User:Timeshifter/Sandbox 7

Besides spell checking and adding a few missing words (in bold), I also added the occasional comma and period. Bolded, italicized word(s) with a question mark (?) are for words that I don't understand, or don't understand in context, or don't think that they are correct for the sentence meaning as I understand it.

Chapter 3

In these first few days of the trip I concerned myself with safely placing Hampton somewhere and getting back wit the bus quickly. It was quite a bit of anxiety for me. This method took work and savvy, being quick on the feet and quick of wit. A chance conversation could quickly lead into a ride and the opportunity to share the Akha story. I prodded myself to be doubly revved up when I felt tired as I could easily miss an opportunity to speak, which might mean a ride or a place to put up Hampton or some other kind of help.

Starting out I pretty much knew what the horse logistics would be, but the bus, family and hitch hiking back to the bus presented new challenges and tasks to finely coordinate, all in very demanding time frames.

Maybe the trip felt boring at first because I knew the area close to Salem quite well. So I anticipated getting further south in Oregon. New scenery, and of course new experiences.

I thought about what we would work to accomplish in Eugene. The Paul W. Lewis Ph.D. case at the University of Oregon still needed work. I wanted the University to see what had occurred and make some effort to rectify the damage done. And then we also needed to do something about Richard P. Haugland from Eugene who lived in Thailand and took small Akha girls away from their families to educate them, These girls ranged in age from 5 years to 12 years. A Hmong woman worked for Richard and helped broker getting the girls. Volunteers told me about their concerns that the girls did not live with their families and became “possessions” of Richard’s. These volunteers spoke of the mistreatment of the girls by the Thai staff. Pinching, hitting, verbal abuse. Supposedly the girls fell into one of two categories for Richard, “bright” and “dumb”. The “dumb” ones he sent off to some other orphanage further south, separating the girls from their families even a greater distance. His boarding house in Chiangmai, Thailand went under the name “Starfish Country Home”. Richard P. Haugland made a fortune in genetics related projects, tools for DNA research. Genetic markers. He and his wife ran a business called Molecular Probes that they sold for an excess of $300 million, in Eugene, Oregon. Then it became Invitrogen and after that it became Life Technologies.

I wanted to see him send the kids back to their families. A man of such wealth could easily support village schools and keep families together. He had no excuse to remove the children. We would organize some kind of protest in Eugene about this.

Some years ago Paul W. Lewis got approval from the University of Oregon (U of O) to do his Ph.D. thesis on sterilizing Akha women. U of O approved it and Lewis’s thesis tells how he went about doing the sterilizations. His thesis reveals his own personal thinking that he thought it was real important to sterilize these people. There were clever ways to get it done. Interesting enough he and his wife were also sterile. I wondered if there wasn’t some screw loose over seeing all these very fertile Akha women running around out there and he had to even the score so to speak, correct this injustice. Interesting also that as far as we know there is no more of his own genetics running around.

I had done some research and it appeared he had adopted a couple of children who had both died.

We had a copy of his thesis on our website akha.org. So far, the University didn’t seem to have any sense that they needed to address this issue. Maybe we could make some progress getting some recognition of the problem by the University.

I thought about all these things as Hampton picked his way along the road headed south.

Along the road in places like Camp Adair, where the rail tracks lay idle. I always looked at the rails, if they were polished from cars or covered with long term rust.

In the borrow pits I saw various animals, among the cat tails left over from last year.

These early days I thought about what the trip would be like, what rhythm would build and chiefly worried about the surprises as in mechanical problems with the bus, like any surprise big enough to shut us down, a major financial or mechanical breakdown. I worried the trip would meet some early crippling disaster. I had worked so hard by the skin of my teeth to get this far. In time a routine would begin to carry us. The hitch hiking was the biggest event I hadn’t counted on. This worked for me to hide Hampton and hitch hike back to the bus but at first felt like a ton of work and not very dependable. That changed in time. I got very good at it. I relied on it. Each night after parking Hampton some where it was a new challenge to quickly get back to the bus with a ride to where my troops waited.

Always a kind of magic took place. I thought that the trip would feel more secure when we had eighty days under our belts. We just started, so we would slowly build a record.

The kids make wonderful artwork back at the bus each day. They covered the walls of the bus with it. Crayons, water colors, colored pencils.

As I rode these first days into weeks and longer, I savored every day that I found the end of, several finish lines all before midnight, many tasks accomplished. No big surprises came and I was blessed. A lot about the trip was blessed. I saw that throughout. The trip itself became a conversation with God on many a back dark road in any weather across the US. Surreal what would happen. I remained devoutly upbeat, undefeatable. The good energy of people we met. I noted what difficulties established a pattern. We were setting off on a great journey and each new day that we completed was a huge victory for us in itself. And for the Akha, because the only reason we ventured was to increase the benefit and publicity for the situation of the Akha. I came up with many solutions, there was excitement at the end of every day too, not just fatigue. At last we were doing it, the country changed slowly day by day. First the places were familiar country and then they were not. On the way to the coast I had dreaded the nbarrow (?) road and getting back again to the valley. Once headed south I anticipated Eugene and addressing some problem people there, people who had made trouble for the Akha. Maybe a lot of people just smiled when I told them I was riding to Los Angeles and then New York. But that was OK. Just to LA was a great journey in itself. I looked forward to doing the whole California coast. Maybe they didn’t think we would make it that far let alone NY?

Hampton kept walking and all these details and currents tumbled through my mind.

New: Put at beginning Come morning I fed Hampton and got him some more water off a spigot at the nearby store in order to conserve what water we stored in the bus tanks.

The coastal wind blew strong, I saddled Hampton and the whole family walked down to the beach. We had to go around a motel, down a path. The waves whipped up and we all got our picture in the surf, time to cross a continent by horse once again.

Leaving the windy beach with rocks and shells and driftwood we all headed back to the bus. Two women stopped me for a photo, “Were you the guy we saw on TV?” I didn’t know. Maybe I was, but I hadn’t see the camera. This happened to me more than once on the trip.

They gave me $40 at any rate to help with the trip.

Brian Keane sent out some money as well, a couple hundred dollars to make sure we had a good footing, and that helped immensely for diesel and grain.

After the family got back to the bus I rode south through Lincoln City to find a feed store and some green grass for Hampton. The man at the feed store said he’d deliver the grain and hay to the bus, I rode back, giving Hampton time on a patch of deep green grass beside the main drag where there was an empty lot between two houses.

As a family we often went fishing just north of Pacific City. Lincoln City felt different, quite a bit busier, but all the interesting shops and feel one gets with any Oregon beach town. Reminded me of when I was young in Tampa, Florida along the beach too. Course there we saw plenty of colorful sea shells and the beach shops were full of inflatable rafts and such, just waiting to get wet after you bought them.

We went flounder hunting in those days, a Coleman lantern on blue waters late at night, warm and clear.

We went to Pacific City on the mouth of the Neskowin river, quiet and secluded. We usually went on Thursdays and camped over night. We didn’t catch much in the way of fish but we always had a good time of it. The salmon runs greatly diminished over the last years, but we saw a few in the water. Nearby fisherman caught one now and then on flashy lures or spinners but they never bit our hooks. The local bait shop where we always stopped sold popular color combinations painted on the spinners. Oranges and greens. We always needed a few sinker weights, or sand shrimp or worms. Camped at the nearby state park, we spent usually two days there before heading back to town.

A man came out of the curiosity shop as I rode by the front of the shop and asked me how much I wanted for my spurs, joking. I tied Hampton nearby and went in for a quick look around.

I could not leave Hampton long these early days while in a town as he got quite restless.

Hampton got back to his small plot and I planned an early departure for the long ride back to Ft. Hill on some really tough narrow road.

As we went along we began seeing wooden crosses every mile at the mile sign posts, they were from a one legged woman walking the entire US coast, praying for people, encouraging people to do the best with what they had, she left a note on each cross wrapped in plastic to protect it from the rain.

I saw these crosses all the way to San Francisco, maybe this was where she ended her trip.

In Oregon and especially on the coast there is a lot of weather, rain. This makes the coast especially great for camping out with ones’ love, a cozy cabin, a cozy place to eat and sleep. At Pacific City the Pelican Bay pub right near the Haystack Rock made good beer, and sometimes we bought food at the market across the road which always closed obnoxiously early and unlike the rugged places of my child hood, felt expensive. When I was a kid people would even open up for you, but now more often businesses made a buck then locked their costly doors right on the money. Policy.

The coca cola chest coolers were gone and you won’t hear the screen door slam as you cross a creaky wooden floor looking for marshmallows, wieners and wooden fish bobbers. The stories we live differ in some ways from the 1958 Field and Stream magazine I found in some house as a child in Everett, Washington. We write down our own stories now, maybe just as far fetched.

We went to Pacific City as a tradition, as a place spun in our hearts, a place we’d never forget, for all the children.

Come morning I saddled Hampton very early and headed up the road out of Lincoln City towards the forest and Ft. Hill. I must cross more than one narrow bridge and get past many hidden corners, carefully switching sides of the road for the side that made sure the drivers could see me. (Hampton falls asleep and falls down walking). I didn’t want to surprise a driver on the inside of a blind curve around a hill.

This part of the forest is filled with water and animals. However, one gets a deceptive view from the road because a corridor of trees is all one sees. Beyond this corridor of trees, a thin corridor, the forest is cut like a commercial crop very similar to corn, replanted and cut again. The environment is damaged and immature. This thinking can not and does not protect all the native species. I remembered how the Akha said it takes 50 years to build a village, I wonder how long it takes to build a real forest?

Now with the housing market well collapsed what wisdom could be found in our economic methods? Oregon old growth forests shrank by the year.

The long treacherous road back to Ft. Hill in the moist fog kept me alert. Hampton still looked underweight from his days at Holiday Rose (but in time he gained his full weight back).

Trucks hurled by whipping us in clouds of cold early morning spray. Once past Rose Lodge we headed up the mountain. Early march, the snow that fell the other day still lay on the ground. It was that cold.

As we approached the top of the grade, I was walking just out of change of routine, thinking, plugging along and walking next to a concrete barrier along side the highway when suddenly I heard a scuffling behind me and Hampton had fallen down right where he walked behind me, he surged, tried to get up, went down again and surged back up kicking up a bit of a storm. This really surprised me, I wondered if something was wrong with him, and checked him over. There was nothing but a scuff where he scuffed himself, and all I could figure was that as I walked along silently he plain old fell asleep. After that I talked to him, whistled, or chewed on a song, to make sure he stayed awake.

The Daily Routine The day had several distinct sections to it. In the morning I’d get up, get some coffee and check my email. Then something to eat after I took grain out to Hampton. That way he’d be all fed time I was ready to saddle up. After I was done with breakfast and spending a little bit of time with my kids, I’d saddle up Hampton and ride. Always I had to remind myself of the days weather, hot or cold, water, camera and charge the phone.

Then I’d ride all day, talk to people, have some lunch and keep an eye out for a person who might offer a ride back to the bus. By evening it was part two and I was looking for a place to hide Hampton. This was either a place in the forest where he wouldn’t be seen or near someone’s place where they would agree to keep an eye on him. I was a bit surprised that people were abandoning horses. (?)

Then I’d strip all the gear, bundle the blankets, and get on the road with the saddle. This was the third part of the day. Getting back to the bus. I began my unpredictable journey back to the bus. Ah Pymm would call and ask me in her soft sweet accented voice, in Akha, “Are you there yet?” meaning, was I at where I was going to put Hampton? And then she would woefully explain to me that there was no milk now and no orange juice, her two chief companions besides Ah Ngoh. Who could possibly not be touched in such a kind way by a little girl calling to inform of the status of the refrigerator. Sometimes it took me quite an effort to close the day out and make sure those two items were in stock.

Sometimes it took hours to get rides back to the bus, sometimes many hours. The latest I ever got back to the bus was at 5am. Probably the roughest night, or one of them, was Tunica, Mississippi.

Once I got a ride I told the driver what I was riding for and the life of the Akha people. Maybe they saw the horse, maybe they didn’t, so I had to fill the story in a bit for them. When they got to the bus a lot of things fell into place. (Pennsylvania cop asked me if there really was a bus where he was taking me?)

When I got back to the bus the fourth part of my day began. I’d thank the person who gave me the ride, stow the saddle and blankets and get something to eat and drink. Usually the kids were still up but often they were not. They were very stout troopers, I can not say enough about that.

Often they eagerly hopped out of the bus and helped take the blankets and helped me get the saddle into the bus. Often it was all I could do to lift it after a long day.

Maybe I had to get diesel, food or check email because where Hampton was there didn’t appear to be a good signal. I’d get that all done and start up the bus and drive back to Hampton. Once back at Hampton I would get him grain, water and hay, put on his quilt if it was cold or rainy, and maybe move him to a better but more visible place where there was more grass. Maybe it was better to get groceries where we arrived at so I’d do that now.

Grain could also be another side trip. For groceries the kids loved to go along and tell me what we needed since sometimes I couldn’t even think clearly at the end of the day. I had no food ideas. Then I’d settle into time with the kids before they went to bed going over school work or what their day or my day was like. Who came to the bus, etc.. I’d look over the tattered map for where tomorrow would take me, check email, start downloading the day’s video and crushing (?) to get it ready for the internet. If I needed to clarify a video or tell a story or explain some aspect of the trip or the lives of the Akha or our work, Ah Soh, my oldest son or Meeh Daw would hold the camera. They might be tired and doze off to sleep while standing there, the camera slowly settling down till my head was cut in the video.

If I had a good signal I’d get it all loaded before I went to sleep. Sometimes there was a coffee shop within walking distance. Hands down Starbucks had the fastest servers. Always there were people who came to the bus at night or in the morning to see what we were about.

Sometime around 1am or later I would fall into bed and forget the whole world. I was good at doing that, I shut off my worries, I had finished the day in front of me. That was enough.

I didn’t worry so much about the next day.

My day would start all over again at 7am or earlier. Then I’d repeat the day’s routine again, all four parts of it with many variations. Fatigue and exhaustion followed my every day.

The Ride The world went by. Hampton dropped his hooves clop after clop. The saddle leather squeaked. It squeaked with each step, a steady squeaking and groaning. A back and forth motion a bit of side to side, was a bit hard to feel, I really fit into Hampton’s rhythm. I wasn’t uncomfortable, just could have felt more at ease with his walk.

We seldom ever trotted, that was too painful for my back. That was also quite choppy, he cantered more reluctantly. But he had a great canter like a rocking chair, once he decided to use it.

Move Riding into the surf, I turned around and faced the continent like a ship facing a vast ocean and leaning into the wind. What a long way we had to ride. Sometimes it was a burden to the mind to try and even comprehend it.

Move to Ch. 1: The road from Ft. Hill to the coast was full of ideas, and histories and dark stories. At Grand Ronde Gen. Phil Sheridan rounded up the surviving members of many tribes and conveniently placed them with the St. Vincent De Paul church on the “reservation”. A church could always be found when a genocide with the native Americans was going on.

There were dairies, mostly closed, farms, saw mills, and closed saw mills. Nothing much remained of the hard wood mill. Some of the Indians had survived and now had some of their “own” timberland back (took an act of Congress under Senator Hatfield) and a very large casino. There was a health center and housing, much better conditions than 20 years ago. Willimina or Sheridan had a Federal Prison, more people on the reservation. A rez for another group of people. To employ unemployed settlers who had run out of trees to cut and salmon to fish.

The road ran through what was called Van Duzer corridor.

Stopped spell checking

There was a stone there alongside the road to commemorate a road built by settlers on an Indian trail.. It was an early toll road. Unfortunately most of the mammoth trees were gone, faded into black and white photos of loggers standing aty the end of one log on a trestle line built out to the logging site, or men on a plank way up on a tree butt getting ready to saw the majesting champion down. So the corridor was actually a small row of trees on either side of the road that gave you the impression you still drove through a great forest when actually just on the other side of the strip of trees ther was more likely than not a clearcut now replanted with trees more like a cornfield. I had lived out there in Grand Ronde. The huge stumps could still be seen, half rotted but too enormous to go quickly or quietly away.

Rusting trucks and old boats were parked here and there for sale. Rose lodge and other junctions. This material marked my route. Hebo Rd. along the creek was another Indian trail to Hebo and the coast along the creek, now lined with houses here and there. A few log trucks still rushed this narrow road on the way to Hebo, Neskoin or Pacific City.

Spirit Mountain overlooked it all and the legend has it some fool got m arried up ther once on the face of Spirit Mountain but an ill wind only blew them onto the rocks, like it blew the escaping balloons into the trees.

On the way into this narrow roadway into the mountains you could even see the American Bison as if mocking the Indians that it was no accident the buffalo were wiped out only to be commoditized by the white folks, not something given by nature to be taken care of.

There was Phil Sheridan’s office, or such there. Somwhere the histories referred to him as a butcher. Course it wouldn’t make the Christians happy to have a memorial to the native Americans holocaust when they still weren’t done tring to “save” the last Indians. I asked one fellow, a self proclaimed missionary to South Dakota, if Christians shouldn’t perhaps apologize to the Indians for murdering so many of them before offering to convert them to a religion that did this?

Riding through this dark narrow forest all the sounds of the dark past of Indians and trees murdered an victorious unemployed white people getting a bit closer to the end of their empire. It all gave me a bit of a chill as I clung to the side of the road and the snow fell on Hampton’s mane like a peaceful blanket on too many sorrows.

More I am glad the rain spared us. I am making videos every day on this great adventure. Our rag tag band went out the door somewhat concerned if we would pull this all off. I am eager to get hundreds of miles under our belts and set a routine of travel and survival. I am thankful we have made it this far but I am still nervous.

Parallel to the coast highway Hebo road runs to the coast at pacific city from Spirit mountain. The Grand Ronde Tribe has a big casino there now at Grand Ronde. The road follows the old Indian trail, it is very windy.

By evening I arrive back at Ft. Hill and a lady in a red truck is getting gas. She is going to pick up a load of hay and will stop by to pick me up on the way back and take me back to the bus at Lincoln City. On the way back she tells me she was injured badly when a horse she rode flipped over on her and smashed the saddle horn right through her leg, as well as many back injuries. She still needed a lot of medication to get through the pain every day. On the way she showed me her horses back at her house, then took me on to Lincoln City. I thanked her, then fired up the bus and drove us all to Ft. Hill where the kids enjoyed feeding Hampton his hay and grain. We would soon make a routine and the kids helped greatly.

Every person who picked me up not only heard the Akha story but told great life stories of their own. This thrilled me to meet so many people. I hadn’t planned this into the trip.

Hampton strawberry at coffee hut in Rickreal.

I met people by every happenstance.

On the way from the beach through the coast range the trees bent and sculpted by the ocean winds give way to trees covered in moss, vine maple, cedars and firs.

A bright morning greeted me as I rode towards Rickreal and Monmouth. It was going to be a good day, the weather was perfect, we would make good time and this part of the rode hadn’t been as bad, we were working our way out of the funnel as it were, the wide end. The time passed quickly as I backtracked over familiar ground. I headed south once at Rickreal which in itself gave me a good feeling, cause I was going to be headed south all the way to LA and the Thai Consulate. In Rickreal I got a cup of coffee at a coffee hut. The lady offered Hampton a large strawberry but he turned it down so I ate the bright red fruit myself. Such a burlesque strawberry should have been covered up in chocolate.

I rode on towards Monmouth, getting on the foot path that extends from Monmouth to Rickreal, one of the longest footpaths a town had that I knew of. The footpath gives a great compliment to Monmouth, other towns should consider such worthwhile paths for pedestrians. The sun began shrinking and I decided I would go no further than Monmouth and began looking around for a chance to find a place to put up. I got to the side of the path as a couple came by. I asked them about a park and they offered a place on their property and a ride back to the bus. I could hardly turn that down, they were just down the road a short pace.

The man let me put the bus beside his shop, He’d just gotten laid off from the mill in Dallas. Lumber was stacked everywhere and going bad with mold because there was no one to buy it. He did midnight work, said big mills called super mills would take over now. The speed at which logs moved through the sawing process was phenomenal, a couple of seconds per log.

He had divided his property to sell one part, the part where Hampton now grazed on grass. He wanted to build a second house there on several acres and sell it. But once he got it divided the neighbor fought him telling the county another house would drain water levels. Might have been a church that wanted to buy it too. Someone wanted to build. The point being that this neighbor wanted to control more land than what he owned. So the debate cost my host a lot of money and in the end he didn’t sell or build and had plenty of reason for hard feelings about the guy next door.

Our host talked us into staying an extra day for a barbeque and so we did. During the day he took me out to get some grain. When we got back the police were there. Someone didn’t think Hampton had enough water, no doubt the same neighbor. And that is how it can be, people into other people’s business to spread a bit of hate and discontent, because it sure will.

The evening was warm and pleasant so before the barbeque I gave Hampton a water hose bath.

By the following day after the great barbeque, the weather changed and by the time I rode out rain would soon be coming.

I rode down through Monmouth and further south. Farmers planted a lot of grass seed around here. Pretty soon the rain came. The worst kind, a cold rain blowing in the face. Hampton didn’t like it, neither did I. Grass fields wet and cold covered by a gray sky did very little for my imagination. The narrow shoulder made for rough travel, picking our way along, keeping clear of the road and vehicles, and keeping out of the ditch at the same time.

I stopped at a diner for some food. A couple of cowboys asked me how far I rode per day? I told him, “twenty five miles”.

“Wow, we ride but nothing like that, “ he replied.

I rode past Adair village, a bit of rail track left and past a anti war protest going on downtown Corvalis, the old court house and south of town. It was getting late and I didn’t see a place to stop, I kept going past the small airport, now a good ways out of town. I saw a couple guys repairing a roof on a house, a woman stood there. I asked her if I could put Hampton in the back lot and park the bus on the side street? She asked her boyfriend who was up on the roof, but they acted suspicious that I wanted to abandon the horse. I assured them I had to go back and get my bus. This marked some of my new experience finding places to put both Hampton and the bus nearby. Sometimes I could find a logical place and other days I really worked to shoehorn the horse and bus in somewhere. Many times I kept riding past the time I wanted to quit for the day because I couldn’t find a place I felt comfortable with. That made for a very hard day because I would be strking out to go back to the bus close to or after dark, which made getting rides harder. I wanted to hide Hampton close to dark so people couldn’t see him, but I needed light to get a ride quicker, so it was a real juggle.

I carried the saddle and horse blankets north after tying Hampton to a tree, I walked a long ways. Finally I got a ride, and as many rides, when the next morning came, when time went by, I could not make out by memory the car or the face or the name of the person who gave me a ride. Fatigue took hold, I gave a card to the driver, body racked by fatigue, and took the time to tell one more person about our journey. I wish I had carried a guest book with me, but often the people were in a hurry, dropped me off and were gone.

I got the bus back to Hampton and settled him in for the night with grain and hay.

The next morning I got up to more rain and rode a long day to Monroe. It was late afternoon, the rain was pouring down. All the gear was soaked. The oil skin duster kept me dry but water leaks in, water wicks up from wet boots and the end of the chaps, and I got increasingly wet. But by the time I got to Monroe it was just pouring down, solid water and wind and spray.

I rode into town a short ways, got something to eat real quick at the small mini mart, got a feel for the place, then turned and headed a bit back north to where there was a big field next to a couple of shops and a bakery.

I tied Hampton in the rain to a pole. Dripping water I walked into the bakery and asked the lady if I could put Hampton up in the back of the field and park a bus. She said the field was not hers but that she did not think anyone would care so I took Hampton to the back corner and tied him, and then once again started hunting a ride for the bus. I didn’t wait long, someone was arranged, and I grabbed my saddle off the steps and loaded up to go back to Corvalis.

The lady at the bakery offered us all breakfast on the house in the morning, so we all came in and I can’t thank her enough for that. The kids had pancakes, far more than they could eat.

Another wet day, I headed for Jct. City and Eugene. Jct. City was known for trailer and RV sales but the economy was already headed way down, the “good times” felt to be over. Easy credit, easy debt, easy repossession.

Once past Junction City I got to a wider highway. There were a few horses talking from the feed lot. I crossed the highway to the power corridor that ran along the east side of the highway. The area was really wide, there was a rail track there and a lot of grass and waterlands. And there was a lot of mud, but it was a big easy ride and the power poles, huge transmission ones, went on for ever.

The ground was standing in water, so I had to walk Hampton in the higher parts. But as we went along the rain came and went, and we encountered many muskrats. At firstn in my excitement I thought mistakenly that it must be beaver, but of course the habitat wasn’t correct. It was muskrats and quite a few of them out feeding. I’d follow them on foot, they’d go under a pipe under the the tracks and I’d follow them over to that side to get a better look. The muskrats swim wonderfully.

The closer we got to Eugene the sunnier it got for a cold wet day, and the muskrats were out on the bright green grass in places and would eventually head back into a pool when Hampton and I got a bit close.

I couldn’t have been happier to reach Eugene, after long wet days, but also because I felt it was a turning point for the trip, the weather, the geography would change, as we headed into southern Oregon. I really looked forward to it and to meeting friends in Eugene.

I crossed the viaduct and into town past many used car lots and finally to Tiny’s bar, where Micah met up with me, passed the hat and got us $80 for the trip. Micah was always jubilant this way. Hampton stuck half his body in the bar door, just as happy for the end to a long day.

The patrons of course were amused, interested, generous and some a bit tipsy.

I had one beer, then moved on to the warehouse where I parked Hampton for what would be a few days. And got a ride back to the bus with one of Micah’s friends. When I got the bus back to the warehouse a party was in swing among our handful of friends there, a dinner cooking, and a bit more beer and humor to go around.

I settled down to plan our events in Eugene and rest a bit among friends, Micah, Tim Lewis and others.

(discussion at Blair’s school, sterilizations, don’t go there)

By the time I got back to Hampton with the bus, he’d kindly eaten the windshield wiper rubber off one of our friend’s green pick up truck. They took it with a sense of humor. Didn’t know Hampton had an appetite for that and so I avoided that problem for the rest of the trip.

Back into Ft. Hill The ride back in pick up truck, red, from women buying hay, her horses, her horse accident.