June 27, 2012, beautiful blue skies and only a little wind

Our chores are done for the morning: veggies prepped, carrot cake baked and frosted, banana bread just taken out of the oven, cabins cleaned, camper cleaned, e-mails read, and dogs petted.  I think back to my days of working for YFU (Youth For Understanding) and putting in 10 hour days during the summer trying to find host families for exchange students.  How did I ever do it?

The Resort has been delightfully busy lately with a family reunion/birthday bash and various groups of fishermen.  It’s so nice when people come and stay for a few days so that we can have some interaction with them.  It’s also nice for them since they can really unwind and recharge their batteries…hard to do that with a single overnight and then back on the road.  The Colorado family that was here recently represented ages 5 to 83 and they all played, laughed, and took over the place just like they were supposed to.  Jake and I had a particularly fun time with Howie, the free-spirited one in the bunch who could be described as “larger than life”, and we spent the evenings down at the dock or in our camper trading stories with him.  Howie has a deep voice, volume always on high, and a great belly laugh to accentuate everything that tickles his funny bone which is, well, everything.  I’ll bet he is the kids’ favorite uncle.

Creative rowing!

Hannah and Anna making a brithday cake.

Jake and I took another wonderful hike this past week on the Odell Creek Trail, located about five miles from the Resort.   It is an easy, wandering trail that has ups and downs rather than just ups as so many trails around here do!  The mosquitoes gave us a run for our money but as long as we kept moving they weren’t too bad.  A sign at the beginning of the trail warned of a grizzly in the area so we made plenty of noise as we walked and Kanela never acted like there was any danger around, as if she would know what to do with a bear.  There was logging in the area so we stopped and chatted with one of the loggers and he suggested we keep going because the walk was so pretty BUT he didn’t know how high the creek was running.  It was running pretty high so that was the turnaround point of the hike; it made the other three creeks that we had already crossed look like child’s play.

About two miles from the trailhead I suddenly felt something strange going on with one of my boots.  My hiking boots were purchased when I lived in Boston some 14 years ago so they had seen better days.  I knew that they were on their last legs (intended); the inside soles were starting to get crumbly so it always felt like I had dirt and pebbles in my boots and the outer sole had started deteriorating away.  That fateful day the outside sole decided that it was going to give up the ghost and completely pulled away from the rest of the boot up to about the arch.  I had to goose step my way down the trail, sounding and maybe looking a bit like Bozo the Clown.  Slap, step, slap, step.  About 20 yards from the trailhead the other boot died, too.  Slap, slap, slap …”Jake, you can go get the truck!”

Without foot gear I had a good excuse to let Jake drive us home and we took the long way around the Centennial Valley.  There has been a bike race going on with riders starting in Banff, following the Continental Divide, and ending some place in New Mexico, I think.  We had met one of the participants about four days previous as we were headed into town and had shared some cherries with him so it was only appropriate for us to continue the tradition when we met a few more riders after our hike.  It’s amazing how much just a few handfuls of cherries were appreciated.  It’s a selfish act sometimes to act in a generous manner…who gets more pleasure?  But with the price of cherries it’s a good thing that the race has already worked its way south!

Yesterday brought another new experience to my list: a real cattle drive complete with cowboys on horseback.  We could see and hear the cows coming at least five minutes before we ever saw them.  The dust was flying through the air and we could hear the bellowing and bawling of cows and calves bouncing off the mountain walls.  You would have thought they were being driven to slaughter.  I hung over the wooden fence watching the parade go by, feeling a bit like a kid, and had to laugh when a cow suddenly put on the brakes and just stared at me like I was from Mars.  Later that day one cow came back down the road, mooing and crying for the calf she had lost along the way.

The out of doors is beckoning me and it is time for Jake to wake up from his nap or he will never be able to sleep tonight.  Our evening will be easy with only nine guests to feed and clean up after so by 8:00 we should be out by a fire or down at the docks, wind permitting.  So when are you going to come visit??

How can one month at Elk Lake already be gone?

June 20, 2012, delightfully warm and sunny

It is simply gorgeous outside and it seems to be almost sinful to be sitting in the camper typing on the computer, but yesterday while in West I called my mom and told her that I would blog today so I guess I’d better.  How is it that I am 47 years old and can still feel like a teenager when it comes to my mother.

Another week has come and gone and Jake and I will have been at Elk Lake for a full month this Friday.  We are finally comfortable in our roles as sous chef, short-order cook, dishwasher, lawn mower, screen fixer, bed maker, toilet cleaner, window washer, floor scrubber, baker, and painter.  I think I’m leaving a few things out but you get the idea.  It may sound like a lot of work but there are six of us doing all these things and as the saying goes “many hands make for light work.”  We all banter and laugh as we take care of our chores and before you know it the afternoon is free and clear for a few hours before we all meet around the table at 5:00pm to eat dinner together.  From that point onward, the evening flies by as we fill the orders of the guests and clean up after them.  Jake and I head to the camper or the lake around 8:00pm and typically enjoy the wonderful Montana high mountain evenings.  We are so happy with our choice of summer jobs.

Jake and I made a foray into Rexburg, ID this past week to check out the shops and the prices in comparison to West, which is touristy-expensive.  Unbeknownst to us Rexburg is a large Mormon community with a Mormon college, an impressive tabernacle, and not a bar in sight.  I forgot my camera so have no pictures to add to the story but we may go back if only to snap a picture of the tabernacle.  If having a big fancy church brings you closer to God, those congregation members must be sitting right at his dinner table.  We have decided that while prices are steep in West, it makes little to no sense to go gallivanting across the country in search of deals since gas is still so expensive.  If we do head out beyond West it will be purely for adventure’s sake.

I am happy to report that I *may* have finally conquered the big old gas stove in the kitchen which I have affectionately named Bertha.  I have learned that Bertha is not such a bad ole gal once you get to know her and I guess I’ll be a little temperamental, too when I get farther up in years.  She just has her own way of going about doing things and as long as you follow her rules the baked goods will come out fine. Today she let me get away with baking five loaves of rustic bread and they look wonderful.  I’m calling a truce.  Now I just need to learn how to use the deep fryer which also has its foibles.

My first true success with Bertha.

The Collins family got their first Sysco delivery of the season and we got a little dose of how frustrating it can be to order supplies blindly.  Along with the first order came the first large group of guests so it was pretty important that Sysco got the order right.  Well, they didn’t.  Craig and Lerrina pride themselves on serving an excellent, high-quality meal with generous portions. The steaks they serve could feed a small nation.  So when Craig started portioning a prime rib into individual steaks and not only were the steaks smaller but contained a huge ribbon of fat, he was not happy.  But that’s not the worst of it.  The tuna was tainted.  Three guests and Craig got violently ill and Lerrina and I (who had only taken one bite each to sample the tuna steak) got mildly ill about four hours later.  I love new experiences but could have gone without that one.  We won’t even talk about the strawberries and lettuce.  But Sysco, true to their reputation of high quality, came through with apologies and refunds and all should be well.

Look at the difference!

In our free time Jake and I have been exploring the neighborhood, taking hikes, going canoeing, and going on drives.  The area near Elk Lake is a bird sanctuary that was created to protect the trumpeter swan and we are lucky enough to have a trumpeter swan family at the far end of our lake.  The signets hatched recently and it is a thing of beauty to see two graceful, long-necked adult swans being followed around the shallow end by their babies.  We were not close enough to catch a good picture but we did enjoy watching them through the binocs (Montana-ese for binoculars).   One evening drive took us way around the Centennial Valley, through a herd of cows, down a gated road, and across to the other side.  The worn out ruins of ranches of yesterday tugged at my heart a bit…what happened that they were abandoned?

Jake continues to try to catch a fish but with less enthusiasm than he had a few weeks back.  Truthfully the window for fly fishing is quite small as the winds really get to whipping across the lake which makes it impossible to cast.  Just a couple days ago the winds tore across the lake so ferociously that they created white caps and knocked down some aspen.  Our camper is planted firmly on the ground but there were a few times when it felt like we were going to go over.  I can’t even imagine being out in a canoe unless my goal was to only get to the end of the lake.

The kids, Hannah and Nathanial, seem to have accepted us as family or at very least as close buddies.  Jake got a Father’s Day card Nathanial and we both get daily hugs from one or the other or both.  Hannah loves to hug and pet Kanela and Nathanial always wants to give her a treat.  Kanela is more than happy to accommodate both.  Kanela seems to feel that we are here at Elk Lake just for her since she has acres to explore, dogs to play with, long walks to take, and lake water to drink.  Sometimes she is worn so ragged that she doesn’t even bother to sit up to eat, choosing instead to lay with her head over her bowl and slurp the kibble up with her tongue.

I’ll leave you with a picture of a bitterroot flower, the state flower of Montana.  Jake discovered it during one of our hikes…this beautiful little flower surviving in the most rugged of country.  There’s a lesson in there, I’m sure.

Kanela goes canoeing and other stuff.

June 13, 2012

Breezy and sunny with a few clouds

Jake is out mowing the lawn and I have already finished my chores for the morning.  I am currently staging a war against the old large gas oven in the kitchen since it seems intent on making me appear as though I have never successfully baked a thing in my life.  The easiest bread recipe that I learned to make last winter will not brown since the oven is too large to hold the steam bath in and the lemon bread I made this morning ended up being burnt on the bottom.  I fear that by the time I figure that dang oven out the summer will be over!
So last Thursday I had an adventure with Lerrina… We hopped in the car at 6:30am to attend a Chamber of Commerce meeting in West Yellowstone.  It’s the first meeting I’ve been to since I quit working before our year-long trip and I felt wonderfully out of place.  Everyone was laid back and friendly, still having full batteries since the summer tourist season is just beginning, and I learned a ton about the activities that take place in and around West.  You name it, you can do it: horseback riding, fishing, boating, zip lining, white water rafting, shopping, bird watching, animal siting, and on and on.  And that’s without even stepping foot in the park.  The table I sat at won prizes for a game that everyone played so now Jake and I get to look forward to white water rafting a local river for an afternoon.  How cool is that?!

We are still enjoying the calm before the storm so Jake and I have had ample opportunity to enjoy Elk Lake and the surrounding mountains.  Our canoeing expedition that I last wrote about went amazingly well considering that it was Kanela’s first time in a boat and neither Jake nor I have had much paddling experience.  We have to shift our weight a bit when Kanela decides to turn around and look out the other side and sometimes she puts her head exactly where it can’t be in order for us to paddle, but for the most part she just lies down in the bottom of the canoe and snores.  We tooled around the smallest part of the lake near the Resort and man was it peaceful.  What a commute.

Another part of our commute took us up a new (to us) animal trail, through the trees, and up to a sage brush meadow overlooking Red Rock Lake and the bird sanctuary.  Kanela, Rosie, and Beau keep us company and protect us from alleged bears and once in a while they tear off into the brush in chase of small squeaky animals and birds.  The mountain flowers are prolific and I have to wonder how Mother Nature can do such a good job when I can barely get flowers to grow back home.  The views up top are breathtaking and make up for the burning muscles and shortness of breath that it takes to get there.

Jake and I took an afternoon trip to the site of the Hebgen Lake Earthquake, an area that we had seen marked on the map and were curious about.  The quake happened on August 17, 1959.  The entire side of a mountain dropped off and slid all the way across the valley and up the other side, crushing campers and cars as it went.  The scars left on the mountains are slowly being softened by new trees and erosion but it is still painfully obvious that a dramatic event occurred there not that very long ago.  I was sobered by the names listed on the memorial plaque…in some cases whole families perished.

We swung into West to pick up a DeLorme map of Montana and some Subway sandwiches.  Note to the wise…do not bother to stop at the fast food places in West, instead opt for the family restaurants that line the streets.  A Subway sandwich that normally sells for $5 anywhere else sells for $9 in West and a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken costs double what you’d pay back home.  We are again reminded of Skagway where if you can’t mine the gold, mine the tourists.  Afterwards we headed out on the forest service roads to explore and look for animals.  There are some great back roads in this state and Jake and I intend to travel them fully.   We didn’t have much luck with the animal viewing part of the trip but we were treated to a beautiful rainbow and had the roads all to ourselves.

The weather continues to be temperamental and even if you wake up to shorts weather you may need to put pants on by the afternoon…or the other way around.  We had more snow over the weekend so we spent a fair amount of time hiding in the camper but I did venture into the Resort to learn a new card game called “Squeak” from Hannah.  It came in handy the next day when Hannah and I had to drive out to meet the mailman to pick up a package that had to be signed for.  We sat in the back of the pickup truck and played while we waited and I couldn’t help but wonder what other people were doing “at work”.

 Jake is still mowing (thankfully it’s a riding mower) and I am feeling guilty that he is working while I am on the computer.  The skies have turned an ominous grey and the clouds are heavy and low so we may have some rain in our future.   Tomorrow we plan on heading to Ashton, ID to check out the grocery store prices…they have to be better than in West…and then on Friday the Florida Fishermen group is showing up.  Maybe they’ll give Jake some pointers!

Settling in.

June 5, 2012

Completely clear skies, around 65FIt is an unusual lazy morning here at Elk Lake, the proverbial calm before the storm.  We had no guests last night what with it being a Monday and tonight will bring only a few people to the dining room with one cabin rented.   For us it is a relief that this first real week on the job has had such a nice pace but I imagine that Craig and Lerrina would like a bit more business to fill the coffers.  We have been told to enjoy this slow time while we can because come the middle of the month the pace will increase and we won’t stop until the end of the season.  Bring it on!It is difficult to distinguish one day from the other except for the number of guests and the weather.  When the guest list is longer, the kitchen turns into a flurry of activity.  My day starts at 8am and I can be found cutting tomatoes, tearing lettuce, mixing up batches of dressings,  sauces, or egg dishes, and basically prepping the fridge for the day’s needs.  Lerrina works away with me and points me in the direction of where ingredients are stored and slowly but surely I am learning the kitchen and pantry.  I still am in the awkward stage of it all but I am feeling more confident and don’t have to hound Lerrina quite as much as I did at first.Jake’s day starts at 8am, too, when he typically dons his apron and steps up to the sink to attack the breakfast dishes with Hannah.  Funny that he started out washing dishes as a kid at The Sands Restaurant in Poulsbo, WA and has now come full circle.  We chuckle about where our careers have brought us.   As usual, he entertains us all with his eye-rolling, off-side humor which can cause his co-washer to lose track of what she’s supposed to be doing and the dishes can pile up.  Then he says “less talk, more work” like it’s her fault. After the kitchen has been put back into shape he takes off to do more manly work with Craig, things like scraping paint, mowing the yard, and weed eating.  He has found a rhythm, too, and is enjoying the physicality of the outside work.The next step is to clean the cabins.  We load snowy white towels, wash clothes, hand towels, and bath mats into a container along with sets of sheets, cleaning solutions, and refiller soaps and shampoos and load that onto a quad to be driven to the cabin needing cleaning.  When we all attack a cabin it can be done, top to bottom, in about 15 minutes.  Jake and I take a little bit longer if we are cleaning alone since we are paranoid about missing or forgetting something…like the cobweb in the bathroom two days ago.  I am glad that we are employed by people who are so fastidious in everything they do since we, too, take pride in a job thoroughly done.

But it is not all work.  Jake and I have had plenty of time to explore our new surroundings, taking hikes in all possible directions just to see what is over the hill and to find treasures.  So far we have come up empty handed but just this past week Lerrina came home from a walk with a moose paddle…so cool.  We have yet to take any monumentally long hikes but just yesterday we bought a fanny pack in Bozeman so now we are well-equipped to take off deeper into the unknown.  It can hold the necessities: two water bottles, the bear spray, the .38, and a bag of spits.  Lerrina gets up morning at the crack of dawn to take her hikes but so far Jake and I have been too lazy for that schedule.  Maybe once it gets busier during the day we will be more inclined.

That's Mom and Charle's future camping spot off in the distance.

The other activity that has been occupying Jake’s free time is learning how to fly fish.  He started this endeavor toward the end of our year-long trip and so far has had no luck hooking anything but algae.   He has tried and tried and then tried some more but the line still ends up in a puddle about 10-15 feet out on the water.  Until this week, that is.  Craig came down to the dock to see how the fishing was going and quickly broke out his own pole to teach Jake a few tricks.  Craig fished for about 15 minutes and managed to land two fish in that time, the first one on the second cast.  Jake was humbled (which, as his Aunt Kate says, is good for him) but he also learned a ton from that short lesson.  His casts now land nicely far out on the water and he is feeling encouraged.  Now for a bite!

Elk Lake Resort sits on federal land so another thing we’re learning about is how to seed a lake.  The US Fish and Wildlife Department is hatching Alaskan grayling in the little creek that flows beside the cabins and about twice a week a truck shows up with a couple people who need to remove the dead eggs and count them in the process.  It seems like pretty tedious work to me but they claim that they have had a 90% success rate in previous seedings in the area so there is great hope that in a couple of years there will be amazing grayling fishing in Elk Lake.  For now the seeds that have hatched are little squiggly things that float around in the bucket until they are released but we have seen some older graylings flapping around in the stream that were born earlier in the season.  Upon approach they quickly take to hiding under the branches over the stream, convinced that as long as they can’t see us, we can’t see them.  They remind me of little kids who close their eyes and think that they are “hiding”.

Well they sun is calling me outside and Jake has been patiently waiting for me so that we can take a spin on the lake in the canoe.  We will try it without Kanela at first but I think she will end up sitting on the bank and whining like a baby so we might try to take her into the canoe with us.  Wish us luck!