Currently On The Road

Team Toolshed is on the road.  We left Monday morning (cats staying behind, of course; we are grateful for Anita taking care of them for the week).  It's a combination of work and family visiting, a week on the road.  A few snippets from the trip so far:

Montana is an early morning start, straight from the bed to a down jacket, the cold metal of the roof racks bite fingers as we load the car in slowly brightening fog.  Gallons of extra veggie oil fuel cram the trunk, and containers for buying more in Portland. The wildfire smoke seems to be creeping back in, so it may just be a good time to get out of town. 

Idaho is easy.  We breeze through the skinny part of this state on veggie oil in the time it takes to have a few conversations: another debate about pigs, scheming over tractors, cover crops, speculating about compost.  

Washington is still smoky, but bright rabbitbrush in bloom lines the roads through the Palouse country.  We are headed for Quincy, a small town in the middle of fields watered by the Columbia, with blue labels on the fences informing drivers what is growing in each field.  My favorite reads "PASTURE: HORSES."  While Noah interviews a bean farmer and consolidator, Malaya and I wander a strange region of ag warehouses and offices.  Tons and tons of food are being gathered and stored here--apple trucks loaded with the giant wooden crates come and go, but the whole complex has no living plants except the green grass in the adjacent cemetery, so we walk there instead.  Diesel fumes, smokestacks, and acres of mysterious cement buildings are all somehow part of the food system.  It's a bit large. 

We know White Salmon, with our good friends, dinner, and bed, is south on 97, but we don't quite know how far.  A traffic back-up near Toppenish appears to be from an accident involving an apple truck. The vehicles have been dragged off the intersection, but a galaxy of smashed apples remains on the pavement. 

Dropping down hills into the start of Oak tree country on the Yakima Nation, wild horses graze ont he side of the highway. Lights flash when we let the downhill get to fast, but the officer is hiding a smile behind his grey mustache.  Holding the license, the worst we get is a warning: "You're going to have to take it down by about 10 miles an hour, or we'll make you brush your dog." We promise to behave.

We make it to the Columbia Gorge in dark, tired and grateful for friends to take us in.