Cascade Locks & Trail Days

Sept. 3, 2014

The lovely gentleman who gave us a ride into Cascade Locks decided that he was going to up his status from 'awesome' to 'absolutely freaking amazing' and bought us all lunch with dessert at Char Burger. Then he topped it off with a $15 certificate for the fudge flavor of our choice! Crazy, I know. People never cease to amaze me with their generosity. 

Snake Charmer and Trail Angel

The dessert!

Karaoke and Doc pointing to fudge certificate

We used the fudge money to buy postcards instead and had fun chatting with some other hikers who were there. Then it was time to find a hotel room and get the scoop on some free places to crash. Because, as chance would have it, our arrival coincided with the famed Trail Days. Trail Days is an annual hiker party that involves a ton of vendors getting together to give out, promote, and/or receive feedback on their products. We had been hearing that it was something we shouldn't miss, and it was to start in 2 days (Sept 5). So I decided to stay for it. Doc had to leave to go to a wedding and Karaoke also had to take off to meet up and hike with an old friend from back home. So just Snake Charmer and I were left from the crew, but hikers hitched in from all different locations on the trail so we were not in want of friends. Within the first two nights our friends Hugs and Pockets showed up, as well as Pippin, Merica' and Rush.

 The first two nights we rented a hotel room and took full advantage of the shower, laundry and television. Oh, and also the coffee pot...but not to cook coffee (see picture below). Since Snake Charmer had not felt the need to use his clever birthday gift (a bunch of fake mustaches (it was funny because he can't grow one), Hugs, Pockets and myself decided to use them instead. We proudly wore them over to breakfast and later to the local brewery.

Dimples, Pockets, Hugs. All rockin' the stache.

Snake Charmer, Merica, Hugs, Pockets

Merica with the ramen noodles he cooked in the coffee pot.

Our prime hotel spot put us right next to where the Pop-up Trail Angels had their hiker-feeding station set up. So both mornings we walked across the street and up a small hill to their RV which was camped at another trail angel's house (who goes by the name of Shrek). The food was absolutely delicious and she even made us banana-schnops coffee to start us off. Talk about a good morning! 

Merica, $inyk, Pippin, SinBad, Lobster, Lobster's mom, ?

Biscuit & Chef

 We then spent a lot of our time at the Cascade Locks Ale house. A lot of time as in, yes I am friends with the bartenders on facebook and, yes, I have been told I can visit their place in Portland whenever I want. But on a serious note, it was the best place in town to hang out. Right by the river and super friendly with both food and excellent beer.

My second night there I met two wonderful ladies who not only invited me to sit with them but also shared two carafes of wine with me! One of these ladies is named Pam and the other Linden Gross, who wrote a book called "The Legacy of Luna" which you should go buy right now. Like right now. Why are you still here reading my blog? She is currently writing a travel guide, which is why she was visiting the brewery in Cascade Locks.  We talked a lot about travel, life and woman power. It was this night that I became friends with Veganaise, who joined us for wine at some point.  Anyways I love these ladies. Absolutely love them. I was even able to catch them again the following night and hang out for a bit with their four dogs who were fluffy and adorable and provided some much needed puppy-love.

Me with Linden

It was also here that I first met Handstand, a beautiful woman with a huge personality, a Tennessee accent and a smile to match. I didn't know it at the time but we would be best friends in another 100 miles.

Handstand

The Brewery

Pockets showing off her sweet hair style

And then, finally, the festivities began. Trail days was being held on "The Island" which is just a man-made strip of land built to help regulate the ship channel. First thing was first: claim a sleeping spot. At this point I was still relatively new to the whole 'tarp' thing, and my skills at setting it up in the wind needed some work. And naturally, being a tiny sliver of an Island and all, the wind came in some very nice gusts. So needless to say I provided some great pre-party entertainment for the hikers around me. I ended up moving my tarp three times before finding a spot where my ties actually kept it tied down. But rest assured I did get it to work eventually! And I wasn't the only one, one of the vendor's shade covers was flat-out blown up and into the river while I was talking to them. Crazy.

That night there was dinner along the river with the Pop-up trail angels who had re-located into the parking lot across the bridge followed by more time spent at the brewery and then completed by an epic dance party. Whoot! The next morning was go-time for all the vendor booths.

Chef playing her didgeredoo

A man and his electric unicycle? 

I don't believe I have commented about it yet on this blog, but my backpack at the time was giant. I was wearing a Gregory Baltoro75 in a Men's Medium. That probably doesn't mean much to you, but just picture a kindergardender trying to wear a high-schooler's back-pack and you'll have a decent idea. This caused a lot of problems for me. For instance, the wrong size pack means that it pus pressure in the wrong places causing bruising and discomfort, distributes weight the wrong way for your spine and generally causes chaffing issues along with a number of other things. I had shopped for a new one all the way back in Bishop but they didn't carry my size and I couldn't find anything I liked better. So I had just stuck with it. But on this glorious day in September that was remedied! I approached the Gregory booth and asked if they could take a look at my pack to help me adjust it properly. Of course they said yes. So I brought it over and immediately Aaron, the man in charge there, was like, "Oh no. No. No this is all wrong. Why are you carrying a gorilla on your back?!" (Okay those weren't his exact words but that was the gist of it). So he re-measured me and took my contact information and then told me he was going to have their new model of the Gregory Diva65 sent to my next town-stop. FOR FREE. And I would get to keep my old backpack (most people make you trade yours in). He did ask that I pay it forward and give my old pack to a different hiker who needed it. Which I did! Then he also gave me a Gregory baseball cap! *Victory dance* I had been trying to get a free baseball cap all day...haha. So that was amazing. I also was handed free beers all day long. Seriously, I didn't even get the chance to think about maybe buying my own. If I wasn't carrying a can or bottle someone would offer me one, be it a vendor or a friend. But I somehow managed to not be silly drunk that day. Though by the end I was incredibly thirsty . They had forgotten to provide any type of water there. By the afternoon I went and filtered water from the river which felt weird because I was in town but who cares!

A view from the bridge

That night I skipped out on the video they were showing and had dinner and more free beer with some friends down at the brewery. Guy on a Buffalo, someone who I cannot recall and a stranger we picked up at the bar all played giant Jenga with blocks so big that we had to reach way far up over our heads to stack them by the end of the game. And when they came crashing down we were just thankful no one got hit in the head. After chatting some more with the bartenders, Biscuit, the Gregory crew and some others I meandered back to the island. I discovered that some new people had pitched camp next to me, but it was too dark to see who they were and by their conversation I gathered they were not through hikers. So without saying hello I began to walk past them to my tarp and that's when a magical voice called to me through the darkness saying, "Hey, would you like some smores? I made the marshmallows myself!"Yep. It was settled. We were gonna be friends. I accepted her generous offer for smores and then had about 3 more (she insisted).

Smores! 

The next morning was clear-out day. We couldn't camp there again because they were turning the sprinklers back on, and most of the hikers were hitching back to where-ever they had come in from on the trail. Snake Charmer and I decided to wait another day for Doc to get back from the wedding and then hike-out with him. And good thing we did because none other than Goldmine rolled up! I hadn't seen this crazy piece of hiker trash since I had been taking care of Oatmeal (remember the baby Kangaroo Rat?) But more importantly this day was awesome because it marked the first day Blueberry and I actually became friends. We ended up walking and talking together for a bit and going down to the river with Veganiase (who Blueberry had hiked with around the John Muir trail). Blueberry was ahead of us on the trail though, so that evening she caught a ride ahead with Rocco Shun. That night I ended up getting another hotel room and a pint of ice cream to go with it. Gotta live it up!