Forest Bathing

My eyes open at 7:30am. This is an ungodly hour for me, but still an hour and a half past our 6am target time. Alaina — definitely an early riser — looks at me in a sweet but disappointed way, but chooses to hold back any comment about it until she had to use it for ammunition later on. We scamper about the house waking up the kids to get them to school and packing up the van for our drive up to Fernwood. This is a bit of an unusual situation because we are usually much more prepared before an adventure.

We say goodbye to the kids as they walk to school, looking at us like we are abandoning them for eternity. We finally get the van packed up and Alaina is ready to go. I delay our departure, as I needed to shower and do my hair to feel adventure ready. As I'm showering, my head is filtering and sorting concepts from the movie "Men in Black" that I had watched the night before. After a quick jig to some music after my shower, I mosey about getting my hair finished up as Alaina reminds me that we still have to drop off the dogs in Weiser before we can head north. Feeling a bit bad for our late departure, I put some pep in my step.

On the way to the freeway, we stop at Maverick, cause you know — it's adventure's first stop. We fuel up, get some hydration, and we are off. The hour to Weiser was great. The puppos did really well in the back of the van and the tunes and conversation set a good vibe to start the trip. We get to Alaina's parents' house to drop the dogs off with her son Dreyden. The puppos explode with excitement and Dreyden was happy to see his animals again.

After some good talks and saying goodbye to Dave, we head to the highway out of town. Alaina takes the first round of DJing while I drove. It was a jam. Good tunes, windows down, flying down the highway, driving through rolling hills on the way up through the mountains. We make it to a gas station and grab some energy drinks. It was a popping place — the bathrooms were clean and the gas pump filled fast. We get our supplies and head to the van. That's when the feeling set in. We are on vacation. The stress sizzled away every mile we put behind us.

Somewhere along the way, Alaina gets into the driver's seat and takes the wheel. It's a bit unusual not being behind it, but it's comfortable as she navigates us forward. We fill our time with deep conversation about our pasts, our present, and what the future holds. Gorgeous rivers pass by and we of course forget to capture some photos on the drive up.

We get to Moscow — a nice little college town. We stop at the Winco there to fill our cooler with food and delectable beverages, watching the energetic college students walking about town in the bustle of their day. After shopping, I get back behind the wheel and off we go.

We had plans to go to Canada after the lookout tower and I had left my passport card in the safe at home. She had remembered hers, so naturally I felt as if I had ruined a part of the trip. But we create an alternate plan on the road that did not involve Canada. Sad sauce.

A good little jaunt from Moscow to Fernwood — mountain roads and beautiful scenery took us to a small mountain town with one mercantile. We pass some homes and trailers on the way up to a dirt road. This road makes the road to Atlanta feel like a breeze. Dirt, pits, gravel, the whole experience. The brochure said it was better to have a 4-wheel drive vehicle, but I had confidence in the van's abilities, as it had gotten us to many a sketchy place before.

We wind and twist up the mountains, passing people's land tucked away behind all of the trees, and we finally make it to the driveway up to the tower. It's steep. We get out and explore to see if the van can make it up this road and it looks somewhat promising. We of course misjudged this — halfway up to the first corner, the rocks slipped under the tires and we bottomed out on a huge rock under the center of the van. Momentum was lost and we started rolling downhill. Luckily there was enough traction to slowly reverse off of the path and get back down to the road. So the brochure was correct. A 4-wheel drive vehicle probably would have been a good call there.

This was but a small inconvenience, as the caretakers had a sled and snowshoes for packing up gear in such occasions. There was no snow, so we loaded up the sled and started our hike up the mountain. It was hell. We get to the first corner and it already felt like our hearts were going to fail — complete with heart palpitations. Lugging a sled uphill full of gear, half of which we didn't even need, dragging it over rocks, mud, and roots, I started getting dark tunnel vision as it felt like I was about to pass out. Alaina was doing a bit better than I was as we kept taking turns between hauling the sled and the cooler.

After a few come-to-Jesus moments, we finally make it up the quarter mile incline. And damn how it was worth it.

A huge sign with coordinates and information greeted us on the path to the tower. We round the trees and look up. There it is — Crystal Peak Lookout Tower. Two flights of stairs up a metal frame lead to a bottom opening door. It was another task getting our supplies up into the tower, and right after we did, we discovered there was a pulley basket system. As tired as we were, excitement took over immediately as we start to snoop about and see what the tower had to offer.

We decompress and descend the tower to explore the grounds. The sun was setting. It had been an 8-hour drive and another hour to get our gear uphill. So we decided to make some delicious PB&J sandwiches and enjoy some Twisted Teas as we unboxed the couples question cards that came with the tower. They were unusually deep questions, so that was a whole different level of laughter for the night.

Watching the sunset, looking down the mountain over a sea of trees, and later watching the stars and a beautiful mix of the Milky Way created a beautiful sense of gratitude. Alaina started a fire in the wood stove, and we hunkered down and passed out hard the first night.

The one thing about staying in one of the highest parts of a mountain in a lookout tower with windows around the whole building is that when the sun starts to get up, so do you. I'm not much of a morning person, but even I have to admit that it was absolutely gorgeous. Alaina wakes up and coaxes me awake with freshly hand-ground coffee to watch the sunrise. It's an unreal experience.

After we get moving about, we head down the stairs to check out the sauna. Walking through woods on the well-maintained paths, we approach the sauna and I get excited as I see the axe throwing station. I learn that I really, really like axe throwing. And I have somewhat of a natural talent for it. Alaina throws a few axes and decides that sunbathing on the deck is more her speed.

She puts on some tunes and I experiment with different throwing techniques. After a while of that, Alaina gets the fire going in the sauna. It's a wood fire sauna with hot rocks, so it heats up pretty fast. We enter the hotbox and stand it as long as we can. Thirty minutes or so go by and we get out and go over to the bucket attached to the roof. It collects rain water and has a string so you can dump water on yourself. Cold and crisp. After the cool-down we ascend back up into the tower to have a good chili breakfast and a nap.

We wake up an hour or two later and it's still not even noon yet.

We mosey about and decide to walk back down to the van to replenish our drinking water and check out the hiking trail. This time walking the paths wasn't too difficult as we didn't have a cooler and a sled dragging behind us. There was a much better trail that led down to the road, but it was blocked off to vehicles. We get our water and start hiking back up.

We get back and stop at the sauna. At this point we strip down and decide to be naked in the woods for the rest of the trip, as there is no one around for miles. After another round of the sauna and another bucket splash and some more axe throwing, we go back to the tower. I had left the door open to the tower so there were some flies to contend with.

Alaina wastes no time. She grabs the wood handle and leather fly swatter and proceeds to wage war on all of the flying bugs around. Historically this hasn't worked well for her on other camping adventures, but she is successful this time. She puts the swatter down as there are fly carcasses scattered about the room.

We have a snack and end up falling asleep for a second nap. It's a peace and a form of rest that is rare and hardly ever attained. Two naps in one day.

After we are done in the dreamscape, we grab our beer, more of the question cards, and scamper back down to the sauna. Walking in the woods naked is always a great experience, but this time it seemed as if the energies were cleaning and cycling and detoxing our bodies. It was borderline magic. We ramp up the sauna to 160 degrees. We go through some cards while sweat is being ripped out of our pores.

Alaina goes to get dinner going after a while and I stay for one last round of the heat. It's a nice time to chill and a bucket splash at the end makes it even better. I dry off and sit for a second to say thank you to the universe for this experience.

Another fly genocide was happening as I smelled delicious meat being cooked. Hopefully without flies in it. We spend the rest of the night laughing and enjoying each other's company. Stories, more question cards, an early night for us after a day of genuine rest. I draw a bit in my sketchbook, we enjoy our drinks, we see the sunset and the stars, and we enjoy the unusually comfortable bed. Lots of snacks and good times were had.

We wake up to the sunrise again and enjoy the delicious coffee. Each cup is a labor of love — Alaina grinds the beans in a hand crank, boils the water in the teapot, and drip-filters the coffee into the pot. (I helped a little bit.) We decide to get moving as we have to check out at 11.

We start cleaning up and I finally get to use the pulley basket. I get all the dishes down and start bringing them to the black water station — a sink that drains down the mountain and a huge drum of collected water. I proceed to freeze my hands off washing dishes in cold water at 8am in the mountains. It was great. Alaina gets the counters cleaned up and the ashes from the stoves taken out. We get everything packed up and ready to go by 9:30.

I look at Alaina and decide to throw a fit because I didn't want to leave. She laughs and says she would like to get on the road. She writes in the guest book, and we leave a folding camp table for the next round of adventurers.

We make our final descent down the incredibly steep stairs of the tower, all of our belongings packed in the sled for the trip down the mountain. We start our journey down — which was mostly me trying to catch the sled from blasting down the mountain, and Alaina laughing behind me watching it happen.

We get loaded up in the van and start driving down the mountain. We stop at the local mercantile for some breakfast and I must say — for random breakfast foods mashed up into a paste and deep fried, it was absolutely amazing.

We continue forth and hit a bit of a snag in decisions of what to do since I had hindered the Canada plans. After some verbal deliberation of clashing ideas, we head towards Pine Flats. A somewhat quiet drive there. But after 7 hours in the car and an hour out of our way, we made it to the hot springs — to find out that due to recent fires, none of the springs and none of the campgrounds in the area were open.

I was about to jump the gate, but Alaina in her great wisdom pointed out the sign warning of $5,000 fines to anyone that gets caught there. I'm pissed and I throw another fit. I really wanted to soak in the springs. But due to the general vibes we decide to pack up and just drive home.

We get home really late. Tired, ready for a hot shower. After unloading the van and cleaning up, we put on a show and drift to sleep. We weren't discouraged with the last day. The trip was absolutely amazing and we were able to experience the kind of rest and relaxation only dreamt about.