Travelog: In which Erica goes full feral in the Olympics

I've been traveling for more of this year than I have been home. I don't know where I'll end up and am deeply uncomfortable at the prospect of an open-ended itinerancy. But I see no other way.

That said, there are different grades of being on the road. For most of the last two months, my on the roadness was of the low grade variety, sleeping on the floor of a comfortable suburban cul-de-sac home. It's early May, and my travels have taken me closer to the heart of adventure, to a higher grade “Where the hell am I going to sleep tonight?” mode of travel.

I drive out of Puyallup and head through Tacoma to the Olympic peninsula. The Olympics have been calling me; they seem like an antidote to the conquered ruin that is Seattle and its suburbs. I sense healing there and its healing I need.

The last person I speak with before making my full descent into ferality is Billy, my ex-from-100-years-ago and my friend-since-15-years-ago. We share our recent love stories and he says some funny shit.

“I believe the technical term for the sort of romantic blind spot I suffer from is 'sucker,'” he tells me. I die laughing and tell him of my own latest misadventure. There's plenty to laugh at, but I'm still a little sore. Still, as I speak to Billy, I'm driving along a gorgeous shoreline and my soul is lighting up. Our call drops and I stop to eat an apple and peanut butter and put my feet in the clear and placid waters of the Hood Canal. My heart juggles both misery and joy, and then joy wins and I dance with it back to my car and drive a little further.

My friend, Geoffry Peak, told me about Dosewallips State Park and so when I see a sign for the park, I stop and go for a walk.

The trail starts in the woods and happiness joins me on my walk. After a while, the it drops near the Dosewallips River. I can see the rocks and water below, but the trail doesn't quite lead to them. The river calls me regardless. I ditch the trail and go down and from there, the walk gets fun.

The water's so cold it tortures my feet but I'm hopping giant dead trees, crossing the icy water on their backs and flirting with the river anyway. One log descends into an arm of the river and I hop off and wade to a bank. At its far end, I must cross again to continue on. I misjudge the water's depth and emerge with my jeans wet to the thighs.

I am happy that this is so.

I wander a dry side channel, tiled with river rocks, and rejoin the river up further on a lovely, isolated bank. The wind picks up. A storm from the west is blowing purple this way and wind whips the weather and river into a call and response. I watch the skies darken, my wet body far from the car.

Never better.

Regardless, I have three pieces of electronics on my person and only my fleece jacket to protect them. I enter the woods, with the intention of going back to the car, and come upon a set of signs facing the other way. Once I get beyond them say “stay the F out” (or some variation thereof – this coming from the back of the sign thing happens to me a lot). There's an arrow pointing back to the trail and emerge near a wetland bridge I've already crossed twice. I amble back to the park. All is well and I've made myself an appetite.

Inside the park, I run into Eric Hendricks and his side kick, Tracy. Park ranger folk. After a few moments of conversation, Tracy declares Eric and I siblings. We both have toured on bicycles the feral way, hiding ourselves at night and pushing forward without clear agendas by day. I ask him about camping and he says the dirt in the park costs $20. I ask him if there are other places and he tells me I can go to a spot high above the Dosewallips River's estuary. There I find the great grand-goddess of all stealth campsites. This campsite is so awesome that I decide it is possible to feel spoiled rotten by the gods.

It's a deep an narrow pad of developed land with a for sale sign out front. I drive the back of it and hide the car among the Scotch broom, those yellow flowered bushes so common to disturbed soil in western Washington. Beyond the bushes is a perfectly flat and concealed place to pitch my tent. From where I'll lay my head is a 20-mile view. I had tried to imagine goodness like this while I was driving, had worked to feel it in my gut as though it had already happened. Perhaps this has something to do with my good fortune. And perhaps Eric Hendricks is just good people.

I play guitar. Finish up an avocado that I'd started eating down on the Dosewallips tidelands where the flats went out half a mile at low tide. I had put my feet in the distant water canal down there and watched shellfish squirt water at my toes.

I snuggle into my tent, cozy and warm with the fly half-applied in case of rain. I leave the door wide open to the view, and read and journal and rest. I want to share how amazing this is and I want to be alone, too, and so I write. I awaken and it's raining and I partially drop the fly but leave the door open. The storm is to the back of my tent. I stay awake for a long while, long enough to watch the sky turn the electric blueberry of twilight and then the pink of day.