November 25-30 2014

A couple weeks ago, Wired messaged me that she was planning a trip to Death Valley for Thanksgiving, and that LoveNote told her to kidnap me and drop me off in Lone Pine, where she and Burly recently bought a house and would be spending the holiday.  No kidnapping necessary, I eagerly agreed!

Planning oversight #1 (and a PSA)
Tuesday afternoon, Wired and I met in the southern Portland suburb of Tualatin to carpool.  Did you know it’s illegal to park your car (even on a public street) more than 24 hrs if you are not a local resident? Turns out the witch (or something that rhymes with witch) whose house I parked in front of is very aware of this law and called the cops on me less than 2 hours after I’d parked the car. I’ll spare the suspense and report that thankfully, between the understanding Tualatin traffic officer who dragged out my ticketing/towing as long as legally possible and an unnamed friend who scraped the violation sticker off my window with a butter knife, my Pontiac Vibe survived the weekend in one place.

 

Planning oversight #2
Upon hopping into Wired’s car to begin our 15 hour drive, I discovered that she drives a manual transmission.  Other than motorcycles, I’d never driven a manual transmission vehicle before.  After a 5 minute lesson in a grocery store parking lot in Klamath Falls, I now drive stick.

Planning oversight #3
Somewhere around the OR/CA border, I discovered that LoveNote and Burly would not be arriving in Lone Pine (they live full-time in Santa Barbara) until Wednesday night.  Wired and I were on schedule to arrive in Lone Pine early Wednesday, where she was dropping me off and heading out to explore Death Valley.  This left me on foot with no plans for the day. I messaged with LoveNote about this realization, and she relayed Burly’s response, “This is so typical of the trail — Wired is taking off to do her own thing, not waiting for anyone, and DNR is prepped and ready, waiting for us to get our act together and show up. I wonder when Sweetfish and Ninja are going to pop up out of nowhere?” Classic!!

 

We got to Lone Pine at 5:30am, because Wired is a crazy lady and drove straight through the night.  We found our friends’ house, complete with lighted avocado tree teepee (keeps the tree from freezing).  After a quick nap, Wired was off. I walked around town, ate breakfast, napped in the hammock in the back yard, and finally got up the energy to try hitching to Whitney Portal with the intent of hiking back down into town. The hitch never came, so I walked around the Alabama Hills until dark. When they arrived in town, LoveNote and Burly (and Huckleberry) fetched me from the local bar.

 

Planning oversight #4
LoveNote and Burly’s house is a work in progress.  They need to completely gut and redo pretty much everything.  One project for the weekend was to fix the toilet, which ran constantly.   When Burly was prepping to start this project Thanksgiving morning, LoveNote suggested he wait until the next day, when the hardware store would be open in case any additional parts were needed. (Foreshadowing at it’s finest!) But Burly was confident in the little kit he’d bought, which would feed 2 birds with one seed (we don’t stone birds here): fix the leaky flapper and and save water.  Note the package boasts “Install in 10 minutes without tools”.  Indeed it took less than 10 minutes….to cause a much bigger leak in the toilet.

 

It was a wonderful and memorable Thanksgiving shared with my dearest of friends, around a cozy fire nestled between the Sierra and Inyo mountains.

 

Thanksgiving night, Rockin’ stopped by and picked me up for a quick trip into Death Valley.  We met Wired at a campground and slept in our cars. In the morning we headed up to Mahogany Flats to hike to Telescope Peak (11,043′), which has a great views down to Badwater (-282′) and over to Mt Whitney (14,505′) and the Sierra.  I’d done this peak in early April 2009, but it’s a fun little hike and I was happy to do it again with my friends.  It was also a good opportunity to add to my ever growing list of streaked peaks.

 

After the hike, Rockin’ stayed in Death Valley with Wired while LoveNote picked me up to go back to Lone Pine to hang out.  On Saturday, Wired returned to Lone Pine and we had a girls trip to hike the little 4 mile trail from Whitney Portal down to the Lone Pine campground.  It was a really nice little trail with beautiful views and a good chance for us to all catch up.  We also stopped by the Alabama Hills and checked out the Mobius arch.

 

A great extended weekend with hike family!