Our "Out"

We went to Ellensburg to pick up the dog, visited some good friends in Issaquah and then headed to the Oregon Coast.

Where we found mossy paths and green grass (not snow) and wonderful full sun.  
Ecola State Park is my favorite place so far with views of Cannon Beach and Haystack rock in the distance.

Friends Visit

We have good friends visiting from Ellensburg, Josephine and her husband Kevin (KC). We were so excited for them to get here. I was able to put them in the best room in the village; reserved just for special people.

We have had a lot of fun visting, hiking again to the avalanche and last night a human powered sliegh ride to a Coffee House / Talent Show. I hope that they are enjoying their visit here.

Art and I head out tomorrow for a week away from the village. We need to get out of the ice and touch solid ground. We also plan to see some friends. We might even go to the ocean.

A Ride in the Imp

What a fun thing I did today!! My friend Nick, our Garbologist, knew that I have been wanting a ride in the Imp, a small tracked vehicle, that he uses to move things around the village. Today he had to go up to the 3rd level and asked if I wanted to go. Here he is waiting for me to grab my camera. I had left my coat in another building so I grabbed this purple one from "potty patrol", our lost and free to take room of clothing items. I asked Angela, my neighbor from downstairs, to snap a shot of me as we took off.
The imp can go anywhere; up snow banks and down. We slid around a few corners as we headed up to the mine tailings. The third level is the upper most level of the tailings and the one with the best view. From there we had a good view of the closest avalanches to the village. These two are just up the valley, behind the old miner's village. As you can see because of the weaker snow at the very bottom, the avalanche cut right down to bare ground.

J - Term

During January Holden hosts a group or two of college students, usually from a private Lutheran University in the US. Pacific Lutheran, Saint Olaf and others. These schools are on a semester system and January is typically a time for a more in depth class or field experience. This January is called J - Term.

This year we have a group of about 30 student from Saint Olaf in Minnesota. They began their adventure travelling via Amtrak to Wenatchee ( the train was only 8 hours late), spent the night in Chelan and then caught the boat up to the village. None of them had been here before mixed with 3 long days of travel, gave us some very wide eyed kids getting off the bus that day. We had heard that they had visions of Holden as a hippie place where people played drums a lot; so that is how we greeted them.

They have been here two weeks now and I must say that we may not let them go home. We just love them. After our initial joke and their initial shock, they have fit in here perfectly. They have brought swing dancing and yoga to the village and they have learned how to do dish team, garbo and stoking our huge multi-building wood furnace called "Dante".

It is so much fun to have this young life in the village. We can attend their classes if we wish and we always have very lively discussions in the library and at dinnner. Thanks Saint Olaf students, we love you!

Hike to an Avalanche

Washington State has been experiencing an air inversion, which means foggy weather for most of the state but here in the Cascade Mountains we have blue sky and bright sun. Well... I should qualify that we have 2 hours of direct full sun in the village but we still gaze upon beautiful sun lit mountains most of the day.

The rainy weather of two weeks ago brought down many avalanches in the mountains, one of which is quite large and only about 2 miles from the village, flowing down Holden Creek Canyon and crossing the Hart Lake trail. Yesterday seemed like the perfect day for a hike and so about 30 of us decided to walk out to see the avalanche.

It was still very cold out so we bundled up and headed out. Because the first snow of this winter was very cold and fluffy, the most bottom layer of snow was the most unstable (the science of snow is fascinating). This unstable snow cause each avalanche to cut right down to bare dirt in many places. Frozen dirt, rocks, trees and roots came down the mountain with the snow.
If you click on the picture above and it will enlarge and you can better see the scope of the slide. The small specs up the canyon are actually brave young people who decided to make their way to the beginning of the slide.

We had a great time. The avalanche was huge and will require much trail repair work this summer. Above you can see our friends Wanda (a brave Floridian) and Carole (a brave Californian) conquering the Cascade Mountains avalanche.

Stop Holding Your Breath...

I am really ok, just a little slow in beginning to post again. I am actually feeling better than I have for awhile. It is amazing what a trip to the dentist can do.

Right now we don't have a lot going on in the village, so I thought I would make a plug for you to visit. From now and until June (except a few 3 day or holiday weekends) you can come up and visit for half price. Just write to registration and tell them you are friends of ours.

Art and I do plan a week out beginning January 26th through February 2nd. Other than that we are here. Summer time is also filling up fast and if you would like a unique vacation you can come visit then as well, unfortunately we can't give you a discount, unless you are under 18 and want to sleep on a cot at our place.

Don't forget that Blewett Pass is closed indefinitely and the route via Quincy is about 1/2 longer from Ellensburg than Blewett is. From Seattle, US #2 is the better choice.

I will write more when we have fresh snow and more outdoor activities. Right now ice is all we have and it makes everything treacherous. A very odd winter.

Thanks all who said prayers for me. I am a lucky woman to have you all.

Joan's Big Adventure

My adventure was a total surprise to me and I was unprepared for what happened. One minute I was eating breakfast and feeling fine and 15 minutes later I was on the floor, so dizzy that I could not even move my head or open my eyes. Every time I opened my eyes the room would literally spin and I would feel very nauseous.

Time stopped for me; I knew there were people in the room with me but all I thought about was not moving or throwing up again. I remember Dave and Liz taking vitals and giving me a shot to ease my nausea. I was unable to even lift my head, much less get off of the floor. At some point the decision to take me out of the village was made, but because of my condition, they knew that the Lady of the Lake could not meet my needs. A Forest Service boat was called down from Stehekin with a medic on board to take me downlake to Chelan. I remember little of the ride except for the fact that the medic kept waking me up. It was a sunny day on the lake and I had not seen the sun for months, I am sorry I missed it.

An ambulance met us at Field's Point where I was placed on a gurney and transported the the Chelan ER. The staff at the ER was wonderful and had me diagnosed within minutes; Labyrinthitis, an inner ear condition that comes on suddenly but can last for a few weeks. I was given some heavy sedative medications and told to go to bed. We got a room at the Chelan Best Western and I took a hot bath and then went to bed.

I feel much better today but we have decided to stay in the hotel one more night just to make sure I have stabilized. I am so grateful to all those who helped and cared for me. I was not an easy patient at times. Each time I moved my head my world would spin. I resisted moving and yet they carried me and transported me over many miles of very remote country to an emergency room. I am am overwhelmed with emotion when I think of each kind word and face that told me that all would be OK.

Thank you all. I am on the mend and plan to be back soon.

Art's Big Adventure

The weather in Washington State has been very, very warm and rainy. So much so that even at 3500 feet the rain has been pouring down in buckets; over five inches in 48 hours. Rain on top of 4 feet of snow makes..... a ton of slush and also causes avalanches.

You saw the "Art's toy" post and when you have a toy you must take it out and use it, so Art and his toy went down the road two days ago to clear the snow and slush. 2 of his other playmates took the snowplow, "Fluffy", down to the lake to clear the way for the bus to bring in guests. After Art was almost finished grading, the radio buzzed to tell him that the guys down at the lake had gotten "Fluffy" stuck and he needed to turn around and head back down to the lake to pull them out.

Down he went again. After he had pulled them out, they all headed back up the mountain only to find the road blocked by an avalanche. They had no place to go but back to the lake again where Holden has a small "A" frame cabin for emergencies. Art had to back the grader down the road to a place where he could leave it and the three of them, Art, Bob and Mark, then walked in the slush the last 2 miles down the road to hunker down for the night.

Back in the village, I was pretty worried about Art and the weather. We had no idea how many avalanches had come down and the rain kept pouring and pouring down. We could hear avalanches around the village and could only trust that the placement of the village was as safe as we had been told. Neither of us got much sleep that night.

The next morning, Art and Mark slogged back up to the road grader to start working on clearing the blocking avalanche from the lake side. From our end, Chuck and Daniel headed down the road in another snow plow to work on the snow from this end. All in all there were 3 avalanches to clear and the arriving guests did not get into the village until 3pm in the afternoon. Art, being the hard worker that he is, stayed and plowed then entire road again finally getting back to the village just after dinner Wednesday night.

Guess what his job is for tomorrow? This trip can't be as bad as the last, the rain has cut our snow pack in half and we return to snow which is much kinder to people.

Art's New Toy

After the plow truck goes down the road to clear a path in the fresh snow, the road grader follows it down to push the snow to the side and level out the road (ice) surface.

Art is the new road grader driver. I am not sure how I feel about this with all the avalanche shoots he has to pass to get to the lake but we can't get in and out of here if we don't keep the road open. Art loves this new duty here.

Its Not All Roses

This post is not the easiest one to make on a night like this, with fresh snow coming down and people to laugh and talk with, but a few of you have commented that life here seems idyllic and I thought I might talk a bit about the realities of living in a remote community in the mountains.

Life here, and everywhere, is what you make of it. Art and I have chosen to give 110% here at Holden to get the 80% of pure joy that we show you here in our blog. Most of the time we ignore the negative or make do with what we have here. We find that we are often surprised with how we adapt or how what we thought was important really is not. That said, below is a partial list of some of the realities of our life here.

Life in community - living closely with other people. Five of us live in this chalet and one is only 4 months old. Living upstairs we hear much of what goes on downstairs. Babies cry and don't sleep through the night. Younger people come and go at much later times that we do, but we also tend to be up and at it long before they would like as well. We also live right next to the best sledding hill you will ever see in your life. Every once in a while a 2am sledding group will decide to scream their way down the hill. Yes we have quiet hours but really....

Life with power outages - Holden generates its electrical power via a small stream that flows down a mountain. There are no power lines to the outside world and our utility team consists of 3 people. The power goes out here frequently, sometimes daily and sometimes for hours at a time. We live with flashlights in every coat pocket and by every bed. Yesterday an avalanche came down and covered the stream. We had to wait for the water to refind its way down its rocky path and back into our generator. We had no idea if it would be 20 minutes or 12 hours.

Life with limited power - Some very talented man wrote a computer program that gives power to the things in the village that need it when they need it. For example, most of the hot water is diverted to the kitchen after dinner so we can wash the dishes. My Chalet gets power to its hot water tank from midnight to 4 am. That means that all of us in Chalet 14 get one tank to use during the day. None of us shower every day and we don't feel dirty nor miss our daily shower. We also don't use our clothes dryers in the winter, but it is so dry here that a full load on a drying rack is dry in 3 hours.

Life with a lot of snow - Overnight tonight we should get about 15 to 20 inches of snow. This means that my first task of the morning will to put on my snowshoes and begin stomping out the paths that go from building to building. We pound the snow down with our snowshoes into a maze that takes us where we want to go. Each path is carefully placed to not be close to a building to avoid the snow that falls from the roofs or as we say "roofalanches". The roofs are metal but still gather a lot of snow on them before they eventually slide off. Tons of snow smash down to the ground and if anyone is in the way they are no longer alive. So far we have surpassed the 120 inch mark of our winter snow fall. Only 200 inches to go before the big melt.

Living and eating close to others - Both Art and I have been sick this year, sicker than we have been in many years in Ellensburg. We are much closer to people at meals and worship than we are at home. We catch colds and flu and anything else that comes this way. Our immune systems are catching up just like small children do when they enter school.

Life in the cold - Those of you that know me will won't believe this but 60 degrees is a comfortable temperature indoors. Each building here has an alternative heat source, wood mostly but 3 buildings are on diesel fuel for heat. We have had many nights thant fall to the single digits. Somehow (miraculously) our bodies adapt to the cold. We wear warm bulky clothing and many layers but for me, my house is way too warm at 65 degrees and I now prefer about 50 degrees to sleep in. When you are not pulled from the warm to cold with each building you enter, your body adapts and you don't need the heat nor the air conditioning that we have in the outside world.

Working closely with people - Holden is a place of grace. We give much more latitude to people than in a normal work place. Many people come to Holden during times of stress or transition in their lives. Working with people who are new to the concept or who are still finding their way is not always easy. Holden staff consists of many post-college young people who are still not sure where life is leading them. They don't have the skills that Art and I have and at times it can be frustrating (I really do love them all). For example I am missing my 4th pair of scissors from my desk and my best broom was used in a game of "broom ball". What were they thinking!!!! Need I say more?

Each frustration here has given us the chance to grow and change. Each person give us the chance to give grace and patience to others. We are learning so much here but that does not mean that I go to bed happy each night.

God bless you all and thanks for viewing a life a bit differently than you live.

Snow Gargoyles