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“I’m Looking for a Safe House”

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For most Wisconsin residents, the city of Milwaukee offers five main attractions: beer, brats, baseball, basketball, and a beautiful lake. From touring the Miller Brewery Visitor Center and witnessing the historic origins of the “Beer City of the World,” to testing your luck at the Potawatomi Bingo Casino, to even experiencing the adventures within the Harley Davidson Museum, a day in the prosperous city can never be uneventful.

However, for others, Milwaukee serves as a secret refuge for spies engaging in covert operations.

IMG_5351While the shadows of Milwaukee’s City Hall may fall on what appears to be a nondescript alleyway, an observant eye will discover a sign that reads International Exports, Ltd., 779 Front Street. Many pass by this sign without any regard. Some, however, choose to enter the hidden door adjacent to the sign and are greeted by a woman known as Miss Moneypenny. She sits at an antique desk in a dimly lit waiting room, and startled, asks you for a password of entry.

Without knowing the password, you may start to panic. What is this place? Am I upsetting her? Miss Moneypenny will proceed to ask you to perform different “tricks” for access to a secret world in return. However, by simply whispering the words “I’m Looking for a Safe House” Miss Moneypenny will hesitate no longer. With the pull of a hidden lever under her desk, a bookcase suddenly moves aside to reveal a mysterious hallway. You too should not hesitate, and instead proceed before Miss Moneypenny changes her mind and closes the bookcase once again.

IMG_5359Upon entering through the bookcase, the obscure hallway seems to continue forever. The lighting barely reveals an atmosphere, and a subtle musty odor lingers in the air. Black and white photographs and framed documents hang from the walls around you, and after looking closer, you start to discover the secrecy of your surroundings. You may try to retreat through the bookcase, but after finding out that it exists no longer, your only choice is to continue to venture forward.

IMG_5355You eventually reach yet another entry way; however, this time you step foot into what appears to be a restaurant. A bar stretches across an area to your left and features a large map with specific locations repeatedly circled in red. Hidden rooms are to your right and each hold tables, seating, and mysterious wall accents. You are greeted by a hostess who refers to you as a spy and asks if you would like to be seated. You say yes and ask her where exactly you are. She hesitates but eventually responds “The Safe House.”

Upon being seated, you are confronted by a waitress who hands you a menu and brings you water in a red glass with a black key hole on one side. She also hands you a folded piece of paper that is stamped with the word “CONFIDENTIAL.” You anxiously unfold the document and reveal a Spy Mission that is to be completed before leaving the Safe House. Without further delay, you read the ten tasks that make up the mission.

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The first task is to find a room with a green ceiling that features a “cracked code.” You begin to wander around the restaurant until you come across such a room. After searching the surroundings, you eventually discover a framed two inch card surrounded by photographs of James Bond 007. The card is signed by a former spy and reveals a code in which you use to complete the mission. You jot down the code, and continue up some wooden stairs to explore another bar and secret area of the restaurant.

IMG_5366The second task is a little more risqué. It involves a woman having to enter a specific ladies’ room located within the restaurant and discovering a poster of Burt Reynolds. When the woman finds the poster, a siren sounds for the whole restaurant to hear, and everyone knows what that woman just witnessed  She then has to walk out of the ladies’ room and is usually greeted by laughter.

Around the corner from the ladies’ room lies the destination that contains the third task of the Spy Mission. A long wall stretches across the area that features various cartoon illustrated individuals. A third bar is present in the room and seating is available alongside the wall for an extra special dining experience. The challenge asks you to discover a button that turns the current stationary wall into action. Upon finding the button and pushing it once, the wall suddenly breaks up into puzzle pieces. The shapes then begin to move over and past one another until the bodies and heads of the illustrated characters are swapped. Once the wall is finished moving, a woman’s body often times now has a man’s head.

IMG_5364After completing three tasks of your Spy Mission, you venture back to your table and order a Spy Burger off of the menu. The Safe House features creatively titled lunch and dinner items ranging from burgers, salads, sandwiches, and soups. The restaurant has won multiple awards for the peculiar atmosphere and decorations as well as for the delicious food. Four bars exist throughout the restaurant as to provide the spies with multiple secluded meeting areas. The Safe House even features an upstairs room that is available for private spy conversations.

IMG_0043While many more tasks await you, I will not reveal any other information about the Safe House other than the route of exit. In order to successfully leave the restaurant, you must exit through a way that you did not enter. Upon wandering throughout the restaurant in an effort to discover this secret route, you will come across a CIA telephone booth in which you should insert a quarter and follow the directions prompted to you. This will then allow you to leave through a mysterious alleyway, but only after being taken into the Interrogation Room.

To complete the entire Spy Mission and discover all that the secret refuge has to offer, visit the Safe House yourself at 779 North Front Street!

 

~Kerry~

 

 

To view my complete album from my trip to Milwaukee, visit EY’s Facebook page!

 

 

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How to Pass the Time While Stuck in L.A. Traffic

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                              Photo from LA Traffic Cam

Los Angeles is known, no—fabled, no—downright notorious for its horrible, mind-numbing traffic. In fact, it’s estimated that Los Angeles County residents spend about 4 days a year (or, oof, 96 hours) in their cars.

So what’s an Angelino to do with all that time? Here are some ways I’ve come up to pass the hours you spend getting from here to there in L.A.:

 

1.  Rock out to KCRW. KCRW is Los Angeles’ public radio, indy rock station, with a heavy dose of NPR-sponsored news and programming. Turn that dial to 89.9 FM and enjoy new bands, the latest news, and helpful traffic updates. Plus, with frequent free giveaways for members in venues all around the city, it’s a great introduction to some interesting music hotspots around town. Bonus: For you smartphone users, they have a great app, too!

 

 

2.  Roll down your windows and let the sunshine in. Hey, you’re in California, remember? Chances are the weather is a balmy 82 degrees and sunny, so breathe in those exhaust fumes and enjoy that sunshine. Just don’t forget to sunscreen up or you’ll soon be sporting a super attractive, left-armed trucker’s tan.

Hitting some of that famous L.A. traffic

This image from PD Photo.org has been released into the public domain by its author and copyright holder, Jon Sullivan

 

3.  Count out-of-state license plates. One of the first things anyone will ask you at a party in L.A. is “So, where are you from?” It’s a widely known fact that no one is from Los Angeles, we all just move here trying to make it big (or cry trying). In particular, you’ll see a large number of out-of-state plates driven by young dreamers like myself. And just so you know, a thumbs-up of encouragement is always appreciated, even after we’ve accidentally cut you off in a left-turn-only lane—quit honking, we’re from outta town, after all!

 

 

4.  Eat. I’ve become a huge proponent of stocking my car with snacks, like cereal bars, trail mix, that sort of thing, since you never know if you’ll get stuck in a jam on the freeway. Bonus points if you’re wise enough to stop at In ‘N’ Out for a burger animal-style before you head out into the rush.

 

5.  Practice defensive driving. Check your blind spot, increase your following distance, signal excessively…and be prepared to get hit despite it all. You’re in traffic for an entire four days a year; chances are you’ll be involved in a fender-bender at some point down the line. On that note, you may want to consider dropping a bit more on insurance than you might in another city; it might be worth it.

 

6.  Learn a new language. Check out an audiobook at the library and practice your nouns while you stop and go (that’s “parada” and “ir” in Spanish, folks). Look for an audiobook that emphasizes conversational language skills, so there’s not too much book work that goes along with it.

7.  Be a trailblazer: Take public transit. Despite its reputation to the contrary, L.A. does have a growing public transportation system (with a subway! Who knew!). It’s particularly useful if you’re heading to Hollywood or downtown. And for those of you out late at night, all trains and the Orange Line are now running until 2 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays!

Final note: Believe it or not – and despite what you may see to the contrary, one thing you shouldn’t be doing while driving is talking on your cell phone – unless it’s on speakerphone or you have a headset or Bluetooth. California has a strictly enforced cell phone law and cops will pull you over and slap you with a hefty fine (well – hefty for someone like me who’s on a budget!). Texting is also illegal, so when you desperately need to tweet about having just seen Justin Bieber coming out of a Starbucks in West Hollywood, just pull over okay?

 

Self-portraits: Only a good idea as a passenger

~Megan~

 

Megan Kayaking

The Key To Sea Kayaking – Part 2

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Part 2 of 2 by Megan Ritchie

(continued from Part 1 of 2)   After an hour on the water sea kayaking, I was all calm now, a real ocean woman. Sure, I come from the middle of an enormous continent, and have lived in landlocked cities my whole life, but here I was, at my true roots.  I was an ocean conqueror! A Californian!!   Suddenly the waves lurched in front of me, taking my boat with them. An enormous wave  overtook my boat and spun it parallel to the shore, like a crazed giant with a toy top, before flipping me over into the waves. There was a flash of panic as I tumbled out, and the waves ripped away my sunglasses, ponytail binder, and the sassy bandana I’d tied into my hair that morning, and carried them to somewhere far away.  I kicked hard away from my boat, all the while thinking “Don’t let it hit my head. Please don’t let it hit my head.”

Wave after mighty wave ground me into the sand. I struggled to stand against them – I was only a dozen feet off the shore by then and the water wasn’t deep – and finally, gained my footing. I plodded up to shore.

On shore, Sarah was doubled over with laughter. “That was….gasp….the biggest wave….gasp…I have ever seen,” she said as she scrambled to grab my paddle out of the still pummeling waves. Adrianna, the wench, had made a successful landing on shore unscathed, and helped me pull my boat up onto drier ground, before we all collapsed into laughter.

“That was amazing,” Sarah said, once we’d all caught our breaths. Sarah pointed up to the pier. “There were even guys up there at the restaurant who were yelling suggestions to you, but once that wave came up, you didn’t have a chance.”

I tapped my head, trying to get some water out of my ear. “I’ve always known I’m really gracefully,” I said dryly. “But I think I may have outdone myself on that one.”

We decided to eat our lunch on the beach before heading back out for another round of kayaking. We scurried up to the parking lot and I reached into my running shorts to grab the key – we’d locked our lunches in the trunk. But the key wasn’t there.

“Oh. No.” I said.

“What is it?” asked Adrianna.

“The key. I put it right here,” I said, motioning to the little pocket stitched into my running shorts, “But when I fell, it must’ve…it must’ve gotten pulled out.” We all looked out onto the waves.

“Oh shit,” said Sarah.

“Yeah.”

We ran down the stairs again, looking around in the sand. But, like my sunglasses and bandana, there was no sign of the car key. I’d taken it off from my lanyard, so it was easier to tuck into my running shorts; our hunt was literally looking for a needle in a haystack…or a car key in an ocean. Sarah said she’d keep looking along the beach while Adrianna and I clambered back up to the parking lot. We debated what to do for a moment, before appealing to the parking attendant to use his phone. After explaining what had happened, he said matter-of-factly, “Oh, you should never take your keys out with you. Everyone just checks them here with me or at the Surf Shack. That way, you’ll never lose them if you hit a wave.” I looked at him. Paused.

“That’s good advice, I’ll be sure to do that next time,” I said through clenched teeth. It wasn’t anyone’s fault but my own (and maybe that big wave’s) that we were in the situation, but it wasn’t particularly helpful to be reminded of a wiser alternative.

Adrianna and I came up with a plan: I had a Triple A membership and could get them to unlock the trunk, which had my purse and phone. Then, I’d call one of my roommates, all of whom I’d met only six weeks earlier, and convince them, beg them really, to drive across the entire Los Angeles metropolitan area on a gorgeous Sunday afternoon with my spare car key, only to turn around and drive home. I sighed. There went the afternoon, and a nice chunk of my dignity.

Triple A said they’d be there in 45 minutes. I handed the parking attendant back his phone and thanked him for his help. He shrugged and gave me a “You sure are dumb” look. Helpful. Adrianna went to go check in with Sarah, and came back saying there was still no sign of the key along the beach. Just then, the surfer dude from the Shack, the guy who’d helped us carry the kayaks down to the beach what seemed like days ago, passed by, helping another couple with their boats.

“How’d it go?” he asked. “You didn’t die, I see.”

“Oh, it was really fun,” I said, trying to reassure his latest victims. “Except, well, I managed to horribly flip my kayak and lose my car key in the ocean.”

The couple, still fresh, looked a little alarmed. “Oh God, that’s horrible,” said the surfer dude. He shot me a sympathetic look as he kept walking past. Adrianna sighed unhappily.

“Are you sure it’s not in your shorts?” she asked.

I shook my head as I poked around in them again, adding “groping myself” to my long list of how uncool I looked/felt at that moment. They were the type of shorts that had built-in underwear, the better to run in, I suppose, and I fiddled around with the liner.

“No, I don’t see—“ And then there, at the very bottom of the shorts, at the very bottom of the liner, I felt something: The key.

I pulled it out, looking very much like a proud hen that had just laid an egg, or, in this case, a Ford Focus key. “I found it! I found it!”

After high-fives all around and a quick phone call to cancel the Triple A locksmith,  we settled along some rocks for a victory lunch. Maybe I wasn’t a Californian just yet, maybe I hadn’t yet mastered sea kayaking or waves or heck, checking my car key with the parking lot attendant, but one thing is for sure: I am really good at storing stuff in my underwear.

 ~Megan~

Megan Kayaking

The Key To Sea Kayaking – Part 1

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By Megan Ritchie

About a month after I moved to Los Angeles, a friend and her girlfriend, Adrianna, invited me to go sea kayaking with them in Malibu. I’d been kayaking a handful of times, most recently on a family vacation to Lake Superior last summer, and was really excited to try it in the ocean.

On a Sunday afternoon, we drove the twenty or so miles from my house on the east side of Los Angeles, across the city and up the coast along the Pacific Coast Highway (or PCH, to us “locals”). Parking on the PCH, which runs right alongside the ocean, is impossible, but we eventually found a parking lot right next to the beach and dropped the ten bucks to park there. After locking all of our possessions in the trunk, I tucked my car key in a little pouch in my running shorts (pay attention to that detail – it comes in later), and set off. We scampered across the highway to the Malibu Surf Shack, which rents surf boards, paddleboards and, you got it, sea kayaks. After we ducked in to the little shop and our eyes adjusted to the dim light, the guy behind the counter asked if we’d been sea kayaking before. Sarah and Adrianna both nodded, yep, they’d been once before at the Surf Shack a handful of months earlier. I hesitated, and then said, “Sure, I’ve kayaked before.” Technically not on the ocean, but so be it.

“Well, good,” said the guy, who was every bit a surfer dude. “Wouldn’t want an inexperienced kayaker out on those waves today….they’re reaaaal rough, even for someone who knows what they’re doing.”

My heart began to pound as we signed off the waivers and put down the deposit.  Sarah, clearly the brains behind the operation—or at least the bravest of us all—led us out of the little shop. Adrianna and I both began talking about how we weren’t exactly “experienced kayakers.”

“Oh, we’ll be fine.” Sarah said, brushing us off.

Feeling that familiar rush of adrenaline and fear I always get from any rule-breaking or risk-taking because I am a coward and a square, I followed her around the side of the shop. We grabbed paddles and damp lifejackets and then waited for a lull in the traffic before running across the highway and back to the beach. The sea kayaks in bright citrus colors were stacked high in a trailer parked alongside the road. Another surfer dude from the Surf Shack helped us carry three down to the sand.

The waves were pounding along the beach. Adrianna and I gulped. Sarah, all confidence, tried to reassure us. I turned to the Surf Shack dude.

“Tell us, honestly,” I said. “Are we going to die?”

“What? No. You guys will be fine.”

“But we are not experienced sea kayakers, man.” I added the “man” there to let him know that even if we weren’t regular wave-paddlers, we were far from dorks. He seemed to pick up on how cool we were, because he said next in particularly soothing tones:

“Look, you’ll be fine. I promise.”

Sarah rolled her eyes, but Adrianna and I were willing to be reassured by anyone, dude or otherwise.

The guy continued, “All you have to do is wait for a lull in the waves and then run out as fast and as hard as you can and hop in the boat when you can’t run any farther. The waves here in Malibu come in bursts—they’ll be a couple minutes of hard waves and then they’ll die down.”

We all paused to look out on the waves. They did seem to be dying down. Sarah took the moment to leap into the water and run out with her boat. When she reached waist-height, she leapt into her boat and paddled out. She looked cool.

I’d missed my window at that point, and had to wait for another round of boat-crushing waves before I too took the plunge. Once the water calmed again, I pushed my boat into the water and high-stepped as far as I could. I leapt into my boat not as gracefully as Sarah but I got in all the same, and paddled quickly past the waves’ breaking point. Alright, maybe I wasn’t going to die. Maybe I was all drama, it was all in my head. There is no spoon. Adrianna and I exchanged a nervous laugh – we were just being silly, everything was fine.

I should note that this was only the second or third time I’d even seen the ocean, let alone been on the water. I’m from Minnesota originally and so “the beach” to me means a day near a lake where the biggest waves we get are from a passing speedboat pulling a couple kids on an inner tube behind it. So my cowardice, while a little pathetic, wasn’t entirely ungrounded.

We paddled our boats out past the wooden pier. There were fishermen with long poles standing at the end of  it, and a few of them waved at us as we passed. It was a gorgeous afternoon, with barely a breeze and a cloudless sky. I looked around at the gentle waves and the rocky coastline, and kept having to tell myself “I live here now. This is my home now.” Sometimes, I find it amazing how huge the United States really are. I marveled how the beautiful coastline I was kayaking along was part of the same country as the rolling hills of prairie grass and wildflowers I’d ridden past only a few months earlier on bike rides in Minnesota.

As we made our way up the shore, we saw surfers up ahead; there was some kind of surfing competition going on up the beach. We paddled out farther to avoid them, and because (understandably) the waves looked even bigger there. We paddled for an hour or so before deciding to come back in and have lunch along the shore.

For the approach back to the beach, we were to do the same strategy as our way out: wait for the waves to calm before paddling. Sarah turned to us. “All you have to remember,” she said, “is to keep your boat at a 90 degree angle to the beach. Just head straight in. See, watch me.”

Sarah paddled forward hard for thirty or forty feet before sliding her boat gracefully onto the sand. Easy. Adrianna and I hesitated. She looked at me nervously. “I’m sure we’ll be fine,” I said, thrusting my chin forward bravely. I looked behind me to try to gauge if the waves had died down. Things looked fairly calm so I paddled toward the shore, making sure to stay perpendicular to the shoreline, as Sarah had instructed.

Adrianna followed suit, looking anxious. After my hour on the water, I was all calm now, a real ocean woman. Sure, I come from the middle of an enormous continent, and have lived in landlocked cities my whole life, but here I was, at my true roots. Humans emerged from the ocean thousands of years ago, shook off their gills and claimed their spot on land. And now, here I was, returning to my ocean homeland, victorious. The forces bigger than me were to be conquered, to bow before me. Yeah, I was an ocean conqueror! A Californian!!

I paddled harder for shore. Suddenly the waves lurched in front of me, taking my boat with them. I glanced over at Adrianna, who was struggling to keep her boat’s bow heading straight for shore. Her kayak pushed toward mine, and I paddled even harder away from her, trying to avoid a collision.

The waves were now coming in even harder, rolling us closer and closer to shore. Suddenly, an enormous wave overtook us, and took my boat and spun it parallel to the shore, like a crazed giant with a toy top, before flipping me over into the waves. There was a flash of panic as I tumbled out, and the waves ripped away my sunglasses, ponytail binder, and the sassy bandana I’d tied into my hair that morning, and carried them to somewhere far away.  I kicked hard away from my boat, all the while thinking “Don’t let it hit my head. Please don’t let it hit my head…”

…to be continued  

 

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Beet Week Day 4 – Cupcakes

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If You Can’t Stand the Beet, Get Out of the Kitchen

I know what you’re thinking…beet cupcakes?! Sounds pretty crazy, huh? For a beet hater like myself, I’ll openly admit to my skepticism. To me, beets are sickeningly sweet, but when they’re baked into pretty little treats, they can actually taste amazing!

You’ve probably passed beets in the supermarket without giving them the time of day and I can’t really blame you, but what you might not know is that beets are actually an incredibly healthy food – super foods in their own right. Joining garlic, green tea and flaxseed, beets can help prevent cancer. They have no trans fat, no saturated fat, are low in calories, and are a great source of iron.

The perfect beet is hard to come by; it should be deep red with roots extending from the bulb. Crisp greens are also a good indicator that your beets are fresh. You’re going to cut these off for your cupcakes (trust me, I tried it, they’re disgusting in cupcake batter and frosting batter.)

Follow the steps to make beet puree  from the beet margarita recipe (Beet Week Day 3). In a nutshell, you’ll be roasting 3-4 beets wrapped in foil at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes. Unwrap, run under cold water and peel the skins off…they come off extremely easily.

Cut the beets into quarters (maybe smaller depending on the size of your beets), and put them in the food processor or blender.

3-4 beets will yield about a cup of beet puree. Set this aside.

Here’s your Beet Cupcake Recipe:

½ C Sugar

1 ½ C Flour

2 tsp Baking Powder

½ C Butter (1 stick)
2 eggs

½ C Milk

2 tsp Vanilla

1 C Beet Puree

Depending on how big your cupcake pan is, this recipe creates about 12 cupcakes.

First, combine the dry ingredients in a bowl (sugar, flour, baking powder). Cream the butter in a mixer; if you don’t have access to a mixer, soften the butter in the microwave for 10 seconds and use a spoon to soften it up for your cake batter.

Whisk your eggs in a separate bowl and add the milk and vanilla to it. Slowly add the dry mix to the wet mix and stir continually.

Once your batter is nice and creamy, fold (mix) in the beet puree.

Use a ladle or spoon to portion your batter into your cupcake pan and bake at 350 for 25 minutes.

And remember, a cupcake is nothing without frosting.

Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting recipe:

½ C Butter (1 stick)

8 oz Cream Cheese (1 package)

1 C Powdered Sugar

2 tsp Vanilla

Cream the butter and cream cheese together in a mixer until malleable. Add the powdered sugar in SLOWLY; you don’t want it to splash back in your face. Finally, add in the vanilla and let the mixer go for 30 seconds or so. It sometimes helps if you take a rubber spatula and scrape down the sides so all of the deliciousness is contained.

I realize not everyone has pastry bags to pipe out their frosting (I’m lucky; my mom’s a chef!) Be resourceful though…plastic freezer bags can act as pastry bags. Put the icing in the bag using a rubber spatula.

Zip the plastic bag shut and squeeze the frosting down to one end. Hold the bag in a diamond shape so one of the tips is pointing down like this:

…and snip the tip off! Once your cupcakes are cooled, you can make them look pretty.

I bought all of my beets from local farmer’s markets. You might have one near you too! If you’ve never been to a farmer’s market, it’s a really cool place where you can buy fresh fruit, vegetables, and other goods to support your local farms.  As an added bonus, the  produce is usually much cheaper and fresher at farmer’s markets.  In Cleveland, (as in other places – see below* for a sampling) you can find them listed on one site: localfoodcleveland.org.

Enjoy your beet cupcakes! Please comment with pictures of your own cupcakes or other beet concoctions (:

-Rebecca-

*Many states, regions and cities have sites listing farmers markets- here are a few examples.

California

New York City

Chicago

Denver

Minneapolis/St. Paul

 

ps – during our experimentation with different recipes, we also tried these cupcakes with a canned chocolate frosting.  We found this to be a respectable (and tasty) alternative.

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Road Trip West: The Wildfire (Part 4 of 4)

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(Part 4 in a 4 part series)-

 

WILDFIRE!!!

By Megan Ritchie

…continuing on our journey out of  the Grand Canyon…we crossed the border into California just as the sun set.

The next day dawned bright and clear as I stepped out into the parking lot for my first view of California in the daylight.

There was desert. Everywhere. Palm trees, desert, and—there she was—the good old Ford Focus with the trusty U-haul trailer still attached. We packed up our bags and hit the road for our final day in the car.

At about 1 o’clock that afternoon, Chris and I pulled off for what was to be our final gas stop. He’d driven the whole morning, in preparation for our last few hours, when I would take the wheel in order to brave the big bad Los Angeles freeway system with a slow-moving trailer.

The saddest room in a gas station in CA

We fueled up, and then I swung into the driver’s seat and pulled out onto I-45.  About 45 minutes later we started to see smoke. As we got closer, we began making guesses at what it could be.  A house? Eh, who could say; it was too far away to tell. Bored, Chris went back to his book and I fiddled with the radio.

Then we hit traffic. Now, according to my handy-dandy smartphone (that I made Chris check, responsible driver that I am) we were about an hour, hour and a half outside of L.A., and part of me (the scared, “What if I hate this city? Can I actually do this?” part of me) was afraid that this was the edge of the fabled Los Angeles traffic. What if we were in this for the next couple hours? What if, for the rest of my existence, I find myself sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic? What if–Alright, alright, calm down, it’s stop-and-go, at least we’re moving.

And then we stopped moving entirely. The smoke was right near us now, billowing in big brown plumes.  Hauling that trailer, we were in the far right lane, the truck and trailer lane, and we weren’t moving at all. Suddenly, we heard sirens. Out my side mirror I saw them: fire truck upon fire truck upon fire truck, racing past us on the shoulder. There were your standard red engines, but also larger ones, with “Wildfire Control” printed on the side.

“Uh, Chris?” I said.

He looked up from his book.

“What?”

“I think this fire is sort of big.”

“Yeah, seems like it.”

Back down to the page.

Then, above: thwup-thwup-thwup-thwup….! I ducked down to see the sky through the windshield. Above us was a helicopter, dumping liquid on the fire.

We still weren’t moving. The smoke was getting thicker and thicker. While it had started on the right of the car, suddenly there was smoke billowing on both sides. I looked around. On the opposite side of the highway, four lanes across, cars were starting to turn around, using the shoulder to drive the wrong way down the freeway, away from the fire.

“Chris? It looks, um, really big.”

He finally looked up from his book. To our right was an entrance ramp. We looked to see cars driving the wrong way up the ramp, fleeing the flames ahead of us. There was a huge semi in front of us; our view was blocked from how close we were to the fire and then suddenly: to our left, it breached the hill.

We watched in horror as a shed not a half a mile away from us was consumed by flames in milliseconds. The fire enveloped a flagpole and burned through an American flag as fast as we registered what it was doing.

“Oh. My. God,” I breathed. “What do I do? What do I do??”

I struggled not to panic. The flames were close, much closer than anyone would like, but I couldn’t see any fire trucks nearby… I kept looking for a cop or a firefighter or some kind of authority figure to tell us what to do and where to go. But there was no one. Everyone was too busy fighting the fire, and no one was there thinking about the bystanders just trying to get out of the way. No one.

But there was Chris sitting in the passenger seat, his book long abandoned, telling me in the calmest tones possible, “Megan, we have to wait for the truck ahead of us to turn onto the entrance ramp before we can go. We just have to wait for the truck to move and then it’s our turn.” I looked over: there was still a big line of cars driving up the ramp, fleeing the flames.  We had to wait for the truck to move or we could get stuck. The only way around the truck was on the shoulder to our right.  But the truck wasn’t moving at all.

I inched forward, very aware that I had not been at all trained in the art of backing up a car with a trailer attached. I heard my dad’s voice ringing through my head: “You could jackknife that thing, easy. Just make sure you never get into a situation where you need to back it up. Just always pull through.” The truck in front of us wasn’t moving and there was at least a truck’s length in front of it. In fact, the truck in front of us wasn’t even running.

“Oh my god,” I said, as it dawned on me. “The trucker—he abandoned his truck! He just abandoned it. He’s not there anymore! He just left! He left it!”

I couldn’t stop talking. Chris was stunned. In my rising panic, I briefly toyed with the idea of doing the same thing as the trucker, leaving all of my prized and not-so-prized possessions in the car to be consumed by the flames. Everything would be lost: my passport, my books, my clothes and camera and computer; even old love letters, tax returns, photographs. But we’d be safe. We’d run through the tall grass on the side of the road until we weren’t breathing smoke anymore. Then some weatherworn trucker would pick us up and drop us in the parking lot of the nearest hotel or gas station with a “Just be happy you got alive, kids,” before he cruised away. It’d be like straight out of an action movie.

With the smoke getting thicker around us, it felt like straight out of an action movie.

“What do we do? What do we do??” I repeated, feeling my hands start to shake.

At about that moment, we started to see even more cars driving up the shoulder, on both sides of the road now. If we decided to zip out on the right-hand shoulder to get around the abandoned truck, we’d risk a head-on collision with someone coming from farther down the freeway.  In fact, these cars were definitely from the frontlines because they were covered in bright orange anti-flame retardant, the stuff the helicopter–no, now three helicopters–were dumping on the wildfire all around us.

I looked around, and made an executive decision.

“I’m going to try to turn around,” I said. “We can’t go around that truck and so we have to get on the shoulder on the other side of the road.”

“But you can’t back up the trailer.”

“I’m going to turn around,” I repeated. “We have to get out of here. We have to get out of here.”

The smoke was billowing even thicker now, blotting out the sun. It reminded me of a solar eclipse I once watched through a tiny hole in a piece of paper in 3rd grade. I wondered, briefly, if I should be looking at the smoke through a hole in a piece of paper too.

Gripping the wheel hard, I turned on my signal and put the car in drive. Thankfully, we’d waited so long that the traffic had cleared out more: so many people had already pulled their cars around on the shoulder and fled before us that the lanes were more open.

We must have looked panicked, two kids with very out-of-state plates hauling a little U-haul trailer behind us, flushed in terror, because someone let us in immediately. I craaaaaanked the wheel and we held on as I started the turn. And then, at last, I exhaled: we’d made it, a full U-turn across four lanes of freeway, and clunked out onto the shoulder of I-45, heading the wrong way down the freeway. With traffic, much of it splattered in orange, but going the decidedly wrong direction down the road.

“We’re okay! We’re okay!!” we shouted and pumped our fists, like so many action stars before us.

After we made it off the freeway at last, I’d like to say we found an easy route around the wildfire and made it to L.A. without any further incident. I’d like to say it was the breeziest part of the trip. I’d like to say we spent the rest of our hour to hour-thirty minute trip marveling at the wildfire and our superhero brush with death.

None of this happened, of course. Instead, after we made it off the freeway at last, we pulled out a road atlas and picked out a new route along a nice county road. It seemed like a pleasant enough journey at first, until the mountains starting rising up in front of us in a sheer wall.

“That’s…that’s not our road, right, Chris?” I said, very aware that the car groaned with effort at even the slightest change in incline.

He re-consulted the map.

“Nah…”

We kept driving, heading closer and closer to the mountains.

“Chris…”

“Wait, wait, wait, hold on. Let me look at this…wait. What are these green dots on the road?”

“Green dots? What green dots??”

“Oh. Uhhh…the green dots mean ‘scenic route.’”

“WHAT!” I almost lost it.  “We do not want a scenic route! We want a decidedly UNpretty, UNeventful, UNscenic route! Pick another way! Find us another way!”

Chris held the map closer, squinting at the tiny roads.

“Hold on. Hold on. Uh. Megan? We might be in trouble…”

“Why?”

“Well, we’re trying to get through a national forest and I-45 was kinda are only main way, but that way is obviously, um, burning. But there are other roads!”

“So pick another road!”

“But here’s the thing: They’re…they’re all scenic routes!”

 

Nearly three hours later, after the car began to bottom out at literally 10 miles per hour, and after an old lady gave us the finger as she passed us in sheer frustration going the wrong way on a blind curve up a mountain, and after I thoroughly sweat through all of my clothes, we made it through the very narrow, very steep and very scenic mountain pass.

And then, after about an hour of that good old L.A. rush hour traffic, we made it to Los Angeles and my new home,  after a full five days of driving and nearly 2200 miles. We were nearly five hours later than we’d anticipated. Exhausted, we piled out of the car. And as we opened up the Uhaul trailer and began unloading my possessions into my new room, I couldn’t help but think, “Well, no matter what happens, no matter if I make it as a screenwriter here in Hollywood or go home crying and defeated, there is 100% no way L.A. can be as intense as that afternoon.”

And you know what, dear reader? On that, at least, I’ve been right.

~Megan~

Part 1 – Road Trip West Introduction

Part 2 – Wigwam Motel

Part 3 – The Grand Canyon

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Road Trip West: The Grand Canyon (Part 3 of 4)

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(Part 3 in a 4 part series)

Onward…

By Megan Ritchie

The next day, Day 4 for those counting, Chris and I awoke, sore from our wigwam slumber and hit the road once again. It’s at about this time in a road trip, I think we can all agree, when real life starts to feel like a foreign thing, and all you have is a car, a radio, and, inevitably, an interesting collection of empty fast food containers crammed in various recesses throughout the vehicle. Yep, we were feeling the miles.

Thankfully, we were just in time for a detour of grand proportions. Now, when Chris and I were originally planning the trip’s route we were all, “Rockies! Rockies!” and my dad was all, “You’re insane and will kill yourselves/the car!” so, as I mentioned before, we chose the southern route. As a compromise of sorts we decided we would take a detour of about 100 miles, give or take, to see the Grand Canyon because, after living abroad for a year, all I wanted was some good old American splendor. And Chris and I, Midwesterners that we are, had never been to the Grand Canyon. And it’ the Grand Canyon, you guys. 100 miles ain’t nothin’ for something that awesome.

 So, over the river and through the woods, to the Canyon we went. When we arrived and hoisted our creaking bodies out of the car, the sun was blistering hot. Armed with sunscreen, sunglasses and some stylish hats, we made our way into the park office. After a few hasty conversations with people giving us impressively mismatched directions (“Isn’t this one of the biggest tourist destinations in the country? Shouldn’t this be more straightforward?” we asked ourselves), we managed to find our way onto a shuttle that would take us into the Grand Canyon National Park.

The bus ride was rather pleasant, mostly because we weren’t the ones responsible for driving. I kept craning to see the canyon, but it was shy and kept itself hidden from the road the entire time. In fact, it wasn’t until we were dropped off that I got my very first view of the canyon. We scuttled up a trail and spread out in front of us, stretching as far as we could see in both directions, was the Grand Canyon.

It was utterly breathtaking. For those of you who haven’t seen it, it is truly one of those places that photographs do no justice. In fact, trying to flatten out something so dimensional, so expansive, so rich in color and shadow and texture, seems borderline insulting. Not that I didn’t try. But after a few pictures, including one on my horrible camera phone for the fans back home (“Hi Mom!”), Chris grew a little antsy and so we headed down the trail.

It seemed the deeper and deeper we got in the canyon, the more beautiful it became. I was snapping pictures left and right, some of the canyon itself, but many of us with the canyon: Chris in an arch, me near the edge, Chris gazing out over the canyon; just call me Annie Leibovitz guys, ‘cause it was a regular Vanity Fair cover shoot.

I clicked on and on and–wait a second: Life was (somehow) continuing on the trail beyond our photo-shoot. In fact, the more we tuned in to our fellow National Park trail enthusiasts, the more we realized that everyone seemed to be from out-of-town. And, while we (obviously) were too, everyone around us seemed to be from a bit farther out-of-town…as in, out-of-country. Nearly everyone on the trail around us were speaking various European languages, and striding purposefully up and down the trail. The Americans, large and in charge, were up above on the shuttle buses, breathing heavily behind their digital cameras, while down here, svelte and workin’ it, Europeans were showing us who was boss. Chris and I decided we were done with the photo-shoot—we needed to pick up the pace…for America! We cruised down the trail a handful of miles to our turn-around point, a sturdy-looking outhouse with a water-pump nearby. It seemed to be a popular spot to stop and find some shade, no matter your country of origin.

After a quick bathroom break and a few swigs of water we looked around, glanced at our watches and decided it was probably time to head back up—we still had over 200 miles to drive before our stop for the night in scenic Needles, CA and the road was calling our names. So, up we went.

The hike down was easy-peasy, but the hike up, well, it. was. hot. Chris quickly ditched his shirt, and I just as quickly regretted having brought my stupid, heavy digital camera along (call me Annie Leibovitz, guys, but only if she comes with a camera caddy who carries all of her equipment for her). Cheeks blazing red, we strode along, and in a competitive push, passed a group of German tourists and an elderly French couple with walking sticks in one sweep, before collapsing in a heap on the side of the trail.

The Europeans quickly re-passed us.

Yet, after a few moments, or perhaps more than a few, we dusted ourselves off, took a final sip of water, and climbed back up.

The trail winded far more than I recalled it doing as we’d walked down, let’s put it that way. Finally, mercifully, at last I began to recognize some arches and vistas from our descending photo-shoot from what seemed like so long before (It had really only been about 90 minutes). We paused a moment to “take in the view” (ahem, for a breather) but were brought out of our reverie by voices behind us. Was that Italian? Without looking back, we quickly scrambled up the rest of the way to the edge of the canyon before enjoying a lazy, air-conditioned shuttle bus ride back to the car.

~ Megan~

Part 1 – Road Trip West

Part 2 – Wigwam Motel

Part 4 – The Wildfire

 

See also:

In Defense of the Family Road Trip

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Road Trip West – Introduction (Part 1 of 4)

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(Part 1 in a 4 part series)

By Megan Ritchie

I recently moved from my hometown of Minneapolis allll the way out to Los Angeles, some 2000-plus miles away. Here are a few tales of the drive across.

First, let’s lay out our cast of characters: We have me, Megan, age 23, and the one theoretically “in charge,” and Chris, my younger brother, newly 21.

 

We’re driving across the country in a red Ford Focus, character #3, and finally, our star to fill out the quartet, the whiney one, the high maintenance one, the one who weighs us all down: the 5’x8’ U-haul trailer packed full to the ceiling with all of my possessions, being pulled behind the car.

We left on a Monday morning at 6 am. My dad and I had been pouring over Google Maps stuff trying to decide the best route. We’d gotten in an argument, as young adult children are apt to do with their parents at times, especially when they’re being overly protective and you’re super strong and brave (and have lived in a foreign country…okay, Dad? I got this one.). I wanted to take the shortest—and therefore cheapest, as far as hotel stops and gas—route, right through Denver, where I could stay with a friend, and on through the Rockies, Vegas and finally to L.A. This idea nearly gave my dad a heart attack. “Driving through the Rockies? With a trailer behind a Ford Focus? Megan, are you insane?”

I relented, after looking at the elevation map and throwing a fairly unusual money temper tantrum (emotions were running high, okay?). So, our route was decided: Take Interstate 35 down to Oklahoma City, take a right, and take Interstate 40 to Los Angeles. That’s it. One turn. Thrilling, right? It was.

Now, Chris and I quickly discovered that driving a well-packed trailer behind a sedan was an interesting challenge. The U-haul folks in Minneapolis had warned me not to take the trailer above 55 miles per hour. I’d nodded along with them, but secretly scoffed at this at the time, thinking I’d be pushing at least sixty-five the whole way…I mean, I had 2100 miles to cover.But as we quickly discovered on the barely rolling hills of Iowa, the car couldn’t get to sixty-five with the trailer. The car couldn’t even get to sixty. And so we inched along at a (super pathetic) fifty-four miles an hour…for five days straight.  Any change in elevation and the car would scream in protest.

Wind Turbine Blows By Us on the Freeway

As it was, the car was going through gas at an impressive rate. Binge drinking, really. Instead of averaging about 300 miles per tank, we were checking in at around 180. Still, despite the gas and the speed, Chris and I were having a grand old time, mostly because of books on tape…which I guess we call audiobooks now because no one uses tapes anymore…or CDs, for that matter. Okay, fine, I just dated myself.

Time for another drink - Somewhere in Iowa

Anyway, on our first day, we listened to all of Tina Fey’s memoir, Bossypants.  If you haven’t had the privilege of hearing it, I’d highly recommend doing so. Fey herself reads the book and does all sorts of voices for her characters. Plus they use the actual Saturday Night Live clips that she discusses, which was extra fun.

That night, high on giggling along with Tina, we stopped in scenic Emporia, Kansas. We were, I admit, feeling quite proud of ourselves for having made it through three whole states (MN, IA and MO, for those keeping track) in one day.

Sunset in Emporia, Kansas

After checking into the hotel, I was quickly reintroduced to any Americana I may have missed in a dining experience in China by our nearby restaurant selections: Applebee’s, Pizza Hut, Burger King and Wal-Mart (does that count?). We were no fools; we chose Applebee’s and man, did we eat good in the neighborhood. Chris got a burger approximately the size of his head; I went a little less risqué and ordered the Southwest chicken salad because I’m trying to watch my figure. As it was, it was covered in tortilla strips, cheese, and creamy dressing. And was delicious. While we ate, someone across the restaurant had a birthday so the whole restaurant got to sing; I ordered about three Coke refills (for free!); and the waitress tried to get us to sign up for the Applebee’s reward program. Can you get any more American than that? No, no, you can’t. It was glorious.

Megan Richie

I couldn’t wait for the next day…

 

 

~Megan~

…And neither can we.  Coming Soon (we hope!)

The Next installments:

Part 2 – The Wigwam Motel

Part 3 – The Grand Canyon

Part 4 – The Wildfire

In the meantime, enjoy a few other stories by Megan Ritchie:

The World Really Is Flat

Running Five Polish Miles

Afterward

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In defense of the family road trip:

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Like many moody teenagers, I dreamt of suing my parents, but never more than after our first family road trip. I imagined bringing my mom and dad to the courthouse of public opinion in my mind, but I thought, why stop there? Why not sue my two sisters and make it a clean sweep? Maybe, just maybe, I could prevent these people from ruining any more lives.

This is my story. The story of the worst, most humiliating two weeks of my life. I’d change the names, but it would only protect the guilty.

***

William Kennedy: Your honor, I present the ladies and gentlemen of the jury evidence that, following a game of highway bingo on August 15, 2001, my sister did punch me in the left side of the head. This unjustified and unladylike assault occurred at Deadman’s Summit on Route 395, so named because of a corpse found there in the 1860s. (See, I still have a bruise.) I also submit that this corpse, though dead and headless, was far luckier than myself because it never met the aforementioned sister.

Furthermore, I contend that I did win the game of highway bingo, that the bird observed on the roadside was in fact a crow, not a raven, and that this sister, one Jane, was entirely unfounded in her refusal to accept defeat and proclaim me champion of the family van.

Judge: Mr. Kennedy, I can’t see any possible relevance in these remarks.

WK: Your honor, if you will indulge me, the above incident served merely as a jumpstart to the injustice and downright terribleness to come on this family road trip—a trip that had just begun when the punching took place, one that still had one week and 1,750 miles to go. From my experiences I have no doubt the jury can only conclude that all future family road trips must be postponed indefinitely or canceled outright, while awarding me a settlement of $50,000 for emotional and physical trauma.

Judge: Well, it’s highly unorthodox, but I’ll allow it.

WK: Thank you, your honor. I call my first witness, Robert Kennedy.

Robert Kennedy takes the stand.

Isn’t it true, Dad, that not once, not twice, but thrice you crashed the brand-new family van, and that on the third instance the door jammed, setting off the ‘door-ajar’ alarm, so that everyone in the parking lot stared at us?

Robert Kennedy: Yes, but…

WK: No further questions. Let me remind the court that sitting in a hot parking lot inside a beeping white van with a broken door is incredibly uncool. Next, I call Jane Kennedy to the stand.

Jane Kennedy takes the stand.

WK: Tell me, Jane “Worst Sister in the Universe” Kennedy—where were you on the evening of August 15 at 4 p.m.?

Jane Kennedy: I’m not talking to you.

WK: Answer the question, please.

JK: Nope.

WK: Your honor, permission to treat the witness as hostile, annoying and spoiled.

Judge: Granted.

WK: I’ll tell you then. You were running away! That’s what you were doing, further wrecking an already hopelessly bad vacation.

JK: Yeah, ‘cause you were a jerk.

WK: Am not!

JK: Are too! You called me fat.

WK: Well, I…

JK: And you threw up on me.

WK: That was an accident.

JK: And it was a raven!!!

WK: For the zillionth time, it was a CROW and I won! You’re such a… Ahem, pardon me your honor, no further questions. For my penultimate witness, I call Helen “Second Worst Sister in the Galaxy” Kennedy.

Helen, you’re probably too young to fully comprehend the psychological damage caused by our road trip, but please tell the good people of the jury…”

HK: It was fun.

WK: What?

HK: Yeah. Except you were in a bad mood. Maybe because you didn’t eat anything.

WK: Helen, be quiet.

HK: And then we finally found organic avocados and bread that you would eat, but when we sat under that big tree by the Native American museum, it shed fur all over your sandwich, and then you looked at us and said: “I hate this family.”

WK: But what about all the hours in the car? When Dad wouldn’t stop to let you use the restroom? Those Utah people thinking Jane and I were your parents?

HK: That was funny.

WK: What about when you made us get out in Yosemite because you saw snow for the first time? And then, when you wouldn’t leave after two hours, we dragged you away screaming and crying, and people thought we were kidnapping you?

HK: I like snow.

WK: Grrrrr. No further questions. For the final witness, I call Maria Kennedy.

Maria Kennedy takes the stand.

WK: Mom, I’d like to take a minute…

MK: Actually, I wanted to take a minute to show you something.

WK: Mom! I’m supposed to be asking the questions.

MK: What’s this in my hand?

WK: Mom, please, you’re really embarrassing me right now!

MK: What is it?

WK: It’s a photo of me, Jane and Helen laughing … under some really cool rock formations near in Zion National Park.

MK: And what’s this?

WK: It’s me pretending to throw Helen in the Grand Canyon.

MK: And how ‘bout this one?

WK: That’s you and Jane helping me write a letter … to my girlfriend. But Mom, pictures don’t tell the whole story!

MK: What about the time you hiked with your dad to the top of Angel’s Landing? Or your bike ride in Moab? Or when we all went river rafting with the guide who loved the A-Team almost as much as you.

WK: OK MOM! No further questions. Your honor, I’d like to request a brief recess before my closing remarks.

***

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, I came before you today originally to sue my family and argue for the dissolution of the institution of family road trips, but I can no longer in good conscience continue. The testimony we’ve heard reminded me that yes, much, and possibly most of what goes on during a family road trip is awful and humiliating, but there are also wonderful moments.

It’s a right of passage, especially for teenagers, to go to a place, be really embarrassed by family members, and promise never to return. And it’s a source for stories that the family will find funny at some point in the very, very, very distant future.

I hereby formally submit to end the proceedings, but leave you with this final insight. Go on that road trip with the whole family, but just the once; it’ll be more than enough.

~Will~

 

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I survived Dog Sledding in Mongolia

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~ OR ~

…How to put what’s left of a good face on travel adversity

“So I went to the doctors,” Bijani said.

“Oh good, what did they say?” The phone-line went quiet for a few seconds.

“Well, that I’d probably lose my big toe and parts of both ears.”

“What?!”

“Yeah, they’re pretty black and peely right now. You know marshmallows, after they’ve been on fire? Kinda like that.”

“Oh—that’s bad! Did you get a second opinion?”

“I think it’ll be ok,” Bijani laughed. “They found a doctor who’d lived in Alaska, and he says as long as everything stays warm I get to keep my nose, earlobes—all that good stuff.”

“… Does your mom know?”

“No—but she’ll kill you when she finds out.”

***

I’m a thoughtful dude: I do dishes; I put the toilet seat down at night; onetime I read the Little Prince and told people I liked it. So, never, in a million years, did I imagine this could happen to me.

Even Bijani’s mom’s parting words didn’t offer a hint. “Mongolia’s not the world’s safest place,” she said. “Don’t let ANYTHING happen to my beautiful daughter.” Frostbite would surely count as a kind of “anything”—and on her second-to-last-day, all because I’d agreed to have “fun” against my better judgment.

Oh, we’d had fun before—my kind of fun—the kind that involves working long hours at a newspaper office and watching Singapore-based sports TV in an apartment. But given her imminent return to California, I couldn’t say no. For our last, most memorable adventure in the land of Genghis Khan, Bijani chose dog sledding.

***

“At least the dogs were cute,” Bijani said.

“Oh yeah, great.”

“And I liked Noel.”

“That crazy French guy? He’s insane—case of permanent brain freeze.”

“Look on the bright side…”

“Easy for you to say. You just got frostbite. I’m going to be murdered by your mother.”

“Well…”

“Aghhhhh. How did this happen?”

***

It started with us setting off for sledding on one of those unusually mild, Mongolian January days. It was zero degrees. For the first time in three months I felt overdressed in long underwear, snowpants, gloves, and two jackets. One small victory in the battle of Man vs. cold.

The Silver Storm company van drove us out of Ulaanbaatar city northeast toward Terelj National Park, while I sweated past wrecked cars that served as “don’t drink and drive” reminders, through stiff yellow hills and finally the famous rock that looks like a turtle happily sunning itself.

We arrived and I couldn’t help feeling a little optimistic about the expedition. Three felt tents beside a log shed made up the camp, where lean, eager huskies and the bemused voice of Noel, our energetic guide, greeted us.

“Is zees all you brought?” he prodded our clothes dubiously and left, returning a few moments later with massive, traditionally-pattered wool jackets and pants.

“Now you will not freeze,” he said.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was colder by the banks of Terelj River than in the city, but I felt impenetrable in my woolen armor. Noel wore a jacket, ski-pants and a fleecy headband. I figured we were being treated with big, woolen, kiddie mittens.

We met Black and White, the skinny lead dogs, and learned the essentials—hold on, lean left to turn left, right to turn right. And that was it—we mounted our wooden sleds and plunged down a powdered ice ramp onto the hard river.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The stony riverside and lines of crisp alpines whipped by at seven miles per hour. Black looked over his shoulder as if to say: “Isn’t this fun?” It was fun, for five minutes.

Then I felt something else. Pain.

Freezing pain.

***

“Remember how the wind cut through seams in your clothes and your boots?” Bijani asked?

“Oh yeah, but how’d it get through both pairs of socks?”

“Weird, huh?”

“You should’ve said something; we’d have gone back.”

“I just couldn’t make myself do it, but I wanted to turn around so badly,” she said.

“I wanted to cry, but my tear ducts froze.”

***

At some point, we stopped for a third time. Bijani started with a neat fur hat and scarf wrapped around her face. Now frost caked her eyebrows and yellowing scarf; the hat was long gone, blown off and replaced by my lopsided wool cap. She looked like the disconsolate runner up of Miss Abominable Snowwoman 2008.

I should have given her my balaclava, but it was too cold to really be considerate.

“Should we keep going?” I asked.

I wanted her to say no. She opened her mouth and nothing came of it, just a headshake. (Later she’d tell me her brain had lobbied for a nod, but some frozen synapses misfired).

“Only 15 kilometers to go!” Noel said.

I knew we would die. Black glanced over his shoulder again, and I saw resignation on his face. “Yes, you are going to die,” his look said. “And if no one’s looking, I’ll probably eat you. No hard feelings, though.”

The wind howled. We crossed more frozen water. Sometimes it made cracking noises and we could see the water running under our feet. Sometimes rocks or debris formed a line across the icy track and we had to get off and run behind the sleds. I cursed nature. Bijani fell. She fell again.

She looked at me and I’ve never seen a face I know registering that much pain.

At last we reached the halfway point, a river bend that provided some shelter from the wind. Noel lit a fire and heated mutton dumplings and tea. I thought it was the best meal I’d ever eaten.

“At least we won’t die hungry,” Bijani said.

Miraculously, the wind at our back made the homeward journey easy. Bijani got a lift in Noel’s sled. I laughed the whole way to camp, partly from relief, partly from borderline hysteria that made me careless with the reins a few times. Black peeked at me, looking concerned and a little disappointed. He licked his lips.

Once inside a safe felt tent with a dung fire going, we took off our huge coats and pants and took stock of our situation. Bijani removed her hat.

“Uh oh,” I said.

“My ears feel funny,” she said.

They were humongous. The backs had bubbled into deep purple blisters.

“Is this going to be ok?” I asked Noel.

“Oh that,’ he laughed. “That iz just from the cold. The elephant ears. You feel just like an elephant because ze are so…”

“Floppy?” Bijani offered

“Floppy!” He made wiggly elephant ear motions with his hands.

“Will she be ok?”

“But it iz nuffing. It’s happened to me at least five times.”

Noel’s headband remained conspicuously over his ears for our entire visit. We drove back in the dusk. Against the frozen brown backdrop that signature rock looked like a turtle trying to squeeze out of its shell and run, run for the hills, far away from its angry, future mother-in-law.

Things looked even worse when we got home and Bijani took her shoes off. The big toe on her right foot was black. I spent the evening breathing on her feet trying to keep them warm.

“This is just the romantic last evening I wanted,” Bijani said.

We got advice ranging from ‘put the affected areas in snow’ to ‘pray,’ to ‘everything will be fine.’ The next day, Bijani left for California with burn traces clearly showing on her face. She called me 20 hours later.

***

“So you’ll really be ok,” I asked.

“I think so.”

“I am so sorry. What a perfect end to a perfect stay, huh?”

“You know, I actually had a lot of fun.”

“Really?”

“Ha ha ha. Of course, didn’t you?”

“Except that it was the most awful, difficult, painful experience of my life, yeah, I guess I did.”

“Good. Plus we have a great story and I’ll have cool scars to prove it.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“It won’t be so bad. They won’t last more than a few months. Speaking of which, when are you coming home?”

“Dunno, after your mom has cooled down for a year or two… “ There was another silence on the line. “So, where to next? Somewhere really nice like Iceland, Antarctica, the frozen void of space …?

“Don’t get any ideas, buddy. I’m taking you somewhere warm.”

 ~Will~

For more on Will’s escapades in Mongolia, check out these additional EY articles:

Second Chances: UB Mongolia

EY Travel Tips: MONGOLIA

and coming soon:  TAJ MONGOLIA

Some say adversity is the fuel on which true love feeds…it certainly seems true for Will & Bijani who continue to surprise, delight & inspire us at every turn!  Read more about their engaging love story here.