is true of most bars or just McMenamins, but since I was drinking diet cola all night the bartenders assumed I was the designated driver, and they were FREE!

Why yes, I believe I will have another, thank you..

There's no place like Home

A traditional saying amongst The Core once the trip starts is "It's good to be back home". This is always said right when we get over there, not when we come back.

As I said before, we've been making this trip for a long time. Camp has evolved over the years, due in part to innovation, and partly due to Bob's virtually unlimited resources. Did I mention he's a bazillionairre? Technically we are indeed camping. We do sleep in tents, all the food is kept in coolers, and your daily consitutional will be done outdoors. Beyond that, however, it can hardly be called roughing it. It takes no less than four full boatloads to get camp down to camp. Now that I think about it, it might be more of a compound...

Every year we bring up some 2x6 boards to make a table for the cooking area. I'm not sure why we do this as the table tops from years past always seem to stay where we leave them. Anyway, once set up, the "kitchen" has 3 tables making a U shape. One of the first things Bob bought was a proper grill for cooking large quantities of food. He had a restaurant grill converted to run on propane, and it has worked flawlessly for 20 years now. It even has a pilot light so you don't have to relight it every time you want to use it. The cooking is a group affair, and no expense is spared on the cuisine. We never eat breakfast before 10:30, and it pretty much always consists of bacon, sausage, eggs, and hotcakes. Lunch is usually not necessary. For this years dinner menu we had:

Steak night (filets, with melted feta cheese)
Prawn night (with mushrooms, sauteed in butter and garlic)
Spaghetti night (yes, the sauce was made not just heated)
Smoked pork chop night (If you've never had one, go to Voget's in Hubbard and get some)
Lobster night (barbequeued, mmmmm)

All fried taters are "blessed" by me with a healthy dose of Tabasco. Garlic bread is made also, with real butter and sliced garlic. Salad, new to the menu this year, was a welcome addition.

BTW- all these foods, when taken to this particular camp site, magically become fat and cholesterol free! Have as much as you like..


When we first started going on this trip it was a 3 day event, so bathing was not much of an issue. As the stay became longer, the need to get the grunge off became overwhelming (especially considering the amount of garlic used in the food). We first tried those 5 gallon shower bags that you set in the sun to heat up. Worked okay, but man what a pain to use. Bob has since devised the system we use now. A hose with a filter on it goes into the river. This is connected to an electric pump that runs off of a car battery. The water is pumped through a propane powered water heater, then goes up the line to a real showerhead that is hung up in a tree. When you turn the shower on, it goes from 0 to "damn that's hot!" in about 2 seconds. It's amazing the difference a little soap and hot water makes..

Jealous yet? Wanna go next year?

Oh yeah, the fishing is awesome too.

Fairly Honest Sam

He's had this nickname since I was a small child. My dad, the salesman. He even had a t-shirt made with that name once. He has had many nicknames over the years. After the second time he fell off the roof we started calling him Captain Gravity, and gave him a hat and one of those inflatable pool-rings to strap to his ass. Has also proclaimed to be BUFF, actually an acronym for Big Ugly Fat Fucker. Most recently, after helping me paint the interior of my old apartment, I have taken to calling him Drippy the Trim Boy.

As I stated in the last post, he's the Idea Guy. Always coming up with "new and improved" even if the everything is going along just fine.

One area of constant concern when you camp in the desert is water, both the liquid and frozen kinds. Sammy excels in hatching new schemes to provide both. His first idea, years ago, was to use dry ice in the coolers. Dry ice is really really cold, and it kept the food really cold too. Unfortunately, though it is really really cold, it doesn't stay that way for very long. Plus when it heats up it just evaporates, leaving nothing in the cooler but rapidly warming food. Plus dry ice costs, well, like a gazillion times more than the kind made from water.

His next idea was to build a bigger better cooler. "Those ones you buy only have maybe a quarter inch of Styrofoam in 'em", he says. So off he goes, buying sheets of 2" thick Styrofoam sheets. After gluing the pieces into a box-like shape, he applies a few coats of a product he used to sell called Miracote. This is basically concrete that can be applied in thin layers, good for coating driveways, sidewalks, etc. Sammy really likes this stuff. What we end up with is a four foot long concrete box that actually works very well. Kept the block ice solid for a whole week no problem. Except for the handles. It doesn't have any. And its heavy. If full, it cannot be lifted by two people. We only ended up using it once. Had to take everything out of it to move the box onto the boat, put everything back in, then take it all out again to move the box from the boat to camp.

This year his idea ended up working very well. The though was that since we have to take bottled water and we need ice, why not just freeze all the bottled water? So he did. And it worked! The plastic bottles seem to insulate the ice in the bottles very well, and we had ice all week long. They actually worked too well. You could take a bottled ice thingy out of the cooler in the morning, let it sit in the sun all day, and it would still mostly be ice well into the afternoon.

Next year Drippy plans on fine tuning this method using gallon sized jugs and keeping the drinking stuff separate. We'll let you know.

John the Baptist and his brother, Cecil

I just got back from my yearly vacation to the Deschutes river. We have a core group that has been going on this trip annually for about twenty years now. Sometimes we catch alot of fish, sometimes not. Sometimes the weather is perfect (like this year), usually the wind blows really hard in the afternoon (not this year though), and sometimes it rains. The one thing that never changes, though, is the entertainment provided by The Core.

Now there are always others that show up and stay a couple days or so, lots that say they are going and then don't show, but The Core is always there to set up camp and to take it down at the end.

The Core consists of:

Me (Resident Smart-Ass, Newly appointed Voice of Reason [I quit drinking a while back])

Sam (My Dad, the Idea Guy, usually outsmarts himself)

Bob (The Expert, The Boat Guide, King Fisherman, and Most Likely to Throw Up after Drinking)

George (The Worker, The Partier, Best Laugher, and Most Likely to Fall in the River)

Steve (aka "Watt-Man". The New Guy. Only been going for about 5 years. Comic relief specialist, though rarely on purpose)


There is always one night (sometimes more) when George, Bob and Steve get really really drunk. This year it was the first night, and the first night provides the title for this entry. This was the exchange between Bob and George after some 7 bottles of wine had been consumed:

George: "Knock knock."
Bob: "Who's there?"
George: "John."
Bob : "John who?"
George: "John the Baptist!!!"

At this point, George throws all the red wine in his glass at Bob, "baptising" him, which also gives him an instant tie-dye shirt.

Bob, never to be outdone, replies with "Well this is from John's brother, Cecil!!", and then throws his glass of wine at George.

Both men had horrendous, well deserved hangovers the next day.

More to come...it was a long trip!